I wasn’t plan on writing anything about my first day in New York, but since I had some time to kill while I wait for my brother to get ready, I thought I would just pen a few thoughts down. We arrived safely yesterday in JFK and we had no issues at all with Customs and Immigration. Thank God for that. We then made our way via cab to brooklyn and arrived with no issues at all. In fact it was really nice to see our cousin greet us as we just got off the cab! What a warm welcome!!
Then we walked our cousin who had to get to work to his bus stop and along the way it was nice to see a part of Brooklyn. It reminded me so much like Canada in the sense when I first moved to Windsor. The layout of the roads, the small sundry shops and the cars as well as the weather made me reminiscent of my time in Windsor. After having a quick breakfast we made our way back home to have a quick freshen up before heading out to the Big Apple.
I gotta admit the train system in NYC is probably the most complicated one that I have ever encountered. Usually I am pretty sharp and have a natural instinct on navigation and my bearings, but given how the stations are numbered (instead of a place like in most other stations around the world), I found it confusing and mind-boggling. On top of that you add the fact that there are about 5 lines running across the place – it was a little overwhelming at first. By the time we got into downtown, it was already 12 pm, and we had left the house at about 9.30 am that day!
But ah but it was really wonderful to start my day at St. Patrick’s Cathedral and we got to attend the 12.00 pm mass just in time. It was really nice to start my entire North American journey with mass. I found it very peaceful and helpful that in the midst of all the hubub and busy streets, I could just find that 30 minutes to be with God at mass.
After mass, I felt more at less at ease. I was fine to do anything and we decided to walk down 5th Avenue. I gotta say I wasn’t all that taken up with 5th avenue – not to say that I didnt appreciate that this was the most famous street in the world possibly but…I wasn’t all too enthralled about 5th avenue. We ended up walking down 5th avenue till we reached Central Park and the famous Fairmount hotel (aka Plaza Hotel) which I could recognize instantly.
We had lunch at McDonalds (the menus are slightly different here) where I had a quarter pounder (the same stuff back at home) and after that we made our way to the World’s largest departmental store that is Macy’s. Initially my view of Macy’s was nonchalant, in fact I found it to be very similar like Parkson back at home, but upon discovering the men’s section and finding how ridiculously cheap the clothes were we decided to research on what we would plan to buy and come the next day and get it. Big bro managed to find some very affordable sunglasses from Ray Ban and I found some really good jeans which I will be getting in the coming days.
We returned home at around 5.30 to which I started to already feel the jet lag kicking in and I ended up sleeping from 5.30 pm until the next day where I woke up at 7.15 feeling super refreshed and ready for the day. On for day 2 now where we will be visiting Natural History Museum (the space center would be my only stop) and Central Park as well as taking a tour of NYC before heading to Macy’s for our purchases.
I will put more pictures up in the coming few days.
