Hello from my home in Matinkylä! This is NordLetter #61, a weekly newsletter on living and walking in Finland. Each week I share some of the interesting things I found on the web.
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/trip to NYC IV
day 8 - MoMA + Summit One Vanderbilt
The trip was coming to an end soon. We had the last two days left in this wonderful city (with our return flight at night on the second day.)
I had caught cold. I was running a little fever. In that state, with my mind a little hazy, I went to visit the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) on 53rd Street.
MoMA has art from van Gogh’s Starry Light to Pollock’s numbered pieces. I was particularly interested in Starry Night, having had it as a cover for one of my earlier Kindles. It is iconic. It is something that I understand. Pollock, I did not understand.
There were others too. There was an architectural exhibition, Otobong Nkanga’s massive multi-floor Cadence, an exhibition made of discarded plushies, a Fallout Shelter, Monet’s Water Lillies, many Picassos, there was also a black and gray painting which I don’t know why spoke to me.
I wish I had more time. And I wish I was OK.
I left MoMA and met with Prerna at the NY public library. There are two good places with a view of the NYC. Summit One Vanderbilt and Top of the Rock. We only had time for one, so we picked Summit One.
Summit One is around ten minute walk from the NY Public Library. We walked, were told to walk around the back. We did that, finally reached the place.
We were ushered into a theatre where they talked about the history of the building. Then we clicked some pictures, which they could sell to us later on, then we put some plastic things on our shoes and walked in line to the lifts that would take us to the three floors of awesomeness that is Summit One.
There were three experiences that stayed with me from Summit One.
- The infinity rooms built with glass - with floor to ceiling reflections, offering views of the NYC skyline. The observation deck part of the experience.
- The room filled with silver floating orbs. Savya enjoyed himself in this room.
- The skyboxes that extend ~1000 ft above street level.
There is also a cafe at the top, which we did not try. We did get a picture from the place, an ultra-wide shot of us in the orb room.
day 9 - MET
We took our time on our last day in the city. We had a wonderful Brunch at our favourite Spice Symphony. Prerna ordered a thali, I order American Chopsuey. Like the other things we had at the restaurant, these were great too.
Then we walked through the city, one last time, taking in all the views. We walked through the Central Park. And finally, we walked through the stroller friendly entrance at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (MET).
The MET is like the Louvre in Paris. It is similarly massive with many things to see. Three and a half hours is not enough time. But that’s all we had.
So, we did the same thing we had to do at the AMNH. We prioritised.
We saw these things:
- The Egyptian exhibition
- We walked through many medieval halls on our way to the Medusa statue.
- I wanted to see some more paintings, especially white field with cypersses. I mean you can almost see the wind in the field.
- Then the Astor Chinese Garden, on our way to
- The Indian sculpture collection There was one beautiful sculpture of Yashoda feeding Krishna, amongst others similarly stolen or sold from our temples.
By then, it was getting close to the close time for the MET. And so we left. We walked back to our hotel through the same streets, that we had walked through these past few days. I was finally starting to remember these streets, these paths. We were finally not having to look up all the time, straining our necks at the skyscrapers.
And yet. It was time to go.
The bittersweet end of a vacation, of a time well spent, in the world’s best city. There truly is not another city like New York.
P.S. The airport sucks.
/five things to share
1. Massive Rent-Seeking in India’s Government Job Examination System - Marginal REVOLUTION
Government salaries far exceed what is justified by GDP per capita or job requirements, distorting education, employment, and unemployment throughout the entire economy in deeply wasteful ways. The only real solution is to bring public sector pay back in line with economic fundamentals.
2. What Could a Healthy AI Companion Look Like?
Tolans were designed to offer a different kind of AI companionship. Their cartoonish, nonhuman form is meant to discourage anthropomorphism. They’re also programmed to avoid romantic and sexual interactions, to identify problematic behavior including unhealthy levels of engagement, and to encourage users to seek out real-life activities and relationships.
3. Productivity, AI and Pushback
Plato was sure that the invention of handwriting would destroy memory, and I’m confident there were scribes who thought that the Gutenberg press was the end of civilization. Yet, all around us, there are writers who use spell check, guitarists who use electronic pitch tuners and photographers who use digital cameras.
I had read a recent comment somewhere, that all code or in general things on the internet which use these AI models will get lesser in quality, but easier/faster to create. Like wood-working.
4. Apple Planning to Launch Low-Cost MacBook Powered By iPhone Chip
The M1 Macbook Air is available for cheap at Walmart. Apple might have seen the good sales of that and decided, lets hit that price point in our own stores! And so..
5. Cyberpunk Edgerunners 2 will be even sadder and bloodier
I loved Edgerunners. It was a big reason why I eventually got around to playing Cyberpunk 2077. Cyberpunk 2077 was famously shit at launch, but they fixed it over the many years. The main complaint remained, however, which I felt too, that the final, no way back from here, quest line came too soon.
The quest lines in general in Cyberpunk were the typical CD Project Red quests. There was no good or bad in them. Every choice has consequences. Mostly shitty consequences.
That was what happened in Edgerunners. Something similar (worse) would happen in Edgerunner 2.
Looking forward to this.
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Until next week.