Eastern State Penitentiary

I went back to Eastern State Penitentiary recently specifically to visit the hospital wing, but a return visit to ESP was never far from my mind. ESP is a former prison, operational from 1829 until 1971. The prison was one of the first examples of what would become known as the "Pennsylvania System" of incarceration, a system that encouraged separate confinement of prisoners. In contrast, the "New York System"—enforced at Sing Sing—forced inmates to work together.

By 1913, however, ESP abandoned its solitary system due to overcrowding. Even in the 19th century it was a tourist destination—once hosting Charles Dickens—and Al Capone was one of its most infamous residents. Al Capone's richly decorated cell is one of the main attractions here, although I overheard a guide explaining that tales of his lavish prison life and special treatment may have been greatly exaggerated. 

ESP is one of my favorite places to take photos. It has all the appeal of an abandoned space—peeling paint, leftover objects, rusty metal—but without the stress of trespassing. Because they offer self-guided audio tours, I never felt rushed (except in guided-tour-only spaces like the hospital wing). It was significantly more crowded this time than the first time I visited, but that was probably just the difference between November and July. I was afraid that I would take exactly the same the photos this time around, but I was surprised to find that a lot of the object arrangements had changed—and even if they hadn't there's just so much here to see that I'm sure I still haven't seen everything.

I didn't know before I went that it was Bastille Day—ESP throws a big celebration later in the day, including a reinterpretation of the storming of the Bastille. They were still setting up for the festival as I was leaving, but if I had known that they would be throwing thousands of Tastykakes from the penitentiary towers, I definitely would have stayed longer. 

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Eastern State Penitentiary
2027 Fairmount Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19130
Open daily, 10am-5pm

Philly

My recent trip to Philadelphia to check out the newly-opened hospital wing of the Eastern State Penitentiary just further confirmed what I've come to realize during my past trips—that Philly is endlessly charming. I walked to ESP through the Fairmount neighborhood, which was so quiet and idyllic (and close to ESP!) that I did a casual search for apartments there when I got home. 

I'm certainly not done with New York quite yet (I only just celebrated my four year NY-iversary!) but it's comforting for me to know that I could potentially be happy living elsewhere. Growing up in Ohio, the only place I ever saw myself living as an adult was New York City, but it's prohibitively expensive and smelly and noisy and relentlessly competitive. I'm sure Philly has its downsides too—as all locations do—but I feel comfortable there in a way I haven't in other places that I've visited. 

One great thing about living in New York is its proximity to other places—there are nearly limitless options for one- or two-day weekend trips via train, bus or car. Regional transit is a bit slow compared to other forms of transportation, but I love the hours of uninterrupted (ideally) quiet reflection that comes baked into a long train ride.

After I was done at ESP, I looked up diners in the neighborhood, and decided to check out Little Pete's a few blocks away. We had eaten at another Little Pete's when we were in Philly last year, and although this location was a little less charming, the food was still diner-good. This location is actually located in the ground floor of what I can only assume is a retirement community, and I fit right in with all of the locals and their nurses eating at 3pm.

I randomly came across Claes Oldenburg’s Paint Torch, a 51-foot sculpture installed at the Pennsylvania Academy of Fine Arts. Oldenburg has a few other statues in the city including a giant clothespin, and he's one of my favorite sculpture artists. His pieces appeal to my love of things that are bigger than they're supposed to be and they always make me smile. 

Like New York, Philly also has a Diamond District—full of great storefronts and signage—and a small Chinatown. I never made it to Laurel Hill Cemetery (next time!) but I did make sure to stop at Professor Ouch's Bizarre Bazaar & Odditorium. Last summer I bought an eyeball model from Professor Ouch's, and they have a great selection of oddities, vintage finds and circus memorabilia. This time I didn't find anything that I couldn't live without, but the small "odditorium" located at the back of the store—filled with bizarre taxidermy and other oddities—is always worth a visit. 

I think the heat and humidity sucked my energy faster than usual, so I was back at the train station in time to catch the 5:44 pm train back to Trenton, but already thinking about my next trip to Philly.

Project 365: Days 204-210

204/365: David and I went to our first Celebrate Brooklyn concert of the summer.

205/365: We spent the day lounging at Rockaway Beach.

206/365: I walked from David's to this cemetery on Flatbush Avenue, hoping it would be open but the gates were locked :(

207/365: Continually amazed that I've not only kept this plant alive for awhile, but that it appears to be growing!

208/365: One last photo of my current art arrangement before I move.

