April 2017. It's my last trip to the USA for fayteq. One week Las Vegas. A week of talking, getting to know people and looking after the booth in the very chilly air-conditioned South Hall of the Las Vegas Convention Center. In the evening and on an off-day, I'll be out with my colleagues Jürgen and Markus on the brightly lit strip.
One evening an event takes place in the holy halls of one of the Pinball Hall of Fame. Pinball machine follows pinball machine. It rings, flashes and tinkles everywhere. In the afternoon we were still, in the scorching heat of Nevada, at Hoover Dam at the border to Arizona. The air stands here and the sun burns relentlessly from the almost cloudless sky. There has to be a bit of tourist action when you're there I guess. But this city hardly offers me much on my second visit. The millions of lights and the effort to get tourists to spend money are impressive - yes. But the city does not appeal to me particularly. I am here to work.
Afterwards, as in the year before, I allow myself two weeks of vacation alone. This time I head towards the east coast. In Philadelphia Barbara picks me up from the airport. I get to know her through our mutual friends from leavinghomefunktion. Barbara is incredibly hospitable. She shows me parts of Philadelphia on the half hour drive to her house, gives me tips for places I should visit and invites me for the evening to a meeting with friends in a bar. Here I get to know Roland, among others. He runs a Moto Guzzi workshop in the Old City and has a fable for European cars, drives a Peugeot himself.
In her cosy and beautifully furnished little house in Bluebell Hill I move into an equally small but cosy room. Next to the bed there is hardly room for my suitcase and my camera backpack. But I like it here. I spend some nice days in Philadelphia. Actually I only wanted to stay one or two nights. There are going to be five.
I experience May 1st in Philly. A demonstration is winding through the wide streets. What surprises me: under the flags of the Antifa also one of the anti-fascist action Germany. I accompany the procession for a while, listen to the rally in front of the historic City Hall and then move on to see the city. From inconspicuous side streets to sights like Liberty Bell. Then I meet Roland at his home. A cosy old building in a quiet quarter. After a quick rinse - it is very warm on this day - we take a walk through the city in his Peugeot before we meet Barbara again in the evening.
On my last evening in Philadelphia we meet some friends at Johnny Brenda's in the evening. Kikagaku Moyo celebrate the beginning of their North America Tour 2017 with a concert at Johnny Brenda's as a support band for Mono. Of course I have my camera with me. I like this city more and more and I'm glad I stayed longer. The next morning my last day in Philadelphia starts before the Greyhound continues to New York. I stroll around the city a bit and Sage in a cafe. We schedule a shooting in her apartment for the next morning, where we take a series of wonderful photos, talk a lot and drink coffee. But I will never publish the photos. At her request. We almost forget about the time when we take the photos and I almost miss my bus heading east.
After a two-hour trip for just $10 I'm standing in the middle of New York. My Airbnb is located in the heart of Brooklyn on Monroe Street. An area where I feel quite at home. I spend the days with long walks through this huge city. Occasionally I take the metro, cruise over to the Statue of Liberty and enjoy the view from Rockefeller Center. All this gives me a lot more than Vegas. Also here I meet friends of my friends of the motorcycle crew from Halle, who circumnavigated the world with their URAL motorcycles.
For Shmuel, who runs the "spiegel" in Lower Manhattan, I brought a gift from the URAL gang. We talk a little over a drink and Shmuel naturally offers his motorcycle to be more mobile in the city. He can't understand that I don't even have a motorcycle driving license and asks me several times in disbelief. In the evening I meet Tony and Marc in the Union Garage in Brooklyn at a lecture before my last day in New York starts.
Also on the last day I walk around a lot again, explore my neighbourhood in Brooklyn and get the idea to visit another concert. In the evening Dinosaur Pile-Up, Royal Republic and Frank Carter and his Rattlesnakes play in The Studio @ Webster Hall. Maybe some of you will remember the series with Gloria and her boyfriend, which I photographed that night after the concert. The photos of the concert will be available in a separate post within the next days.
The bags are already packed at home that night. The next morning at 11 o'clock I return to Germany. Unfortunately this year I didn't make it to the USA. But hopefully again next year. The camera will be with me again.
Nerdfacts: Also this time I was accompanied by my workhorse, the Canon 5D Mark II. The lenses were the Tamron 24 - 70 mm 2.8 and the Sigma 35 mm 1.4 Art. The photos are stored on one SanDisk Extreme Pro 32 GB and four SanDisk Extreme Pro 8 GB memory cards.
I took the analog photos with the Nikon FG through a Nikkor 50 mm 1.8 on 1992 expired Agfa CT Precisa Agfachrome 200. Since the film was poorly stored and had expired about 25 years at the time these photos were taken , these wonderful dots were created on the photos. Interesting. Scanned from the negative with a Canon CanoScan 9000F.
Translated with www.DeepL.com/Translator
