Tuesday, May 7, 2013

Jules and Charles and Poetry in the Subway


Mean bellmen from New York City. Really mean. They'll act rude, demand tips and throw your bags around.   WRONG!!!   NOT EVER LIKE THAT!!!

 
We just made our annual spring trip to New York City to get our museum fix. We always pay a disgustingly high rate to be able to stay at the Hilton Garden Inn on 8th Avenue.  Jules ("Chocolate") and Charles ("SteelDrum") are two of the reasons why. They always smile and laugh with us, give us great advice, help us figure out stuff and even act like honorary friendly Texans.  We don't need them to do anything with our bags and sometimes on a trip, if the airfare was high, our budget is tight so we might not tip any of the staff.  And guess what? They STILL are nice to us.  They personally totally ruin the reputation of  New York City people being rude.
 
 
Here's another reason to stay at that hotel:  Donna Bell's Bakery across the street. Starbucks on both corners (gotta love the City) and breakfast in bed is served to my Blog Wrangler.



 
Subways and buses are the way we budget travel and we got a kick out of the fact that there is now poetry on the subway. This is from the Poetry in Motion program.  It's amazing how creative this Arts for Transit and Urban Design program is. But I wonder if anyone living there even notices it.


This program in New York City definitely contrasts with the Metro in Washington DC where they put the posters that say "If you see something, say something" on the ceiling of the cars. What? Do they think people lie down in those cars? If they did, would they be sober enough to even read the poster on the ceiling? Go figure.

This latest give-away is tucked away at the Whole Foods Mothership in Austin.  That's the Whole Foods store/headquarters here in Austin where they originally started.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

I'm so glad to see that Poetry In Motion is still going strong. About 12 years ago I encountered this W.S. Merwin poem in a subway: "Your absence has gone through me / Like thread through a needle / Everything I do is stitched with its color." I was so struck by it, I got off and found a bookstore and bought a book of his poetry, which I still have, and read on occasion. So here's one person, at least, who was moved by this wonderful program!

Anonymous said...

I also lived in NY and read the poetry. And NYers arent rude, they are rushed. There's so much to do and see and eat, they have to rush.