27 and 28 June updates

27th June
A long day and many tired boys later... We awoke for our morning breakfast fare at Delmonica - a much smoother affair today as the boys knew what to do. They are certainly embracing the American breakfast lifestyle, bagels, flapjacks and French vanilla coffee etc etc. We then set off per metro subway to a folklore workshop for the Rhythms of One World Choir groupings, presented by Kearsney. We were a little late getting all 64 boys through the subway system and the 6 blocks walk to the workshop venue, nevertheless the other choirs were very forgiving and thoroughly enjoyed the hour long presentation. Then it was back to the hotel to change and on to the SA Consulate for a lunch hosted by the Consul General and his staff. The "CG" spoke to the boys and told them how much he had enjoyed the Kearsney Choir at last night's concert, stressing how proud he was of them and the passion with which they performed. He also mentioned that Kearsney was a school of excellent results and achievements in many fields and that the boys were involved in many aspects of school life other than the choir. After the visit to the Consulate we walked back to the hotel to change for the afternoon activity of a Broadway Musical Workshop. We took a subway and a walk to the venue, where ex-cast members of the show Wicked taught the boys a song and choreography for the show. The boys were split into two groups and when we ended the session with two minutes to go, our boys offered to teach Brad some gumboot dancing and Shazi and Tshepo treated him to some of their brand of freestyle dancing. We then took another subway ride to a huge seafood restaurant in Time Square where we enjoyed a wonderful meal together complete with a Forrest Gump quiz in which the boys gamely participated. Then a 3 block walk saw us at the venue for the show Wicked. A wonderful treat for the senses, a marvellous show. Then back to the hotel via the train shuttle with instructions to go straight to bed as we have an early wake-up call for a morning tv show between 7 and 9am.

28th June
We were up early this morning and arrived at Times Square after a 15 minute walk.  The boys attracted a lot of attention in their black and red outfits and gumboots.  The boys had to be in position on the street and were filmed on the dot of 7am for Good Morning America - the pedestrian traffic was brought to a standstill as cell phones were whipped out and the performance filmed. The boys then had 45 mins free time and had to be back to be filmed again for the 8am slot.  Many more people stopped this time!  The boys then had free time to explore and to shop and to have breakfast.  Elwyn and I headed off for the Empire State Building with a few boys in tow and spent an hour familiarising ourselves with the city of New York. We were then bussed to the Avery Fischer Hall, Lincoln Centre for a rehearsal of the joint choir number for the Rhythms of One World Concert which will be at 7pm tonight.