209/365: Three friends and I grabbed falafel at Mamoun's after work and dessert at Dō. We waited probably an hour in line, and I don't regret it but I definitely don't need to go again. The portions are way too huge (I ate all of my ice cream but just a fraction of the cookie dough) and a tube of Toll House is just as good.

210/365: I've been trying to pare down my stuff before I move and I took two big bags of books to The Strand last week but I'm still dragging my feet with the actual packing part.

Eastern State Penitentiary: Hospital

After a few months of thinking that I needed to check out the newly-opened hospital wing of Eastern State Penitentiary, I finally headed to Philadelphia for the day to do just that. I had been to Eastern State only once, but it's been high on my list of places to revisit ever since.

When David and I visited Philly last year, we took Amtrak. I've returned on two solo trips since (including my visit to Mount Moriah in the spring), and both times I've taken regional transit which is about twice as long but one-third as expensive as Amtrak. To get from NY to Philly via regional rail I took a NJ transit train from Penn Station (ugh) to Trenton, and then a SEPTA train from Trenton to the 30th Street Philadelphia station (which is basically Philly's version of Grand Central and 10,00000000 x better than the current Penn Station). Once in Philly I just walked to Eastern State, although I've used Uber a few times and it was cheaper than it is here in New York—my 30 minute ride back to the train station was under $4 (tip included).

One of the things I love most about ESP is that you can wander throughout the grounds on your own—I prefer to go at my own (snail's) pace and always feel rushed on guided tours. I had a mini-freak out when I arrived at ESP to find that the hospital wing appeared closed, and when I inquired about it I was told that it was open by tour only. Luckily, the short "Hand on History" tours are included in your admission price and occur frequently throughout the day, so I didn't have to wait long to (finally!) get inside of cellblock 3. 

Eastern State Penitentiary opened in 1829, and cellblock 3 was part of the original plan. The hospital wing transformed throughout the years to keep up with disease and changing therapies, and included an "operating room, laboratories, pharmacy, X-ray lab, hydrotherapy rooms, psychiatric department and a solarium for treating tuberculosis patients." 

I did feel a bit rushed during the tour—which lasted about 20 minutes—but only because I'm a slow creep who travelled three hours by train just to see a long-abandoned hospital wing and I could've spent much longer just soaking it all in. 

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Eastern State Penitentiary
2027 Fairmount Avenue
Philadelphia, PA 19130
Open daily, 10am-5pm, Tours of the hospital wing every half-hour or so.

Rockaway Beach

Nature did not make me a beach person. I'm basically made out of transparent tissue paper, I burn even after liberally and frequently applying SPF 55, I can't swim and I can't stand the feeling of sand basically anywhere above my feet. But David loves the beach on a near-spiritual level and I love exploring (and him), so we compromised this weekend and went to Rockaway Beach. 

Rockaway Beach is accessible by the A and S trains, and during weekends this summer the S has been extended to Rockaway Blvd allowing you to transfer from both the Lefferts Blvd and Far Rockaway-bound A trains. For me, the journey somewhere is always half the fun, and the subway ride to Rockaway is long, but as far as I know it's the only subway track that runs over a large body of water so at least the views are interesting.

Before we headed to the beach, David ran to Rite-Aid and bought an $8 beach umbrella. It might sound silly, but that cheap piece of plastic and cloth increased my enjoyment of the beach so significantly that I have no idea why we didn't buy one sooner. Last year I finally got a bathing suit that I feel (mostly) comfortable wearing in public, but this stupid umbrella immediately changed my life for the better. 

I would like to go back and explore the actual town of Rockaway apart from the beach—I hear there are some delicious hipster tacos being made at the Rockaway Beach Surf Club—but we had a great time just lounging. I made a dent in my latest book (this totally appropriate beach read), ate a (boneless) hot dog from the concessions and photographed it like a shameless millennial—I don't know if I'll ever officially consider myself a beach person, but I'm starting to see the appeal. 

Letchworth Village Cemetery

After we explored a few buildings in Letchworth Village, we decided to call it quits despite barely making a dent because 1. we saw a cop, 2. I was getting hangry and 3. we needed to get our Zip Car back to the city by 9pm. We still had a bit of time before it was absolutely necessary that we start heading back, however, and I'm always angling to squeeze one last thing into a day spent exploring.

To remedy the hangry issue, we stopped at Hoyer's, a circa-1933 ice cream stand in the nearby town of Haverstraw. I used a $10 bill I found in one of the buildings (I'm still pumped about that find) to buy us soft serve and a root beer float which was exactly what we needed after creeping around for hours in hot, humid and probably asbestos-laden buildings. After Hoyer's, I suggested that we make just one more stop—technically on the way home!—and try our luck at finding the Letchworth Village Cemetery.

