Madison Brang
02/19/17
Hiss, Tony. “Simultaneous Perception.” In The Experience of Place, 3-26. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., 1990
Grand Central Reflection
“I felt hurried along. My breathing was shallow and slightly constricted; my neck and shoulders were tight. I could smell cookies and pizza baking in the shops around me, nut it seemed difficult to look to either side.’ (pg. 6)
During my first exploration of Grand Central, I was completely consumed with stress and covered in sweat. In the quote above written by Tony Hiss in Simultaneous Perception on page six he explains how he felt his body tighten and nervous rise; I can relate to those feelings. I was already three coffees deep, and my anxiety was on high alert. At first, I was excited to go because I had never been, after living in upstate New York for fourteen years, and was interested in what it was like. Instantly, after walking into the main room, there was a change in atmosphere. It went from slightly chaotic to complete chaos in one step. People began to flood from every opening and doorway, hustling to their trains while shoving down shake shack and taking a selfie when passing the center clock.
We were assigned a check list to take pictures of. On this list were particular architectures and symbols in Grand Central. This just added an extra level of stress. Always stopping in the middle of traffic to take a picture of a painting or tile work would aggravate everyone around us and lead to pushing and an unbalance in the rule of staying to the side when not walking and staying in your own lane. I never realized how relevant in the city this rule is and Grand Central follows it to a tee. You must go by these rules to keep everything flowing smoothly so everyone can get to where they need to go and we were defying them.
Looking for these small symbols and art works was hard. We retraced our steps at least six times before finding what we were looking for and three of them were usually right next to each other, but I guess I am just not that observant and neither was my partner. However, I did get my work out for the day!
It seems like chains have taken over Grand Central, as Hiss said, he could smell pizza and cookies baking on either side of him. It didn’t look like a train station but more like a mall filled with fast food, markets, and an apple store. It is a great attraction to visit for tourists, but for the people traveling and using the trains, it seems hectic and too stressful. I think there were more tourists taking selfies and exploring then people using the transportation systems. For people traveling that could get a little annoying and make your traveling experience that much more stressful. Trying to get around these people while they are standing in the middle of your path would get very aggravating. Grand Central was beautiful to look at and had a lot of great attraction, but I would never want to travel through it.
