Black is the new President, bitch

I went to the Guggenheim on Monday morning. A crazy building, but they were placing a pretty heavy focus on one particular photographer who was not all that interesting. I met Jess as planned at the Museum of Natural History, but we did a lot of talking as we walked around and it was hard to appreciate the museum itself. The Human Origins room was cool. We hung around Times Square and stuff, and went to a comedy show in the evening in the Upper East Side. Apparently it's a club where Jerry Seinfeld got started, etc... It was good comedy in general. Tuesday morning I went to the Met (the Metropolitan Museum of Art) - a sprawling museum full of antiquities and a neat section in one corner of European paintings. I spent a couple of hours there but still ended up power-walking through many of the exhibits. It's much like the Louvre in terms of sheer overabundance of stuff. Tuesday afternoon I had a snooze and then went to meet Jess and her friends for a private Election Night party that I had managed to invite myself to. There were many Australians... It was about 11pm when a Newsflash announced that Obama would be the new President. We decided to get a cab down to Times Square and join in the celebrations. Giant screens showed Mccain making his concession speech to much booing and jeering in the New York crowd. It was around midnight when Obama finally appeared, live from Chicago, and gave his straight-faced victory speech. Everyone was ecstatic.. it was such a beautiful atmosphere. Lots of people in tears... We had the real sense it was a very important moment in time.. But I can't help but worry that he can't possibly live up to all the hope that he's aroused in people... Yesterday morning I went out with my Israeli dorm-mate, R.L., to Harlem just to walk around. We stumbled upon a midday church service and went inside. It was a classic high-energy Black baptist service. People rising from their seats in religious rapture, calling out "Yes suh!" and "Praise Jesus!" and so on. The preacher kept referring to Obama as a tool of God, sent to heal the ailing nation, and referencing Dr King's "dream" speech with so much excitement that he looked ready to faint. R.L. recorded the whole sermon covertly. We walked a bit more around Harlem then travelled back through the city to the East Village, where we played pool in a big billiards hall until the rain stopped. Later I met Jess outside a club in the same area and we watched some bands in their basement bar - starting with a UK girl punk band and ending with a rollicking gothic country band from Brooklyn. Lots of fun. Today I went with R.L. to the Museum of Modern Art, yet another huge museum with an amazing collection of paintings (amazing!). Countless modern European paintings, as well as a few beautiful Edward Hoppers, a token Frida Kahlo, some Francis Bacons, and a George Grosz among many more that were particularly exciting to me. R.L. busied himself taking secret photos of gallery-goers - making for an interesting theme, I thought. They were controlling entry to the special Van Gogh exhibition, so I had to hang around until 3.30pm for my turn. Many of the paintings I had already seen at the Van Gogh museum in Amsterdam but many I had not. I'll be meeting Jess again soon in Brooklyn for dinner and more live music. It will be the first time I've left Manhattan since arriving in New York. Should be good. At this stage I plan to go to Montreal on Sunday.