(continued from the previous post...)
After the museum, the plan was to go to MOMA (Museum of Modern Art). When we arrived, it was around 4:15pm and the museum closed at 5:30pm. Plus, the line-up to get into the museum was pretty long. We wanted to have enough time to see everything thoroughly without feeling rushed, so we decided to pass on visiting the museum and save it for next time.
We walked past a smaller museum next door, the American Folk Art Museum, and decided to go inside. The museum has 5 levels, and we were told to start at the top and work our way down. (I didn't take many photos because after snapping a couple, a security guard informed me that you weren't allowed to take pictures). The 5th Floor had the museum's permanent collection, which showcased a variety of art across centuries in a variety of mediums.
The 4th Floor had more art that was part of the permanent collection as well as the Henry Darger exhibit. I hadn't heard of him before, but his art is utterly fascinating. His artwork was not found until after his death, but it is super impressive in sheer volume - he wrote a 15,000 page story that featured many characters that he created for his own ficticious world. His art features these characters - it is incredibly interesting!
The 3rd Floor was a loaned collection of Ulysses Davis who created intricate word carvings of important Biblical and mythical characters, presidents, plus more. I hadn't seen anything like it before!
On the 2nd and 1st Floors, there were a collection of Paula Nadelstern's Kaleidoscope Quilts! What a unique and interesting concept. I've never seen anything like it! When you got up close, you could see just how detailed the quilts are - careful planning on the precise placement of the fabrics to create a perfect kaleidoscope design. There were many different takes on the kaleidoscopes as well - snowflake patterns, and "shards" - a kaleidoscope that was broken and pieced back together.
There was a little shop at the museum where we were able to purchase a book about the Henry Darger collection at the American Folk Art Museum, an "opulent ornament" that looks like the patterns from the kaleidoscope quilts made of fabric, and a kaleidoscope quilt postcard. All in all, the fact that we didn't have time for MOMA didn't matter - we found a hidden gem in NYC, the American Folk Art Museum.
After the museum, we made our way back to the subway. Tired with sore feet, plus hunger setting in, we were in search of good eats. I consulted my list of restaurants that I looked up in advance, and I wanted to try out a nice vegan restaurant called Angelica Kitchen. Located in the East Village, it was a bit of a trek on the subway (transfer to the L-train), but we arrived and walked a couple of blocks to 12th St at 2nd Ave. The menu looked very appetizing so we went inside.
We ordered some tasty selections from the menu - Norimake to start, fresh lemonade and cool apple cider, and main dishes: Poolie got a Tempeh special and I got the Dragon Bowl with soup + bread: rice, beans and sauce, a green pea and vegetable soup, and sourdough whole wheat bread with onion spread.
The Norimake sushi rolls had many vegetables and bean curd. The rolls were really too big and they fell apart really easily - they weren't really rolled properly. I enjoyed some of the flavors, but Poolie didn't feel as though the vegetables all necessarily tasted good together.
My soup was excellent and had garlic croutons. The bread was nice, but the onion spread was a tad too sweet and pasty. The juices were excellent.
Our main dishes arrived - mine had rice, pinto beans, tofu cubes, sea vegetables and other veggies with a soba sauce. The sauce tasted great! The tofu cubes and rice were the best part of the meal, the pinto beans were just okay and the veggies were alright. The sea vegetables were kinda gross. Poolie's tempeh dish wasn't as great - he said it was totally bland and had no flavour - it came with a bland sauce with a few sides (beans, cucumber) that didn't add anything special. The tempeh was spiced but was uninspiring.
It didn't help matters that two of the most vapid girls sat down next to us, plus we had a pseudo-intellectual who read a book during half of his meal on the other side of us. Clearly, this was a dining locale for fake-hipster-wannabes in the city. Our waitress was also rather dour; she lacked any sort of spirit, was neither pleasant nor unpleasant, but brought an air of depression to our table. I guess you win some, you lose some when it comes to restaurants! Next time, we will do ourselves a favour and head back to Gobo's in Greenwich for a fantastic vegetarian meal!
After dinner, Poolie was a little disappointed so we stopped for ice cream (I got a coffee instead since I was pretty full from dinner!) We took the subway back to Port Authority. The NJ Transit schedule that I printed out from the website before we left for the trip said that the bus came at 7:56pm. We waited for 20 minutes after purchasing NJ Transit tickets for the 125 bus from the machine. We waited and I thought to check the wall to make sure that the bus was coming. The bus schedule changed - the bus now comes at 7:30pm on Sundays (must have missed that one) and then not until 9:00pm! Ugh, we did not want to wait that long!
We decided to check back at gate 51 for the Community Coach bus and they had a large coach bus to take people back to NJ! Community Coach is way better than NJ Transit - way more frequent and way more reliable! So, we have unused NJ Transit bus tickets...oh well, a $5 souvenir, haha.
Back to the hotel...we took the elevator up to our room and our room keys didn't work. We went all the way back down and got them activated again. Back in our room, thank goodness the toilet seat was fixed! But...this time, the toilet was broken! It wouldn't flush! Another call to the front desk, and we waited again. Finally, someone showed up to fix it (a Howard Johnson employee from next door, just like yesterday) and after about 10 minutes, he was able to fix it. Thank goodness, I did not want two nights in a row with a broken toilet!
Now, we are finally settled in and will get ready to leave bright and early tomorrow morning! We have had a great vacation here and will have to come back for more!
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