Big Drama

(part 2 of 3)

The afternoon was going well, too well really.

After the powder blue skies and 360 degree Manhattan views from Big Bambu atop The Met roof, the rest of the day was always going to be a climbdown-both literally and metaphorically.

However, it starts positively, I am really enjoying the Medieval furniture hall and The American and I are pretending we're in The Tudors-the one with Jonathan Rhys Myers on Showtime.

"Ye privy council informs me you are a lady of ill repute!" The American bellows
"'Tis true, to my regret fine Sir!" I reply, head bowed in mock shame.

But it all starts to go tits-up when I get caught stroking a 15th Century tomb. A guard tells me off and The American joins in:

"Stop trying to touch stuff Emma."
"I can't!"
"Just stop!"
"It's too tempting, these things are like, 500 years old!" and I run my fingers along the side of a Belgian tapestry while his back is turned. 

Next, we're in a hall that resembles a Stately home, with grand room reconstructions from the last 400 years. It's so... opulent...decadent.

Oh god. I need to stroke things. Sit on the chair, sweep though the room in a Crinoline gown. Be ravished atop the Chippendale table. Instead I just get my camera out of my suddenly horribly modern looking bag. It's dark, I turn on the flash, take the picture.

"MISS! NO FLASH ALLOWED!" yells a scary Museum guard of indeterminable sex.

For the love of Henry VIII! There is no sign about not using a flash. PUT A FUCKING SIGN UP. And what's with the rules anyway? I'm snapping a chamber pot, not the Turin Shroud.

I take the flash off my camera anyway. Or rather, that's what I think I'm doing. Technology is not my friend. Technology just laughs in my face. I take another picture and the flash goes off and it's so bright against the dim lighting, it's like an atom bomb exploded and I'm getting yelled out... again.

As my finale, a mere 5 minutes later, I accidentally lean on a 17th century marble fireplace. It was absentmindedly-I didn't even realise I was doing it. I am told off once more.

This is my tipping point. I am mad and out comes my inner Verruca Salt. The last 3 misdemeanors weren't my fault and really, if it's that delicate,  I say put a cover on it? Or rope it off? These are the unspoken museum conventions we all adhere too. If it is touchable, I want to touch it. I will to touch it. I go stropping off and it would have ended there, had The American not have defended the Museum Nazis.

"Honnneeeeee. You just can't touch stuff."
'What?"
"They're like, totally right, why are you getting mad? You just can't touch shit in here!"
"I know that. I am not a frig-ging child."
"Well, you're acting like one."
'No...you're treating me like one."
"'Uh, cos you're acting like one!"
"Oh for fuck's sake!" I shout.

Then it kicks off. He tells me not to shout, I say I'm not shouting, just raising my voice, which was always the differentiating factor in my house as a kid. He storms off, muttering about just wanting to see the Roman statues. I go after him, we fight again in the grand Gothic lobby. He walks off, going outside to chain smoke. I go after him, we argue once more on the steps and he walks off for a third time and leaves me with all bags for our planned Central Park trip. Before I know it I am hurling a picnic blanket at him down the street. It misses, but by this point, several people have stopped to watch the free entertainment.

I march off in the other direction. I pass the crowd that had gathered, who now look really disappointed the fight is over. I want to ask them if us arguing is the best show they can get in this city?  I want to tell them they should come to my place, opposite the Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual and Transgender community centre-then then they'd see some real entertainment.

I walk up Fifth Avenue. Two blocks ahead, an entrance to Central Park. The great, grand green goddess I viewed from above while on the roof. The calm amongst the insanity of New York.

I head straight for it. I imagine grass under my feet. I haven't felt grass for months. Grass feels like home. Grass and space. I need space.

Space to breath.

Minding my P's and Q's

Of all the traits that will help you navigate your way through the urban jungle of New York-manners are pretty low on the list.

But being British means always saying you're sorry-usually in the form of two words "Excuse me?"

"Excuse me, can you help me?" "Excuse me can I just squeeze past?" "Excuse me, do you mind? "Excuse me do you know the way to Union Square/5th Avenue/ San Jose?""Excuse my breathing, excuse me living, excuse my excuses?" The only time New Yorkers say Excuse me is when you're in their way. Which I seem to be quite a lot. No matter where I stand. There's is not a genuine Excuse me though, it's a snippy forced one, spat out with vitriol and without a question mark. There is no time for punctuation. What they really mean is ''Get the hell out of my way you waste of skin."

