Last Friday I went with my hostmom, the kids and a Swedish Aupair to NYC. It was SO great.
We left at 11.30am on Friday. I had to drive because my hostmom still doesn't have her driver's license and Michelle (Swedish Aupair) isn't insured with our car. Google Maps said it's gonna take 4h30. It took us 6h30.
We drove through Pennsylvania and New Jersey. We made a lunch break in a McDonald's and it was my first time in an American McDonald's. Let me tell you: German McDonald's is better. Michelle said it's because here, they can put everything they want in the food. Yay European laws!
At some point, it started raining and driving here gets so much worse when it's raining. You can't really see the lines on the streets and it's really not pleasant. Especially not with two screaming children in the car.
We had to drive through Manhattan cause we slept in my hostmom's aunt's house who lives on Long Island. We crossed two bridges and on every bridge, you have to pay a toll. I think for the first one it was 14$ and for the second one 8$. NYC ain't cheap.
So we finally arrived at 6pm.
We had to hurry up a lot because we had tickets for a concert in Madison Square Garden at 8pm.
Michelle and I took the Long Island Railroad from Manhasset to Penn Station which is directly next to Madison Square Garden. We were freezing our asses off cause it was so cold and still raining and we wore short clothes. But it was worth it cause we were clearly the hottest chicks in Manhattan!
Just kidding.
There were three support acts: Alex Metric, AlunaGeorge and Madeon. I only knew the second one, because she has one popular song which she played at the end of her performance so I only knew it was her at the very end. Madeon is also a DJ and when he performed, we thought that he was the main act cause our seats were quite far away from the stage. He played only one hour and we didn't know any of the songs and we were like "what is this shitty concert" but then we noticed that he was only the third support act :p
ZEDD was so extremely AWESOME.
It wasn't the best concert I've ever been to (nothing beats 30 Seconds to Mars) but maybe directly after Mars. It was just so much fun, I can't even. The music was great. The videos in the background were just overwhelming. The whole experience was so completely amazing!
Some videos for you to understand my enthusiasm:
Opening (including Beautiful Now): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Gl2JBkQ6tds
Last song (Alive): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jm_DnuNjdgg
Afterwards, there were two guys who asked us if we want to go to some after concert party with them and we said that we're not 21 yet and they asked if we don't have fake IDs. Apparently it's normal to have one here. Sorry to disappoint ^^
On Saturday, we already got up at 6am cause we had tickets for the Statue of Liberty at 10am. So I had 3 hours of sleep. OhMyGod and I don't know how I survived Saturday and Sunday, probably NYC air plus adrenalin.
So we took the Long Island Railroad and the subway to Battery Park.
It was cold. It was raining. It was windy. It was an awful day concerning the weather. Concerning everything else, it was perfect.
The Statue of Liberty is pretty neat. It looks like in the movies (like everything in NYC). We just went to the island, took photos and went back to Manhattan. We skipped the audio tour and Ellis Island because of the weather and because we didn't want to go into a museum.
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| Foggy skyline from the ferry |
Then, we walked to the 9/11 memorial.
In the picture on the left you can see the One World Trade Center. Although you can't see the top because it was just too cloudy!
The 9/11 memorial is really very impressive. I had goosebumps. Just thinking about what happened there and seeing all the names of the people who died there ... I can't even describe the feeling.
Afterwards, we walked to the Brooklyn Bridge.
I always wanted to see that thing, it was nice to finally be able to do that.
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| windy |
Then we wanted to go to Times Square, but we didn't want to walk cause we were freezing and we thought about buying hats and gloves, so it was really terrible weather to walk in the city. So we took one of the famous yellow cabs to Grand Central Station. Looks like Gossip Girl! Ha! It's just crazy.
We had lunch at The Hard Rock Café and went to some shops at Times Square.
Around 4pm we walked to and through Central Park to get to another relative's house who lives in the Upper Eastside. That sounds fancy, but it was a pretty normal apartment. The cool thing was the view (they had a big balcony) and the guy in the entrance who kind of welcomes you and asks the people who live there if they're waiting for visitors.
So at their apartment, we also met my hostmom and the kids again and some other family members. We had nachos with the best guacamole ever! And chili. It was my first chili and they had two versions: the normal one which is spicy and the children's one which is "mild". So I chose the children's one (better be careful) and it was totally spicy for me. Good decision :p
After dinner, we went into the city again. The relatives dropped us off close to 5th avenue so we could look at all the cool shops (Prada, Chanel - that kind of stuff). Unfortunately, they were already closed ;)
NYC in the night is not really dark. The sky is not dark. There are so many lights! It looks so cool.
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| Rockefeller Center |
Michelle and I went to the top of Rockefeller Center again. I already did that when I was in NYC during my Orientation Days, but I needed to it during the nights because of the view. It was so much worth it.
On Our way back to Penn Station, we passed Times Square again.
We had Red Velvet cake from Magnolia Bakery and took some photos with Spiderman. Casual NYC night.
I slept till 8.30 on Sunday, but my legs hurt from walking around all day on Saturday and head hurt and I felt so terrible. Michelle too. But I had to drive back and I absolutely did not want to do that! Plus I still had to do an assignment for college when we arrived in Ithaca.
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| omg no make up |
But the ride back here was better. The weather was good (of course it was only bad when we were in NYC) and it was kinda more relaxed. We powered up with Twixx Ice Cream and Red Bull.
It was such a great weekend!
Although the weather was bad and the ride to NYC was just terrible, I'd do it again every day.
NYC is such a cool city.
But - although I love NYC - Berlin is better. I really like Berlin more. I don't know, NYC is just SO MUCH. It's like throwing stuff in your face the whole time. Berlin is more chill. NYC reminded me of how much I miss Berlin. Berlin, du bist so wunderbar ...
P.S.: I am listening to German radio and just as I finished typing, this song about Germany came on:
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