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Details: Written by: Richard_McKie; Parent Category: Travel; Category: North America; Published: 20 December 2010; Hits: 24000

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When we lived in New York my first wife and I had an apartment in a York Avenue high rise, near the East River.

Apartment 27D 1365 York Avenue - new in 1977 under repair in 2010 for concrete cancer

My eldest daughter was born in New York Hospital just across the way. Over the years York Avenue hasn't changed much, except that New York Hospital no longer operates as a general hospital; it has become a medical research institution. But elsewhere New York’s changed a great deal since the late 1970s. The most dramatic changes are downtown, around Soho and on the West Side. An area that used to be mainly artists’ lofts and old garment factories has transmogrified into a major retail area with lots of trendy boutiques. It seems the whole West Side, up into the hundreds, has been gentrified.

Because of my familiarity with the area we rented a serviced apartment in east 58^th street. This is still a good choice as it is an easy walking distance to Fifth Avenue, Central Park, the Museum Of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim. We were there at the end of March but there was still snow piled at the end of Central Park the day we arrived. Our first night we walked across town, past Carnegie Hall to Broadway and then back via Grand Central station and Lexington.

Broadway - to see more photos click on the above image

You either love New York or you hate it. I’m in the former group. It’s like London, I feel at very much at home when I’m there. But of course it’s quite different to Sydney.

Needless to say we visited the various museums; the Empire State Building; Radio City Music Hall; the Chrysler Building, from outside and above; took a Circle Line tour around the island, taking in the Statue of Liberty; and went to the Opera at the MET one night (la Traviata). We also did the ‘sex in the city thing’, based on the TV show, and shopped. I picked up some new skis and boots from the after winter sales and a new camera. The catalogue of Wendy’s purchases is too long to list here.

Then it was time to pick up the rental car and drive to Washington.

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Travel

Sri Lanka

In February 2023 we joined an organised tour to Sri Lanka.

Beginning in the capital Colombo, on the west coast, our bus travelled anticlockwise, in a loop, initially along the coast; then up into the highlands; then north, as far as Sigiriya; before returning southwest to Colombo.

Fiction, Recollections & News

On The Secret

There is an obvious sub-text to my short story: The Secret, that I wrote in 2015 after a trip to Russia. Silly things, we might come to believe in, like 'the law of attraction' are not harmless.

The story is also a reflection on the difference between American and Australian stereotypes, that were evident from conversations on the cruise.

I lived in New York for some time and my eldest daughter was born there. I have visited the US fairly regularly since. It is, in many ways, the closest country to Australia that you will find, outside New Zealand. So, I have often been surprised by how different it is in other ways to Australia, given the great similarities in the median standard of living, shared popular culture and immigrant demographics.

I have come to the conclusion that this stems from our different founding origins.

Opinions and Philosophy

Climate Emergency

emergency
/uh'merrjuhnsee, ee-/.
noun, plural emergencies.
1. an unforeseen occurrence; a sudden and urgent occasion for action.

Recent calls for action on climate change have taken to declaring that we are facing a 'Climate Emergency'.

This concerns me on a couple of levels.

The first seems obvious. There's nothing unforseen or sudden about our present predicament.

My second concern is that 'emergency' implies something short lived. It gives the impression that by 'fire fighting against carbon dioxide' or revolutionary action against governments, or commuters, activists can resolve the climate crisis and go back to 'normal' - whatever that is. Would it not be better to press for considered, incremental changes that might avoid the catastrophic collapse of civilisation and our collective 'human project' or at least give it a few more years sometime in the future?

Back in 1990, concluding my paper: Issues Arising from the Greenhouse Hypothesis I wrote:

We need to focus on the possible.

An appropriate response is to ensure that resource and transport efficiency is optimised and energy waste is reduced. Another is to explore less polluting energy sources. This needs to be explored more critically. Each so-called green power option should be carefully analysed for whole of life energy and greenhouse gas production, against the benchmark of present technology, before going beyond the demonstration or experimental stage.

Much more important are the cultural and technological changes needed to minimise World overpopulation. We desperately need to remove the socio-economic drivers to larger families, young motherhood and excessive personal consumption (from resource inefficiencies to long journeys to work).

Climate change may be inevitable. We should be working to climate “harden” the production of food, ensure that public infrastructure (roads, bridges, dams, hospitals, utilities and so) on are designed to accommodate change and that the places people live are not excessively vulnerable to drought, flood or storm. [I didn't mention fire]

Only by solving these problems will we have any hope of finding solutions to the other pressures human expansion is imposing on the planet. It is time to start looking for creative answers for NSW and Australia now.

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