Excuse me is the worst way you can start a conversation with an American. It confuses them, they think you're apologising for something, but they don't know what you're supposed to have done.

My own American goes so far as to say manners are annoying, frivolous and not necessary for a New Yorker. He theorises where population is dense, courtesies are squeezed out. I am reminded once more I am a Welsh Alien and how manners run gleefully back home-through the hills and towns- where we have plenty of space, enough for there to be more sheep than people.

Bring the Welsh to New York and they get caught out all the time.

"Excuse me?" says my Mother to a Mexican market stall holder in Boston train station, "Do you happen to know where the Bolt Bus for New York goes from?"

Excuse me is even worse when the person doesn't speak American as their first language. They just stare, blank faced. It's an expression I've seen many times before so I barge in.

"HEY! BOLT BUS? BACK TO NEW YORK?" I shout.
"Oh! Just over there. Gate 9!" he smiles back.

"You just have to shout and say less words." I tell Mum.
"Oww. Really? It just seems so...rude."
"I know, but it's the only way."
"But it's so...not...you know?...British."
"Yes, but you will spend too much time repeating yourself otherwise."

Mother looks bemused by this, but I suspect that it's because she has spent a lifetime repeating herself out of choice in the form of nagging.

I explain to her that Please and Thank Yous are something of an antiquated custom here. Akin to laying your coat across a puddle Sir Walter Raleigh style. Lay out your manners in the same way and it is you, not your coat that gets stepped on. You and your P's and Q's are a novelty.

I tell her how the common courtesy of holding a door open is greeted with...nothing...not even eye contact of gratitude. How I have taken to yelling "YOU'RE WELCOME!" at the top of voice to anyone who doesn't thank me. Which is everyone.

I say I have concluded that you have to pick and choose what British affectations to keep and which ones to lose.

She looks happy when I declare Please and Thank Yous will stay. I tell her am taking a nod from Beyonce when she says ''My Momma taught me better 'dan 'dat."

She looks bemused again. She doesn't get it, she is fluent in manners but she doesn't speak much American.

She doesn't speak New York.

*

Overexcite at the museum

Under the category of 'Spontaneous Sunday activity' The American and I are at The Natural History Museum.

We are in the queue arguing over the admission fee. He wants to pay the 'suggested' donation of $16, I want to pay a dollar.

''But why pay more when you don't have to?" I protest.
"This is not the way I want to budget Emma, ripping of the Natural History Museum."
"It's not ripping them off, it's a suggested entry! They they are suggesting that we don't have to pay loads of money. You can pay what you like!"
"No. They are suggesting we pay sixteen bucks each."
"Why spend money we don't have to?"
"Well, we'll have to spend more anyway, as I want to do an exhibition. If we just do a suggested donation we don't get to go into any exhibitions."
"I'm fine with that. I just want to see the Gorillas and stuff."'
"We're paying the full rate Emma."
"I'm freelance! There should be a special rate."

Turns out there's a dizzying array of entry options, when you factor the exhibitions in. Suddenly it's gone up from $16 to $24 and we have to make a quick decision on which one we want to see. I grumpily vote for Journey to the Stars (because it looks like the least boring option). He votes for The Silk Road.

"The Silk Road? Seriously?" I protest
"Yeah, that is like totally interesting."
"How? What is there to say? Men in The East travel on camels through the desert, it's really hot, they trade silk-The End!"
"Fine! Stars it is then." he concedes, probably to distract me from the fact he is handing over 50 bucks to the guy at the desk.
''Next time why don't you tip him 20 percent too!" I shout as I stomp off. 

*

20 minutes later and I am standing in the Hall of Biodiversity in front of the guard who's next to the roped off entrance to The Hall of Ocean Life.

"Hi, when do the fishies re-open?" I ask cheerfully

Silence, accompanied by a menacing stare. God, I need to get in there. There is a giant whale hanging temptingly from the ceiling in the distance and I want to stroke it.

''Excuse me, I say, with authority this time "When do the fish re-open?"
He looks up.
"I dunno."
"You don't know?"
"Nope." he shrugs
'Right, well is there someone who does know?
"Listen, they're like...doin' some stuff in there right? So I can't call it."
"Great, so you just don't even want to guess?"
Another shrug is all I get in response.

