Adventures from Life in the Big Apple

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Moscow

2011-08-26T10:05:00.001-04:00

Moscow was a ridiculous two part adventure.

first, the adventure even getting to the city. second, my whirlwind literally THREE HOURS in the city. the damn visa for just this city cost me $300 (so essentially I paid $100 for each hour I was there), but honestly... when is the next time I'm going to get to M-O-S-C-O-W?! it's not exactly the easiest of places to get to, nor is it really that high on people's travel priority list. but since I was already flying on the Russian airline, I decided to make my layover as long as possible in order to be able to get into the city.

I'll start with trying to get to the city first.

as mentioned in the previous post, I arrived at the airport at around 9:30pm for a 2:00am flight. about two hours before the flight was scheduled to leave they finally listed where we were supposed to go to check in. I wait in line like everyone else, get up to one of the ticket agents and hand them my passport, since I didn't have a way of checking in online and printing my boarding pass (pretty sure you can't do that on an international flight anyway). the woman can't find my record in the system. so she legit tosses my passport over to guy at the next counter so he can check me in. he can't find me in the system. he finally explains to me that his supervisor (who was also checking people in - I think they were short staffed at the desks at this time of the night/morning) would check on my situation once he was finished checking people in. no problem - I mean did I really have any other choice but to wait? finally the supervisor finishes checking people in he brings me over to a separate desk to try and figure out the problem. after about a half hour or so he finally figured out what the problem was. apparently the airline company canceled my reservation and never re-booked me. awesome. he was able to re-book me on to the same flights and get me a new confirmation number, but he said unfortunately the flights were full. I thought to myself, "that's nice but I'm still getting on both of these planes even if I have to sit on the pilot's lap." so I go back over to the counter to check in and they couldn't find me again. but then this woman came over to help and after a little bit, was able to get me all checked in and set with both of my boarding passes. as a side note, I noticed earlier that these two other American girls were checking in and had a lot of trouble like I did. coincidence maybe?

second adventure: a total of three hours in Moscow

make it to Moscow a-ok. head out to the main terminal to find an information desk, as I only had pretty crude directions on where to meet up with a friend of a friend who lives in Moscow (we were meeting at a Starbucks no less). the first information girl I spoke with had this attitude about her that how-dare-I-ask-her-for-anything (uh, hello? your job is to provide information, meaning you are going to have to actually talk to people) and she can't believe she is stuck in "the worst job in the world." I was able to finally get her to print out a subway map for me of where the train from the airport would bring me into and where I had to take the subway to. as I'm heading to the train, I find another information booth and this woman was 10x more helpful. she printed me out a map of what street I needed to walk down once I got off the subway, which is what I really needed to begin with anyway. I could have found my way on the subway, I live in in NYC for goodness sake! (although, I will admit it's a lot harder on a subway when all the words are in Russian and they don't even have the same letters as us!) so I get on the train to the subway fine. had a little mix-up on the subway trains, but through sounds, hand gestures, and a general look of confusion on my face I was able to get people to help me find where I needed to go. I get off the subway train and this was the hardest part - trying to find the street I needed. I memorized the Russian word for "english" so I just randomly started walking up to people and saying "angliyski?" and pointing to the spot on the map where I needed to go. no one could help. ugh. finally found a police officer, who, when I asked him "angliyski?," responded with "little." perfect! I could totally work with that. showed him the map and all of a sudden he got really animated and started spouting off in Russian on where I was supposed to go (I'm assuming). I of course had NO idea what he was saying, but he kept pointing to the right so I assumed that was the direction I was supposed to go. and even as I was walking away, he was still talking to me in Russian.

made it to the Starbucks and the friend of friend met me there (he was 17 and let me tell you, it's been a long time since I've been around a 17 year old. they act differently). our first stop was the Red Square, Kremlin and St. Basil's Cathedral. it was beyond cool. the city as a whole was a little industrial to me. to be honest, I'm not sure how high going back there is on my list. maybe to go to the country of Russia itself. or at least to St. Petersburg. however, I can say that I definitely do not regret going and it was a fun way to end my three week trek through eastern europe!! :)

(entrance to Red Square)

(can anyone read me what this says? anyone?)

(St. Basil's Cathedral)

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Istanbul

2011-08-22T10:01:00.000-04:00

I am going to forewarn you - this post is going to be LONG. but I hope you still read and enjoy it. :) before I can even begin to tell you about the wonderful city of Istanbul, I have to talk about our TWENTY-FOUR hour train ride there. mind you the train wasn't supposed to take 24 hours - it was only supposed to take 20 - but we made so many random stops for god knows what reason that it took an extra four hours! by the way, this was also the "express" train. if this was express, I'd hate to know how long the regular train was...

so the train had a total of three cars. one Romanian car, one Turkish car, and one Bulgarian car. and NO food car. for 24 hours there was no food. luckily, well sort of, Furi Kuri and I woke up late the morning of our train ride and had to end up throwing all of our breakfast stuff in little baggies to take with us (because we did have a 2 1/2 - 3 hour drive from where we were staying to the train station, not to mention we still had to return the rental car) so we had food for the train ride. just had to ration everything out to last us. we did make friends with the guy working on the train and ended up sharing a beer with him and his friend. it helps to talk to people. :) some other interesting factoids about this train ride:

1.) we literally stopped at every border station for them to check our passports. all other trains I've been on they check your passport while the train is still going. and not only did they stop the train, but they stopped it twice. once to check your passport from the country you were leaving and then 15 minutes later for the country you were entering.
2.) I have two stamps in my passport for Bulgaria, even though I have never stepped foot in that country (just like The Netherlands - I was only in the Amsterdam airport for a total of three hours, yet I have a stamp in my passport).
3.) they stopped the train at around 2am to add another car. seriously took about 45min -1 hour to this. unsure why it took so long, but I don't work on trains so I couldn't even begin to give you an educated guess.
4.) they kicked everyone off the train at 5am when we got to the border of Turkey so we could get our visas. we had to go to one window to purchase the visa and then stand in line at another window to get the stamp. not exactly a very efficient system if you ask me. also, you were never sure of how much the visa was going to cost. and you had to pay in your own currency (they didn't take Turkish money for them). the cost depended upon Turkey's relationship with your country at that time - so I will say a thank you to the US Government, this time, for not effing things up with the country of Turkey. because if it cost any more than the $20 I had, I'm pretty sure they wouldn't have let me in their country.

