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Published: February 10th 2006
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Smile!
Me with Maria's Uncle and Parents. A day of eating
Dim sum with the “relatives”
Dinner with Tony
Today’s plans all seem to be revolving around food! My favourite especially since eating is my hobby. 😊 First up on my list of eating adventures is to head into the Manhattan Chinatown. There’s an excellent bus shuttle service between the Flushing Chinatown to the Manhattan Chinatown for a mere $2. So Maria and I caught the bus to Main Street Flushing and then hopped aboard a shuttle bus and we were soon on our way. Once in Chinatown we met up with Maria’s parents and Uncle. They, as I may have mentioned before, were all very excited about my arrival into NYC especially since it has been so many years. Luckily I still have some photos from Christmas Eve on the memory card that happened to be in my camera and I was able to show some photos of what everyone looks like. When I showed them the picture of my mom & dad taken a few days before Christmas they said a few times that my mom looks the same but my dad is looking fat. Lol Then they were all surprised how big the cousins
Say cheese!
Me with Maria and her Parents. have grown. Hmm, it has been 15 years and for example Liz is no 20 (btw Happy Belated!) so what are the chances she’s changed just a little bit? Lol
With their limited English and my even more limited Cantonese, it made for “interesting conversation” or rather lack of conversation. Lol But lunch was yummy. Gotta love the dim sum!
Then after dim sum we went upstairs to their apartment for a bit. Maria had to help her Uncle with stuff and I just hung around. At about 2PM Maria and I left. We parted ways as Maria headed back to Queens and I had about four hours to kill before meeting up with Tony. He works near Union Square so I decided I’d walk up Broadway to Kate’s Paperie (cool paper stuff there but a little too pricey for me) and then see what eels there was to see around there. Ended up in what I think was the SoHo district and there were a blot of funky shops and other big chain stores to browse. I only bought something from Old Navy. I couldn’t resist the $1.97 tank tops that were originally selling for $8.50. What
a steal!
By mid afternoon I needed a break and grabbed myself a Frappuchino from Starbucks and worked on updating my journal…always behind. I also took the opportunity to call Tony at work to arrange a meeting place and time. Since I was petty close to Union Square at this point, I suggested meeting at Barnes & Noble at whatever time he was off work…6/6:30. Excellent. It will give me a chance to check out the first floor of books that I missed out on yesterday.
I was reading Tip #100 of 101 tips to improve your writing (or something along those lines) when Tony was standing at my side. I quickly made a purchase - “Wicked”, which is about the life of the Wicked Witch of the West before the Wizard of Oz and I guess before she became wicked. They’ve actually made this into a play on Broadway but I’m sure it is too busy for me to get discounted tickets for a popular show. But I digress.
After making a quick purchase and running into one of Tony’s coworkers we were off towards the Meat Packing District and dinner. Tony picked Markt which is a really nice restaurant. Not too many times in the last eight months that I’ve been to a restaurant like this! The menu items were in French but the descriptions in English. Thank goodness! Lol Tony ordered a duck paté to start. This was followed by a hugeass platter of seafood - oysters, clams, mussels, shrimps, lobster, crab and snails. It was all so delish and oh so fresh tasting. We weren’t finished yet we still had pasta to come! Amazingly I was able to finish my linguine with crab and tomato sauce. Only because the serving size was not huge like you’d get at Anton’s. lol We still weren’t finished eating since Tony wanted to share a dessert. Well, okay since ice cream with chocolate sauce sounds like a great way to top off an excellent meal. I can’t believe we had a four hour meal! I think that this was the first time that Tony and I have actually sat down and had a real conversation. It was really nice. So there were no worries about finding something to talk about. Lol
I finally noticed that it was 11PM and thought, hmm, I’d better check the LIRR schedule to see when I have to be at Penn station. OMG! The last train is at 11:49 but if I’m lucky I might be able to catch the 11:19 train. Tony was kind enough to escort me all the way to Penn Station. I quickly purchased a ticket while Tony went to find what track I should be going to. Number 19. So we raced off. Oh no, we forgot to take a picture together. So I asked a guy walking by to snap our photo at Penn station. Oh well, not the most picturesque spots. We quickly said goodbye and I hopped on the train with even a couple of minutes to spare! I was at my station by 11:43 and ringing Maria and Eric’s doorbell less than 5 minutes later. I was a bit worried that they’d be asleep but lucky for me they were both awake still. 😊
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