short takes

Day 1: I am staying at the YMCA Vanderbilt - which is right near the UN. So after flying in I took a walk to check out my neighbourhood.

Day 2: I have lunch with a friend from my trip to Afghanistan. Afterwards we go check out some Morroccan rugs in an art gallery. They are fascinating - sorry the focus isn't the best on the first. Apparently the Berber women can't always access wool so they will then use whatever they can find - could be fabric scraps, as in the second one, or hosiery, as in the third one.

The patterns were very free style - we were intrigued about why they would use various colours and patterns. And then there were the random black spots - maybe because they always liek to have an imperfection in the rugs to show they were definitely made by humans and not God.

Day 7: today I visited a Flea Market - I loved this stall

And this is the nearby Subway Station. All the subways have the numbers/names in mosaics but this one is pretty special because it also features a lot of pictures related to teh Natural History Museum.

Wandering back home at the end of the day...

...and this installation - very sweet.