we finally made it to Istanbul. my very first impression was that it was similar to Cairo, though much more cosmopolitan. thank goodness we had looked up the address to the hostel from the train station on Furi Kuri's phone and saved the map because otherwise, I have no idea if we would have ever made it to our hostel. first thing we did after checking into our room was change and head out to do some sightseeing. our hostel was literally a 5-10 minute walk from the Blue Mosque and the Hagia Sophia. I cannot even begin to describe what it was like to be in the Hagia Sophia. I mean, it's something I've only ever studied in a text book and then to see it in real life?! the magnitude of the place is unreal. let's just say, the inner art history geek in me was freaking out a little. I had to leave Furi Kuri to explore a little on her own the rest of the afternoon as I didn't have any energy left (I had been sick from the moment I stepped on the train to Istanbul - and believe me, being sick on a rocking train is NOT fun whatsoever).

(inside ceiling of the Blue Mosque)

(inside ceiling of the Hagia Sophia)

the next day was absolutely amazing and one of the reasons I also absolutely love traveling with Furi Kuri. we started out the morning going to the Topkapi Palace. let me just tell you - the Turks have EVERYONE beat when it comes to jewels. I mean they had a box on display of lose emeralds. I can't imagine what they were for. unless the little spoiled prince of a sultan decided he was going to play bocce ball with emeralds or something. after the palace we were going to head over to the grand bazaar. on our walk there we heard someone say "girls, girls," which at this point we had learned to ignore since it usually just meant someone was just trying to sell you something. but after we kept on walking we heard the person say "I'm not trying to sell you anything." at this point we actually turned around to see that the gentleman that was talking to us had a Florida Gators shirt on! turns out he was from Turkey, his wife was from South Carolina and they were currently living in Sarasota. he had his own private carpet selling and making business (plus a few hotels and other business ventures as well). we were asking him for tips on what to look for when buying a Turkish rug, so he asked if we would like to go to his private building and have his general manager explain everything to us (usually only reserved for clients who buy wholesale). our answer? sure! so we headed over to the building (which looked like an art museum inside) and the general manager and his brother pulled out rug after rug after rug to show us the differences and things to look for to make it authentic. now I wasn't really looking to buy a Turkish rug (mainly because I didn't think I could afford it), but I saw one there that I just HAD to have. it literally was perfect. I threw my credit card at him and told him to charge it before I changed my mind. even though it was one of the largest purchases I've ever made in my life, I do not regret it one bit. I love that rug! Furi Kuri took a little longer in her search to find the perfect rug. she won't buy anything unless she absolutely loves it (something I admire about her). in the meantime, they bought us lunch from a place that only caters to businesses and as someone walking in off the street you cannot order anything from them. after a little while longer there we left to drop off my rug back at the hostel and then continue to our original destination - the grand bazaar.

somehow on our second walk to the grand bazaar we found another small street bazaar. stopped into this linen and towel store and started talking to the guy about prices and such. somewhere along our trip we heard that we should say we are from Canada as people tend to jack up prices for Americans (which wouldn't surprise me one bit). so when the guy at the store asked us where we from we told him Canada. all of a sudden his face lit up and he explained to us that the owner of the store, Jennifer (who was sitting just a few feet away talking to someone), was also from Canada! shit. we tried to hurry up and leave, but the guy kept talking so much that we didn't get to leave before Jennifer came over. he was so excited to tell her that we were from Canada as well. and then of course she was so excited to have someone from her home country in her store. here is how the conversation went:

Jennifer: "where are you from?!"
me: "...Toronto..."
Jennifer: "omg! I'm from [insert name of small Canadian town here]"
me: "omg no way! that's crazy!" (meanwhile of course I had absolutely NO idea where she was talking about)

we actually ended up having a good 1-2 hour conversation with her about how she got started in the business, her other business ventures, how everything in the store was organic and made right on small farms in Turkey. she even had a video on her camera that she showed us of this 80 year old spinning silk from this huge vat of silk worms onto a loom. it was amazing to watch. another one of her business ventures was in quartz and ceramics. I mentioned that I was looking for a gift for my mother, so she personally walked us down to her other store and told the guy there to explain the differences between quartz and ceramic to us. after getting a few souvenirs, the guy asked us if we would just like to walk down to another store that had all the quartz stuff in it. sure! let me tell you, it was amazing!! once I save up enough pennies I'm definitely going back to get my dad something! we got to talking to the guy and asked him for restaurant recommendations - which he said that there were a lot of good places along the water by the bridge and that actually him and his friends were going there to have dinner, drinks and dancing. we promised to try and stop by after he got off work, but if we weren't there then not to wait for us.

(finished silk worm cocoon)

we finally made it off that street and went to this textile store that Furi Kuri had been drooling over our entire trip. of course spent another few hours there going through hundreds and hundreds of squares in all shapes and sizes of the most colorful textiles you've ever seen from every "stan" country you can think of. finally we were starting to get hungry, so the shop keeper suggested a place to us that was just up the road. we ended up making friends with our waiter there, who felt so bad that Furi Kuri didn't like the meal he suggested to her that he brought us free alcohol. next thing you know, he was telling us that one of the other waiters wanted us to join him for shisha and backgammon (HUGE in the country of Turkey by the way). next thing you know, it was three o'clock in the morning and we had just finished smoking way too much shisha, playing countless games of backgammon and having the most delicious popcorn I've ever tasted. oh, what a night. (I feel like I should bust out in Frankie Valli's "December, 1963 (Oh, What a Night) )