*

We are in The Hall of Biodiversity. I admit that I don't really know what Biodiversity is. The American claims he does, so I ask him and he says:

"It's like...lots of different life and...like... lives and stuff"

Hmmm. I try and read this more in depth description but he talks and it interrupts the voice in my head:

This becomes a feature of our trip, The American imparts his knowledge without it being requested while I try and read the information on the brass plates. Then I try reading out loud to indicate that his talking means I can't concentrate. He doesn't get the hint and becomes especially feverish when we are in the North American Mammals hall and there are lots of native Alaskan animals. He lived there for 3 years and takes great pride in telling me how he once woke up to see an Alaskan moose grazing outside his window.

I don't know much about Alaska, aside from the fact that Sarah Palin lives there and online shops are always at pains to stress they will not deliver there (or Puerto Rico) but now I can add another fact to my arsenal: They have a lot of animals there with really big antlers. There are lots of antler animals in the museum generally. To be honest, I think they totally overdid it on the antlers.

We head off for the Asian and African animals halls via the dinosaur bones in the regal main entrance.  The American explains how the tall one with a long neck and a small head was a vegetarian. He tells me that the ladder-like neck allowed him to munch the leaves out of the trees.

"Like a giraffe!" I say.

I tell him that I reckon that this particular dinosaur must have evolved into the giraffe, which I think is quite an intelligent comment, but The American cracks up and says "You don't know shit."

Asian and African Mammals are a bit 'seen one you seen them all' so it turns out. Predictably there's elephants in both. I insist on leaning over the velvet rope to stroke some hide and The American tells me off.


Then it's time for the stars thing and I am worrying it's going to be really boring and long and a bit like Techniquest in Cardiff. You know, one of those teachy preachy experiences ''Oww yeah, science is fun boys and girls! Now watch my bow tie light up powered by these 16 Hamsters in a cage!"

Hundreds of us stand in line for a giant white dome, that looks like the Epcot centre in Florida.

We file into a humongous circular cinema with a domed ceiling at least a 100 ft high. Whoopi Goldberg's voice booms out as a giant panorama of Central park in the summer sunshine spans 360 degrees around the screen. The American and I look at each other and mouth "WOW".

The arena goes dark and planet Earth appears at the top of the dome and then drops down from the sky. Comets and other planets pop up and move across the dome and flashes of light come right at you. Hundreds of stars rain down from the ceiling and Whoopi talks about supernovas and auroras as they dance around in front of us. I can't stop oww-ing and arr-ing and am squeezing The American's hand in wonderment.

I begin to have all these unexpected existential thoughts about who or what I am in this vast existence. This is the Universe and I am a teeny tiny me in comparison. Whoopi asks us all to concentrate on a star and stare at it and watch what happens. I fix intently on the brightest one I can find. I stare and stare and tears start to prick at my eyes. It makes me remember how Dad and I used to do the same thing when I was a kid. How we would gaze up, necks crained at the inky black sky and look for the brightest star. Then he would say that star was mine.

Two fat tears roll down each cheek because I miss him but I try and hold it in, like you do in the cinema at a sad film. When the lights come up I feel silly, like people will think I've been crying about the stars.  I hurry outside the dome and find a bench to compose myself on. The American follows and comes and gives me big bear hugs.

"Wanna go to the giftshop honey?" he asks gently
*Sniff, sob* "Oh...yes please." *sniff sniff sob* "Can we go see the Gorillas too?'
"Sure honey."
*Sniff sniff* "Will you let me take a picture of you beating your chest next to them?"
"Of course honey."
*Sniff, sniff sob* "Thanks. Love you."
"Love you too honey."

*

Snowmageddon

If frenzied local TV news reports are to be believed New York is on the verge of becoming a real life version of 'The Road'.

"It's a big time storm people!" NY1 has been screaming for the last 24 hours.

If Ny1 had pants it would be wetting them right now. This week they've had a City councilman charged with fraud (Larry Seabrook claimed $170 for a bagel), the last fashion week at Bryant Park and snowmageddon-all in one week. There is even the possibility of these stories colliding-should the accused decide to turn up at the tents and become trapped by a giant snowdrift while trying to get a receipt for $120 for a can of coke.



