The only reason I can give for the title of this post is a recurring thought I have when entering any structure that is higher than a leaping distance from the ground. Saturday was one of them, and you already know what I was thinking while looking down from 630 feet. A few months ago while flying from Lagos to London, similar thoughts entered my head at some point during the long flight, and from London to Boston. What are my chances of survival from this height of over 60,000 feet? There is a kind of surrender that inevitably accompanies a decision to take a plane flight. Our lives are in the hands of the pilot whom we never ever get to see.
About two and a half weeks ago, there was a major news item about a pilot on the London-Boston route who was caught drunk just before take-off. Just two and a half weeks ago! The plane was grounded and the passengers resettled into another plane. Sigh. I mean, it could have been any of the planes that I have been in. And what are the chances that the pilot of my plane from London to Boston wasn’t equally drunk? Come to think about it, I kinda felt the plane shake and wobble one too many times during the flight. Or not. Well, one of the reasons Maya Angelou gave when she came to Edwardsville in October for buying her travel bus instead of travelling on a plane was a plane trip of hers in which the pilot, just a few seconds after take-off – even before the plane reached cruising altitude – came out of his cockpit and meet and greet “the distinguished Maya Angelou” who he had learnt was on board. Ha! According to her, she knew then that it was time to change tactics before someone got hurt from the effect of her star power. Those were not her exact words.
I can say also that one of the reasons for my choice of writing as a hobby, pastime, vocation or whatever one can call it is – not really a fear but – a preemptive strike against the eventuality of death. And no, I’m not depressed at the moment. Not even as bored as I might like to think. I’m just taking liberty with my ability to imagine.
Since I spent much of my time in Chicago last week either taking pictures or admiring the landscape and its contrasting colours, it is only fitting that I make a third, and maybe final post on what I saw while I was there. On the first night alone, I had already taken a few hundred photos of everything beautiful from road signs, shop signs, name tags to sign posts and street names. By the end of the weekend, there were already too many to choose from. Anyway, here are some of the rest, featuring the Willis Tower, a toy model of the city, the Navy Pier, Artworks on teh wall at Starbucks, the Fisher Building, the Buckingham fountain, the city at night, and a statue of President Lincoln at Grant Park. I hope you like them.
Most of the art works, scruptures and wall reliefs in this collection were shot at the Art Institute of Chicago at South Michigan Avenue. It was our first stop early on Friday morning since the Sears Tower refused to open to visitors on time.
No visit to the city of Chicago is complete until one reaches the pinnacle of this building, standing on the glass ledge that sometimes bobs with the wind, and looking through the floor to the street 1,353 feet (412 m) below.
I will remember this visit to the 103rd storey of the world’s fifth tallest building mostly because of the way the city/investors take maximum advantage of the landmark for their own financial gain. According to the displayed statistics, the building receives 25,000 daily visitors, and it only has 149 staff members. Considering that the amount spent by each visiting tourist is about $50 or thereabout, it is definitely a good long-term investment, along with returns from several other similar buildings in the city, one of which is the John Hancock Building. One could only wonder how much of returns these buildings/structures would have brought to Chicago if the rights to host the Olympics had been given to them. Now, at places around the city, one could still see little torn posters of the city’s Olympic bid: Chicago 2010.
These photos are some of the over five hundred shots that I was able to take on the streets of Chicago. On the first day, I took almost three hundred. Their locations vary, from the Union Bus Station the Sears Towers, Congress Parkway, Navy Pier, Shedd Acquarium, Chicago Arts Institute to Lake Michigan, Michigan Avenue, Buckingham fountain, and Grant Park.
I will leave Chicago with this feeling: thrill; this impression: awe. Here’s a city that runs on order and a certain edge. Walking the length and breath to where my feet could reach, I found an open eyed town that never stops demanding. Either going upward on an elevator onto the Skydeck of the Sears Towers, taking pictures there on the glass ledge, requesting for branded gift items at the Institute of Arts, getting a guided tour, getting a 4D Fantasea tour of the Shedd Acquarium, or getting onto the Ferris Wheel at the Navy Pier, Chicago never stops demanding. Here’s where a padlock costs up to $10. (A little riddle on that: Q: Which is safer, a padlock with number combinations or a regular one with jam and lock? A: If they both cost the same, they stand equal chance of being broken), and a bottle of soda could cost almost $3. It’s a shopaholic’s heaven, a traveller’s escape and a photographer’s playground. There’s hardly ever a place to turn without something memorable to see. The one advantage of this set of travellers was our preference for our feet as means of transportation all through the large city. There probably was no other way we could have seen so much.
New York has the Subway. London has the Underground system. Chicago has the “L”. “No, not the ‘El’. Only Boston folks spell it like that,” our guide says. “It’s the ‘L’”. It hardly matters that there are places where the train moves at ground level. It’s still the “L” which stands for “Elevated Train.”
Lying at Union Station with a computer on the lap and an earphone plugging the ears, a stranger stops by, hooded and jittery. He needs a smoke and was ready to pay for it. Walking across the street, a woman with a scarf on her head is throwing up on the curb with no one taking notice. A policeman on small motorped warns squatting travellers to watch out for their bus or stand a risk of being ejected from the Amtrak station as soon as it is midnight. Coming in a cab for the first time during this trip, conversing with a Romanian taxi cab driver, sharing the words of exile. He will one day go back home, but not to become a politician. He’s now a Chicago citizen.