(shisha "house" we were at)

the next day we actually managed to get up early (since it was our last day in the city, we wanted to take in everything that we could) and make our way down to the water to catch a ferry over to the Asia side of Istanbul. we were bad tourists in that we didn't really explore the area too much, we mainly just went over there to be able to say we went to Asia. our next goal was to find the modern art museum and somehow along the way we managed to find the spice bazaar. wasn't 100% what I was expected, but still fun to walk through (minus of course everyone shouting at you "girls! girls! come look in my shop! I have many, many things for you!"). we searched forever and ever for this museum and ended up in what I am pretty sure was a place they do NOT put in the guide books. we kept seeing a sign for this cafe, so we decided to stop in and ask them where the musuem was and ended up stumbling upon one of the best views of Istanbul. (I was totally right by the way in that we were completely on the wrong side of the city for the museum - just want to point that out.) so we stayed there and had lunch and just soaked up the views before I unfortunately had to go back to the hostel and pack since the airport shuttle was leaving at 8:30 that night (even though my plane didn't leave until 2am - yeah, that was a fun wait in the airport). on our walk back to the hostel we finally made it to the grand bazaar. maybe because we didn't have much time or maybe because we had already gotten all of our gifts, but I wasn't 100% impressed with it. don't get me wrong - it definitely was cool - but actually a little more modern than I was expecting.

(view of the city coming back from the Asia side)

(our lunch time view)

(some sweets at the bazaar)

(man trying to sell me sweets at the bazaar)

(anyone fancy a hat?)

(some of the spices at the spice market)

(some gorgeous lamps I saw at the bazaar)

(deciding what pieces to put into a Turkish rug)

(many of the carpet stores literally had stacks upon stacks of rugs)

and even though I hated to leave this city because it was my favorite of the trip, unfortunately the time had come. :(

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Romania

2011-08-19T16:29:00.001-04:00

before I can even begin to talk about our time in Romania, I need to discuss the train ride there. it was my first time ever taking an overnight train and it was a rather interesting experience to say the least. and since Furi Kuri and I are completely horrible about waiting until the last minute to do things, we ended up in a six person sleeper car instead of the two person that we wanted. so there we were with this old Romanian couple who didn't speak a lick of English, a girl that had just graduated high school and had been traveling for months (I commend her - I couldn't even do three weeks by myself!), and an asian kid who didn't speak to anyone the whole trip. so in order to fit six people sleeping in one of those Harry Potter like train cars this is how we had to set everything up - the very top bunks were already laid out (all comforters and pillows were up there & that's also where we had to store all the luggage), the "seats" we were sitting on were actually the bottom bunks, and then the back rests we were leaning on flipped up to become the middle bunks. it was a very tight squeeze once all of the beds were set up. not only that, but sleeping on a moving train was also an interesting experience as well.

(inside our train car)

and, as stated before, Furi Kuri and I can never have a trip without an adventure. so here is our story in Romania:

- we arrived on a Tuesday at noon. decided it would be best to buy our train ticket to Istanbul for the next evening while we were already at the station (see mom, sometimes I think ahead). go to the ticket counter only to discover that there is only ONE train that leaves from Bucharest to Istanbul - and it leaves at noon every day. awesome. that meant that we had a total of TWENTY-FOUR hours in the country.
- so we bought the tickets and headed to the bus stop to go up to the airport where we would pick up the car we rented (which turned out to be an almost expensive, epic fail). got into a fight with the guy who gets on the bus to check your ticket. tried to tell us we owed a 50LIE (their money) fine. finally after a bit of arguing the man finely did what he should have done in the first place - unlocked the machines so we could validate the tickets we had for two people (instead of the one it was accidentally validated for).
- got the rental car (with GPS) no problem - finally something went right.
- then the goal was to find the bed & breakfast place we were supposed to be staying in. according to their directions online, they should have only been about an hour, maybe hour and a half, outside the city of Bucharest. three hours later we were still driving with no sign of the B&B. and mind you the directions we were following had statements like "go over the wooden bridge" and "take a left at the second rock."

**side note: driving through this country was an obstacle course!! between the crazy drivers, the horse pulled carts sharing the highway, having to stop in the middle of the highway for the pedestrian crosswalks they had set, dodging stray dogs, and dealing with the most construction I've ever seen... let's just say I had white knuckles the entire time I was driving (Furi Kuri didn't dare get behind the wheel, as she isn't the greatest driver to begin with and probably would have had a heart attack trying to navigate this country).

- we decided to ditch the B&B plans and turn around to drive back to Bran Castle. the guide book said it closed at 7:00pm, so we figured we had plenty of time...
- arrive at 6:15pm to have this woman inform us that the castle actually closes at 6:00pm (thanks a lot guide book), but we decided to head up to the castle anyway just to see for ourselves. it did indeed close at 6:00pm, however it didn't even matter because the last entry time was 4:30pm. :( I couldn't believe it. my ENTIRE reason for even going to this country in the first place didn't happen. to say I was disappointed would be an understatement.

(Bran Castle)

(the entrance into the castle grounds - looking up at the castle)

("Dracula's Castle" that I didn't get to see :( )

since our entire reason for going to this country didn't happen and we had no place to stay that night, we decided to stop for a little dinner and figure out our next moves. we ate at this little outdoor restaurant in the town of Bran (which I swear was a population of about 300 people, minus the tourists) and this group of three couples sat down at the table next to us. it was one of those situations where they ask to take your picture and then you start talking and next thing you know they were inviting us to stay at the B&B they were staying in just up the road. our obvious answer: sure!

it was the cutest little place! cheaper than where we were originally going to stay and included a nice warm, home cooked breakfast. spent the evening chatting with the couples (all from Israel and beyond totally Jewish), taking shots with them and making friends with the St. Bernard - Altos - that lived there (I was excited because I had never seen a St. Bernard in real life). we even got to meet their bike tour guide - Arnold. not necessarily a "Romanian" name in my opinion, but he did have that Draculaesque "I vant to drink your blood" accent. :)

so even though the train was almost an epic fail, I did end up having a good time. and at least now it's a story. :)

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Budapest

2011-08-15T18:00:00.002-04:00

I'll say it. we were officially the worst tourists ever in Budapest. first thing we did was one of those hop on, hop off bus tours to get an idea of the layout of the city. once we just rode around the whole thing once, we would pick the spots we wanted to go back and see, then hop back on the bus and go. yeah... the hopping back on the bus thing never happened. maybe it's because we were exhausted from traveling the day before and our sort of scary evening trying to find the hostel.