When I had initially googled "Letchworth Village," one of the auto-fill suggestions was "Letchworth Village Cemetery" and I I knew that finding it could be the cherry on top of an already perfect day. I'm eternally frustrated by the lack of location information available online sometimes—maybe I'm just a greedy millennial, but I feel that locations that are open to the public and amenable to visitors should not be so hard to pinpoint on a map.

The closest directions I could find were "drive down Call Hollow Road until you come to a path in the woods," which is what we ended up doing. Thankfully there's a bright blue sign for the cemetery and Call Hollow isn't a long road but I still took the time to figure out as close to the exact location as I could in hopes that it might help someone else one day be less frustrated that I was—405 Call Hollow Road, Stony Point, NY 10980 should get you there.

There's a small gravel clearing near the sign where you can park, and the cemetery is just a short walk through the path into the woods. This particular cemetery was used from 1914-1967 and while it contains a handful of traditional tombstones, most of the graves are marked with a simple, numbered metal marker. Names weren't used to assure the anonymity of the patients (or, in a lot of cases, their families), although a plaque has recently been added to include the names of those interred here—still not matched to their numbers but under the heading "Those Who Shall Not Be Forgotten."

This was a cemetery unlike any I have visited before, which is a distinction I keep thinking I'll no longer be able to make—until I come across yet another unique way to handle a burial space. Seeing rows and rows of graves marked with nothing but a number is sad in a way that traditional cemeteries usually aren't and even the graves marked with tombstones are sobering when you realize that people didn't seem to live long lives at Letchworth.

Project 365: Days 197-203

197/365: My first time trying Halo Top ice cream wasn't great—I ate this entire pint of chocolate chip cookie dough in one sitting (don't judge) only to find out that it had ZERO cookie dough in it. I wasn't expecting much, but come on!

198/365: I took the train to Philly for the day to see the newly-opened hospital wing of the Eastern State Penitentiary (definitely worth it). Afterwards I just walked around for a few hours—Philly is endlessly charming.

199/365: My mom and I tried to go to the Cup and Saucer diner on Canal Street before they closed for good (RIP) but there was a line out the door. I wish all of these people had patronized the diner before it was announced they were closing, but even then I don't think they could've survived their rent suddenly doubling (!!).

200/365: I couldn't resist buying this cast iron witch's boot planter at a thrift store in Philly—check out that suspicious green spot in my photo which is probably just a weird reflection but also might be the ghost in my apartment that Mozart is always staring at?

201/365: So annoying, but so cute.

202/365: I needed a light read after I finished the Jonestown book, so I started this 465-page book about the great influenza epidemic.

203/365: I took the day off and snapped this selfie of me dying of heat exhaustion in my sweltering apartment.

Letchworth Village: Chairs

I've seen the hashtag #theresalways a chair on Instagram and it's mostly used with photos from abandoned places where there does always seem to be a chair. This is something I noticed in my real life explorations way before I noticed the hashtag, but that's a nice perk of the Internet—finding out that other people notice the same weird things that you do.

Even before I started creeping on actual abandoned buildings I was noticing the chair phenomenon in once-abandoned places that I took sanctioned tours of, like the Ellis Island Hospital complex or the Ohio State Reformatory. Obviously these places are well-maintained for tours but I'm not sure to what degree that they are "decorated." But once I started actually exploring truly abandoned spaces, I noticed that even when a place has been nearly stripped clean of things, you can still find at least one chair. 

The buildings we explored in Letchworth Village were full of stuff, and so I wasn't surprised to find a ton of chairs. It makes sense that institutions or hospitals would naturally be full of chairs, and maybe they remain because they don't have any obvious value to people that typically strip abandoned buildings of things like scrap metals.

However (like Kings Park) there were some really great vintage chairs left at Letchworth that my mom likes to chastise me for not dragging home—even if the moldy, asbestos-covered fabric chairs are long past their functional prime. I do think it's a shame that the plastic and metal institutional varieties are just left to rust or are covered in uninspired graffiti, but with all the uncertainty that comes with exploring abandoned places, it's somehow comforting to know that there is always a chair. 

NYBG: Chihuly

My mom and I recently went to the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx to check out the Chihuly exhibit. Dale Chihuly is an American glass sculptor (with an eye patch!), and even if you don't realize it you've probably seen his work which appears in permanent collections around the world.

