New York: The Rockefeller Centre (Sunday 09/07/2017).
Today was our last in the city before the long journey home to the UK.
Feet were sore from pounding the endless Avenues.
Necks ached from gazing up at the countless skyscrapers.
The superlatives roll off the tongue when trying to articulate exactly what New York is; some is iconic; much is super sized; most is expensive; everything is familiar - but at the same time, slightly artificial. It is clearly full of real people going about their real lives but simultaneously it is a fantasy; a giant movie set with filmic reveals around every corner.
Marilyn's skirt blew up on Lexington Avenue by 52nd Street; Holly Golightly gazed into the window of Tiffany's on the corner of 5th Avenue and 57th Street.
Do I even have to mention 'The Muppets Take Manhattan'?
Desperate to squeeze every last drop out of the Big Apple, we ate pancakes with the VB's, sitting in William Berkley's seat at the Brooklyn Diner before hot footing across midtown to the Rockefeller Centre for views of the city.
In the summer, the plaza is a jazz infused watering hole for the well heeled and a Christmas Wonderland themed skating rink in the winter. 'Top of the Rock' is the preferred viewing platform for many as despite only being 70 stories high, it has, since 1933, given the best views of the Chrysler and Empire State buildings to the south and Central Park looking north.
The glass ceiling lift races up to the viewing platform in a mere 43 seconds and the lights in the shaft above disappear to a point, 777 feet in the distance. To put this into perspective, if waves were lapping against the top storey windows, anyone hapless enough to be asking for directions at the ground floor reception would be squashed by water weighing the same as a 250lb American Football player....and 3,499 of his closest friends.
I can vouch that for first timers, the view is breath-taking and you can't help but stand silently for a few minutes, simultaneously soaking in both the enormity of the spectacle and the inherent hazard presented by such a lot of people in such a small space. I have harked on about New York's Hollywood propensity to incur the wrath of every passing alien horde, freak weather phenomenon or disgruntled sea monster but this is precisely because the place lends itself so freely to destruction. You just can't put 1.7 million people so tightly packed on what is effectively an island, and expect the powder keg not to blow off from time to time.
The Rockefeller Centre is actually a collection of 19 buildings conceived by John D Rockefeller, just before the Great Crash of 1929. The banks pulled out and being a man of principle, but more importantly, almost unlimited wealth, he upended his piggy bank and stumped up the $250 million to see the work completed. In the process of doing so, he kept 40,000 construction workers busy at a time when the city was in the grip of its worst ever economic crisis.
Bear in mind that $1 in 1929 is worth $15 now.
The added benefits of finishing the job included both providing the world with the iconic shot of hungry men eating sandwiches on a high rise girder and despairing bankers with a convenient stepping off point from which to put their affairs in order.
After lunch with the VB's at Anejo on the corner of 48th and 9th, we said our goodbyes for another decade before they headed for the airport and the return flight to Melbourne.
We headed back to Pier 83 for a Circle Line boat around the island.
Manhattan can seem a little oppressive when viewed from the canyon floor. Sometimes, the sky above is just a sliver of blue, boxed in between the perpendicular cliffs of glass and steel that seem to lean in just a little.
From the river, perspective has a chance to reassert itself and the scale of Manhattan is reduced to something more manageable. Viewed from 500m, the towers jostle for space at the waterfront; from Ellis Island the city takes on the proportions of a modest snow globe, by Liberty, it barely manages to upstage a fridge magnet.
Tony, the smooth throated announcer, supplied a mellifluous stream of anecdotes as we made our way past an endless line of iconic real estate. Apparently, Central Park was constructed by the Aztecs; The Empire State is a rocket ship from Mars; Donald Trump was created in a terrible laboratory accident. These may or may not be true. Apart from the last one. That is definitely true.
It doesn't really matter though because it is self evident that New York is everything to everyone.
The Statue of Liberty invites:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”
Any city that aspires to this is alright by me.
Feet were sore from pounding the endless Avenues.
Necks ached from gazing up at the countless skyscrapers.
