Day 11 - Westpoint-New York
Previously featured:
Flight to Newark, Day 1 - Newark-Princeton
Day 2 - Princeton-Philadelphia
Day 3 - Gettysburg-Lancaster-Ephrata-Alexandria
Day 4 - Alexandria-DC
Day 5 - Westpoint-Hyde Park
Day 6 - Hancock Shaker Village-Hanover
Day 7 - Burlington, Vermont
Day 8 - New Hampshire-Bretton Woods-Portland Head
Day 9 - Portland-Kennebunkport
Day 10 - Marblehead-Salem-Boston
We left Tewksbury reasonably early to try to catch the first tour of the day at Westpoint. Unfortunately, I was then unable to get hold of the amusing pamphlet about Applebees previously mentioned.
For breakfast, we stopped at a McDonalds where curiously, though 11 breakfast meals were offered, there was no Big Breakfast. There was also a picture of the head manager, who looked like a pedophile. Whether the two facts are connected will be left for the reader to decide. Apart from the usual muffins, there were bagels, biscuits and McGriddles (which I later found out were mini-hotcakes with sweet chunks embedded in them). Be that as it may, they were all variations on the same thing (XXX with egg, Sausage XXX, Bacon, egg and cheese XXX etc). However, the sheer burst of flavour that the real pork bacon provided more than made up for the limited choice. Their dollar menu was interesting, with the Double Cheeseburger being on it (a normal one was also $1, oddly) together with 2 Apple Pies, the McChicken, the Chicken fajita and the parfait. Also, they had 4 McFlurry topping holders but only 2 were in use. Sigh.
On the New York State Highway, this amusing sign was sighted: "Headlights required when using wipers". Err.
Certain stretches (usually 2 miles) of American highway are adopted by organisations as a subtle form of advertising. On the 9W to Westpoint, I saw that the Cornwall Lions Club was being cheapskate, sponsoring only 1.4 miles of highway instead of the 2 that almost everyone else does. Later though, I saw that there was a 1.3 mile stretch sponsored by "Teens *something* by/for Christ" (I didn't get to read the sign properly).
Reaching Westpoint, we went on the tour. Westpoint is actually an accredited college: in addition to Army training, trainees also get a real college degree from there. The place has 500 instructors, but only 4000 cadets - I think few colleges would be able to match this ratio.
We were taken to the new chapel, built in "Military Gothic" style (sans gargoyles supposedly because the Army suffices to protect them) and with the world's largest church organ. Until 1972, cadets were required to attend religious ceremonies every week until the Supreme Court rule it unconstitutional. How dreadful it must have been.
Organ console
Even members of the US military band have Masters degrees. Hmm.
There was a Civil War monument with "the largest piece of quarried marble in the Western Hemisphere". Bah. So what's the largest piece of quarried marble in the Eastern Hemisphere (or rather the world?) Then again, at least it wasn't "the largest piece of red-green hand-quarried marble in the Northeastern USA".
The list of ex-Superintendents of Westpoint includes such distinguished names as Robert E. Lee and Douglas MacArthur. In contrast, COs of SAF training schools are usually condemned officers. This might explain something about the quality of the people they churn out.
Great view of the Hudson
Only 2 cadets in the history of Westpoint have never accumulated any demerit points: the two mentioned in the previous paragraph. In contrast, Eisenhower was sentenced to more than 100 hours walking the parade grounds as punishment (for crimes such as not polishing his boots and not arranging the books on his shelves in order of height) because he didn't saw military "discipline" for the pointless rubbish it was. Yet he still managed to become a General and a President! I guess "discipline" isn't all it's made out to be.
Cadets only have to eat dinner at the mess hall once a week. This probably explains why there are so many restaurants near the academy, as well as a McDonalds.
There's a "flirtation walk" at Westpoint for cadets and their dates, where the dates must supposedly agree to requests for kisses. I wonder how it works for female cadets with male dates.
Mess hall
Cadets get to study bond-free for the first two years. Hmm.
Leaving West Point, we drove back to Fort Lee, NJ, just beside New York, for our live lobster at Sally Ling's. Unlike the other Chinese restaurants we'd seen, this one didn't look cheapskate, and it was open through the afternoon, having no lunch break. Here, we came as close to fine dining as we would during the trip. My brother in law commented that he felt that we were in a bad Woody Allen movie - a nice restaurant, an old clientele, semi-refined music playing and a subdued atmosphere. Portions were smaller than in normal American joints, but then I don't think normal Americans go for fine dining, so.