(something famous in Budapest)

I've traveled a fair amount in my life and have stayed in some pretty interesting places. but the hostel we stayed in in this city, was by far the sketchiest place I've ever been. ever. don't get me wrong though - I loved the city and the people there were some of the nicest people I've met, but the actual hostel itself and the area surrounding it... whole 'nother story! (don't be upset mom, I made it home safe and sound.) the area was very, I mean very, deserted at night and there was barely even a sign for the hostel. we initially walk passed it the first round of trying to find it and when I told Furi Kuri that we needed to go back I thought she was about to take my head off! finally we found it, with this tiny little flyer posted on the window. they had to buzz you in and when you got in the main door it looked like you stepped into someone's garage. not even kidding. then it was into this beyond ridiculously rundown courtyard and up a flight of steps. once inside the hostel though, it was cozy and the people were very hospitable (the guy working at the hostel was Australian and oh so cute (especially with that accent), which may be the reason why I wasn't so sketched out anymore. who knows).

[overlooking the whole city of Budapest (I don't have a picture of the hostel, because it was just too sketch to photograph)]

the idea of time kind of escapes me in this city, but I can tell you that we spent almost an entire afternoon sitting outside at a restaurant while waiting for the rain to stop drinking pitchers of mojitos and making friends with our artist waitress. now what mojitos and tapas have to do with traditional Hungarian culture, I couldn't tell you. but it was an amazing afternoon. I believe this also might have been the day that we did some aimless wandering and happened upon a really cool outdoor art installation, which was next to an actual castle we decided to take a peek into, and then stopped at what we thought was going to be an amazing outdoor concert of euro-hillbilly music but ended up with a bald man with a beer belly playing the flute (not even joking), then finally ended up spending the evening at the Turkish baths.

("art" in front of the castle)

(the outside pool at the Turkish bath)

apparently we lost track of time so much that we ended up seeing the sun rise over the city twice (this is supposed to be a vacation right? way too many sunrises for a vacation) - which of course both were the result of nights out dancing and drinking. and speaking of drinking... Budapest has the best drunk food. ever. it's called langos. it's amazingness in your mouth. seriously. now I will admit that the first time I tried it, I wasn't a fan. but the second time... oh, the second time. first night out was with people from the hostel (cute Australian included) and we ended up going to see the hostel owner's friend who was playing in a band in an underground bar. it was a chill place and the music was really good and even though it wasn't really a dance party, we turned it into one. randomly made our way over to another bar, complete with a roof deck, which stayed open until who knows what time in the morning which is how we ended up seeing the sun rise. the next night (well day too actually) we ended up at this party for a guerrilla music station that was only in business for a month and then threw a huge "going out of business" celebration. we went with our new friend T-Bone who part of this awesome music group - Dr. Relax. as a result of going to this party, we also missed our train to Romania. oops.

(the sun rising over the city)

(one of the worst bands ever that was playing at the radio station party)

however, the best part of this whole city was when we went... wait for it... CAVING!!! we had to meet our guide at a bus stop, take a bus, walk, then another bus to who knows where outside the city. got to wear these gorgeous zip-up jumpsuit type things and the outfit came complete with a helmet and head lamp. sexy, let me tell you. after a few instructions, down into the caves we climbed. I've never received so many bruises before - on my legs, arms, shoulders, back, head - but it was totally and completely worth it. we had to army crawl through spaces that my ass barely fit through, squeeze through another space they called the "wedgie" (and for good reason), crawl like a spider monkey up rocks, slide on our butts through tunnels, and probably everything else in between that I can't think of at the moment. our guide even had all of us turn off our helmet lights at one point to play a game of "telephone" in which we had to line up single file and give directions to the person directly behind us on where to walk in the completely-pitch-black-can't-even-see-your-hand-right-in-front-of-your-face cave. by the time we finished this little game, it felt like we had gone a hundred yards. of course, when we all turned our lights back on we had maybe gone about 10 feet. awesome.

(one of the tiny, tiny spaces we had to crawl through)

we did unfortunately have to leave this amazing city, but it was on to Romania and the land of Dracula - which I cannot even begin to describe how I excited I was about it! I even took a course in college called the Slavic Vampire - but don't categorize me as one of those squealing Twilight fans! actual vampires (as real or non-real as they might be) are a bit different than Edward Cullen & Co. (I did read the books, however. don't judge. but I don't own the movies. does that make it better?)

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Vienna

2011-08-08T10:53:00.003-04:00

Vienna was still as gorgeous as I remember. I first visited the city when I was 14 as part of People to People Student Ambassadors (in which you are supposed to be an "ambassador," but really it's an excuse to travel on your parent's dime). honestly, I think it may have been a little young to send a 14 year-old on a three week trek through Europe because all I can really remember from the trip is spending countless hours in a bus, eating pringles (and not much else since European food was still "weird" to me at this point), listening to the Pure Moods II CD over and over (don't judge), and spending the only few hours we had in Zurich in the chocolate shop (Teuscher) - which was beyond completely worth it. but I can say that I remember Vienna having a lot of big, pretty buildings. and my memory definitely served me correctly, as Vienna wasn't any different than what I remember.

