We are back in New York, this time for an extended stretch. It feels great to be here. For the most part, we have spent our first week getting ourselves organized for work at home. In fact, we are finally moving in; I have been unpacking boxes of random stuff that I packed up in haste when I was cleaning out my father's house. I found a program of the first concert performance of my music (a piece for 2 pianos, 8 hands) in Canada in Toronto in 1973. I also performed on steel drum under the baton of Princess Yasmin Aga Khan, who was conducting her own music.
Our Vancouver friends will be amused to know that we went to a farmer's market in our neighborhood.
Culture starts in earnest next week with the New York City Ballet and Einstein on the Beach.
A New York story: As Vera and I were casing the various food stores in our neighborhood to recalibrate our daily food habits, I saw some nice looking bakalava. I watched as the clerk weighed my pieces on the scale, and then turned to find a container to put them in. While she was turned, a man came up next to me, reached over the counter to the scale where my baklava was, and grabbed a piece of it. I protested, so he put it back, which made me protest even more. He said he thought it was one of those plates where people get to try free samples. He got to eat the piece he had touched, I got a replacement piece, and I learned that in New York, you always have to watch your baklava. (or, if you are really hungry, how to get free baklava...)
