With departure imminent, I am trying to tick all the Auckland boxes I have just never got round to…. One of these to-do’s was a visit to Martha’s Backyard, the local USA food and clothing emporium. I have no pictures of the shop, but a few photos of the bounty and some sub-par junk food reviews!
Eating Cheetos (for the first time) made me feel like I could understand the inner workings of Britney Spears. It’s corn crack! It makes you do stupid stuff. Like eat the whole packet in one mouthful…
I can’t believe there is a cereal version of my favourite imported candy! The Reese’s Puffs look like dog kibble but taste delicious or their own or with milk. Watch out though because they make your entire biosphere smell like peanut butter.
Eat. Spit. Be Happy. I had never imagined sunflower seeds as a snack – these BBQ ones were quite more-ish but were really messy with all the shelling and spitting. Good for mindless TV watching. Or sports.
Barnum’s Animals crackers seemed like the poor child’s version of the amazing animal biscuits I enjoyed as a kid in NZ. Our ones had fluro-coloured icing! The circus inspired packaging is super cute though.
“MoonPie, you were a let down.”
There was also some Big Red soda which tasted just like cinnamon bubble gum. Next time? More soda, perhaps some Lucky Charms and wheatie, sugary Life cereal, some of those “smore” flavoured pop tarts (they have a big range), and yes, an essential tub of marshmallow whip…
Another documentary I have seen and enjoyed recently is The King Of Kong: A Fistful Of Quarters. It’s a 2007 American film that follows middle school science teacher Steve Wiebe as he tries to take the world high score for the arcade game Donkey Kong from reigning champion and hot sauce kind Billy Mitchell. Even if you don’t have an interest in gaming, you’ll love this battle of the nerds.
It’s a classic tale of good vs. evil, with lots of laughs and plot twists. It leaves you hanging for more, and pondering whether you could be the next world champion in something… If only you put your life into it.
Inspired by Charley, here is a list of consumption and thoughts regarding my trip to the US. I visited Los Angeles, San Francisco, New York – 7 flights in all. It was a trip of museums, tattoos, wonder, good friends, new friends, chowing down, coffee, writing, listening, dancing, breathing… and pinching myself constantly.
BOOKS
Miles from Nowhere – Nami Mun
After Dark - Haruki Murakami
Norwegian Wood – Haruki Murakami (the van was spotted in Soho, just after I finished reading!)
On Writing – Stephen King
One Hundred Years of Solitude- Gabriel García Márquez
I Love You More Than You Know – Jonathan Ames
Shantaram - Gregory David Roberts
FOOD OF NOTE
Reeses peanut butter cups, holy shit, you’re amazing. Addiction imminent. Peanut butter anything for the win – like Emma’s amazing PB shake at the Shake Shack!
Diet Vitamin Water. Now I have a full blown obsession with this drink, I want the diet version at home, pronto.
Pizza. In all its glorious and cheesey forms. Root beer (pray tell, what is the root?) was discovered to be a good friend of pizza.
Pie crust flavoured soft serve ice cream with toasted marshmallows from Momofuku. It’s as weird as it sounds. Liquid… pie.Does not compute.
MOVIES
The Hangover
Wall Street
Where The Wild Things Are
Yes Men Fix The World
Untitled
Julie And Julia
Up
Once Bitten
… and two others, the names and entire plots of which, I have lost in my brain to jetlag.
STORES
Urban Outfitters, I love you.
Uniqlo, I love you more.
Jumelle, Bedford Avenue. Eclectic, beautiful clothinbg store with loads of thoughtful designers. Go buy yourself a beautiful scarf for winter.
I loved everything about the New Museum (Contemporary art! Rooftop zen room! Cute French speaking staff!) but the shop was especially good – think art books and limited edition works. Also deserving of a honourable mention is the MoMA store – so many great gifts! I bought a mug.
Strand Books. Aside from a moment when one wayward staff member called me baby, I had a fabulous hour browsing Strand’s excellent selection of art/design/fashion books.
Beacon’s Closet in Williamsburg. I found a deliciously comfortable French faux leather jacket there. It has amazing power shoulders.
HALLOWEEN COSTUMES
The unicorns of Brooklyn – prance little ones, prance!
Girls dressed as bright pinatas. I think there was a stick sort of character involved too.
Wayne and Garth from Wayne’s World (BEST MOVIE EVER).
A man carrying an outhouse, which opened up to show a man sitting on a dunny reading. This was an elaborate one person costume and I am 99% convinced the dude was Australian.
Edward Scissorhands. There were many Scissorhands but this one was special. He literally became Edward, and stayed in character the entire time – no talking, lots of fumbling.
Numerous howling, stomping, Wild Things. Bravo!
Oh, be still my wistful heart. I loved everything about it. It’s a pretty safe assumption I’m going to go back as soon as possible…
Emma and I had a lovely lunch one Saturday afternoon at Five Leaves on Bedford Avenue, Brooklyn. We ended up there on the epic search for good coffee. People tell me it was dreamed up by Heath Ledger, and is named after “Swan cigarette papers that tell you when there are just five left in a package”.
