Journal 5

Today’s class started to rain on our parade, no literally it rained all day but that didn’t stop us from seeing New York at all. We started walking to Time Square today to learn a little about the area and about its new pedestrian zone. I liked the new pedestrian zone because it gives people a place to relax and look at Times Square with out all the cars. Times Square before the 1904 was known as Longacre Square. “Longacre Square was dominated by horse exchange, carriage factories, stables, and blacksmiths' shops” (BG p.217). Soon this area started to see a big change into more of what it looks today. Crime and sex trade started to increase in this area until around 1980 “new commercial real estate development in the west 40s and 50s” (BG p.218). This new comm real estate lead to the sleazy area to become a tourist attraction. Every time I go to Time Square I can't help myself being a tourist looking up at all the flashing lights and caught up in the New York atmosphere. We also made a stop at the G.E. Building which I never went in before. I wish we could of done a tour of the NBC Studios. Another thing that I saw was the ice skating rink which wasn’t a ice skating rink yet and saw where the Christmas tree stands every year in December. This area I couldn’t believe how it looks completely different from winter and now.

After we left Rockefeller Center we walked to the New York’s Museum of Modern Art. We seen most of the artist of New York and more. But I finally got to see starry night which was hard to really look at it for awhile because all of the people wanting to take a picture of it. Another painting that stood out to me was sex and death. It was really graphic and just so much going on that I couldn’t stop looking at it. My other favorite one was the Spider-man one because I just like him as a superhero so really any painting of him I would like. Then after the art museum we went to Yum Yum 2 in Hells Kitchen for my first time eating Thai food which wasn’t bad. I really didn’t know what Thai food was at first but it was mostly like Chinese food. After we finished up the rain slowed down and we walked to the subway to head over to Brooklyn again. We went to a the City Reliquary Museum which was a community museum that stored all of Williamsburg and I found a old fireman jacket that had a American flag on the back of it and the city skyline on top of it. This piece of history spoke to me because I want to be a New York City firefighter and I'm also a volunteer firefighter in my town. I truly respect the firefighters that died on 9/11 and who risk there life in saving people. Lastly we had to stop at the Sketchbook Museum Project due to the bad weather and I learned it was a library that you can rent out artiest sketchbooks that help them develop there thoughts and ideas to there final piece. There was so many cool little notes and different types of drawings to designs. I could of stayed there all day looking at all the cool sketches.