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The absence of my blog yesterday was due to one single main event that may not have even registered in your head. I'm not calling my readers idiots though, I'm merely explaining that the event is not important outside of America. If you look at the date, you'll understand. Independence Day! A public holiday splattered with festivities and parades and fireworks, a truly momentous day in the American calendar. So, now you know why I haven't added anything, would you like to see what I did both today and the day before? Sure you would.
After my internet café trip yesterday, me and Sandy decided it would be best to head back to the hostel, and just wait out the rest of the night until we were ready to sleep and meet up in the morning. We arrived in the hostel, where the common room and garden terrace type place was filled with fellow hostellers. Me and Sandy sat down to discuss our plans for the next day, including poissibly taking in a show on Broadway, when a voice from behind her speaks up, from the computer area.
"There's a ticket booth in the Financial District too" We face the stranger, who is a roughyl 20 year old girl with an Australian accent. She is smiling. "Sorry, I didn't mean to eavesdrop, but me and my friends were told it by our room mate, and the line is much shorter than the Times Square place." Her advice is welcomed, and an apology is offered for her sneaky listening!
She then joins us at our table, and we then launch into a long conversation regarding her time here mostly, but we bat around topics about where we live and what we're doing. It was really interesting; she'd been here about 5 days and she had taken in so much of the city and its sights I was jealous. She did give good advice though. A long time passed, and soon we were momentarily joined by her friend from the group of 4 she was travelling with. We eventually learned their names (Tracy and Anita), and they said we should join them and some English guys outside on the terrace. We did.
After involving ourselves long into the night with inane talking and general banter, I decided I should probably get to bed. Leaving the remnants of the troupé, I went up the stairs and opened my door. First of all, I was confused, thinking my eyes had tricked me, but then it hit me; somebody was in my bed! I remembered walking in, placing my sheets on the bottom bunk which was the only empty bed, and quickly leaving to go out. The room was dark and the people were asleep. The bed I was going to use had been filled, so I went downstairs to reception. I asked the guy (Who didn't speak much English) if the room was full or overbooked or something, and he said it was fine. I explained my problem, but said I'd sort it out!
I went back upstairs, and realised the bed above, though strewn with mess and clothes and letters and everything else was in fact personless! I knew I would just have to sleep in the guys bed who was now sleeping in mine. I started to take some of the things off and put them down, but when I climbed up the side to get into mine, I discovered the bed was enormously creaky! I got in, and was sifting through the rest when the person in the top bunk beside woke up and said 'Paul?'. I don't know why I did the next thing, but I just pounced onto the other side of the bed (I think it was to stop making so much noise! :P) beside them. I frightened the living daylights out of them! I said sorry, and explained I was moving stuff out of the bed. She (In a male dorm, strangely) said it was her boyfriends and he'd slept in the other bed. Wasting no time I just cleared up the stuff and went to sleep.
In the morning, I had set my alarm to wake me up for 9AM, with time for a shower, but the late night/early morning got to me and I slept 40 minutes past. I woke up, and realised this was no time to sleep in (I would probably have woken ealier, but the other room mates were up and getting ready individually so I had no choice but to wait.). I quickly changed and had a shower, and ran downstairs. Sandy was still there, and I told her I was sorry and she said it wasn't a problem, she was reading her book. So, eventually, we left.
Our plans were supposed to include the morning in Central Park, but that wasn't an option because at 12 (It was getting close to 11) we were to meet Regelio and his friends to go to the Museum of Modern Art. We went straight there. We waited til 5 past and decided to head straight in and meet them at the backup time (My suggestion, I am so organised! Lol) of 1PM. We went in, into the garden, and went around trying to understand the art, to no avail. There were stuff worth seeing though, like a small version of a sea sparrow helicopter hanging from the roof, and some mega sculptures and weird paintings (I took stills on the videocamera as I've still to find a decent camera). Halfway through the first gallery we bumped into Rogelio, and said we'd just carry on as two groups.
Looking around, there was some weird stuff, like a half of a man with candles sticking out the backs of his legs lying down on the floor looking like he was stuck in the wall. And more stuff along similar wackiness levels. I'll explain more of them to you when I get home though.
On the fourth floor, we bumped into Rogelio, and said to meet up at about 2:50PM by the entrance. So, me and Sandy sped up our journey on the last floors, of paintings and photographs, and got downstairs with ten minutes to spare! We headed across to see the MoMA design store, and found that the great little items were cool but so expensive! We walked outside just as Rogelio was coming out the entrance to MoMA across the road. We met up, and basically just decided that because he was going somewhere different that we'd meet up (I forgot to say that when Rogelio met me first he told me he'd bought Broadway tickets for Phantom of the Opera for $26 and I'd have to pay him back) at 6:30 the next day for the show. I obliged, and we went our separate ways.