(Rathaus, Vienna's City Hall)

we arrived in the city a-ok from Prague, though it was a little bit before we could find our hostel (after walking in literally circles for a good half hour we came to discover that our hostel was literally just around the corner from the train station. awesome). the hostel itself was really cool and a very nice, clean place to stay. it even had it's own bar in the basement (complete with a free drink on your first night of check in)! Furi Kuri and I kind of each did our own thing in Vienna - which was probably one of our better decisions. I wanted to do the more classical visiting of the palaces and see all the fancy jewels and such (hey, I live on the UES for a reason) while Furi Kuri wanted to do more of the artistic, off-the-beaten-track scene. so we split up agreeing to meet at a certain point later in the day (which didn't exactly work out according to plan when I waited at the designated meeting spot for 4 hours before dragging myself back to the hostel only to have her come back there about an hour later saying she got lost and ended up at the wrong church - now if you know her, this is not a surprise to you). while Vienna was gorgeous and I loved all things royal there, it definitely wasn't my favorite city of the trip.

(Schönbrunn Palace)

however, we did take a day trip to the Wachau Mountains for a bike ride and wine tasting tour. and no, we didn't end up in a ditch somewhere, clutching a wine bottle by the end of the tour - although that would make for a really funny story. it was more along the lines of have a tasting of these three wines at this vineyard, hop on your bike to this vineyard, have a tasting of these few wines, bike, wine, bike, wine. we did have lunch stuck somewhere in there too. and we made some great friends along the way! towards the end of the day we hiked up to the Durnstein Castle ruin that apparently at one point held Richard the Lionheart captive. it honestly didn't look too much like a castle, but it was definitely up high enough on the mountain to provide a gorgeous view!

(some of the wine we got to taste)

(the ruin at the top is Durnstein Castle)

[view from (almost) the top of the castle]

now our trip wouldn't be one of "our trips" without a little adventure. and although it seems like Vienna was smooth sailing, she was saving it all for the end. we had to catch a train to Budapest at 7:45. by the time we left, dropped everyone else off, made it through crazy traffic we arrived at our hostel at 7:30. we still had to get our luggage out of storage, run to the train station, wait in line to buy our tickets (no mom, we didn't do the "right" thing and buy them before), and legit run on to the train probably seconds before it pulled away from the station. however, we were smart enough this time that when we bought our tickets we got seat reservations instead of risking the chance of sitting next to a large, smelly eastern European man that is trying to have a conversation while you are clearly giving him the signal of "I-have-my-head-phones-in-for-a-reason-so-I-don't-have-to-talk-to-anyone." which of course they never understand. le sigh.

p.s. - I didn't end up buying a bottle of wine to bring back home with me because I wasn't schlepping that halfway across Eastern Europe. however, I did end up getting a bottle of this tequila, cinnamon, and chili stuff that's actually really good (and it was a really small bottle) and a bag of rabbit shit. yeah, you heard me correctly - rabbit shit. it's actually dark and milk chocolate mixed together in a little ball that probably could pass as rabbit shit, but it tasted soooooooo good. so needless to say, none of it made it home.

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Eastern Europe, Prague

2011-08-02T21:36:00.004-04:00

I have been planning this vacation for years. what originally started out as a two month trek across western and eastern europe was eventually whittled down to a three week jaunt through eastern europe with nothing but my backpack, camera, and my crazy, but lovable, friend by my side. (actually you should check out her blog, Furi Kuri Travels, as she is quite entertaining.)

before I can even begin to tell you about my adventures in the first stop of my trip (which was Prague btw) I have to share the story of my adventure to even make it to that side of the world. so being the cheap ass that I am I was extremely stoked when I found an airline ticket for this trip that was only $800!! I booked it right away obviously, without paying much attention to who I was flying. big mistake. my flight was on Aeroflot Airlines (the Russian airline) and I vow that I will never, never fly this airline again. here's a run down of the adventure:

- the flight was supposed to leave at 7:00pm, but at 9:00am that morning they had already delayed the flight to 9:00pm
- had to stand in line for TWO hours to get my boarding pass (thank god they delayed the flight then or none of us would have made it on the plane)
- the plane of course didn't end up actually taking off until 10:00pm
- we arrive in Moscow at 2:35pm and my connecting flight was leaving at 2:45pm - which I tried explaining to the flight attendants to see if they would allow me to sit closer to the exit and the response I got was "just talk to someone when you get off the plane." thanks.
- plane lands and everyone jumps up in the aisles to get off. I explain to these two Russian women behind me that my flight is leaving in 10 minutes, to which they proceeded to tell everyone else in the aisle my situation so I was legit crawling over people to try and make it as close to the exit of the plane (meanwhile my carry on bag strap had broken at this point)
- I get off the plane and RUN to where I have to check in/go through passport control to get to my next flight and when I finally stop panting and catch my breath (hey, it was a long way to run) to explain to the woman my situation she tells me my flight was delayed until 5:15pm. thank you jesus! I have never in my life been so grateful that a flight was delayed.
- got my boarding pass and made it to the next gate, which, by the way, wasn't even my gate at all. my plane moved and of course no one made an announcement to this change. wait, I lied. they did make an announcement - however it was in Russian and since I don't speak Russian (except for the word thank you - the only word I know) it was interesting to figure out where I had to go.
** as a random side note I would like to point out that the airport was stock full of hundreds of duty free shops (not even kidding), which doesn't make any sense because I swear Russia doesn't want anyone visiting their country since they make it EXTREMELY DIFFICULT to get a visa (ridiculously difficult actually).**
- got on the plane to Prague for what I thought was only going to be an hour flight - completely forgetting about the time changes and also not realizing how far away Moscow actually was - and four hours later I was in Prague.
- I seriously saw 6:00pm three times in one day and couldn't tell you what time it was, what day it was, or heck probably even what my name was by the time I landed in my first destination.
- by this point I'm hours late and my friend and her husband, S. Monster, had been waiting at the airport for me since I had no way of getting in touch with them to let them know of the flight delays (read: I didn't bring my phone with me on this trip) and when I get there, my luggage didn't.
- had to report my lost luggage to the airline people who said that a flight was coming in from Moscow at midnight and that my backpack would probably be on there. and when it came in, they would deliver it to me. she asked me for the name of the hotel I was staying in. didn't know the answer. asked me for a number I could be reached at. didn't know the answer to that one either. at this point I think she was a little frustrated with me and gave me a number to call with my information once I knew it.
- walked out of the baggage claim with my broken carry on in my arms and gave my friend a GIANT bear hug when I saw her. at this point I just lost it. (hey, it was a stressful however-many-hours I had just been traveling through three different countries and countless time zones.) however, five minutes of bawling my eyes out later and I was good to go! :)