The chef at Sally Ling's was very modest, with the menu including such delights as "No. 1 dish in the world - jumbo shrimps, scallops, filet of fish and lobster meat served with selected vegetables in a chef's special sauce. Served on a sizzling platter". Intrigued by the dish's name, we ordered it. It turned out to be underwhelming in the extreme. My brother in law suggested that it was named so because it was the first (No. 1) dish they learned to cook in the world.
No. 1 dish in the world
The appetiser they served us was much better than the usual nuts or preserved vegetables you usually get, it was large pieces of kok kok (fried wanton skin), served with a red fruity sauce and a horseradish sauce.
Even the fortune cookies we got were special, having a semi-sweet chocolate flavour.
Due to traffic and half-expected hor lan-ing, 3:25pm saw me barely into New York, sitting in the 175th street subway station. Planning my schedule for the rest of the day, I decided to visit the Museum of Sex first. Luckily, my sister and brother in law were not with me, or they would have been sure to have made their usual annoying remarks like "are you old enough for this?" This is especially irritating given that being rocking US college undergrads, they were probably doing more at a younger age, and that sometimes when they are with their friends, they will pronounce conditions for admission which have steadily been going up over the years from "O levels" to "A levels" to "a University degree". Extrapolating, I project that in a few years the minimum requirements for admission will be to have participated in a pot-suffused multi-racial orgy conducted on tarpaulin while outdoors on a warm New England afternoon during winter, being shaded from the harsh light of the sun by an ongoing solar eclipse.
The museum was very interesting (and as a bonus, I got to use my ISIC card to save a buck). Besides the permanent collection, there were two temporary exhibitions up. The first traced the evolution of American pinup photography. According to it, the Victorians were responsible for developing erotic photography, further burnishing their credentials as a schizophrenic people.
Oddly enough, most of the visitors to the museum were women - either singly, in pairs, in groups or in couples with males. Apart from me, there was only one other single male there, and no groups of males. I asked the guy at the ticket counter, and he confirmed by observation, while having no idea as to why this is the case. Of course, we all know that this phenomenon occurs because women have great intellectual curiosity; however all men who visit the museum must be perverts looking for cheap thrills. This is just like how if girls take pictures in male toilets, or while posing at urinals, they are being fun and cheeky, but if males take pictures in female toilets, they are perverts and peeping toms. Similarly, if males make jokes about the female body, they are misogynists and male chauvinist pigs who objectify and dehumanise women, but if women do the reverse, they are speaking the truth and exposing the dominant, oppressive and male-centric social order.
"She stopped modeling after finding God on New Year's Eve in 1958" - On Bettie Page, pinup nude girl featured in cheesecake shots
Stripper cards - Irma the Body
Basically, the exhibits in the museum just proved the old adage - plus ça change, plus c’est la même chose. Lesbian sex was present in vintage pornographic flicks, and oral sex was involved in 90% of business transactions in eastern US whorehouses in 1938.
Plot devices: With only ten or twelve minutes at his disposal, the stag producer had to employ simple plot devices to kickstart his story. He had to invent a credible excuse for removing the clothes of his performers, moving them into intercourse in several positions, and concluding his narrative quickly. Outright rape, of course, would have been the most economical device, but violence would have destroyed the stags' fantasy world of constant and wholly consensual sex. Instead directors relied on formulas designed to demonstrate that male and female desire can flare anywhere. Spouses succumb to impulse, as do office workers, painters and models, doctors and nurses, but large numbers of stags deal in sex between strangers, chance encounters that are the stuff of fantasy. The best-remembered stags involve plumbers, repairmen, and salesmen--interllopers who visit when the husband is away, to eroticize the male viewer's secret anxieties.
"Know your scumbags - this one prevents AIDS". At the bottom, the infamous 'Heather has two mummies' book.
Condom ad: "I take one everywhere I take my penis"
There was this electronic display showcasing weird patents. US patent 4030490 (1975) was a 'female protective device' inserted into the vagina which would pierce a penetrating body with a sharp plastic point. Ouch.
CyberSM - the world's first multisensory, full body communication system which connected Paris to Colonge (1993)
Of course, there was the replica of a Real Doll's torso, a picture of which I used for my competition.
A Real Doll
These dolls are the most advanced sex-dolls ever developed and feature completely articulated skeletons which allow for anatomically correct positioning. They incorporate a blend of the most expensive silicone rubbers that have a flesh-like feel. Continued research will produce dolls that move, vibrate, change temperature, and may eventually be cyberkinetic.
