So it's been like 3 weeks plus since I've landed in NYC.
The one thing that's been on my mind since I got here is how I love everything here, simply admire it, even the dirt and filth swarming between the rails of the subway. Now as for rodents walking on the tracks - they're all rats, haven't seen one mouse, this one's reserved as a London display of underground wildlife that you won't find here. I guess as the theory goes - where there's mice there are no rats and vice verse(so i was once told by a man who kills rodents and insects for a living) now it is becoming clear why i haven't seen even one mouse yet running around helplessly on the tracks, while trying to find cover from the intimidating presence of humans.
I can go on and on wondering about rats and mice living in NYC subway but it's not really what i wanted to talk about on this blog. I'll try and portray a picture for all of you out there who'll be reading this piece of writing, may be out of sheer interest in my adventures, or just to kill some time, but whatever reason that may be, I'll try and spare as much interesting details, anecdotes and funny stories that I can possibly think of in the course of my time here to give you some good time while sharing my experience as I go along.
I live in w184Th Street which is in Washington heights near the Washington bridge. Yesterday I was told it was part of Harlem, I was surprised because I always imagined Harlem to be some kind of a danger zone, out of limits for white people where you can't walk outside late at night, apparently I was wrong.
The uniqueness of this area is that it's all Dominican/Spanish inhabited and the vibe is all in all quite friendly. Yes there are the odd dodgy looking type whom you can't figure out and just what do they mean when they're staring at you but hey, we've all stared at someone at some point in our lives and they must have felt strange being stared at by us, now do they?

So the comedy scene here which I've come to check is pretty much different from the one I'm used to in the UK. Much more comics, or aspiring ones at least, ranging from the genuinely funny and original to the boring, unfunny and mentally challenged ones, who are treading along each evening in those open mics nights. Some of these evenings are better then others, but mostly be prepared to be stared at (and judged by) those other comedians who are on the same bill with you.
The feeling of standing on the same stage as some of your personal comedy heroes is quite uplifting and flattering, so much for that when you do it in front of no real paying audience.
The last one I did in a place such as this one ('purpose built' is the word for that) was one in the east village which had 3 people left in there after a bill of about 15, and they were all tired, jaded and just wanted to resume their lives. Unlike every other business, show business is the cruelest of them all in my opinion, but, I also believe that the rewards can be far beyond our own predictions and small-ego mentality of failure or success pre-conseptions that we have accumulated from day one of wanting to be part of that business.

21/1/09
I barked (Meaning I stood outside in the freezing cold trying to get people in) for the first time on Wed just gone. Two guys approached me, one of them had a dog, a bull mastif from what I could recognize, mixed with something else.
When you stand outside trying to bring people in from the street, you have to be engaging immediatelly, meaning - you have to engage them imedtailety as they walk pass you (most likely on their way to somewhere else) to go down into a free comedy show and promise them that they're going to have a life changing experience through the next 2 hours. I used to flyer for stage time in London, that's much easier. A flyer is a piece of paper with words and drawings on it, it offers information to whomever takes it from you. In other words, you cannot change the contents of it, and the person who took it from you may or may not use that information to come to the advertised event or not. But when you have to talk to someone who swiftly passes by you and could, in some cases, react in a manner which can leave you humilated or curse the moment you volountereed to do this then it's a different matter altogether.
Let's go back to the two guys who approached me with the dog. Turns out it was a she and that the guy who was holding her on the leash just got out of jail that same morning.
Both took interest in what I was doing and why in the name of allah/jehovah/jesus and the devil I was standing there freezing my ass off.
Then the guy who got out of jail asked me if I wanted to see something cool, I said sure why not?
So he lifted the dog up and showed me her belly, there was a tatoo on it of a gun, a Barreta.
I asked how on earth could he have tattooed the animal without it going totally berzerk and he replied that she was asleep when they tatooed her. I don't want to even think how and with what she was put to sleep.
The other guy was less talkative but his gaze was direct and calm and he had a hearty smile, i connected with them both so they offered to bark with me. Not soon after the other guy (the less talkative one) stood in the middle of the sidewalk, almost blocking the passersbys and saying that Barack Obama was downstairs giving autographs, we managed to pull 4 people in, that was fun.
I suggested he should ask for a spot to go on stage and try some comedy, but he politely declined and they both wished me a good evening and good luck with my future plans and took off.
I was kind of curious to know why his friend with the dog did time in jail, but I didn't get to ask that. He did remind me a bit of the type of inmates you see in reality shows about jails in america on the National Geographic channel.