I hope you found that story entertaining. I do anyways when I look back on it now, at the time of course I did not find any of it remotely hilarious. now I can get on to the adventures in Prague. :)

first thing we did in Prague was take a trip outside the city. we hopped on a train to a little place called Kutna Hora that was about an hour outside the city to see The Church of Bones. yeah, you heard me right. a church made of bones. I mean technically it was a church first, then a family bought it (didn't know anyone could own a church), during the plague there were so many bodies lying around that the church was converted into an ossuary (where they store bodies), and then for some odd reason someone thought it would be a fantastic idea to take the bones of some 40,000-70,000 skeletons and make art of them. not my idea of a good time, but I guess whatever floats your boat...

(bone chandelier)

we did the general sightseeing things - Old Town, Clock Tower, Charles Bridge, and Castle. (so cool because they definitely invoked the sense that you were transported back into the middle ages.) we saw the city's TV antenna tower complete with bronze babies crawling all over it. you heard me right - crawling babies. it was pretty cool far away, but up close the babies just looked extremely creepy. we went to one of the coolest bars I have ever seen. apparently they change the decor every few months when the people in charge just get tired of what's up on the walls. we went also went to the oldest brewery in Prague - U Fleku. you didn't have a choice in what you drank there because as soon as you sat down they plopped a mug of dark beer in front of you. normally I don't drink dark beer, but let me just tell you that this was seriously the best beer I have ever had in my life. hands down. no joke. the place also came complete with a two man band - a tuba and an accordion.

(beer at the beer hall)

(TV antenna with crawling babies)

(skyline view of the old castle in the city)

funny enough, one thing I really remember from Prague is that not ONCE did we eat any sort of typical Czech food. we ate Mexican (twice), amazing Italian, some pizza, and we even stopped at a Starbucks (I know, I know but I was dying for a frapp and it's the only one I had the whole trip). we did also partake in the Prague nightlife and ended up going to a place that didn't even open until 4am. that was only one night however, since I am old now and can't party like I used to.

(really fun installation at one of the bars we went to)

sadly we had to eventually say goodbye to this city and head off on our adventure, which continued in Vienna. :)

I have the best friends

2011-07-05T10:49:00.004-04:00

one random week day I get an email from Hollywood asking me if I would like to go to the Metropolitan Opera. to which of course I responded yes. (I mean, honestly, who wouldn't? it also helps that I've been wanting to see an opera forever.) I kid you not, literally a few hours later I get another email from Hollywood that reads like this: "we have free tickets to go on Tuesday." nice.

so the night of the opera arrives and it turns out we are seeing Ariadne auf Naxos. I've never heard of the opera, but it was an opera nonetheless so I was perfectly content. our seats were A-MAZ-ING. we were almost literally in the laps of the people on stage. and right in the center of the orchestra as well!

I was even lucky enough to score a seat behind this lady:

I mean, really? this isn't the royal wedding. it isn't Ascot. WHY in the world did she think it was necessary to wear a hat to the opera?? especially since the opera is a place where everyone sits and it's already hard enough to find a viewing spot with people sitting right in front of you. put a hat into the mix and it just makes it worse. le sigh.

to thank Hollywood for scoring us these awesome FREE tickets to the opera, I decided I would treat us both to a glass of champagne during the intermission. so I'm waiting in line and while waiting I end up talking to the very nice gentleman in front of me. small opera chit chat about what our favorites were, which I of course had none seeing as this was only the second opera I had ever been to. finally it's my turn to order the drinks and I tell the man at the bar two glasses of champagne. while waiting I look to the left and the right of me at others ordering and notice that everyone is paying with cash. so I asked the bartender if it's cash only - which it was and I didn't have the THIRTY SIX dollars to pay for the two glasses of champagne. and wouldn't you know, the gentleman who was in line in front me paid for my drinks. I didn't ask him - he just jumped in and handed the bartender the money. I couldn't believe it. after thanking him profusely I asked him how I could get in touch with him to repay him the money. he wouldn't let me - said it was his treat to me and that I should enjoy the opera. all I can say is, karma is going to come back to that man in a good way. :)

after the wonderful free champagne, we went back to our seats for the second half of our free opera. even though I definitely enjoyed the experience, I am going to complain about one little thing here. this opera was legit the longest thing I have ever had to sit through! seriously at the end of it, the two main characters were singing "I love you" to each other over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and over and... well you get the idea. and now you also get a sense of what I had to sit through! but it was a great night in the end and one I hope to have more of in the future. :)

(a picture of what the opera house looked like from behind our seats)

p.s. - I didn't have my actual camera, so please excuse the bad iPhone photos

"free falling"

2011-06-24T07:41:00.001-04:00

I'm sure y'all are familiar with Groupon, LivingSocial, Flockmaster, and all of those other "discount" websites. one day Yelp was having a deal for a High Falls Stunt Class, courtesy of Hollywood Stunts. so for shits and giggles, my friend, we'll call her Hollywood, and I signed up. it turned out to be one of the coolest things I have ever done.

before we were able to do any of the jumps, we had to practice on this small platform first. they told us, just jump and land completely flat with all of your body parts landing at the same time. surprisingly not an easy task, since I am pretty sure instinct tells you not to slam your head on anything when you fall. but in reality (after a few tries) it hurt way less to land like they said - a.k.a. no whiplash. I was even excited during this practice session because I was the only one who got a "perfect" from the instructor. :) (let me gloat a little)

then it was time for the big guns. the first jump was about 20 feet or so. when the instructor asked who wanted to go first, I grabbed Hollywood so fast and said we would do it that I don't think she even had time to react. it wasn't until we were up on the platform, 20 feet above the ground about to jump into a giant air bubble/blob thing that she even registered what was going on. the instructor was a little flabbergasted because he said that he never had girls literally rush to be first in line (what can I say? I was really excited to try this :) )

