Sound Walking...

With the first signs of spring slowly rearing their heads everywhere across the city, that sluggish depressed feeling that I’ve had for the past couple of months is slowly lifting. I almost feel less trapped, but am waiting for the day where I can step outside the house without a winter coat on before I rejoice and officially proclaim that spring has arrived. Until then, I am keeping my eyes on the little green buds showing up – oh, and the fact that my itchy eyes and runny nose is back points to a definite spring-like quality in the air!

The bad thing about this long winter is that any attempt at being social involves running from the warmth and comfort of your apartment to the train station, freezing on the platform, running from the station to your destination coffee shop/restaurant /movie theater and then freezing your bum off while you’re there before repeating the whole process until you’re back in your warm, comfy sweats and sheepskin slippers (thanks Ouma!) and warmly tucked under a blanket, munching something warm and chilling on the sofa at home. So the natural choice then, is to just stay home in your warm, comfy sweats and sheepskin slippers and order in something warm and comforting. 

In an effort to break this nasty habit, John and I decided to venture out for our first day on the town in a long time this past Saturday. And what a fabulous time we had! It was as though the entire city was sharing our joy and had come out to play. But we had a mission. Before leaving home John had downloaded a ‘Soundwalk’ tour of Little Italy, a small suburb in trendy downtown SOHO. Narrated by one of the actors on the HBO show, The Sopranos, you upload this walking tour onto your ipod and then follow a map of the area while narrator Vinny Vella shows you the local haunts and hotspots. What a fantastic time we had! We ended up spending about fifteen minutes with ‘Sal’ at his barber shop (he’s a friend of Vinny’s and both John and I took a photo with this cool old Italian guy). The most memorable part of the tour was where Vinny handed us over to his Chinese friend who took us into a Chinese food market in China Town, just off Little Italy – What a weird experience! At the entrance to the store were the usual Chinese food fare, but as we moved to the back we were accosted with weird and non-wonderful edibles (?) including pork snout, pork hooves, crocodile legs (fresh…still included skin-covered feet), pork uteri (yes, one uterus, many uteri), duck’s feet, boneless duck’s feet, a variety of birds – all with the head still on, congealed pork blood and a strange variety of fish heads and other seafood that really belongs, well, alive and in the ocean. It was weird and a little freaky. But I guess that’s what part of making life in New York what it is…a melting pot of different cultures, different beliefs and, well, different appetites.

You can listen to an excerpt of our tour on the website, and if you’re ever in the city, be sure to schedule some time with Vinny – it is highly recommended!