Setting up the Wardrobe

The furniture arrived last wednesday. The wardrobe and the bed.

The bed was easy enough to put together. Animesh did it all on his own. Its stuck to a corner of the room to conserve space. I took out our brand new Ralph Lauren 350 tc sheets to christen it suitably. The sheets were great but I had the hardest time working the sheets around the corner. I just don't think we'll be making the bed that often.

The wardrobe was a different story altogether. The wooden frame was heavy and unwieldy. I wanted to call 'Jake', our craigslist helper who does odd jobs @ $20/hr, to help us put it together. Animesh immediately vetoed the idea saying its an unneccesary waste of money. I'm not sure when this atitude reversal happened in Animesh, but its definitely come about in a big way. While I am still in the 'Illinois' mode of wanting everything just so and shopping for clothes and things, Animesh is counting pennies like we did when we were in grad school. He passed up on the one invitation to play golf with stern students ( @ $75/head), the first wine club event ( $40-50/head) and is happily eating simple pasta dinners once again. I'm entirely pleased with this change of heart, but I can't seem to go along with it myself. If I feel my wardrobe is inadequate, and I feel that all the time (more on that later), I do feel compelled to go shopping. Now I haven't had much success with shopping in NYC (more on that later too!), so our cash situation is still OK. But back to the wardrobe we were trying to assemble. Animesh and I came up with a system of working the frames and drawers in parallel, in two different rooms and then assembling them in the bedroom together. Finding enough empty space to do this was a real challenge. But we did it all in under two days. The wardrobe looks so nice next to the new bed with the creamy Ralph Lauren linen. All we need now is to add some handles to the doors and drawers and we'll be able to put it to use. We went to HomeDepot this weekend and got a cordless power drill and screwdriver for the job. We also got a stud finder so that I can the pictures up on the wall. And today, a few short hours ago, the delivery guy from Overstock.com brought in our new Futon that awaits assembly. So we are slowly making something pretty out of this dump of our apartment. I hope we don't have reason to leave it soon.

The other major thing that happened last wednesday was that the cable guy came and fixed us up. I can now work from home if the weather gets nasty or if I am simply too tired for the long commute. This has been an incredible blessing. I am working from home today, and I'm getting quite a lot done without getting all stressed out about the long bus ride.

I had taken a vacation from work last wednesday to get all these things done. I had the most depressing experience in NY when I went out for a little shopping that evening. The main problem with my wardrobe, especially my shoes and bags, is that they aren't meant for NYC. They are ok if you have to step out of the house, sit in a car and drive from one place to another. But if you have to walk, run and stand or sit in not too sanitary public transportation, they just aren't convenient. My purse, the biggest and least fashionable one, is too small to hold my MTA/ bus passes, umbrella, story book, sun-glasses, baseball cap, chapstick and wallet. So I definitely needed a new bag, like a messenger bag from Fossil. A new pair of shoes that are comfortable for walking but have enough heel so that my pants don't touch the ground (eww!). And a lot of simple T-shirts I can wear to work over dress pants, because my tops are too fussy, especially when I am running to watch a train. I also needed an appropriate jacket for later when it starts to get colder at 5pm when I'm waiting outside for the bus home. I have a couple of gift cards from Macy's that people gave me before I left for NY. So I went to the Macy's on 34th. The store is HUGE. An entire block and 8 floors high. They have every conceivable department and desginer. What I didn't see was a floor map or store directory. So I was wandering around not sure where I wanted to be. The sales attendants were too few and overworked to be helpful or even polite. The place was just full of people. I'm not sure why there were so many people out shopping on a weekday afternoon. There were lines for the fitting room, lines for the restroom and lines for the elevator. I saw a few desginers I liked, but the price tag threw me off. So I headed out to the sale section. The sale section was a narrow rack absolutely surrounded by people. By now I really missed the outlet mall in chicago. Nothing stood out as a good enough deal. Maybe I'm a spoiled shopper and too picky, but I'd spent maybe an hour and a half on the apparel section and was getting very unhappy. I think New Yorkers either spend an awful amount on clothes or these were all tourists going crazy in Macy's. Maybe real New Yorkers only shop when they go away on vacation. To Chicago! On my way out, I saw a very cool display of pearls. They had a pearl illusion necklace that I'd been looking for in IL. So I went up to the attendant and asked to about it and heres how the conversation went:
me: "How much is the pearl necklace on display?"
she: "It should be written on the tag"
me: "This one doesn't have a tag"
she: "Is it on the display? Look on the tag" She hadn't moved an inch. Its not like she was busy doing anything else.
me: "There isn't a tag on it, I looked"
She turned and started talking a another colleague. Like I wasn't there. I stood there, appalled for a few more seconds before I walked away, out of the store. I called Animesh to see if he was free for dinner, but he was out to a weekly Stern event, 'The Beer Blast', and couldn't meet me for another hour. So anyway, I went home alone that night feeling quite miserable. I missed my shopping buddies, Yuxiu and Lynn, I missed the stores and I definitely missed the common courtesy people usually treat you with. I even felt bad about having moved to Whippany where I know no one and I eat lunch alone everyday. But its a choice I made, so I can't really complain. But I indulged in some serious self pity that night, I'm ashamed to say. I even plotted ways to get back to Chicago... and of course, there is no reasonable way to do that.