The fervor was fed by mayor Bloomberg who called a press conference yesterday about the snow, which he kicked off by declaring the closure of all NY public schools on Wednesday. After that annoucement from the NY Department of Knee Jerk Reactions came this advice from The Mayoral Ministry of Stating the Frickin' Obvious:

"Wear hats, scarves and gloves"

Bloomberg then looked serious before decreeing:

"Don't shovel snow if you're not in great shape, we don't want anyone having a heart attack"



This all smacks of British weather panic and brings back memories for me of sitting at news desks writing headlines like "Batten down the hatches", even though I was always pretty sure no one had hatches and I remain unconvinced 'batten' is a word. I expected better of hardened New Yorkers.



Meanwhile on the lovingly low budget NY1 there's some more advice for the advice frenzy machine. Just to make sure you get the message they are running them over some cheap snowflake graphics:

'Find your snow Shovel'
'Plan your parking'
'Be ready for airport woes'

Telling New Yorkers how to deal with snow is a little like telling Brits how to deal with rain.


As I write this evening Bloomberg is doing another press conference live on NY1. He's telling us all how well he's dealt with the snow and how justified he was in closing schools.

Just in case anyone should think he's making a icy mountain out of a snowy molehill he's chucking in a serious news angle. New York blood banks have lost 1500 donations today so Bloomberg is urging us all to go and donate.

Then for viewers bothered by the serious tone, there's some light relief from the Mayor-Fear not fans of musical theatre! The likes of Jersey Boys and Wicked won't let 10 inches stop them! Oh no!

"All Broadway performances will go on as planned."




The show must go on. Thanks Mike.

That's more like the New York I know and love.

Same shit, different Ikea...

It is a truth universally acknowledged that a trip to Ikea, no matter where in the world, will always yield the same five things:

1) Tealights.
2) Wine glasses with an unfathomable name like 'Klumpenkont'.
3) Frustration and self loathing.
4) At least 10 things you don't want, but are convinced will make your life better. These items are usually storage related.
5) A bill roughly 50% higher than you estimated when walking around and 200% higher than you originally planned to spend



Visiting New York Ikea is no different to anywhere else, the homogenisation police have seen to that. If anything, it is more of pain in the arse for me personally because I don't have a car. There are no Ikeas in Manhattan. Manhattanites speak of craziness like getting water taxis to the Brooklyn Ikea. I do not think flatpack furniture and boats are a happy marriage and anyone that thinks so has clearly been living on an island for too long.

So I plan to subway and bus it to Brooklyn Ikea with The Teenager in tow. She has been bribed with the promise of a bedside table, but my main purpose is to buy black out roller blinds for the apartment. The blinds will cost the same price for five as they will for just one at Bed, Bath and Beyond up the road from the apartment. I am conveniently ignoring the fact that what I am planning will involve hours of travel and the eventual purchase of far more than just the blinds, therefore rending the saving nil and effectively taking me into a negative balance.

If this is my first mistake, then my second is listening to a man on a shopping related issue.

''Huneee. Go to the New Jersey Ikea, it is waaay nearer than the Brooklyn one" The American advises.
''Hmm, not sure, that's not what google maps is saying."
''I am telling you Huneee. And it's super easy. Go to the bus terminal by Times Square and there's a free bus!''

Super easy. It sounds too easy. American easy rather than British easy

45 minutes later The Teenager and I are at the Port Authority bus terminal. We have spent ten minutes trying to locate where the free bus goes from and another ten realising we need to get a ticket for the free bus, even though it is free, so a ticket seems superfluous. We have been dissed by the rudest woman ever employed by New Jersey transit and gravely misunderstood by an African cleaner. We are standing at the window of a tour company that is the last booth left to try:

''Do you run the free bus to Ikea in Elizabeth?"
''Yes we do!''
"Brilliant! When is the next one?''
"Last one went at 3."

It is 3.o7 p.m. On the man's instruction we go back over to the New Jersey transit windows. I refuse to stand in line for the rudest woman ever employed, so end up in a longer line that takes 10 minutes to get to the front of.

''Hey, do you run a paid bus to Ikea?''
''Where?''
"Ikea."
"In Elizabeth?"
"Yes!'
"Yes."
"Great!"
"Last bus went 2 minutes ago...NEXT!"