I first became aware of Chihuly when I was in college and saw an exhibition of his at the Phipps Conservatory in Pittsburgh. The NYBG show is similar to that one in that it intersperses Chihuly sculptures with the garden's own plant collections and natural surroundings. Chihuly pieces are so fluid and organic-looking that they fit perfectly into a garden setting. There were actually some pieces that fit in so seamlessly that it was hard at first to discern what was glass and what was plant—and vice versa. 

Chihuly pieces aren't exclusively based on flora—there were ones that looked like cranes and rock candy—and I was surprised at how many different styles are on display in the garden. He's probably best known for his twisting, curling, spikey concoctions as well as his undulating bowls, but there were more modern, simple pieces placed near water so that their reflections were as integral to the art as the actual glass panes.  

I was very impressed with his work back when I saw it at Phipps, but ever since I feel like I've very badly wanted to hate on Chihuly for being too commercial or write off his work as faux-opulent (he has a lot of work in Vegas and a store at the Bellagio), but I'm won over every time I see a piece in person. 

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The New York Botanical Garden
2900 Southern Boulevard
Bronx, NY 10458-5126
Tues-Sun 10am-6pm, Closed Mondays
"Chihuly" is on view until October 29, 2017

Project 365: Days 190-196

190/365: Crazy eyes.

191/365: We creeped on the abandoned Letchworth Village in upstate NY and David found a copy of The Handmaid's Tale that he's currently airing out on his balcony because it's just a tad moldy // I used a $10 bill that I found at Letchworth to buy us soft serve and a root beer float.

192/365: My mom and I went to 7th Avenue Donuts which is one of my favorite neighborhood diners and walked back to my apartment down 7th Avenue.

193/265: A tiny bouquet that David picked for me during our day exploring Letchworth Village. I should probably get a bud vase but this shot glass from Orange World makes me smile.

194/365: I'm officially obsessed with this book and the story of Jim Jones. Sometimes I worry that I'm so interested in cults that I'm going to accidentally join one.

195/365: We went to dinner in Park Slope and came across a box on a stoop full of plastic play food. I wanted to take the whole box but restrained myself to just taking these two hotdogs.

196/365: Ominous skies. Also, it was approximately 10 billion degrees today is fall here yet??

I should really be packing for my upcoming move but instead I think I'm going to spend Saturday in Philadelphia. Eastern State Penitentiary has recently opened their hospital wing (it was closed when I first went) and I've been dying to see it. If I don't end up spending the whole day at Eastern State, I might also try to fit in a visit to Laurel Hill Cemetery, eat a cheesesteak (with whiz, of course) and shop for some oddities. I'll pack next weekend. Have a great weekend!

Letchworth Village 2017

It had been a while since I creeped around an abandoned building, so on Saturday I proposed that we spend the day exploring Letchworth Village. Letchworth Village is a complex located in Rockland County in upstate New York—at one time comprising 130 buildings—built to house and care for the mentally and physically disabled. Letchworth was conceived as a self-sustaining village, with residences, medical facilities and a working farm. The first patients were admitted in 1911 and the 2,000-acre complex was designed to care for 3,000 patients, although by the 1950s it had more than 5,000.

Almost from the beginning, Letchworth was plagued by accusations of overcrowding, abuse and neglect. It was even mentioned in a famous 1972 investigative documentary about similarly horrific conditions at the Willowbrook State School in Staten Island (the piece won Geraldo Rivera a Peabody Award) and after years of slowly being emptied of patients, Letchworth closed for good in 1996.

The area is now a park in the same vain as the Kings Park Psychiatric complex—you can park your car and walk your dog but entering the boarded-up, crumbling buildings is "not allowed." I didn't really have high expectations for the day, but knew that at the very least we'd be able to walk past the buildings and explore the grounds. I've mentioned it before, but I'm learning to lower my expectations when it comes to exploring abandoned places—the less I expect, the better the outcome usually, and that was definitely true of Saturday.

We ended up slipping into one of the buildings very easily, and spent quite a bit of time going from room to room. The lower floor was very dark, but I was immediately surprised at how much stuff was still inside. One of the very first things we came across was an old, rusty letterpress, surrounded by a huge pile made up of thousands of tiny, metal, moveable type letters. I'm not sure if the Letchworth residents ran a printing press for outside clients or just for themselves (one tray was labeled "Certificates"), but the graphic designer in me was going nuts. Personally this is one of the coolest things I could have come across, and I couldn't resist taking three tiny A's and one ampersand home with me.