Me and Sandy were keen to get a lot of things done, so we decided top just browse Fifth Avenue as we'd been told by Tracy that it was good. We did, and after shopping in the Lindt shop (Yes, chocolate is what it was, with free samples!) we got to Trump Tower. I filmed inside for you. Needless to say, the gold effect and endless Trump merchandise and waterfall inside was enough to leave me jealous of that guy! We got out, and I tried to call home, but as is getting the norm these days, there was nobody home!
I said we should go to FAO Shwarz which was round the corner (And I've been there twice) and so when we went in, we played the Guessing the Price game of certain items. I shocked her several times. The most expensive toy was well over $100,000...
We got out, and saw some sort of famous but very unfamiliar sight. It was told to us by someone that it was this certain thing, (Another thing which I'm going to leave you guess!) but even after seeing it it didn't look the same as I thought it would. Anyway, it was right next to Central park so we went in there.
We pretty much spent the next two hours or so just looking around there because it was so big and so nice to walk around. When we got to the first lake furthest south, we walked around and stopped by this little seating area in the shade in a wooden hut type thing. We saw lots of people renting boats and crashing like the dodgems and laughing and having fun (But I didnt want to go because of the jeans I'd chosen to wear, D'oh!). A gondola we'd spotted earlier made the trip by and with a different couple. All of a sudden, cheering from the bridge and the lake spectators arose, and we saw that the man had proposed to the lady, and the Gondola man even stopped moving around and took their picture. It was awesome to be a part of that. And this guy behind us was laughing and saying that he wanted to do that and the idea was stolen from him :D
We eventually moved further north in the park, seeing different things and stopped in this huge piece of lawn next to turtle pond and sat and rested our legs for a good hour or so. And by then it was getting close to the time when we decided we should head down to the South Ferry station to Battery Park to see the fireworks. We got back to the hostel, and I got caught up in my filming and watching the tape and then Sandy came to my room. She came in, and soon after that, the boyfriend and girlfriend duo came in. They didn't actually seem bad at all, in fact, they were quite nice people, and we had a laugh about the scare I gave her last night. We also discovered that we were going to the same place but at different times so we didn't leave together.
We got on the subway (Because the traffic was hell and the place was so far away to walk) and the station was roasting! I was sweating when I got on, and thankfully the train was air conditioned, as is normal apparently. We took the right one too, and as we neared the station, the announcement came that only the first five cars would let you exit to South Ferry (Our stop). So, a manic rush began to sprint to the five cars at the next stop. No transferring between cars, just getting off, running, and getting on again. We got into the fifth car which was so packed it was unbelievable, and managed to get off all right. The stairs to get out of the subway was tremendously packed too, but we waited and we were able to reach daylight and slightly cooler weather!
The place we chose to sit down at Battery Park first seemed Ok, because the main spots right beside the water edge were all taken and fabulously overcrowded, so where we were felt good enough. We did notice the sign saying 'Newly Seeded Grass, No sitting!' but everybody else had already sat down on it and we weren't going to get in any trouible over it. Then, it seemed to get better, with this one park guard opening up the grassy area next door and me and Sandy grabbed our opportunity to get the best seats. However, then the policemen came and said that we shouldn't be on the area, and we had to listen. We trodded back to our old place, and three other park guards told us that wasn't Ok either!
We jumped off the grass trying to get a good place (I had Rogelio's friend Juans number which I had tried to phone twice to meet up, but the first time the phone cut off and the second time there was no contact between the lines so we never met up), and the water edge was being guarded by police! Damn it, we thought. We decided to take the long way around and find any old grass to sit on until the display. We did get one. It wasn't a great location, but at least we had somewhere to rest until the big moment. Sandy played my DS and I read my book which kept us separately entertained, until the fireworks came and we both rushed up to see them.
I've seen a better display, but it wasn't too shabby at all. I got most of it on film for yourselves to compare. There was much cheering and whooping during and after the display, which felt good, and after that we decided the subway probably wasn't the best idea just yet, so we opted to walk to the next station, probably about two blocks away. However, the plan never really worked because we were enthused by the thousands of pedestrians almost taking over the streets, and decided to stay with the crowds. We wound up at the WTC, and spent a good time there, just looking and reflecting it in the night time. After that, it was back to Broadway to find a subway.
After about twenty minutes, we figured that the subway we wanted wasn't even on this street, but we didn't feel like wandering off, so instead we walked the whole way back to the hostel! That's approximately 75 blocks or a few miles. We managed to stay with small groups of couple or gangs so we were never in any position to feel dangerous. Sandy is a fast walker though. I only just kept up with her properly! And later on I took over as my stamina beat hers 😊
We passed a display from a street performer...
EWnding this as computer time run out! Update tomorrow or soon, bye bye!
Russ/Epiq
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chloe
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its chloe, have you seen any famous people yet russ? sounds like you're havin a great time!