It is 3.17 p.m.

The Teenager has decided a bedside table is not worth this much hassle and looks ready to attack me when I tell her we are not giving up and are going to the Brooklyn one instead.

I call The American. The American claims it will be simple.

15 minutes later we are on a Brooklyn bound C. The train stops at Jay Street and then we are to change trains to the F. Except that when we get to F the F-ing F is not working. The platform has been cordoned off with dramatic looking tape as if multiple murders have taken place there. But the only murder taking place is the one the teenager is committing on me in her head for dragging her into all this. Weekend engineering works are the culprit. There are signs taped everywhere directing passengers to a bus. A bus? I have never even been on a bus in New York, how do they go faster than 2MPH with all the traffic?



By now The Teenager can only bear to speak to me to ask to borrow my phone to call The Boy.
''We have missed our SKYPE date cos of this crap Mother."
''Sorry."
''Just give me yer phone yeah?''

We left the house 3 hours ago and are going nowhere fast. Halfway through the bus journey I casually mention the other bus we have to change to.

''Other bus? What the fuck Mother?''
"Language!"
"What other bloody bus?"
''The Ikea bus!''
"We're on the Ikea bus!'
"No, we're on the bus that takes us to the Ikea bus."
"For god's sake! I want a frigging car yeah? I want a car for my 16th."
"Don't be so ridiculous. We live in Manhattan, no one drives. "
"I want a car."
"You're not getting a car."
"The American says if we all move to LA we could all get cars. Convertibles."
"The American talks a lot of shit sometimes."

*

We are on the other bus and after ten minutes of bumping down unfinished roads to the sound of the gangsta' rap being played by the driver- the familiar blue and yellow Ikea branding is blinking in the distance of the Red Hook sky. We get off the bus to a gang fight over the road and The Teenager is worried that someone will get shot, so makes me run with her to avoid any potential gunfire.

When inside my brain is compromised and I start to believe that hanging art Ikea prints on your wall is acceptable behaviour and that cardboard storage boxes are the road map to peace in the Middle East. Everything happens pretty fast and in the midst of it all The Amercian calls and agrees to order me a car service back to Manhattan to make up for his earlier balls up suggesting New Jersey Ikea and subsequent fuck up of not checking weekend engineering works.



Before I know it I am heading for the checkout with a trolley full of things I won't be able to even remember I bought by this time next week. All around me are similar victims. Shell shocked New Yorkers, their trollies piled high with bright plastic chairs and Lack side tables. No one knows what just happened to them.

I have forgotten something and I can't remember what it is. Somewhere in this distance my child is whinging about getting to the hot dog and ice cream cafe before the car arrives. In America it is a hot dog, frozen yogurt and doughnut cafe. An Ikea manager somewhere is loosing his bonus for allowing this flouting of Ikea homogenisation rules.

The fucking blinds!

I go tearing back through Ikea the wrong way, which as we all know, is nigh on impossible, so I run faster so as not to get caught by the anti clockwise patrol. I arrive at a tiny selection of Venetian Blinds. Where are the Roller blinds? I scan frantically only to see voiles.
Voiles, voiles, everywhere. Panels of fabric swaying tauntingly from the ceiling. Where are the roller blinds?!

By sheer fluke, one of Ikea's three only employees walks by and I grab them, a look of panic in my eyes.

''Where are the roller blinds?"
''Huh?"
''The Roller Blinds"
''What blinds?''

Fucking hell, shall I just google the Swedish for blinds? Is my speaking the Queen's English in the manner it was meant confusing you? I make a mental note to hire full time translator so Americans can understand me.

''Black out?''
''Oh the blinds?"
"Yes!"
''Like roller, black out blinds!''

Big pause.

''Nah, we don't do them anymore..."
"What?"
"Yeah, there is some kind of problem with them and they, like, took them off the shelves. Sorry!"

And she walks away, like the last wasted 5 hours of my life are of no significance to her. I look at my watch, which has started to run backwards in the oxygen deprived rabbit hole of Ikea. 5 hours. 5 hours of my life that I will never get back.

Just the same shit. Different continent.

Mrs Smith takes Manhattan

 

There is no minimum qualification period for becoming a New Yorker.

As soon as you land at JFK you're in. In a city of great democracy all comers are welcome-the only conditions are a few dollars in your pocket and lots of attitude.

