My First Bite of the Big Apple

It was last thursday around 5pm when Bjou and I landed at JFK. The entry went smooth for the two of us, though Bjou was told that it might lead to a problem that he only wanted to leave the US to Mexico. Fabian had finished work early and was picking us up right in front of the terminal. In his new, huge and actually pretty cool Toyota SUV we cruised towards the skyline and entered Manhatten. Fabian lives on West 50th Street, right in hells kitchen, and so we got a good impression of what was waiting in NY when we started with a cold beer on the roof of his house.



Of course we strolled into the Big Apple that same night. Us freshmen were really tired, but after a Burrito right in front of the Worldwide Plaza we found enought energy to climb up the 230 Fifth, one of Fabian's favourite roof top bars. Actually I didn't even think it was very touristy and we had a great view of the skyline. Loved it, though the beer was pretty damn expensive. This must have been where I started just handing over my credit card ... After a very long day we had a very long night.

Around noon the next day Bjou and I hit the city. We started walking south on 8th, Hudson Street and West Broadway and ended up at Ground Zero. I must say that I expected something else. It is a very huge building site with very huge fences around it. What ever is being built is not very well documented for visitors. And when you start thinking about what happend there six years ago it is simply hard to imagine. Still you could feel that most people there had similar thoughts and there was some deliberation in the air.

We went on to Battery Park and watched the Statue of Liberty. As we both had been there we didn't catch a ferry and just hung out on a bench for some time. In general this city does not freak me as it did once. Maybe it's because we have seen some skylines by now, maybe because it's that we don't get overwhelmed that easy anymore in general. But on the other hand this comes with new opportunities like experiencing the feeling to chill in a city like this. Pretty cool. However, we went on to the financial district, the Hanover Sq., watched Wallstreet and Wallstreet people, trinity church, City Hall, more sky scrapers, Ground Zero (from the other side), ... and heaps more. We started walking up and strolled a little through Soho but were way to tired to enjoy the diverse mix of restaurants and shops. Finally we tried NY's underground and went back to our basecamp.