Time to Leave New York City

Time to Leave New York City

A sketch book sketcher clandestinely sketches a boy playing a guitar and a harmonica in the Metropolitan subway stop of Brooklyn. The guitar and harmonica boy has short, ratty white-person dreadlocks and plays songs for alms in the subways of New York City. He has a nice Fival Mousekewitz hat over his white-man dreads and belts out “C’est la vie, we all move on” through the underground tunnels of the city I am about to leave. The scribbler – me – scribbles notes about the sketch book sketcher and the guitar and harmonica player.

Craftsmen at work.
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Wade from Vagabond Journey.com
in Brooklyn, New York City- December 16, 2008
Travelogue — Travel Photos — Travel Guide
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The Beady Eyed Fruit Man has already escaped the Brooklyn winter to slumber out the season like a king is his Calcutta home.

“Hey Boss!’ he yelled out to me as I passed him on the street.

“Hey Fruit Man!” I yell back.

“I go back home tomorrow, to Calcutta!”

“Calcutta? That is a nice city,” I oddly found myself saying as I remembered walking knee deep through the overflowing sewers there with Stubbs in 2005.

We then shook hands, embraced, and that was it. The Fruit Man was gone. One of my characters in the big city has moved on to other pastures. I know that I am next.

As I walked away, I could hear the Fruit Man yelling out to me, “You want yellow plum? Three for one dollar, five for two dollars.”

I am going to miss this Indian fellow ripping me off with good humor.

I finished my undergraduate degree, crossed a half dozen hurdles, smashed through a brick wall, and now I find myself on the other side: a university graduate with no prospects but the entire world.

This weekend I will probably leave New York City and then have Christmas with my parents and little Chinese sister Upstate. In early January I have a flight going to Budapest, Hungary. From there I am looking east . . . always east.

I went for a long walk yesterday. A preemptive goodbye walk. They day was surpisingly mild, and white clouds moved swiftly through a blue sky. I walked from Brooklyn Heights over the Brooklyn Bridge to Manhattan, up to Chinatown, ate dumplings, and then walked back to Brooklyn over the Manhattan Bridge.

I stopped on this bridge and looked over Chinatown, at the Chinese characters on big signs, and at the Chinese people walking in typical ant-formation in their satellite home. I missed China. I missed the East. I felt like it was time to go, and once the time-to-go feeling hits there is nothing you can do about it.

I am going.

East, always East.

Related Pages:
Baby Bananas and the Beady Eyed Fruit Man
Begging for a Laugh in New York City
Obama Celebration in Brooklyn
Multicultural Multi Ethnic New York City
Herman Melville Pilgrimage
Urban Hermit

Links to previous travelogue entries:
Travel Book Reviews on Vagabond Journey
Travel to Bangor Maine
Patriotism Around the World Survey