"I can't think of anything that excites a greater sense of childlike wonder than to be in a country where you are ignorant of almost everything."
Bill Bryson

Tuesday, September 20, 2011

A Bite Out Of The Big Apple


Having had a few days to mull it over, I now feel that I can go into more details about my New York trip on Saturday. I briefly covered all the things that we got up to in the big city but, for once, I didn’t provide my usual critique and analysis... so here it is.

I had been to New York previously in Christmas 2006 with my family so it wasn’t completely new to me. We just went for a few days and did the usual tourist things, going up the Empire State building, visiting Ground Zero, which was still pretty much rubble at the time, and Ellis Island and The Statue of Liberty etc. What I do remember from my last trip is completely and utterly falling in love with NYC. I thought it was beautiful and amazing and the people were so friendly, despite all the rumours, and Manhattan just seemed the most magnificent and majestic city that I had ever seen. In fact it was probably my new found love for New York that had made me fall more in love with America and made me want to come back!

This trip... I didn’t have quite the same reaction. Now everyone’s heard about all the amazing sights, which are amazing, but this time I was much more aware of the reality of the city as opposed to the glitzy touristy exterior. For starters I didn’t enter into Manhattan from the lovely Staten Island Ferry but instead the bus drove through Harlem. An area of New York which I have been studying in my aforementioned Latino Literature class and which is known as an area inhabited largely by Latinos and African Americans. It is also known as one of the more run down areas of New York and this definitely seemed the case as we drove through it. It was dirty and grimy and none of the buildings were in good order with shaggy and ripped curtains blowing through cracked and dust ridden windows. While this did change as we came deeper into central Manhattan it still wasn’t the sparkly city that I remembered but instead it was quite dirty and tacky. Now I went there at Christmas so I saw proper Christmas ‘tacky’ with the mountains of lights covering everything but this was a different type of tacky. So many shop windows had very eccentric and gaudy displays which you would never see in London.  This however definitely did not stop me from spending a good few hours wandering up 5th Avenue and perusing the numerous floors of Forever 21; my new favourite shop!

Another thing that I really disliked was how dirty it is compared to London. I think we take it for granted how clean London, and England really, is. For instance, having grabbed a snack from, I’m highly ashamed to say, McDonalds, I spent a good half an hour or so wandering up and down looking for a bin to put the rubbish in.  You would never have that issue in England we have an abundance of bins on every street corner! Despite this I didn’t get lost looking for a bin thanks to the wonderfully simple grid system! Although I have to say that I do quite like the higgledy-piggledyness (hey Shakespeare made up words so can I) of London’s medieval streets, it gives it more character. Now I’m not saying that New York lacks any character but I think that it comes out more through the people and the general nature of life in New York rather than through the physical place.

All in all, while I absolutely loved my day in New York, so much so that I’ve already booked my tickets and an extortionate hostel room for in a few weeks time, I still am very much an English girl with a love of London. Yes the skyscrapers and central park and the general awe inspiring nature of New York is beyond describable but I don’t think I could ever spend more than a few days there; despite all this... I’m already ridiculously excited about going back! I’ll let you know if my opinion changes.

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