30/1/09

OK, I wanted to write something earlier but just didn't have time, or rather was tool lazy to let my creative bloging juices flow into the keyboard.
It's Friday evening, didn't go to an open mic tonight, got really late with all this 'day to day running around, everybody knows this is nowhere' as Neil Young rightly put it.
Meaning - woke up again at mid day, dazed with some remains of a dream about my past. This is a metaphizycal reaction to Geographical distance, or just cheap and meaningless reminiscence about my 'Youth I pray to keep' as Chris Cornell rightly out it. That's just too much of a load to figure out for you readers, maybe I'll just write about subway rodents again?
Talk about Subway experiences, on late Tuesday (or was it Monday? or Wednesday? who gives a toss, it all seems the same to me since I got here) I took the 1 train uptown back to where I stay, and sat close to the door. This large woman walked in (her race is not important, but she wasn't white) and while i was hovering over some story about shootings in Brooklyn on the new york post that i found laying around, she asked me to move so she could sit down. I was about to move when the next thing I know i hear this thud and turn my head just to see she's laying on the floor of the coach. So like any good and considerate samaritain I rushed over and was trying to help her to get back on her feet. The other two people who were sitting oposite didn't seem to care that much, they were asleep. So I grab her by the one hand, and she goes - 'this arm is fractured, try the other arm' so I do, but the only problem is she is too heavy for me to hold her all the way up and with a moving train underneath, the laws of phyzics were not on my side, or hers for that matter. Finally I made eye contact with the other fellow who just opened his eyes and she asked him for help. So he naturally came over to grab her from the other hand, the one with the fracture. So she starts telling him not to, so he reaches for her coat and drags her by it and both of us almost fall backwards trying to pull her up (I kept thinking how a crane could have come handy at this moment, why is there never one around when you need it?)
Finally and after starining a few muscles, we get her back up on her feet. That was my work out for the week, who needs to pay money to work out in a Jym when you can help large women of the floor of a train at 2 o'clock in the morning?

Historical fact of the week: The name Brooklyn comes from Dutch and means 'Broken Land'.

Penny's is an open mic night that happens evety Wednesday at a local underground theatre on St. Mark's place on the east village. It is a home to poets, spoken word, musicians and the odd comedians. It's got regular performers who come to perform a 7 minte piece each week.
This Wednesday just gone was my 2nd time there, I realy enjoy this place, it's got an amazing atmosphere and the girl who host it, Penny is really sweet and supportive.
The performers are randomelly picked out from a bucket, previous to that everyone writes their names on small notes which go inside the bucket and Penny then pulls them out and once your name is read, you sign up on a list which becomes the running order of the night. There are 35 to 40 perfomers at each night whic means you can be either number 1 or 35/37..40.
The beuaty of all this is that most of the people stay till the end which is at 2 am in the morning.
I have seen the most eccentric perfomers along with the bizzare and the funny.
I go down pretty well there, I had the late slot the other night but it gave me enough energy to push the envelope a bit further than usual. The people who were there really enjoyed it and it gave me a dose of encouragment and I proved to myself that I don't have to hide behind my fears of speaking my mind and be hilarious at the same time, something which I always inspire to be on stage.
I know I can find my voice, I'm on the good track, finally.