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Published: August 20th 2008
After a short delay, our plane landed at LaGuardia Airport, and soon after that we were aboard a shuttle bus and on our way to our hotel in Gramercy, a very pleasant neighbourhood in East Village, Midtown Manhattan.
Now, anybody who hasn’t had their head down a rabbit hole (or up their own) for their entire lives is aware (even if they’ve never been there) that NYC is hectic!! But the word hectic takes on a whole new meaning.
We were perversely excited about not only being in New York, but about the fact that we could be involved in an accident, or a road rage incident within the first hour of our arrival, as our minibus driver went to battle with the Manhattan traffic.
When it comes to the amount of people, noise, and the fact that all those mopeds have now turned into yellow taxi cabs, New York isn’t that different to Ho Chi Minh City. But that, thankfully, is where the similarities end. All that chaos seems to have purpose here, and that sense of purpose is, in the main, surrounded by sophistication, class, and charisma.......very unlike Ho Chi Minh City!
Of course, speaking the language
helps, but with Chinatown, Little Italy, Latino and Russian areas, even that can be a little tricky.
Manhattan’s grid system makes the city fairly easy to negotiate, and due to the countless films, dramas, and sit-coms that have been shot on location here, the city seems to have a familiar feel on almost every block.
With so many famous landmarks, places to eat and things to do, New York can be a bit of a head-spin. You could probably live on Manhattan Island for 3 years and never have breakfast in the same café.
The big deal about being in the Big Apple was hard to deny when soon after opening our eyes on the first morning of our first full day, I found myself humming the lines:
“I wanna wake up, in a city that doesn’t sleep. To find I’m king of the hill, top of the heap”
But, as I was reminded by Sam, I was neither of those, but we had awoken in New York New York, and for the next ten days or so, we were ‘gonna be a part of it’!
In order to orientate ourselves further (yes, you guessed it) we
TAXI
on Brooklyn Bridgejumped on another one of those sightseeing tour buses. It was a pretty good deal, which included our bus ticket that we could use to hop-on and hop-off over the next 48 hours that included an Uptown, Downtown and Brooklyn loop, as well as a Night Tour (the best time to experience Times Square). Included in the price was an hour and a half cruise that would take us under both the Manhattan and Brooklyn Bridges, along Lower Manhattan, and on returning, past the Statue of Liberty - more on her later. As if that wasn’t enough, the ticket also included the entry fee to the viewing platform of the Empire State Building.....a bargain!
We stayed on the sightseeing bus for most of the first day, making notes of things to do and see, as well as taking pictures from our elevated position on the open-top double-decker bus. With a better idea of the location of certain highlights, we formulated a plan of how to achieve the best New York experience our time would allow.
The following day (taking the good advice of the guy who sold us the ticket) we arrived at the Empire State Building as
Views from the Empire State Building....
...of part of Midtown and all of Dowtown Manhattan it opened in the morning, allowing for a quick passage to the viewing deck, and sharing the fantastic views New York’s highest building has to offer with a manageable amount of people. After the lift (sorry - elevator) down, we jumped aboard the tour bus again for a free ride down to Pier 17.
It’s never the same on the sightseeing buses, as each guide has their own unique style of delivering the historical and quirky facts about nearly every part of the city. We took our cruise that afternoon, and then we planned to walk across the Brooklyn Bridge, but after leaving Sam in a pub whilst I made a phone call home to mum and dad, I came back an hour later realising we’d have to shelve it for the time being. Sam had obviously made an impression, as on my return we were bought drinks by Bob, an attorney from Baton Rouge, and had a round on the house from the barman, Jimmy - probably out of sympathy for me! We went on the night tour later that evening, which took us over Manhattan Bridge to Brooklyn, where we had great views of the Manhattan skyline
at night from across the East River.
