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Published: March 28th 2012
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The last time I had visited New York City (NYC) was in 1988. I went there to watch the Grateful Dead perform for three nights in a row at Madison Square Garden. The highlights of that trip included an evening with the Asian “escorts” that were being advertised on the local cable television stations and the availability of beer on every street corner irregardless of your age (I was 16 years old when I visited). “Tall Boy” Budweiser singles were sold to us under the surreptitious disguise of a brown paper bag, thus allowing us to walk the city streets with brews in hand.
The NYC of 2011 is much different than the one I visited in 1988. It was clean and perfect. My life never felt threatened throughout my entire visit. Well...... unless I walked down the street with a beer in a brown paper bag... then my life would be threatened, but this time it would be threatened by the police officer who would most likely throw me in jail for an open container violation.
On the July Fourth Weekend of 2011, we took the Amtrak train from Boston to NYC for $100 round-trip (RT). Yeah... you
can take The Fung Wah Bus for $30 RT, but the vertigo might catch up to you, and you are likely to barf up the $20 dinner you just ate. If that happens both ways, the total cost of your trip would be $70, so we figured it wasn’t worth the risk.
We arrived to Penn Station at 2pm on July 3rd, 2011. It instantly brought back memories of my trip there in 1988, considering that Penn Station is literally underneath Madison Square Garden. Upon our arrival we decided to see a different type of show... A Broadway Show. The performances started at 3pm and no evening shows were scheduled, because it was the night before the Fourth of July, which apparently is the start of the holiday for the New York Actors Union. Everything was sold out, so we rushed last minute into a theater that was starring Robin Williams as a tiger called “Bengal Tiger at the Baghdad Zoo”. It had a special characteristic considering that we were attending the final performance of the play, so that was exciting.
We checked into our hotel "The Morgan’s Hudson Hotel" that afternoon. The hotel had a very classy
decor and the rooms were clean, albeit with a limited view. I would highly recommend this hotel for couples, but maybe not families. We spent the evening walking around Central Park and visiting some off-location neighborhoods where we found an excellent place to dine. At this point, we realized it is possible to walk everywhere in NYC, of which..... crazy as it sounds, I did barefoot! We took one cab and one subway during our entire stay, and that could have been avoided with better planning.
The next morning was the Fourth of July, so we decided to follow the masses to the Statue of Liberty. The line was predicted to be over three hours just to get on the boat, but we waited, and exactly three hours later, we were on a boat to visit the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We didn’t have reservations (which can be made online) for our boat trip, so that can save you some time, if that suits you. Both locations were interesting. In truth, I enjoyed my afternoon more for the experience of riding the boat and visiting islands, than for the historic value of the sites at hand.
After we got off the boat from Ellis Island, we caught a couple street performances. The performers were good, but what really caught my attention was their uncomfortable approach to dealing with their mostly white audiences (the performers were mostly black guys). They would try to make racial jokes about white people feeling threatened by black people, which seemed contrived. I guess I'm over those stereotypes, but maybe some people aren't.
We continued on, past Ground Zero. I was surprised to see so much construction still going on, considering that it had been almost ten years since the event had occurred. The fire department has a unit posted near the site, where they let you pose for pictures with them etc. It’s a somber yet positive vibe where you get to thank the firemen for the services that they provide to our communities.
Next, we made a quick jaunt to the Brookline Bridge before heading to Little Italy. The bridge is certainly a tourist attraction, where they have a clearly marked walking path. Nobody pays attention to which side you’re supposed to walk on, so expect to see bikers collide with walkers, or skateboarders hitting bikers, or people
in wheelchairs smashing into hoverboarders etc.
Little Italy is fun because you can order mixed drinks and walk down the gated section of the street with them. There are restaurants everywhere, so you can take your pick. They all have their food inspection ratings hanging on their front windows, so we picked the one with the lowest grade (B-), and it was awesome. I was always an under performer at school, so I figured we could support the restaurant that was similar to the likes of my own.
We caught the Fourth of July fireworks that evening. They were displayed on the West Side of Manhattan (The side that faces New Jersey). It seemed like it would be cool to sit on the Jersey side and watch the fireworks over the NYC skyline. For us it was hard to get a good view of the fireworks, ‘cause we arrived late. The police did an overtly good job controlling the crowd. The crowd was restricted from using the streets or private property (like bank parking lots) to view the fireworks, and the police made sure of that.
The next morning we went to the top of the “Top
of the Rock” for a mere $25. While at the top, I noticed the lack of foreign tourists, but I later realized that they all go to the Empire State Building, because it is taller and more prestigious. Anyway, that afternoon the ride home on Amtrak didn’t include any seizures or vomiting so I figure our mission was accomplished.
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