We next explored some structures that seemed to be dedicated more to the inner workings of the village than to patient care—a huge power plant and some other buildings that were probably storage or for maintenance staff. These buildings were more open and thus more covered in graffiti, but most it was far better than the quick dicks and profanity that you usually find covering abandoned spots. Despite the signs warning that the premises was constantly under police surveillance, people have clearly spent time inside of these buildings. We did see a cop car sitting near the entrance when we were leaving, but it seems as if you could spend days lost in the wooded grounds without ever being spotted.

Like almost every abandoned spot I've explored, I started dreaming about my return to Letchworth before we even left. The complex is so much larger than I anticipated, and we only explored a small fraction of the buildings. I've seen photos of the area in the fall—when the ivy covering the buildings turns brilliant shades of red and orange—and I can't think of a better time to return to (what is allegedly) one of New York State's most haunted spots.

Historic Jersey City & Harsimus Cemetery

After my first visit to the Historic Jersey City & Harsimus Cemetery, I'd been looking for a chance to go back. Not that I ever need a specific reason to visit a cemetery, but this particular one holds events quite frequently. Most recently they hosted the JC Oddities Flea Market and an oddities flea market in a historic, once-abandoned cemetery is pretty much my dream event so I was looking forward to it for weeks.

I was hoping that the oddities selection would be good, but most importantly cheaper than the over-priced Brooklyn events I've attended. Unfortunately that wasn't really the case—there were some interesting vendors with taxidermy, bones and vintage finds but I only ended up buying one thing (a milk glass bottle from the 1939 World's Fair).

The main attraction ended up being the cemetery itself, and I was happy for the chance to explore its overgrown grounds again. The cemetery was established in 1829, but even before that it was the site of Revolutionary War skirmishes and a War of 1812 ammunition bunker. It was abandoned in 2008 but is now cared for by a group of volunteers, with proceeds from events going to the care and upkeep of the grounds.

In addition to human volunteers, the cemetery is also home to several goats. When I first went they were roaming around, doing their part to keep the grass in check, but for events they're fenced in an area where you can pet and feed them (the dream life, if you ask me).

We had also been lured to this event with the promise of crypt tours, but unfortunately they were cancelled because it had rained heavily the night before and the crypt had flooded. Even still, for just $5 it was the perfect way to spend a sunny Saturday afternoon and support a worthy cause in the process.

Moray

Before the salt ponds and the Inca Trail hike and Machu Picchu, there was one more Inca ruin that we visited—Moray, an archaeological site about 30 miles northwest of Cusco. We went to Moray on the same tour that included the Maras salt ponds and I do recommend taking a tour (we booked ours through our hotel)—and a load of Dramamine if you get car sick on speeding, rickety buses like I definitely did.

Moray comprises several circular terraces and it has been speculated that they were used by the Incas to study crops. Their depth creates as much as a 27°F temperature difference between the top and bottom terraces, and you can definitely feel that difference as you descend. The largest depression is 98 feet deep, and the site also includes an irrigation system (the Incas were wizards with water flow).

We didn't have a ton of time to explore the Sacred Valley before we left for our hike but I think we definitely chose the right tour. It might be sacrilege to say so, but after a while Inca ruins all sort of start to look the same—so much so that by the time we got to Machu Picchu it felt a bit anti-climactic. Moray felt different though—the stone work and terrace layout are Inca signatures for sure, but the concentric circles are just so perfect and visually stunning. You can only walk around—not inside of—the circular terraces, making for some excellent people-less photo opportunities although it's impossible for photos to capture the immense scale of this place.

I remember being fascinated by crop circles as a kid, and annoyed when it was revealed that they were done by humans (allegedly!). But attributing things like this to aliens is actually just doing a disservice to the very real humans that created them—probably out of necessity and with slave labor, unfortunately, but also with ingenuity and an incredible eye for composition—thousands of years before the promise of Instagram likes even existed.

Project 365: Days 183-189

183/365: This diva has been sleep-torturing me (pretty much always, but sometimes it gets worse?) and I'm still collecting advice if you have any ideas on how to keep her from screaming at me all night long.

184/365: I celebrated my four year New York-iversary at the House of Wax, a bar that was tailor-made for me and filled with hundreds of anatomical, pathological & ethnographic waxworks. I saw some of these at the Morbid Anatomy Museum (RIP) but I'll never get tired of how cool they are.

185/365: We spent a lazy Sunday lounging and snacking in Prospect Park.

186/365: I'll miss these sunsets when I move.

187/365: We spent our day off lounging and snacking on the beach in front of this abandoned hospital that I want so badly to creep on.

