Happy Easter!!

OK so Easter in NY means missing out on three public holidays back in Australia. No big deal... I was told the reason why there is no time off here for Easter is because religious holidays (excluding Christmas) are not celebrated with public holidays in the US. Fair enough... but Easter is a religious holiday?? That's news... I thought it was about candy and bunnies.. So much to learn.

This all means not much celebration for Easter... and that's probably a good thing because it would be hard to compete with my usual Easter of chocolate and movies... and hot cross buns...

So, Sunday morning, after I had finished mourning the lack of hot cross buns in this town (to be honest, I am still mourning, but I've managed to pull myself together), E, Pants, Noodles and I headed to Brooklyn for brunch because "Williamsburg, like M&Ms is always a solid choice". Add Noodles new game and it was going to be brilliant. (The game is a Hipster version of Where is Wally. You get points for spotting a hipster and making an ironic statement about them. Double points if they are riding a single speed bike, ironic TShirt etc)

The point of the trip was to check out Fatty Cue's, a place recommended in Time Out magazine. I had the French toast and it was beyond amazing. Yum Yum Yummmm!

After eating we wandered through Williamsburg (spotting hipsters like there was no tomorrow...) The weather was amazingly warm. People were in TShirts and shorts... and rightfully so. It was hot. If I dared complain I would.

We headed towards the flee market - a pretty cool place. Lots of interesting and unique pieces available.

Exhausted and way over dressed for the weather we headed back to Manhattan. Noodles and I spent the afternoon in the sun, people watching at Union Square. This was the most fun I have had just hanging out and observing people.

Union Square is one of my favourite places in Manhattan (probably second after Soho) which makes sense because it attracts some crazy people. See below some of the hula hoopers... jugglers... magicians...

There were a lot of people out enjoying the sun. After we had been there for a while a group of street performers set up and started playing. They were quite cool and talented. A couple of little girls in their Sunday best started dancing, their Easter Egg baskets in hand.

 

The band attracted an even larger crowd and everyone was clapping and cheering. There  was one creepy looking man who reminded me of this guy from Dennis the Menace:

So Noodles and I sat on the stairs of Union Square, laughing and keeping one eye on Creepy Guy... then something funny happened. A random guy started to try and chat us up. At Union Square. On the steps! He even had moves, including a magic trick where he turned a two dollar bill into two ones.. Umm interesting??

Noodles told him we were both from Australia... which he believed, despite Noodles standard US accent. So we were kind of ignoring him when one of the street performers we were watching pulled out a David Bowie style ball and started spinning it in his hands.

Noodles was pretty impressed and said to me "OH wow, check out that guy's David Bowie Ball!" To this, our new friend ripped open his back pack and pulled out... an identical ball! Then he ran down and joined in with the performers.

Of course, Noodle's made the call of the moment "Where is Ashton? Are we being punked??"

We later spotted our admirer pulling the magic trick on another poor girl. Noodles wanted to go over and say "Jason, Mum said you had to be home by four!" But by the time she had convinced me he had disappeared.

We managed to spot him playing chess with one of the old men that hang out at the Square. See my stalker picture of our magic trick playing, David Bowie Ball carrying friend below.

This was all very hilarious, but at some point we needed to move on. Plus the creepy, Dennis the Menace guy had found some hoons with a football and they were getting quite rough. There were a few near misses of football to face. Defiantly time to go, this was not the way we wanted to die! (Cue scene where Noodles and I walk in front of a cab... Lets leave out the details to save embarrassment)

We headed uptown, stopping when we spotted an Easter egg at Madison Square Park. It must have been to high up for the children to see.

Surprise, surprise... all this talk of candy was making me hungry. One last stop at the famous Magnolia Bakery before home time. This meant tackling Times Square (argh.... nightmare!) But totally worth it for the cupcakes.

I begrudge you all in Australia with the long weekend off! Back to work tomorrow, so I better get some sleep.

<Insert dreams..> I assume I will dream about the Easter bunny cruising in Williamsburg when he is attacked by Creepy Guy who has caught the subway over from Union Square. The Easter bunny will jump on his single speed bike to try and escape, but he will struggle to pedal fast enough. But don't worry, a group of hipsters will attack Creepy Guy with snide and ironic remarks about his appearance... "You're so mainstream, you copied your look from a popular children's movie." The bunny will use the time when Creepy Guy is crying to make his getaway. Then they'll all have vegan chick pea sandwiches in a fair trade coffee shop and laugh about the whole adventure.

Happy Easter to all.