(it's weird for me to be posting an "almost" picture of myself because I semi wanted to remain anonymous on this blog, but there I am. climbing up the scaffolding so I can jump off it 2 minutes later)

funny thing though - I was absolutely terrified waiting up on the platform to jump. we were essentially just standing on scaffolding and if you fell off (not in the direction of the bubble/blob) well... it would hurt. a lot. as soon as it came time to actually do the free fall we had been taught I didn't have a moment's hesitation.

free falling is A-MAZ-ING. I've done my fair share of cliff jumping in my life (around the Cornell campus in NY and in Italy), but it was always into water. so really it was just jumping off a giant diving board (with a few jagged rocks here and there). this was something else entirely though. I can't even really describe that feeling of just falling - the moments between when you jump and when you land. when you feel like you could float in the air forever.

all I can say is that I am definitely ready to go back and sign up for the next level! :)

I am a little monster

2011-06-23T19:17:00.002-04:00

a friend of mine, we'll call her Ms. CT, texts me randomly one day that she has an extra ticket to the Lady Gaga concert and would I want to go. to which I replied, "can a Jew really pass up anything free?" so within a week's time, Ms. CT and I were meeting at her uncle's restaurant for pre-concert drinks and appetizers. well like any uncle I imagine would do (at least I know mine would) he totally picked up the bill for everything. it was very, very nice of him. I even somehow got a free hat for the restaurant out of the deal too! the food itself was so delicious (don't get me started on the crab cakes), so if you have a chance you should check it out - Statler Grill.

(before the concert started - kinda obvious)

(right as the concert was starting)

(please excuse the bad quality of these pictures as they were taken with my iPhone)

the concert itself was what a concert should be. it wasn't just "here are a collection of my songs," but instead she told a story. it was a show, not just a concert. a performance. which honestly made it much more exciting to be at rather than a regular concert that is essentially a grown up version of a girl/boy scout sing-a-long. what also made the concert was the fact that almost everyone dressed up. honestly, Ms. CT and I felt a little out of place because we weren't dressed up (it was too short of notice to put together the most amazing Gaga costume, especially since I have this tiny detail of work getting in the way).

(one of the stage sets)

(it was the Monster Ball after all - so here's your monster :) )

but the truly amazing part was the huge respect I had for her, as both an artist and a person, after the concert was finished. she sang every single one of her songs. no lip-synching whatsoever. and the girl can SING. she played a few slow numbers on her piano and I didn't know she had that voice in her!! almost makes you wish she would stop coming out with all of the pop-y songs and sing actual ones that really show off her talent. or more so that people would be receptive to it enough for it to be played on the radio. and last, but not least, you could really feel the appreciation she has for her fans (not sure if being in NYC made her more nostalgic). I've never experienced a concert where the artist had THAT much gratitude for everyone in the audience.

(I know this probably isn't the best video quality, but hopefully you can still hear her singing)

p.s. - turns out the concert I was at was the one they used for her HBO special. :)

running through the streets of NYC

2011-06-22T21:42:00.001-04:00

I'm not sure how many of you will understand how much of a big deal this was - me running the NYC Half Marathon - but let me tell you, from a girl who used to not even be able to run a mile (seriously) to finishing 13.1 with no breaks was a pretty big deal. yes, I used to not be able to run at all. I remember in high school my dance coach would make us run a mile before practice, to which I would respond "Coach, if I wanted to run I would have joined to the track team." oh she definitely thought it was funny and laughed - but she still made me run that damn mile.

but slowly through the years I've started to enjoy running more and more. and the only reason I got into it really is because the best friend forced me to do so (I will be forever grateful to her for kicking my ass and making me run). over the years I have done mostly 5Ks and randomly a 10K here and there (a big deal at the time mind you). it wasn't until after cheering Fabulous on in the 2010 ING NYC Marathon that really made me want to run as well. it was an amazing experience to watch 40,000+ people running 26.2 miles through the streets of my city. I followed Fabulous first in Brooklyn, then the UES and then finally on the home stretch at mile 23. it was fun because at each place I got to see some of the people I cheered on at different spots over and over again. I'm not sure if many of you know this, but a lot of runners in the marathon write their names on their jerseys so while they are running people will just shout their name for encouragement. it was really cool when a couple of times I would shout someone's name at mile 23 (which also happened to be a hill) and I literally could see their pace pick up a little.

(spectator view at mile 23)

I really was inspired by this, so I decide to run in the 2011 NYC Half Marathon (baby steps - marathon will be next year). I ran for a charity - The Children's Tumor Foundation: NF Endurance - which honestly help me stay motivated to stick with my training schedule more. and at the same time, I raised money for a great cause and ended up raising $1,000+ more than I actually had to (thanks to my wonderful friends)!

(the weather I had to train in)

after months of training race day finally arrived. it was cold (it was in March after all) and it was early, but I was still there. I think what got me through most of it was the "runner's high." or it could be due to the fact that the first half was basically my normal run - so I was used to that - and the second half of the run was through the streets of NYC. I cannot explain how amazing it was to do that. I love this city so much, but to see it from that perspective - the roads closed down for you, being able to see things head on instead of always from a sidewalk, having random strangers cheer you on while you are running mile after mile - it's an experience I'll never forget.