The superlatives roll off the tongue when trying to articulate exactly what New York is; some is iconic; much is super sized; most is expensive; everything is familiar - but at the same time, slightly artificial. It is clearly full of real people going about their real lives but simultaneously it is a fantasy; a giant movie set with filmic reveals around every corner.
Marilyn's skirt blew up on Lexington Avenue by 52nd Street; Holly Golightly gazed into the window of Tiffany's on the corner of 5th Avenue and 57th Street.
Do I even have to mention 'The Muppets Take Manhattan'?
Much imitated, never bettered.
|
The best film I have never seen. |
Miss Piggy at the New York Public Library |
Desperate to squeeze every last drop out of the Big Apple, we ate pancakes with the VB's, sitting in William Berkley's seat at the Brooklyn Diner before hot footing across midtown to the Rockefeller Centre for views of the city.
In the summer, the plaza is a jazz infused watering hole for the well heeled and a Christmas Wonderland themed skating rink in the winter. 'Top of the Rock' is the preferred viewing platform for many as despite only being 70 stories high, it has, since 1933, given the best views of the Chrysler and Empire State buildings to the south and Central Park looking north.
Look one way - Central Park. |
Look the other - TESB. |
The glass ceiling lift races up to the viewing platform in a mere 43 seconds and the lights in the shaft above disappear to a point, 777 feet in the distance. To put this into perspective, if waves were lapping against the top storey windows, anyone hapless enough to be asking for directions at the ground floor reception would be squashed by water weighing the same as a 250lb American Football player....and 3,499 of his closest friends.
I can vouch that for first timers, the view is breath-taking and you can't help but stand silently for a few minutes, simultaneously soaking in both the enormity of the spectacle and the inherent hazard presented by such a lot of people in such a small space. I have harked on about New York's Hollywood propensity to incur the wrath of every passing alien horde, freak weather phenomenon or disgruntled sea monster but this is precisely because the place lends itself so freely to destruction. You just can't put 1.7 million people so tightly packed on what is effectively an island, and expect the powder keg not to blow off from time to time.
The Rockefeller Centre is actually a collection of 19 buildings conceived by John D Rockefeller, just before the Great Crash of 1929. The banks pulled out and being a man of principle, but more importantly, almost unlimited wealth, he upended his piggy bank and stumped up the $250 million to see the work completed. In the process of doing so, he kept 40,000 construction workers busy at a time when the city was in the grip of its worst ever economic crisis.
Bear in mind that $1 in 1929 is worth $15 now.
The added benefits of finishing the job included both providing the world with the iconic shot of hungry men eating sandwiches on a high rise girder and despairing bankers with a convenient stepping off point from which to put their affairs in order.
After lunch with the VB's at Anejo on the corner of 48th and 9th, we said our goodbyes for another decade before they headed for the airport and the return flight to Melbourne.
We headed back to Pier 83 for a Circle Line boat around the island.
Manhattan can seem a little oppressive when viewed from the canyon floor. Sometimes, the sky above is just a sliver of blue, boxed in between the perpendicular cliffs of glass and steel that seem to lean in just a little.
The shrinking sky. |
From the river, perspective has a chance to reassert itself and the scale of Manhattan is reduced to something more manageable. Viewed from 500m, the towers jostle for space at the waterfront; from Ellis Island the city takes on the proportions of a modest snow globe, by Liberty, it barely manages to upstage a fridge magnet.
Fridge magnet proportions. |
Tony, the smooth throated announcer, supplied a mellifluous stream of anecdotes as we made our way past an endless line of iconic real estate. Apparently, Central Park was constructed by the Aztecs; The Empire State is a rocket ship from Mars; Donald Trump was created in a terrible laboratory accident. These may or may not be true. Apart from the last one. That is definitely true.
It doesn't really matter though because it is self evident that New York is everything to everyone.
The Statue of Liberty invites:
“Give me your tired, your poor,
Your huddled masses yearning to breathe free,
The wretched refuse of your teeming shore.
Send these, the homeless, tempest-tossed, to me:
I lift my lamp beside the golden door.”
Any city that aspires to this is alright by me.
Comments
Post a Comment