188/365: I'm hopeful that this will help Mozart chill out and not scream throughout the night and into the morning. Results from the first night were inconclusive, but I've read that it may take a while to work fully (fingers crossed).

189/365: My apologies for this terribly boring photo, but I went for a run after work, which I haven't done in a month. I don't want to talk about running all the time and be one of those people but I stopped to let a minor injury heal, because I was sick and felt like I needed time to recover from our recent trip. I will never been good at running but that's ok—it's something I need to do only for myself and I deserve to celebrate the times I do make it, and not punish myself for the times that I don't. 

I've got a lot of packing to do before I move which is daunting, I have to take a ton of stuff to Goodwill and I'd like to fit in a stoop sale (my first!) sometime soon. But other than that, I don't have any concrete plans for the weekend—I am hoping there's some mac n' cheese to be eaten at some point. Have a great weekend!

NYBG: Roses

My mom and I recently went to the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx to see the Chihuly exhibit. I met her for breakfast at Tom's on the Upper West Side (of Seinfeld fame) and we walked to the C train at 110th Street. We got off at 145th Street, the last place to transfer to the D which is the train that we needed to take to the garden. The first train that came was an A, and then another A. After the fourth A train came, I was frustrated and declared that if yet another A train pulled up, I was going home.

When the next train was indeed an A, my mom very sheepishly said "is there another level to this station? The announcements keep mentioning a lower level." We had waited for nearly an hour on the wrong platform, while presumably five D trains had come and gone below us. This was over a week ago and I still feel dumb but New York always seems to have a way of humbling you like this when you least expect it. 

Despite the delay, we did eventually make it to the garden and it was packed. When I lived in Manhattan, I was a member of the NYBG and I went frequently. I have never seen it so crowded, and we had to wait in line just to get a ticket. Luckily the Chihuly pieces are spread throughout the grounds, so unlike the holiday train or orchid shows the conservatory wasn't overwhelmingly packed. They were also running trams quite often, and we took one to the rose garden.

I actually wanted to visit the rose garden because I thought there was a Chihuly piece there (there isn't) and roses have never been my favorite flower or held much fascination for me. They've always seemed a little boring and cliche, but I think I've under-appreciated them for too long—maybe it just means that I'm officially turning into the old lady I've always (not-so) secretly been. Even though the blooms were past their peak (my mom kept saying "it would be nice if they weren't all dead") it's hard not to be wooed by the variety, beauty and fragrance of the humble rose.

Cartagena

After a week in Peru—and experiencing nearly every climate and season while hiking the Inca Trail—we headed north to Cartagena, Colombia for four days. Like Peru, I knew very little about Colombia, but after the dry, cold air high in the Andes, the warm, tropical humidity of Cartagena was a welcome change.

We had to take three flights to get to Cartagena, and aside from one very tight layover that had us running through the Lima airport Home-Alone-style, we had pretty good travel luck. I was also carrying my Peruvian market bat by this point and Colombian airport security is no joke—they questioned us so many times about how our luggage was handled that I almost started to think that it might actually be filled with heroin. Thankfully, my bat and I made it through various customs checkpoints without incident, but I did learn that I'd probably be the world's worst drug smuggler.

We stayed in the Getsemani neighborhood, located just outside of the old walled city. I didn't realize it when we booked our hotel, but this once crime-riddled area is now considered "cool" and "up-in-coming", or as we started calling it "The Brooklyn of Cartagena." The historic part of Cartagena is very small and walkable, and I definitely recommend staying in—or at least exploring—Getsemani. The area is filled with murals, bars and restaurants and there were some pretty decent-looking hostels if that's your thing. 

Founded in 1533, Cartagena is a port city on the northern Caribbean coast of Colombia. I had heard it compared in style to New Orleans, and I definitely agree with that assessment—even the cemeteries felt similar. Cartagena is a very colorful and joyful place, filled with beautiful hand-painted signs, rainbow-colored stucco buildings and vibrant nightlife. Our militant airport welcome wasn't very indicative of how I felt in Cartagena—I never felt unsafe or wary and generally found people to be very nice and welcoming. 

We mostly just walked around the city and tried (rather unsuccessfully) to keep cool—Cartagena has an average temperature of 88°F year-round, with an average humidity of 90%. It rained periodically while we were there but mostly we were thankful for the cloud cover.

We couldn't not stop into the Palace of the Inquisition museum, which had some interesting examples of torture instruments and even if we couldn't read most of the informational signage, at least the rooms were air-conditioned. We also made a point to visit the Iglesia de Santo Domingo, allegedly the oldest church in Cartagena. In 1552 it was rebuilt in its present location when the original burned down, and a portion of the floor is paved with 19th century tombstones (!!).