After our bus ticket expired, it was time to experience the New York subway, which apart from feeling like we were walking down into a kiln (in the summer humidity), is an easy way to get around the city. On surfacing, we wandered up Wall Street and stopped for a drink in the historic Fraunces Tavern, reportedly the oldest surviving building in Manhattan, and the very spot where George Washington bade farewell to his officers after the revolution. After a few cold ones we had a closer look (and participated in a slightly embarrassing ritual) at the Charging Bull:
The Charging Bull: Also known as ‘Wall Street Bull’ or ‘Bowling Green Bull‘, this is a large bronze sculpture weighing 3,200kg (7000lb). At a total cost of $360,000, it was made and positioned by its creator, Arturo Di Modica. The Bull is a symbol of aggressive financial optimism and prosperity, and was a Christmas gift to the people of New York in December 1989, when the artist himself trucked it to Lower Manhattan (his own idea, not the city’s) and positioned the Bull outside the New York Stock Exchange. It was subsequently
The Charging Bull
Also known as the Wall Street Bull or Bowling Green Bull. removed and impounded by the police, but the ensuing public outcry led the NYC Department of Parks and Recreation to install it in its current location. It has since become the unofficial symbol of the Financial District, and one of the most photographed sculptures in New York City. They say you’ve got to rub the Bull’s nose, horns and testicles for good luck, and its shiny nether regions are testament to this custom being very much alive 20 years later.
That night we had dinner in Greenwich Village, a less-touristy, very relaxed area of Manhattan, and, as well as lots of good places to eat and drink, is the home of the ’Tiles for America’ memorial where post 9/11 children would draw or write their messages on ceramic tiles before attaching them on a designated fence.
The following morning we made our way to Little Italy and had some breakfast, Godfather style. Little Italy is apparently becoming increasingly smaller as its neighbour Chinatown (the US’s biggest) expands. There’s no confusing where you are though, as Little Italy has its signposts, lamp-posts and every other kind of post painted in the colours of the Italian flag. Whereas Chinatown is
Flatiron Building
"I found myself agape, admiring a skyscraper the prow of the Flatiron Building, to be particular, ploughing up through the traffic of Broadway and Fifth Avenue in the late-afternoon light." - H.G. Wells (1906)
just full of shops selling cheap, tacky shite.
After our al fresco Italiano experience, we travelled north on the subway and went inside to admire the interior of Grand Central Station, and then back outside for the exterior of the Chrysler Building, which are practically next to each other. We then went to ponder over another famous structure, the Flatiron Building near Madison Square Park, and although far from high in today’s standards, it’s considered New York’s first skyscraper. If you’re not familiar with the name, you may recognise it from the photo, and it still remains one of New York’s most unusual buildings, with the front being only 2m wide - hence the name.
We were headed into Friday night and we’d been unable to secure our hotel, or any other in Manhattan in our price range for that matter, on a very busy weekend. So we packed up and went to stay in Queens for 2 nights, having reserved a room back in Manhattan for the following week. The lack of quality ’old school’ graffiti so far in New York was disappointing, but as we entered Queens on the train, we were a little concerned at
The memorial to John Lennon
Strawberry Fields in Central Park (NYC) how abundant it now was.
Our time in Queens passed without incident and allowed us to achieve some planning without the distractions of the NYC attractions, but before long we were back in the thick of it.
It was Sunday when we returned, so we took the subway to Central Park, seemingly the hub of all activity on a fine weekend. It was warm and sunny and there were hundreds of people on Sheep Meadow enjoying the weather, whilst others were on The Lake in rowing boats. Within the Park is Strawberry Fields, a 2.5 acre landscaped area dedicated to the memory of John Lennon, and we sat on a bench close to the centrepiece, which is a mosaic that encircles the word ‘Imagine’.
The entrance to Strawberry Fields is located directly across from the Dakota Apartments where Lennon once lived, and was killed in 1980 after being shot in the back four times by Mark Chapman. We listened as buskers played Beatles hits, although the most poignant moment was when they played Imagine. If that doesn’t send a little shiver down your spine, you’re probably as dead as John himself.
