Concrete jungle where dreams are made, oh

New York is a city where anything can happen. Anything can happen anywhere, of course, it's all statistics, but in New York it's definitely more likely. Believe me.

The Adirondack train from Montréal to New York city halted in Grand Central at the foreseen time of arrival, half past eight in the evening. I said goodbye to Claudia, a charming Mexican girl from the Yucatan peninsula which had been sitting next to me. We had talked about Mexicans in Mexico and in the US and she had complimented me on my Spanish - I hope I will be able to keep warding off a gringo accent contaminating it... I should have asked for some contact information, but as always I only realized when she had left in an unknown direction.

The last contact I had had with the people whom I was going to stay with - I had stayed with them in April and they are friends of a girl I randomly met in March 2009 on a bus from Brussels to Turin who was going to Milan but whom I was able to convince to see Turin instead - had been Sunday evening, in Montréal. I couldn't reach Megan (that's the name of one of them) by phone because I can only call or text certain people with my Belgian cell phone and I didn't have my American number yet. So I just went to her place in Astoria hoping that her plans hadn't changed and that she would be there. After 20 minutes of subway and a 15-minute walk, I got to the place and found a note on the front door. It said "We're in the city - call me". I tried a payphone but it didn't work and I lost a quarter. So I picked out a friendly-looking passer-by and asked to use his phone. No problem. Megan was with two Australian guests of her at a free festival in Central Park and she said I should come join them. So I did. Over an hour later - I had taken the wrong metro line and had to walk 14 blocks back at some point - I arrived at the location where the festival had been held. Some people were still hanging around, but Megan and the two aussies were nowhere to be found. So I looked for another kind person with an iPhone and an unlimited-talk-plan and phoned Megan. "Come to the Apple store". This time I urged them to stay where they are and I started walking to the big glass cube at the Southeast corner of Central Park. When I finally got there, Megan was waiting for me - thank God - and she insisted on hugging the sweaty mess I had become having carried my backpack all the way in the warm New York night. She was with a friend of hers and the two boys from Down Under. We made our way to the subway station and hopped on a train back to Astoria.

Remember I said that anything can happen in New York. Well, then something did happen. Megan took a seat, and next to her sat Paola. I called her name, she looked at me, her mouth fell open, and she said "Non ci posso credere" ("I can't believe it"). I had met Paola in the summer of 2005 on Bark Europa during the Tall Ships' Races. She's an Italian actress and lives in Rome. In the past 4 years we had heard from each other two or three times. And now our paths crossed again, in a very unlikely location and a very unlikely moment. Same day, same hour, same continent, same city, same train, same car, same door. What are the odds! Megan and the others were flabbergasted when I started talking in Italian with what had seemed a complete stranger.
I decided to have a picture taken of Paola and me before the mirage dissolved. But after she was still there. We agreed to have breakfast on me the next day, because she was too tired to come with Megan, the aussies and me for beers at a pleasant Astorian beer garden I had been to in April.

On Tuesday I had a genuine American brunch with Paola and her host Christina - I had waffles, wrongly termed Belgian. Paola was in New York for just one night because she had to move on to Canada for a theatre performance. We talked about her career which had evolved in a very positive manner, about Christina's job as a voice-over artist (like an actor, but only for sound), and about my life and my studies. Paola didn't have a lot of time because she had to get ready to leave for Canada, and we decided to meet up at Penn station a couple of hours later.


I really needed to check my e-mail so I went into the city and to the coolest free internet café in the world - the Apple Store at Central Park. I first used a Macbook and then switched to an iPad. It looks really neat but is very clumsy to write e-mails with and it blocks quite easily (and I don't know how to restart - ctrl-alt-del doesn't work because it has a touch screen, and probably also because it's a Mac).


Then I wandered through the city, had some fastfood, visited toy stores to feel like a little boy again, visited phone stores to call Megan to see what she was up to, and took the quintessantial New York picture of myself on Times Square. In between I had seen Paola for 10 minutes at Penn Station because she had to hurry to catch her train and her flight, but we promised to try and see each other again when she's coming back to New York.



In the evening I took Paola's host to Vincent's place near Grand Central to have a drink, and then the three of us went to West Village where we met with Alberto, a Roman friend from Rome whom I had met on the same voyage as Paola. Our meeting was less coincidental however, as I knew that he was studying in New York and we had communicated during the year. He didn't know Paola was in town and so was very surprised as well when I told him that I had seen her on the subway. It was great to talk with Alberto again. We rekindled memories of our sailing trip and talked about American academic life, and we seemed to perfectly understand each other. I'm happy I know him. Both Paola and he are friends that I am able not to have any contact with for months or years and still connect to instantly when we do meet again.

On Wednesday I went back to New Haven, and two presents had arrived by mail. One was a first payment of living expenses by the foundation that gives me my fellowship. The other was my $10 cell phone. I eagerly opened the box and started checking out what had to be done to use it. After some trouble for which I had to call customer support - it also took ages to talk to a human being since most of these customer care lines are virtually completely automated - I could use it. In my opinion, I got very good value for my money: for $25 a month I can text as much as I want, talk for 300 minutes, and use mobile web as much as I want. The latter is the coolest. Apart from Facebook, I can use my gmail e-mail, check out news sites, look up locations on Google maps, and see where the Yale shuttles are in real-time. I was as happy as a boy with a new toy. Literally.

The evening was quiet - I don't even remember what I did. Thursday was devoted to laundry, looking for academic advisors, strolling around town in futile search of someone who was moving out of New Haven and was giving away stuff for free. In the evening, I went to have dinner at an Indian restaurant with Rachel and her friends, and then I took a free salsa initiation class at a Japanese restaurant (weird, huh). I didn't like it that much but decided to sit it through. Afterwards, I danced with a Lesbian girl that spoke French, and met up with a friend of Rachel's. We had a drink and then went to join Rachel and her gang. I'm lucky to have found her.

Today I washed the dishes - mine and those left by someone else in the sink that began to stink and had a swarm of flies over them - and went to my favourite supermarket - PriceRite. This time I had to take the bus though. It's amazing how filled with black people the buses are! And if the passengers are not black, they're hispanic. And if they're white, they're really weird. Remarkable, and not to my liking. Not because I have a problem with being on a bus with black people, but because it means that the white people take the car instead. And that's sad.
At noon I had eaten the leftovers from the Indian restaurant which I had taken home in a doggy bag - very common here - but I realized I shouldn't have when suddenly my guts pushed the alarm button. Fortunately, the shop had a restroom.
I returned with twelve rolls of toilet paper in my hands that wouldn't fit in my backpack that weighed over 30kg, probably 35. I had bought a huge watermelon, a gallon of milk, peanut butter, 3kg of corn meal to make my own tortillas, instant pancake mix, and much more stuff, and I felt first hand that that adds up to quite some weight. But I got home okay.

Plans for the weekend: maybe go out soon, look at a bike tomorrow, perhaps go to the beach, have dinner with an incoming student of my school who will be couchsurfing with a friend, possibly go to New York City on Saturday evening, show the apartment to a potential third housemate, ... And do some exercise in between, because I checked out the 9-floor, 3-swimming pool gym today and it's a nice and fun place. And free! Who knows, maybe I'll become governor of California one day...