I can't speak much about the local cuisine because at this point in our trip I had just begun to eat real food again and was even more cautious than usual in stepping outside of my culinary comfort zone. We had some good tapas but if I'm being totally honest the best meal we ate in Colombia was at a Subway—it tasted exactly like Subway should and it cost the same as it would have in America, which was actually expensive for Colombia but so worth it.

We drank mojitos while watching the sunset at Cafe del Mar; had a less-than-ideal beach day where I threw a tantrum and still got sunburnt despite spending the entire day in the shade; explored the coolest cemetery and saw an unbelievable amount of exposed human remains; walked on the walls; cooled down with fruit from a street vendor and I saw my very first paste-up funeral announcement (which was to take place at the same cemetery we visited!). I do wish that I hadn't been so travel-weary at this point in our trip because Cartagena was a really beautiful place, worthy of more attention than I had left to give. Even so, one of the very best parts about Cartagena was that after 14 days of travel and five flights between two countries, we had a five-hour, direct flight back to New York.

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Where we stayed: Hotel Casa Pizarro

What we did: Palace of the Inquisition // Iglesia de Santo Domingo // Cementerio de Santa Cruz

Where we ate/drank: Cafe del Mar //  Demente // Caffé Lunático // I Balconi Pizzeria

Flavor Town

I don't really remember who mentioned it in the first place, but suddenly I was making reservations for me and three of my friends to eat at Guy Fieri's American Kitchen in Times Square. It's been five years since Guy's opened, and five years since it received this now-classic scathing review from Times restaurant critic Pete Wells. We went ironically, of course, but also because we thought that the food would be so bad (for us) that it was actually good (tasting). Although I've somehow never seen an episode of a Guy Fieri show, I have eaten at a few diners while his spray-painted on signature and face looked on (presumably because he had visited for his show Diners, Drive-Ins and Dives).

We made reservations not because we thought we needed to, but because the formality of it made me laugh. I once made reservations for the Hard Rock Cafe (also in Times Square, on a Tuesday night) and as the host was leading us through a near-empty dining room he asked, "So, where are ya'll from?" When we said "Brooklyn," he paused and then said in all seriousness, "Really?"

As you approach the entrance to Guy's, you're immediately bombarded with sensory input—screens and speakers and flashing lights competing for your attention in an already chaotic neighborhood. The decor consists of mostly car and guitar-themed pieces, including a few photos of what I assume is Guy's signature red Camaro bearing the license plate "FLVR TWN."

"Flavor Town" is a destination reached presumably by ingesting Guy's signature creations, which included dishes such as "Guy-talian Nachos", “'Awesome' Pretzel Chicken Tenders," and "Volcano Chicken." I'm by no means a food critic and my culinary tastes are decidedly basic so I genuinely went into Guy's expecting to love the unhealthy, greasy food and to be entertained by the ridiculous atmosphere. Well we were certainly entertained (by each other, mostly) but I'm sad to report that in five years the food doesn't appear to have improved much, if any from the same, bland, lukewarm fare that Wells wrote so memorably about.

The food wasn't by any means inedible, it was just perplexingly (and ironically?) flavor-less. At one point one of us said "This literally tastes like nothing," and though we tried, we never came up with a better one-line review of our experience than that. We started with a round of drinks and disappointment when three of us ordered the Sailor Jerry "High Honor" drink partially because it was supposed to come in a souvenir tin. Our waiter, Sal, informed us that they had long ago run out of tins and that the specials card on our table was "from Memorial Day," and he "had no idea why it was still being advertised."

The Dragon Chili Cheese Fries arrived barely warm, and despite being piled with recognizable ingredients like chili, tomatoes, cheese and bacon, barely tasted like any of those things. We all approached them tentatively, expecting them to be spicy (or at the very least, hot temperature-wise) enough to live up to the "Dragon Breath Chili" name, but found them to be woefully tame. The same can be said of the "Awesome" chicken tenders, which were fine—but dry and inexplicably cutlet-shaped. Whether you call them fingers or tenders it doesn't seem difficult to at least get the iconic shape correct. One review: "I'd rather eat a McDonald's chicken nugget—at least they're juicy."