New Yorkers aren’t shy in coming forward
to showcase their talents in Central Park on sunny Sundays. Amusingly, this not only brings out the talented, but also the clueless and the undignified, which brings us nicely on to ‘Rollerdisco!’ That ridiculous craze that should have been packed securely away in a box in the Eighties, labelled - ‘For the sake of mankind’s dignity, DO NOT re-open’.
Instead, it was shocking to see it alive and well, in all its embarrassing wrongness, here in Central Park. It was contained within an enclosure, that quite clearly only the medically insane, or the bizarrely-dressed-and-currently-hallucinating could enter. It was one of those moments when people’s actions and choice of attire was so bad that you wanted to mock them and pity them at the same time - it was compulsive viewing. It’s hard to explain, in moments like these, why you feel so personally embarrassed on behalf of someone else who actually looks like they’re enjoying themselves. It was a ‘George Galloway being the cat in Big Brother’ moment, and we stayed for about 20 minutes (more like an hour!) before the spell wore off.
We continued with our ‘list of things to do’ on Monday by taking the free
Staten Island Ferry over to, well, Staten Island, and back again. We finally walked across Brooklyn Bridge and, once over the other side, had lunch in the posh River Café that sits below the bridge looking back at Lower Manhattan.
After lunch we made a visit to the area formerly known as ’Ground Zero’. If you, or someone you know, weren’t involved somehow on that fateful day, then truthfully there’s not much reason to come here other than sympathy or a touch of morbid fascination. Now that’s OK, but we were a little confused as to what people were expecting to see, as they climbed up onto planters, straining on tiptoes to make themselves a couple of inches taller to try and glimpse over and beyond the barriers. It was pretty ugly to watch, as Americans, and other nationalities, who I’m sure found the whole 9/11 attack disturbing and upsetting at the time, were now holding their cameras aloft to take pictures into the area where the Twin Towers used to stand. The search for survivors is over, isn’t it? Therefore, what can be seen now is probably no different to any other building site.
As mentioned earlier,
Katz's Delicatessen
Where Harry met Sally there’re famous film sets all over this city, oh, and by the way, steam really does come out of the manholes. Down on the subway we’re reminded of the film Ghost, whilst on the Empire State Building it’s King Kong and Sleepless in Seattle, there’s War of the Worlds, Taxi Driver, X-Men, Goodfellas, MIB, Die Hard with a Vengeance, I am Legend, The Departed, The Godfather, Sleepers.....the list is endless.
But the one place we did seek out and have lunch where the cameras once rolled, was Katz’s Delicatessen. Where? we hear you ask. Well, this is the famous diner where Meg Ryan faked it, in When Harry Met Sally. There’s a sign that hangs above THE table that reads ’This is where she sat, hope you had what she had. Enjoy!’.
That night as we went back to eat in Greenwich Village, we also passed the park where they filmed the scene in ’As Good As It Gets’ where Jack Nicholson walks the dog for the first time, and it imitates him by avoiding the cracks in the pavement.
The following day would be our final full day in New York City. With most of our tick-list
The Statue of Liberty
Picked out in her patina green complete, we’d decided to leave the heat, fumes and noise of NYC for a few days of fresh air in Boston, and would return for the evening before our flight out. So, in order to make the most of this day, we boarded a boat at Battery Park that would take us across to Liberty Island. Although we’d seen her from afar, this day we would disembark and see The Statue of Liberty a little closer. It was another Sydney Opera House moment. We’d seen her on TV, in photographs, and even replicated in Vegas, but she’s so much better in the flesh (copper)! It was a goosebump inducing moment for sure.
The Statue of Liberty: Presented to the US by the people of France in1886......blah, blah, blah.....
What don’t ya know? Well, how about this; It acted as a lighthouse between 1886-1902. First suicide was on May 13th 1929, when Ralph Gleason crawled out through a window in the crown. Her mouth is 3ft wide, and at 24,634 tonnes she’s the world's heaviest statue.