This week my mother arrives and has the latter down to a tee. It starts in the back of the cab when we arrive at the apartment.

''How much?''
"2o percent Mother."
"What for? I am paying him 50 dollars already!" The cab driver is rolling his eyes in the rear view mirror. Brits moaning about tips, nothing new I imagine.
"Mum, you gotta tip 20 percent, that's the standard."
''Ten dollars? You want me to give him ten dollars?" she protests incredulously "That's 20 percent!''
"Yes mother. I know, I just said that."
''Bloody ridiculous!" she huffs and hands me a wad of notes, ''There's $56 and that's all he's getting!"

The teenager and I laugh loudly and haul her suitcases out of the cab while she waits impatiently on the steps of the apartment. God we've missed her. Lots.

The next day Mum is tackling New York via the subway, armed with a laminated map and 66 years of finely honed navigation skills. Halfway through the day she has already declared me 'crap at the subways'. She also informs me my Blackberry GPS is 'bloody shit'.

We climb onto a packed commuter train later and a young boy, maybe ten or so, is sitting down reading Harry Potter with his bag sat beside him on the only spare seat. Mum picks it up and plonks it on his lap and sits herself down. He is agog but she ignores his looks of disbelief.

This might be New York, but they need to move over for Mrs Smith.



*
On October 19th at 1 p.m. The American I get married at the Ladies Pavilion in Central Park. The gloomy cold has turned to bright sunshine and warmth for the first time in over a week and the park is movie set pretty, dappled with Autumn golds. We say our 'I dos' with New York at our feet, led by a nautical captain we found on the Internet 48 hours previously. Tourists mill around snapping pictures on their SLRs.

Afterwards we take our own pics and while my back is turned Mum sprinkles some of Dad's ashes among the rose petal confetti.

We hail a yellow cab and go to Baltazhar for a $400 boozy lunch and get free champagne from the management. The freebies continue at the Gramercy Park hotel where we get a cake delivered to our room and an upgrade to a suite. Mum and The Teenager come for a cocktail at the rooftop bar where a round costs $120. As usual she is served without a blink but nearly gives her age away squealing with excitement when bumping into Terrance Howard from Iron Man in the lobby.

Mum and The Teenager leave and then it's just The American and I left to do what most newlyweds do- getting too trashed and passing out in what is probably the best hotel room you will ever stay in.

Goodnight Mr Rudolph. Goodnight Mrs Rudolph.



*

On Mum's last night three generations of Smith women go to Bitchy Bingo at a drag bar around the corner. Mum might be a drag virgin but when it comes to the bingo, she's got it locked. She wins the first game and secures herself top prize, which turns out to be two tickets to a gay play.

''Hello?" she shouts at the host while waving the tickets. Oh god. Oh god. Oh god. Ginger spins on her glittery platforms.
''Yes?'' she snaps back and shoves the mic at Mother
''What good are these to me?''
''Excuse me lady?''
''I said, what good are these to me?! I don't even live here!''
''Oh right." says Ginger. I clench everything, knowing the comeback is just seconds away:
''So tough shit England lady, go tell the fucking Queen about it!'' and with that she flounces off to laughter from the bar. This does not deter my mother. Amber and I exchange worried glances as we see her open her mouth to continue the exchange
''Uh excuse me! I am NOT English!''
Ginger turns around and I can tell that for a moment she is stumped. She buys herself a little more time...
''Ok, so where ya from lady?''
''I am Welsh.''
''What?
''Welsh!''
''Where?''
''Wales!''
''Yeah, no one gives a shit" and then she walks away again and tells my mother she likes the attitude, but to try turning it down a notch, which causes Mum to laugh uproariously.

It's a laugh I haven't heard for a while and thought I might not hear again. I think through a frozen cosmo haze how miraculous that laugh and my Mum's spirit are. And that I am a married lady now. And a New Yorker.

And that both of us are survivors of several of the craziest months ever known.

Cheers. To. That.

Finding my New York...

New York City is an assault on the senses.

It is loud, smelly, breathtakingly beautiful, it feels rough and smooth and sometimes leaves a bad taste in your mouth. Today I hate New York and New York hates me right back.