Despite still remaining solidly on the outskirts of "Flavor Town," we awaited our entrees with hope. We decided to go full Fieri with two Bacon Mac n' Cheese burgers and one "Big Dipper," Fieri's take on a French Dip. One of the burgers came with a burnt top that we initially thought was a purposeful brand—until the waiter interrupted to say "I hate to burst your bubble, but it's not Guy's face. It just got too close to the broiler." The burger was woefully bland, despite claiming to be slathered with garlic butter AND Fieri's signature "Donkey Sauce."

Speaking of Donkey Sauce, apparently Fieri very recently admitted that it's really just garlic aioli, although I think that's an unfair comparison. I've never met an aioli—and especially a garlic aioli—that I didn't love, and our side orders of Donkey Sauce were grey, nearly tasteless and the consistency of Vaseline. I'm having a hard time choosing which flavorless item caused me the most distress, but it's probably the mac n' cheese. Mac n' cheese is one of my all-time favorite foods, and I'm still confused how exactly they got it so very wrong.

By the time it came to dessert, we had decided to go full-on Thelma and Louise—holding hands and just driving over the cliff together (hoping at the very least to finally end up in Flavor Town). We ordered the Deep Dish Cookie Dough Pie, described as a "warm chocolate chip cookie dough pie, toasted walnuts baked in a sweet, brown sugar crust + dollop of vanilla bean ice cream." We wondered how baked cookie dough could possibly differ from a regular chocolate chip cookie but that was the least of its problems. The vanilla ice cream actually had taste—not vanilla, unfortunately, but freezer burn. The pie was dry and brittle and I could occasionally taste a walnut, but not much else.

The only thing the whole evening that hinted that we might be in the near vicinity of Flavor Town? The strawberry garnish on our dessert actually tasted like strawberries, which might not sound impressive but it was a welcome reminder that our taste buds weren't inexplicably malfunctioning in unison. Our bill was $161 for the four of us, which isn't cheap even by New York standards, and we certainly didn't go to Guy Fieri's for an authentic New York experience.

Do I recommend eating or drinking at Guy's American Kitchen? No. Would I go back? Definitely not. Am I glad that we went? Absolutely. Like war buddies, the four of us emerged from Guy's greasy, confused and strangely full yet unsatisfied—forever bonded by our shared experience. We may not have ever actually made it to Flavor Town, but damned if we didn't try.

Four Year New York-iversary

I haven't really done much for longer than five years in my life. My longest relationship and job both lasted about five years and I took five years to graduate college. I don't think it's because I get bored easily (or because I was behind in college), but I think that my life tends to run in cycles. Like seasons, lives change—sometimes slowly and sometimes all at once but staying in one place, either emotionally or physically, never seems to be the best option for me for too long.

Four years ago today I moved to New York City, beginning what would be a period of huge change for me in nearly every area of my life. To live in New York is to live with seemingly constant change and I've mourned losses (friends, apartments, diners, the Morbid Anatomy Museum) just as much as I've celebrated gains (friends, apartments, diners, the Morbid Anatomy Museum). One month from now I'll be moving for the fourth time in four years—back to my last neighborhood, to a studio apartment one floor below where I used to live with my mom (and where she still lives, with a roommate). Besides two years in college, I've never lived alone before and I'm looking forward to it more than I can possibly explain.

I will miss Brooklyn and running in Prospect Park; walking home from the Double Windsor, home of the world's best mac n' cheese (shh); hosting Halloween parties and Christmas Vacation viewing parties in an apartment that can hold more than two people at a time; having a washer/dryer just steps from my bedroom; my morning commute that is surprisingly chill and affords me loads of reading time and all of the wonderful memories that I've made at 636 Carlton—before and after I moved there officially.

I won't miss living with roommates (despite having been quite lucky in that department); dollar van horns and garbage truck engines on Flatbush Avenue all night long; having a very loud washer/dryer just steps from my bedroom; worrying that Mozart is annoying my roommates as much as she's annoying me; juggling shower times with two other people on the same schedule as me; trying to get to North Brooklyn neighborhoods via Subway without having to go into Manhattan first and roasting nearly year round in a fourth-floor walk-up that gets too much sunlight (yes, that's a thing).

In some ways it feels as if I've lived in New York forever and I joke that most days I feel just steps away from turning into Lillian from Unbreakable Kimmy Schmidt. But in other ways it feels as if I've just arrived and when I think I've got my life figured out, another cycle ends and I'm forced to readjust to a new reality. The good news is that this all seems to be getting easier—even as the changes and stakes seem to just keep getting bigger—and I've weathered enough change in the past to know that it's inevitable and should be welcomed, not feared. So here's to another year or four or forty in New York—I may not have any idea what those years will bring, but I'm looking forward to finding out.

My Third Year as a New Yorker