Returning to Lower Manhattan, we had an early dinner and returned to our hotel to shower and change ready for the evening. Earlier
The Phantom of the Opera
The longest running show on Broadway in the day we’d been to the TKTS booth, where you can get tickets to shows for the same evening at reduced prices. We couldn’t believe our luck when we managed to get two tickets to see a show on Broadway. But not just any show, the longest running show in Broadway history; The Phantom of the Opera. For stubborn non-showgoers, we have to reluctantly hold up our hands and admit we really enjoyed it. We walked out of the Majestic Theatre and made the short walk to Times Square.
Times Square is a lot smaller than you might imagine, and it must be crammed on New Year's Eve. It’s also one of the only places that you require sunglasses at night to avoid neon-blindness, as adverts for everything and anything flash, flicker and dazzle you in an explosion of uncoordinated colour. This is no place to hold the epileptics world convention.
The next morning we lugged our backpacks on the subway to Penn. Station, and caught our train to Boston - a journey of approximately 4.5 hours. The high rises of Manhattan gave way to green and open spaces as we passed through Connecticut and into Massachusetts.
Liars!
We went in, and disappointingly, nobody knew our names!!! Boston. We arrived, after leaving the heat of NYC, to chilly weather and torrential rain.
Boston’s a lovely city and rightly or wrongly reminds us of Canada. It doesn’t seem to crave attention like Los Angeles, Las Vegas or New York, it was just there waiting to be explored, with its laid back atmosphere and the best of America’s history………the oldest Tavern in the USA!
Staying with pubs, Boston is also home to one of the world's most famous of watering holes - 'Cheers'. Of course, we spent a little time in both of them, although Cheers is only recognisable from the outside. The inside is completely different, not like the studio version at all.
Whilst in Boston, we had to get our laptop seen to as it’d developed more gremlins than even Spielberg could manage. We then went to North End, the large Italian area, that thankfully bore no resemblance to its namesake in Portsmouth! We ate in a great restaurant that would appeal to lovers of mob movies, as we are, with no less than 6 screens showing as many different gangster movies, including Goodfellas, Donnie Brasco and The Godfather. We decided that the restaurant was
a front for the local Mafia.
Definitely worth a mention is the New England Holocaust Memorial. It consists of a path that takes you through 6 individual glass chimneys, each 54ft high, with steam rising up from grates below your feet. The steam rises past a million engraved numbers per chimney. There are also quotes from survivors etched on the glass. The 6 hollow glass columns represent the 6 Nazi death camps that were used to murder approximately 6 million Jews (hence the engraved numbers from 1 to 6,000,000), over 6 years from 1939-1945. It’s brilliantly done, and people’s silence as they wander through is a tribute in itself to how thought provoking the memorial is.
After our train journey back to NYC, we arrived in time to grab some dinner before heading out to a small but cosy venue we’d booked before leaving for Boston. The Comic Strip is one of New York’s best known comedy clubs. Laughing at eight stand-up comedians going through their routines is generally a good night by anyone’s standards. It was made even better when out of the whole audience my name was picked out of a hat resulting in my drinks
bill being on the house. Sam still had to pay for hers! (...so I took it out of his pocket money!). We ended our New York experience sat in a 24 hour diner at midnight, with a drink and a slice of pie…………
.........or so we thought!
We arrived the next day at LaGuardia Airport to absolute chaos. Flights had been cancelled the day before due to storms and the queues were hideous. Even worse, flights were being cancelled on this day too, as another storm unleashed high winds, hail and lightning directly over the airport. It was so bad that the TV cameras were there to capture the madness, mayhem and misery. For us (seasoned in airport chaos), things were to become even more frustrating. Way back in Perth we’d had to change a few flight dates on our itinerary, including the flight we were about to check in for, except there was no record of us on the system. Allegedly, the Qantas representative in Perth had cancelled our original flights but hadn’t rebooked them on the new dates. This meant that not only had we just queued for two hours
DKNY mural
Now untouchable due to the Twin Towers being in it for a flight we weren’t even booked on, but we’d be spending another night in Queens, because the only flight they could get us on was the following day, which even then would be going via Charlotte, North Carolina, getting into Miami at approximately 9pm.
That’s if our flight to Miami went according to plan,
it’s hurricane season……………………………
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