All in all, the museum was most interesting - they even had an original copy of the Disneyland memorial orgy and a Choose Your Own Adventure parody: Escape from Fire Island!: A Date With Destiny Adventure (with 29 endings). The only down side was that the oldest part of the collection dated from only the late 19th century.
6:30 saw me in Central Park, witnessing a phenomenal number of people cycling, walking, jogging, skipping, bouncing, jiggling and otherwise exercising their way around and through it - and all early on a weekday evening too. Witnessing this spectacle, coupled with the park's cool, non-humid air and shady paths, I almost felt like joining them, a teething desire hastily quenched by the throbbing of my feet. Technically, in the end I did join them, albeit at a reduced pace, as I walked around the Jacqueline Onassis Kennedy reservoir, or rather hor lan-ed my way about it, wanting to go south but meandering northwest.
People exercising
Signs in the park warned passers-by about giving priority to horses, but I saw none (except for one on top of which a policeman was riding). But then I saw a big pile of horseshit somewhere, so.
View across reservoir
Just before 7, my feet gave out and I collapsed onto a bench and watched people and their adorable, well-behaved dogs, many big, most lively, and all preferable to the average cat.
Since the Empire State Building was open till midnight (probably the only attraction open so late), I went there next. I'd been there 11 years ago, but the view at night was sure to be very different from that in the day. I found the place unexpectedly crowded for a weekday evening (8 pm), and worse, there was nowhere to sit from the time one started queueing on the second floor until one returned to the second floor from the top, so I just had to bite my clip, close my eyes, jiggle my feet a little and hope I didn't faint.
The management was very smart: to earn even more money from people, besides the normal $14 ticket, there was a $30 express ticket which would allow one to skip the queues, as well as an option for a $14 Skyride (simulator flying through New York) and a $6 audioguide. When I got to the top, I found that the queue was forced through a kitschy cardboard display of the Empire State Building and a photograph was taken ($15 for a 5 x 7" photograph, and 2 wallet sized ones). Meanwhile, the area with some small static exhibits was under renovation, supposedly to improve the future experience (and raise future prices too, no doubt).
The spire of the Empire State Building had some advanced, sophisticated and powerful radio equipment on it. Unfortunately it wasn't quite advanced, sophisticated or powerful enough to give me handphone reception, grr.
After coming down from the top of the building, I went for the Skyride, having been foolish enough to shell out $14 for it. Since there was no one in the queue, I stepped over the rope acting as a lane divider, and got shouted at. Being too tired and too much in pain to argue, I went through the normal way.
The Skyride was narrated by Kevin Bacon (which might have been why it cost so much), who made reference to the game "Six degrees of Kevin Bacon". It wasn't too bad, but it wasn't worth $14, especially since there were too many frills (simulated technical failures, going under water and on the streets) and not enough of what I (and presumably most people) wanted to see: a panoramic view of New York by air, with narration.
Sister's food diary: "Day 11 : McDonald's breakfast with real pork bacon. Late lunch at Sally Ling's, Fort Lee NJ. Kock-kock with dips, live lobster, seafood, chicken in imperial sauce. Dinner - separately."
Barring a few exceptional places, all establishments in the US list their prices without adding taxes in. That this makes you underestimate the true price of something you're eyeing isn't my main beef, but the fact that this inevitably results in the final total being some funny, non-round number. Americans may like jangling their pennies around, but I rather not lug bags of coins everywhere I go.
I decided not to watch a show in New York for several reasons. Most of the most promising-looking shows were sold out, and the rest only had tickets costing $100 or more left. I also wasn't prepared to queue for hours to get a 30-50% discount at the half price ticket booth, especially since it might not even be for the shows I really wanted to watch. Furthermore, the train ride alone from New Brunswick station (where my motel was) to New York's Penn Station took 50 minutes, not including waiting time. Transport from the motel to New Brunswick station would take another 10-15 minutes even if my brother in law picked me up, excluding waiting time.
Late in the day, my sister dragged my brother-in-law shopping for the 6th shopping trip in 11 days (and 10 full days). Luckily, this was after I'd left for New York, so I was spared the torture.
New York city mamak stalls seem to be run by a city-wide cartel of indians, none of whom accept credit cards.
The damn New York subway refuses to provide maps, so I was reduced to squinting at the posters in stations and trains for 3 days.