The interior is nautically divine, the staff are a bunch of friendly Aussies and yup, the coffee is pretty damn nice. We also feasted on some tasty burgers and fries (chosen from a typographically decadent menu), that made our 15 minute wait in the drizzle outside more than worth it.
This day was marked by a visit to the Museum Of Natural History, where I had a grand time, wandering the halls for hours.
There was an epic dinosaur and “extreme extinct mammal” display, unlike anything I’ve ever seen before… They even had an ancient narwhal skeleton!
Flocks of taxidermied owls and packs of stuffed beasts…
I was a little disappointed to miss out on an epic maritime battle (as seen in the film The Squid and The Whale) but nonetheless they were both to be found:
And finally, on they way out, more fantastic subway mosaics – including this little New Zealand fellow:
It’s details like this that make my heart beat faster for the city, I tell you.
They had an ancient narwhal skeleton! It was so much bigger than I imagined.
Touchdown to the greatest city on earth. After finding our sweet little apartment and snoozing for 12 hours Emma and I headed to Times Square. The very first thing that happened? A woman gave us free cupcakes!
From there we headed to Union Square and schlepped around a giant (to my teeny Kiwi eyes) Barnes & Noble. Novel. There I found Domo, preparing for Halloween:
Talk about making friends with the subway maps. A + E + 1 + W + ? I adore all the station mosaics. They’re like Pokemon, I want to capture them all…
Food summary of the day: Ordered an amazing pizza and sipped some truly disgusting “coffee”. Desperate for a good one, I have been coffee free for about a week – this is truly abnormal. If you know where to find some let me know! xx
<a href=”http://www.flickr.com/photos/teststrip/4029365063/” title=”subway by Amber P., on Flickr”><img src=”http://farm4.static.flickr.com/3533/4029365063_384405a666.jpg” width=”500″ height=”334″ alt=”subway” /></a>
San Francisco. I took the BART to downtown, after finally making it to SF after 3 flights, one day and a whole lot of stale airport air. I met Katy at the appointed place outside GAP by the street cars, after talking to several street hustlers – “I love your flowers!” – they all adored my shoulders… which were exposed because it was freaking hot.
After meeting up with my lovely friend, I had a terrifying experience on the street car; clinging to the side with my luggage hanging off the side, precariously balancing on a step. [Also after 8 years apart, within our first moments together, some elderly people told us off for 'cussing'. Rad. Just like when we were kids!]
Finally we made it to Katy’s beautiful apartment and I settled in by drinking Mexican beer on the rooftop. After getting ready there was a wild taxi drive, up and down hills, to the Mission – where I met the burrito of my dreams. It was the size of a baby. Not joking, see:
We headed to the Financial District, and up a tower to the Carnelian Room for a rather fancy cocktail and a look at the view. It was so high my ears popped! K. pointed out all the sites and we gossiped. We also discovered a carnelian is a reddish/brown gem… thanks iPhone!
Chinatown was rather lovely – we stopped at a dive bar where everyone was playing dice… Followed by a visit to the bakery where one day in July 1996 Bill Clinton also sampled pastries between 5 and 5.30pm. Mm, we gorged ourselves sticky sesame seed and black bean buns – they were so greasy, but perfect.
From there the night is a blur… A quick peep (!) at the iconic City Lights Book Store, making friends with nice people in a bar, cabbing home, drinking more beer, yelling on the roof top and taking photographs – long exposures of SF city.
An excellent effort for 24 hours, if I do say so myself. SF, you’re so nice!
Passion Pit has one of those nice hooky make-you-go-aw stories behind it. Last Valentine’s Day Michael Angelakos made a CD of bubbly, glitchy, love songs for his girlfriend. It was copied for a number of friends and cohorts, eventually making its way onto the hands of a record company. Voila, record deal!
The original CD was released as the Chunk of Change EP – a heartfelt river of synth. The next step was to form a band (all bespectacled, beardy & dark), flesh out the sound and release the well received first album, Manners.
I’ve been listening to EP and the album on and off over the last week. While writing, while driving out in the country with friends, while making dinner. I think at this stage I prefer the EP – especially the breathy endearing falsetto of Cuddle Fuddle. But my mind could change. Every time I listen to the album, it’s like getting a little hug. I even enjoy the children’s choir on Little Secrets. It’s all so nice!
Both bodies of work falter in places; but I lack time for a lengthy critical reviewso I’ll shunt you gently in the direction of Pitchfork if you’d like to read about Passion Pit indepth. Funnily enough Ian Cohen comes back to the same point as me – the music makes me happy, so why not indulge? Give either of albums an outing on your stereo – it might make for a very enjoyable Monday!
Hello! My name is Amber Parkin. I'm a New Zealander living in London. I'm a writer obsessed with fondue, chesterfield sofas, vintage dresses, foxes, and 35mm.
