Monday, March 19, 2018

Brookyln

Here’s the last post about the trip to New York! It only took a little over a month to edit and write up the posts, so that’s pretty good I guess.

But one day, we headed down to Midtown and had lunch and then went to the International Center of Photography. They had two exhibits, one of which was a large and interesting exhibit about the Japanese Internment Camps during World War II. It was nice to visit a museum that was dedicated solely to photography. It seems like most art museums have only a few token photographs laying around, or else they’re shoved in a dark corner of the basement.

This row of buildings were in a neighborhood that we walked through, which was near the Tenement Museum.

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Then we headed across the river and into Brooklyn. Over 2.6 million people live in the borough of Brooklyn, the most populated of all the New York boroughs (even more than Manhattan). For a comparison, that 2.6 million people are squeezed into a city that takes up only 97 square miles, while I live in a city (Little Rock) with a population of 198,000 people spread out over 121 square miles.

We headed to the DUMBO neighborhood, which sits in-between the Brooklyn and the Manhattan bridges. The name DUMBO means Down Under the Manhattan Bridge Overpass, and is not about a Disney movie with flying elephants. It sounds a little silly, but I do admit that I live in a neighborhood called PINOCCHIO, which actually means Paris It's Not, Or Chicago. Cars Have Interstate Obviously.

A famous place for photos here is a spot where the Manhattan Bridge is perfectly framed by two old buildings. And if you stand in the right spot, you can even catch the Empire State Building situated in the arch of the bridge. We went down there, but we weren't the only ones with that bright idea. The street was filled with people taking pictures and selfies, and also with cars with annoyed drivers trying to make their way through the throng of people.

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And you know a spot is popular with tourists if there is a hotdog cart there.

Brooklyn Brooklyn, take me in

From there, we walked over to Brooklyn Bridge Park, which obviously offers up some pretty neat views of the Brooklyn Bridge.

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And also of the Manhattan Bridge, which is a little bit newer than the Brooklyn Bridge (construction on it was completed in 1912).

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We headed over to this spot in the park, where the wooden remnants of old pier jut out into the river. It's another popular spot for pictures, and there were probably two dozen photographers already perched on the rocks and sidewalk by the river. I went just a bit further down the sidewalk, to a spot where no one had set up yet (which I thought was slightly better since you could see more of the skyline from here).

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Together we all waited for sunset, as other people walked by and asked what exactly all these people were taking pictures of. There was also a large flock of seagulls perched on the pieces of the old wooden pier, and all were indifferent to the crowds of photographers and tourists on the shore.

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After sunset, I walked through the park and got this shot looking back towards the Brooklyn Bridge with the One World Trade Building in the distance.

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From there I decided to actually go over and walk onto the Brooklyn Bridge, which I though would be a short walk. But the pedestrian ramp onto the bridge was a deceptively far walk from the park. But I eventually made it, and set up the tripod to get a few shots. It was a somewhat difficult spot for photography. The bridge was constantly moving with the rush of traffic passing below.

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The Brooklyn Bridge is one of the oldest bridges in the United States. Construction on the bridge began in 1869 and was completed in 1883.

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I took a few more pictures, before making the long walk back into Brooklyn.

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And that's it for the New York pictures! We would fly back home, and thanks to a delay at the St. Louis airport we ended up arriving around midnight in Little Rock. We drove home on an interstate that was nearly empty of all other traffic, which was a bit of culture shock after being in such a busy and crowded megacity. But we were eager to get home, since there was a sleeping toddler waiting for us at the house.

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