Donovan's Brain

I arrived back home late Friday night from a two week holiday in the US – 8 days in Boston and 6 in NYC.

Staying in hostels paid off again; it was cheap and I met lots of interesting people. I went out drinking a couple of nights in both cities with a guy from Argentina, sat watching the July 4th fireworks in Boston with a girl from Columbia (and 600,000 other people), went up the Empire State building for sunset with a girl from Canberra, and spent a couple of days in Manhattan with a woman from Denmark.

In Boston I visited both Harvard and MIT campuses (including somehow getting onto a tour for prospective students), and the MIT museum. The latter was very good, much better than I was expecting. Highlights were the display of holograms, which were much, much better than the crappy ones you see in shops aimed at tourists, and the kinetic art sculptures by Arthur Ganson.
To learn the history of the city I followed the Freedom Trail, a 2.5 mile walking tour of 16 historic sights in Boston, mostly related to the early settlers and the beginnings of the fight for American independence. Another interesting part of Boston was Beacon Hill, an old residential area very near Downtown consisting of grand houses built in the mid 19th century by the rich Boston Brahmins (a term given to the wealthy, elite, members of Boston society).

My time in NYC was a similar mix of walking, museums (the Guggenheim,
the Met), and checking out the architecture of the different areas. I was lucky enough to have a local guide for a couple of days, Lisa’s friend Ian, who took me to eat in Chinatown and Koreatown and down to Battery Park and Staten Island.

The weirdest thing of the whole trip was bumping into my friend Fernando who I’d met in Boston and had been out with in NYC when I was at the top of the Empire State Building. How many millions of people are there in New York? Sure, he was a tourist too, but it’s still pretty unlikely.

But the best part of the trip was seeing Pearl Jam play live three times, more of which another time.