Perspectives

Should my title be perspectives or perceptions?

I am in Rio, on my computer in the apartment, which is in Ipanema off Rua Prudente de Moraes. The Apartment is on the 4th floor and faces the building next door to us. It is relatively back from the road, but none of this makes any difference, there is noise from 5am until about 1 am. Right now and through out the day my window is open to the sounds of the city; there is a very young baby crying, a baba talking loudly to a young boy in the apartment below us, sounds and smells of lunches being prepared, a car with a loud speaker selling something - I can never make out what they say it is just more noise - and finally the sounds of the ubiquitous traffic.

Even with most of the building not exceeding 5 stories and the trees lining the streets the noise is deafening - all day long.

I once read a novel where the heroine was up in the penthouse above central park in NYC, and she 'woke to the sound of the city coming alive', or some such literary phrase. This phrase leaves me feeling confused when combined with the noise I hear outside my window and the resent memories of walking the streets of Manhattan - I had to look carefully through my photos to find signs of heavy traffic in NYC - I don't remember any particular noise.

Maybe there is more noise up in the 'penthouse' then down on the sidewalks, but compared to our diesel driven, gear grinding buses here, the streets of New York where tranquil - the buses there are gasoline driven, and even with the taxi and buses using their horns with aggression, the sounds were non intrusive in the way I find the noise here. Maybe after 5 years in Rio no noise is like our noise! GingerV

perspectives

Last month Camillo and I spent 3 days in New York City (see prior blogs - travel outside Brasil) and one of the Museums shows that we saw is featured in the March 17 TIME Magazine. I scanned the photo they used in the article to use as a comparison with mine. Cool huh! of course you can tell that the photo on the right is mine and the left is theirs. I don't know if this is the reason for this photo shot being used, but it was only allowed for the 'public' to take photos in the rotunda of the Guggenheim Museum. I would have thought that a photographer from TIME could have taken his camera all the way through the show and that they would have feature the extraordinary 'mud men' sculptures - for me this was the best of the show. My photo was taken because I found the structure interesting not the art - cars with poles of flashing lights stuck through them did not do much for me. To tell the truth I didn't get it. It is not clear but possible the artist CAI GUO-QIANG planned the section of 'mud men' but it is not actually his work because the TIME says, "...Its a replica of more than 100 life-size clay statues that were originally crafted in Shanghai in 1965 as pure Maoist agitprop, ... In 1999 Cai had a team of artisans reproduce the ensemble...." The beauty of these statues and they struggle represented between good and evil, rich and poor, power and powerlessness I could understand. GingerV

more New York New York

The best dinner - Maria Pia (Italian) 319 West 51st Street The worst meal (this is hard) - Breakfast at the NY deli across from the hotel - ordered a ham and cheese croissant - it was open faced, the size of a 10 inch plate, the cheese was coagulated, and the ham non existent. two breakfast $46.00 Most impressive - The Met - needs about 6 half days to see it all. The most Moving - the mud men created by Cai Guo-Qiang "I want to Believe" at the Guggenheim. I was brought to tears - the faces of the Chinese revolution carved in mud - when the exhibition is over they will be broken down and re-created for the next show. A must see. The most 'different' - the feel of the cold air blowing off the river - no matter how many layers I wore I was cold. The streets were full of cars and buses and taxis and there was no noise, How is that possible? Rio streets 10 times as noisy maybe the noise was frozen too.

New York, New York

The lights of Time Square, NYC

I am finally back HOME in Rio and find myself just as happy to be here as I am when I go HOME to Houston - a mystery that applies to my 'between two worlds' blog of several months ago.

On our way back to Brasil Camillo and I spent 4 days, 3 nights in New York City. When we made our trip reservations nearly 4 months ago there were no seats available on the direct Houston - Rio Continental flights, and would have to fly via New York in order to get home - so we decided to make a three day stop. We were in the very expensive tourist center of NYC but enjoyed it anyway. Museums, Broadway shows (Chorus Line) and more people than taxis. In our three days of tourist-ing, we saw the museum of modern art (MoMA), the Met, the Guggenheim, Rockefeller Center including the observation deck on the ROCK, took a tour on the Hudson River around southern Manhattan, TIME square, ate some very bad food, got taken by one taxi driver, ate one very good dinner, got taken by the GRAY LINE City Tours, and almost froze our tooshes off.

One evening it was -6c. I bought a red hat.... but that's another story.

I decided I like the warmth big city Rio better than the cold of big city NY.