She thinks it's strange out here

New York, I have some questions:

Why is there a wire rack in the microwave? I was told as a child never to put any metal of any sort in the microwave, yet there it is. Hanging out like it belongs there. I’m sure there are some of you laughing at me because they’re probably readily available back home but I have never seen them before.

Still in the kitchen, what’s with the old school kettle on the stove? Where I’m doing classes at the moment, the teacher made a point of saying “and we have an electric tea kettle for you aussies”. She laughed like we were so wacky for a having an electric kettle. Keep up with the times New York. Ps. Betamax says ‘hi’.

Your food is weird. Not so much of a question as a statement but no less true. Although I still haven’t had a huge amount of food related experience, I believe this opinion will hardly change. The other night I was out for dinner and ordered a salad that sounded very yum and very Melbourne. It had baked pear, blue cheese and walnuts. Sounded amazing. Upon being presented with the food I was a little overwhelmed. It came out looking like every colour of the rainbow had exploded on my plate. I wish you could have seen it. This over garnished mess left me gob smacked. First of all, the way the pear was presented made it look as though the skin was that of a chicken. Not cool. The cheese came in these little fried packages looking more like some kind of chicken kiev that you buy from the freezer. And the walnuts were sweet, the sweetest thing on the plate in fact. Knowing that Americans like a more of a sauce than a dressing to accompany their salad, I ordered balsamic vinegar thinking that would be safe. Wrong again. Although still by far the best choice, even the balsamic was far thicker than any balsamic I’ve ever seen at home. It ended up tasting ok but a reminder to not go to New York expecting Melbourne’s food. Even shopping at the supermarket is an experience. Initially I was excited because the prices are far cheaper than our own. But on further inspection, while all your usual foods appear to be right there in front of you, they’re in fact not. Just standing in the cheese section left me contemplating if I wanted the orange cheese or the orange cheese? Thank god for Whole Foods supermarket which is the uppity supermarket for the rich. Which strangely enough equates to our normal Coles/ Safeway prices. Are we being ripped off back home? Probably. But Whole Foods is a joyous place where everything makes sense and the cheese is plentiful (and yellow as god intended).

Ok, so not really a lot of questions but I'll get to more later. Now for the people of New York.

There are two types of people in New York. Crazy people and overly talkative people. Now it gets tricky cos some people are both crazy and over talkative. And over talkative people can be both lovely and rude. I’m lucky enough to have experienced both.

I’ve talked to more strangers in 1 week in New York than I have living seven years in Melbourne. And I’m not even talking about the ones who are trying to pick you up. I was looking displeased whilst shopping in Urban Outfitters when a large man told me very sweetly “It’s fine. You’ll find something. Don’t stress.” I also had a great conversation with a flaming homosexual at Whole Foods about that fact that he didn’t know that they don’t wash spinach leaves before putting them out and had been eating them unwashed for years. Then there’s the other side of the overly talkative: The Rude. I was walking down escalator to the subway when I stopped behind a couple. The man then told his partner to move to one side because some people will want to walk down. Let me be clear that I didn’t ask him to move. I was happy to wait. But since he moved, I continued past only to hear him say “take the stairs if you want to walk down the escalator” and he continued to bitch about me as I walked on. Have a cry, New York.

Last but not least we have: The Crazy. On my first trip to Brooklyn the other day, I walked past an older woman coming out on to her stoop. Her look was fantastic. Board shorts, holey black sports bra, long reddy hair with just a few rollers on the top of her head- and she was holding a cat. “She thinks it’s strange out here”. That’s right, she was speaking on behalf of her cat. The best part (or should I say the worst part) was that she had an Australian accent. That’s right. Maybe all of our crazies come to New York. Or maybe New York makes you nuts. Maybe the cat has all the answers.