I am standing on a corner in Chelsea crying into the phone to my Mum. The reason for this is the perfect Manhattan apartment that I gained blisters trying to find looks like it has fallen through. I can't take looking at anymore overpriced shoeboxes or hanging around on blocks where even the drug dealers fear to tread. So I am crying like a big baby.

In the UK simply having a deposit, the first month's rent and not looking like a psycho is usually enough to secure you a flat. It was certainly the only requirements I had for my tenants. Not so here: Imagine the worst job interview you ever had. Now imagine you had to pay for the privilege of going through the stress.

The real estate agent has come back and said that the landlords require yet another month's security. With a 15% fee you might think they could deliver better news. The amount the landlord require us to put down before we move is roughly the same as my annual starting salary when I graduated.

And who are we to argue? What with The American's imperfect credit rating and my non existent U.S. one. So this is where the call to my mother comes in; to beg for cash, which felt acceptable in my twenties, but is simply humiliating half way through my thirties.

New York doesn't care that I am crying, I am just another freak on the street. The noise level seems to go up tenfold as cars whizz by and beep their horns aggressively and a big, gleaming truck screeches it's breaks so loudly I can't even hear my own sobs.

I just want my bed. Then I realise I don't even own a bed here and this makes me cry even more. I call The American and I can't hear what he is saying so I shout down the phone against the noise. I tell him I just want my own place in New York, that I just want to find my place.

*
When I pull myself together I walk down the street towards the subway when a camp man swinging a Whole Foods bag bumps into me and nearly knocks me over.

'Stoopid.' he mutters.
Wait. He bumped into me?
I pause. Then go for it: ''FUCK YOOOO!'' I shout.
He swings around and eyes me threateningly ''What. Did you just say to me?''
Oh crap. I picked a fight with the gobbiest gay in Chelsea.
''I said..." and I gulp and get ready to run: ''FUCK YOOO!'' and with that I leg it into the subway, praying he doesn't have a metro card to follow me.
"You're a cunt lady." he screams after me
''And you Mr Are an even bigger cunt!'' I holler back.

I have never called anyone a cunt in public before. It is my first public cunt and my first New York FUCK YOOO! and it feels great.

*

"Hey huneee. I got us this."
The American places a small red radio down on the table. I am furrowed eyebrows.
"It's a wind up radio." he explains.
"Like they use in Africa?"
"Yes!"
"Oh right. Ummm. Why?"
"Because huneee. We can listen to announcements should Manhattan ever get attacked."
"Are you being serious?"
"Manhattan is an island huneee. There is no way to get off in a disaster."
"Matthew. This is not a disaster movie."
"Huneee we had a real life disaster movie here? 9/11?"
There is not much retort to a sentence that ends with 9/11 so I shut up.
''Huneee I just want to protect you and my stepdaughter. I just want to protect my new family''

The American has found his place in New York.

*

I go for a drink with the first in a long line of Cardiffians who've promised to come out to New York. I meet Nick and his friend Jim and spend a great few hours talking to them about home and their impressions of New York while I sip small but deadly $6 cosmos.

The bar woman offers to buy us all a round of drinks and Nick and Jim think it's some kind of joke. Like any good Welshmen would, they want to know what the catch is and I say as far as I know there isn't one. I am a little too pissed to remember the exact etiquette with 'buy backs' but I figure like everything in this city, it just involves a lot of tipping. So when we leave we put so much cash on the bar, it could have simply bought us another round. Which leads me back to the beginning of this paragraph and there being no catch. The lack of logic in the whole process can really do you in when you've been drinking. Probably why 'buy backs' work so well.

When I get back to the ever glamorous Queens I trip out of the subway and spot a pair of $20 cowboy boots in a Thrift store. I Insist they get them out of the window and drunkenly try and pull them on, while still standing on one foot. I sway a little to the left and then a little to the right. They won't budge, so I yank some more and nearly topple over before conceding that they don't fit. The woman behind the counter rolls her eyes. In New York even the volunteer at a thrift store in Astoria has attitude.

I leave the store smiling and trip down the street blinking against the lights. I feel for my engagement ring, a nervous habit I have developed since The American put it on my finger. I remember I have a knuckle, so It can't just fall off.

The smell of the kebab stall wafts down Steinway and music is blasting from the Brazillian bar. I can still taste the rocket fuel cosmos. It's ok. New York can assault my senses today.

I will find my place here.

I will find my New York.