So I resolved to do a few things. One, I will join an art class. Fortunately ( and I HAVE been fortunate in finding an apartment in Hell's Kitchen) there is a great evening art school one block away. Two, I will take every opportunity available to make friends. I have decided to join the 4A group in Whippany and maybe even the WILL (Women in Leadership at Lucent) group in the hopes of making friends at work. I started chatting with this guy from Lucent on the bus, and hey, while its nothing to write a blog about, its a start! And Animesh and I went out for long walks several nights in a row. We live in a really cool area. The Lincoln Center is only a few minutes walk and they have a lot of cool (some free) shows and concerts planned for october and later. The Carnegie hall is nearby. They have a great all night bakery and cafe on our street that has a killer Tiramisu. A jazz bar, an excellent brunch deli and a cheap chinese soup place... all less than a block away. I did my groceries at the farmers market again today. I think they've started recognizing me. Life is actually quite good here in NYC, and its going to get better.

Here in NYC... finally!

I have resolved to enter a blog atleast once a week. So here I am, with my news from NYC.

First the apartment. Its a tiny one-bedroom apartment in midtown west, a couple of blocks from central park. The apartment building is a co-op and most of the residents are actually owners (or shareholders as our landlady pointed out). It was built in the 1920s. In NY, this is fashionably called a pre-war apartment. The place is old. The hardwood floors are uneven, cracked and sometimes almost worn out, the sink shows rust that no amount of clorox bleach ink can get rid of and the plumbing is questionable. Despite all this, Animesh and I manage to find it kind of cute. We've setup shelves everywhere... in the kitchen, in the bathroom and the bedroom will have a large wardrobe (this has yet to arrive). The living room is large enough to hold up to four people. The bedroom can take two persons (on very good terms with each other) and the kitchen will hold one person who can be neither clumsy nor overweight. There are plenty of windows for our plants. These windows turned into a great source of contention between Animesh and me. The one in the bathroom, for instance, opens to the apartment on the left, and were the residents so inclined, they could watch us go about our business. I don't believe anyone in NYC is so perverse and I think we should forget about it. The poor old apartment has no ventilation to speak of and keeping that window open was a matter of hygiene. Animesh disagrees. Apparently people in NYC are JUST that perverse and are lining up to watch us with our pants down. He closed the window and sealed it shut with all the packing tape left over from IL. Man, did we have a row! In the end the window stays open, but is artfully covered with shelves, baskets of shampoos and lotion and even my trusty african violet. Hah!

The other big issue we had was with Valentino. Valentino is the Super, a mild looking italian fellow. Well, mild he is not. He has yelled at Animesh on numerous occasions until Animesh finally decided that I should be the one to deal with him and get things fixed. Here is an actual conversation...
"Hi, I'm nayantara, I moved into 5B yesterday and my husband moved in earlier. He has been trying to set up the phone line but...."
Valentino: "I talked to your husband. He not understand me. He not hear me. He need to give me 2 days notice. The interface card is in the basement of another building and that building have another super! I TELL him!"
I: "Oh i'm SO sorry. He probably misunderstood. Do you know where the interface card is. Because the telephone company says we SHOULD have service but we do not have a dial tone"
V: "Are you in the building? When you come home tonight? 7pm? you call me, I come up and take a look"
I (almost falling over with pretended gratitude): "Thank you. Thats great. I'll see you tonight. "
V (overwhelmed by me? very gruffly): "ok. bye. "

Because of my apparent success, I have become the one that talks to Valentino henceforth. I have even looked up the internet and found that the appropriate gift to give a super is a local (grocery) store gift card. I will buy one promptly and make peace with the man.

And now work: The biggest issue is getting to work and back. The commute in is from 6.40am to 8.15am. The commute out is 4.50pm to 7.10pm. I take the subway to port authority and the bus to whippany. The commute is long but predictable, and I manage to get a lot of reading done. So far, I only had problems when it rained and the subway was messed up. I missed my bus and had to wait an hour for the next one. Whippany is a lonely place (for me). I have a huge office all to myself (its seriously the size of our living room!) and no one to talk to. I've had lunch at my desk every single day and my few attempts to make friends have not been reciprocated. I think people here are generally not into non-work chat. They certainly do not go off shopping at lunchtime or do a diversity event at the local baseball game. Nothing like that at all. So I write this blog to entertain my good friends in IL :-) I also joined the local Gym. That was good because the facilities are both adequate and clean and it offers me a much needed diversion.

And finally life in NYC: Aaaah! This is the good part. I think we live in a great area. There are restaurants all over and the closest startbucks is less than a block away. There is a very cute mom 'n pop cafe that serves bread, pastries and coffee all night. And a jazz club. And a health food store. And even a little farmers market. Lincoln center in a ten minute walk and we went there after dinner one night. They have a lot of shows and concerts this winter where we can get tickets cheap. I fully expect to do that. The village in 15 mins away by train and Animesh and I ate there every day the first week. We had kati roll (Egg-roll to indians) and indian stuffed bread (aloo paratha type of thing) one day. The whole meal cost us less than $20. They usually have happy hour in the bars till 8pm with cocktails at $3. All these good deals had us coming back for more, until this week when we really wanted some good old daal-chavel. So Animesh inaugurated the kitchen with daal, chaval and baigan sabji. We've tried to cook dinners at home since. I went out with Animesh's school friends a few times. The parties are all great and the company very interesting. I will certainly not be bored here.

Thats a long blog, I think. More next week. I'll have to make a few notes about my problems with shoes and clothes and such. But thats for next week.