Leaving the Bronx

It's my last day in New York, and I spent the night in the Bronx, so last night I googled "Horror movies set in the Bronx" and 1968's Rosemary's Baby came up. It happens to be on Criterion this month and I haven't seen it in at least a decade so I went with that. Unfortunately, this hotel's wifi is easily the worst I've experienced in the US or Japan and seems to simply not work except a few, secret, select hours a day. Even now as I write this it's not working so I imagine I'll post this at a Starbucks or something later (it's a McDonalds, it turns out). Last night, the wifi shut off in the middle of Rosemary's Baby. At least I know how it ends.

Roman Polanski used to have such great economy as a storyteller. Particularly with Rosemary's Baby and Repulsion, two movies from the point of view of a woman. Both of them seem to immediately attach themselves to the viewer's mind at the natural pace of thought and perception. Knowing he experienced life under a Nazi regime as a child, it's easy to see how he could conjure a world in which everyone you trust could suddenly turn out to have sinister motives aimed at you at the most intimate levels. Given levels of anti-Semitism in the US to-day, I wonder how far away we are from something like what happened in Germany in the mid-20th century. I didn't mention October 7th, either a few days ago or the day of the original massacre, though I think about it often. I found it horrific specifically because it was an attack on a music festival, an event where people attending have such implicit faith and trust in civilised behaviour that they can abandon themselves to experiencing artistic expression. I suppose Jihadists must be offended by anyone experiencing ecstasy outside the confines of religion because it seems concerts and music festivals are often targeted.

Another difference between New York and the west coast I noticed, there are a lot more Jews in traditional attire here. In fact, I wasn't the only one wearing a fedora. There are young Jewish men all over the city wearing black fedoras and I was asked by them no less than 15 or so times, "Are you Jewish by any chance?" The Sleepy Hollow Hotel, where I stayed a couple nights, is a prominent kosher and Hasidic and Orthodox Jewish-friendly establishment and event place.

I wonder why the Jewish population in California isn't so visible. I'm reminded of the scene in Polanski's Chinatown when Jack Nicholson's character pretends to be trying to get his father checked into a nursing home and the attendant tells him the place doesn't accept Jews. I suppose the stereotype of Jews with money must make them natural boogiemen when socialist or communist interests are prominent, or at least, the ignorant version of those interests, as in the case of the National Socialist Party.

Hopefully I'll have wifi to-morrow. I'm leaving for England on the Queen Mary 2. I'd planned on going to Europe and was idly thinking, "I sure wish there were some other affordable option aside from air travel." I've been on a lot of long flights this year. So I asked Google's AI if there was any way to go by sea and it mentioned the Queen Mary 2. Of course, it was much too expensive for me but then I noticed the price went down a few days later. Apparently these things work in the opposite way of airline and hotel reservations, the price actually goes down the later you make them. I waited 'til the price got down to just over 500 dollars. They force you to pay for at least two people, though, so the actual price I paid was just over 1000 dollars for a week's journey. Since it includes food, if I calculate the cost of a flight plus hotels for a week, that's still either cheaper or, at the most, just a little more expensive and I figure it'll give me more time to get work done. It's kind of a nuisance switching hotels all the time, chasing the best prices, though in just the two weeks I've been in the twin city area I feel like I've gotten a much more concrete impression of the physical space of New York and New Jersey.

I have to pay 30 dollars a day for wifi on the ship, which seems to be one of the hidden fees. I may see if it's possible to get it for only part of the voyage.

Sonnet 2013

A stamping crown of rusty nails approves
In office stations made to clear the green
Beneath the street, a steep decline improves
Surpassing soot is nothing truly clean
Potato changes hands to greasy bolts
As pigeon ships descend above the spike
Their tough and grumpy captain slowly molts
Collected birds prepare a feathered strike
In Union Square, the squirrels prepare cake
They crush their acorns 'neath the bench's foot
It's more than dizzy ravens like to take
The surplus in the taxi cab is put
A truly greenish crown ennobles dames
The tired moved and made substantial gains