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Old 11-27-09, 05:24 PM   #51
JU_88
Silent Hunter
 
Join Date: Jan 2006
Location: UK
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I went to U.S once, 9 years ago in 2000 -but only for a few days,
It was an oppotunist thing really, I was in Uni and my girfriend at the time was Japanese and in the UK on a student Visa.
She had to renew her Visa for another year so she basically had to leave the country and come back. At the time my older Brother was living in NewYork so we figured we would pay him a visit.

We flew there with Lufthansa (German Airline) but it was connecting flight via Frankfurt... So we flew from London to Germany, then from germany (back over england ughhh) all the way to JFK, and we arrived late at night.
The funny part was that my Brother told me not to tell immgration about him, because he was working odd jobs but didnt have a green card and was only on a tourist visa
But the immagration officer I saw actually got suspicous, saything that I looked familiar - he though he had seen me before and that my name rang a bell, after I convinced him it was my first time, he joked with me and stamped my Passport for 3 months.
When I told my Brother this, he asked me if the imagration guy was; short, bald, Italian with a mostache (discribed him perfectly) ,So seems like the guy actually remembered my brother out of all the millions of faces he sees every week. Impressive - that man was clearly VERY good at his job

We took a yellow cab to Brothers apart ment over in Williamburg in Brooklyn. The cab driver has a huge fat balck guy with shades (at night)
and giant afro , He didnt speak much accept to curse other driver on the road, and occassionally pulled out a big afro comb he kept tucked under the sun sheild to bush his hair. LOL

First time I saw the the Manhatten Skyline all lit up - from the cab I was blown away
I always though it looked awesome in photos and on TV, but it was really something to see it for real, just the scale of it seemed incredible.
I say 'was' because the WTC towers where still up in 2000, Im glad I got to see them before their destruction, they were were really beautiful buildings.

My brother place was on street in Williamsburg that was home to Peurtericans, had their flags everywhere, old pople playing chess on the sidewalk. Gang of teenagers hanging around listening to music, nothing too intimidating though
My borther said that in his 2 years of living there the most greif he every got was the occasional ... nod accompanied with a harmless "hey Greengo!"

Most New yorkers seemed pretty friendly, we spent our first night drinking in a Brooklyn bar, where Brother was regular. I never tried to drink in Manhatten as I was told they were more strict with ID checks, I was 20 - so under the legal age to drink by 1 year, (though in the UK, I was 2 years over - as it was 18 back then)
We spent the next three days just wondering around Manhatten really. My girlfreind wanted to check out the shops (obviously)
I was impressed with the NYC subway and the way its flat rate $1.50 to go any place you want, nice and simple. London underground pricing goes by all these stupid Zones that make no sense at all.

Although NYC streets are one big grid, it sometime tricky to get your bearings. because everyhting is so symetrical, if your following a map it somtimes takes 15 mins to walk one block, but which point you realise you are heading the wrong way..
In the end used the Empire State Building as reference for North and the Twin towers for south.
But I wished i had a compass at the time
We wondered aound Central Park and Metropoliatn Museum (briefly) we went around China town (10x the size of the one in London)
ALOt of walking, one time we were a few blocks from the WTC and i wanted to go up the South tower, but it was getting dark and cloudy, so we figured we wouldt see much.
(And now I'll never get the chance, bleedin' Terrorists )

What else can i say? I loved New york (manhatten & Brooklyn), it had really awesome feel to it, a really great Athmosphere and loads of character. I could see why my Brother liked to live there.
It was really a mixed up place too (much like London is), like you can find just about anything there.
What was really intresting to me was that every area or street I saw reminded me of a british counterpart in London - only a little different, It was like a beefed up London in many respects.. kinda weird but the two cities seemed to have ALOT in common so it almost felt like home...

I definately want to go back again there someday, but everyone should go at least once.....
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