(my jersey and number :) )

view while running towards Times Square (please excuse the bad photo, but I was running after all)

can't wait until next year when I do the full marathon and get to experience that in all FIVE boroughs of the city.

the starting line for the race (where I was NOT located)

Mermaid Parade

2011-06-21T21:53:00.000-04:00

the best friend and I took a little trip down to Coney Island for their annual Mermaid Parade.

not much of a parade honestly. but some of the BEST people watching I have seen in a long time. and I'm not just talking the people walking in the parade. Coney Island seems to bring out the best sort of people to gather in one area - think carny kinda folks. now while I have pictures of those walking in the parade, I don't really have any of those not walking in the parade, but spectating rather. this is mainly due to the fact that I was very afraid of what these folks might do if I just snap a photo of them without their knowledge. however, now that I think about it I probably just should have asked them and I'm sure they would have been delighted to pose for a picture (maybe even 2 or 100, depending on the individual).

however, before the parade began the best friend and I had to get a Nathan's hot dog. so we had our dogs and downed them with some good ol' Coney Island beer while hanging out at Beer Island. good times all around and who knows... I might even dress up next year for this thing. ;)

the Coney Island beer I had at Beer Island

starting this kid's pimping skills early

Ursula. couldn't you tell?

I saw way more boobies at this parade than I ever expected to

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Paris

2011-04-29T14:27:00.002-04:00

this trip included a major first. the first time I have ever truly traveled by myself. granted both times I studied abroad in college and when I went to Egypt I didn't know anyone else on the trip, but at least I went with other people. Paris was just me.

now I know I sound spoiled for saying this, but I have already been to Paris four times. however, every time I went it was with someone who had never been before and so all I've ever really seen of the city is the tourist areas (and trust me, there is a lot more to it than just the sights). but every time I was there I fell in love - with the city, the architecture, the culture and, yes, even the people all over again. so for a long time I've been wanting to go back with nothing but me and my camera.

I had been looking for cheap plane tickets for a looooong time and finally, courtesy of Air Fare Watch Dog, I found a flight for only $350! so... I booked it. at that point I didn't even know if it was ok for me to take the days off, I didn't have anyone going with me, I didn't know anyone there and I didn't have a place to stay. but I didn't care - I was going to Paris with nothing but me and my camera. :)

months went by and it was finally time for my trip (I did get a hotel btw - wasn't planning on sleeping on the streets or anything). brought the suitcase to work, took a late lunch so I could leave early, hopped on the plane, and when I woke up the next morning I was in Paris. :) now when I first arrived I didn't have a map of the city (I mean hell, I had just looked up how to get to my hotel about an hour before I had to leave), but in the airport they had a little stand with free ones! problem one - solved. I eventually find the bus that's going to take me into the city and when I get into the city itself I decide it would be a genius idea to just simply walk to my hotel (since I already love walking). bad decision. I arrive about an hour or so later with two new blisters, which was absolutely fantastic given the notion that my only plan for the next three days was to walk around the city wandering aimlessly while taking pictures (long story short - I went through a lot of band-aids on this trip).

and walking is exactly what I did. after putting away my things in what I swear is the world's smallest hotel room (legit - you opened the door and it was BAM! bed right in front of you and that was it), I grabbed my camera and iPod and started walking. about seven hours later I came home. the plan was to go out to grab a quick bite after resting for a bit, but due to jet lag and sheer exhaustion next thing I knew I was waking up and it was seven A.M. oops. so I got ready for the next day of walking (this time for about nine hours or so).

I am not sure if anyone knows this, and if you don't then now you will, but I used to be a "ballerina" (it was only through my senior year of college, nothing serious) and now I volunteer for the NYC Ballet. so I decided that when in Rome do as the Romans do - Saturday night then I went to the ballet at the Paris Opera house. I found out later that the ballet I saw was actually the school of ballet and not the company, which you could definitely tell from the performance. oh well. I was excited because I got to sit in the orchestra for not a whole of money and the inside (well the outside too) of the Opera House made it TOTALLY worth it!! probably one of the most ornate and beautiful buildings I've ever seen. I'm pretty sure I stared more at the interior of the building than actually watching the ballet.

the last day again was full of walking (I haven't gone into a lot of detail about my wanderings because I'm pretty sure no one would find it exciting except for me). that night I had to come home and pack because I was unfortunately leaving the next morning. :( even though I was there for a full three days, it still definitely was not enough time in the city. so moral of the story... I'll be back. ;) and since no post is interesting with just words and no pictures, below are a few I took from the trip.

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Phoenix

2011-03-28T22:16:00.001-04:00

a few weeks ago I took a long weekend trip to Phoenix, which surprising had a lot more things to do than I expected. (what can I say, I live in New York and now think that anything outside of the city will just be Bore-Town central). it actually sort of turned into almost a total college weekend - which I loved and surprisingly kind of needed. :)

spent a night (possibly two - wasn't sure where we were the second night) at the bars in Scottsdale. which, can I just say, had probably the biggest gathering of tools I've ever seen in one place. it's like they rounded every one of them up from all across the state and transplanted them to one bar. I don't even think my college bars had that many in one place... however, the second night we went out was amazing. not because of the bars or anything. no. it was amazing because I got to go for a ride in a Lamborghini - possibly a Gallardo Spyder. not to sure on the type as I wasn't really concentrating on what model it was ;) also that night some apparent YouTube "celebrity" was there "singing." I wasn't too impressed, actually I had never heard of the kid, but everyone else seemed to enjoy it... you can check it out here: Keenan Cahill

we also went to a spring training game. the Colorado Rockies v. ..... well they played somebody. it was different in any other baseball game I've been to because it wasn't a huge field (actually we were apparently on an Indian Reservation). and we didn't even sit in seats. just got our beer and plopped ourselves on a grassy hill wherever we could find an open spot. and the sunset we saw was beautiful.

the next day I got to see my Magic play (all the way in AZ!). it was a really small arena, well at least compared to MSG and the Amway Arena in Orlando. and the fans were probably some of the saddest basketball fans I've ever encountered. in fact, I think they cheered harder for the people who throw out the free t-shirts than for the actual Suns. afterwards we went to some sports bar for lunch and drinks. it was such a welcomed relaxed afternoon. sitting outside, which hasn't happened here in NYC probably since about August/September, and just chilling on the patio. and I'm pretty sure we made best friends with the waitress who kept bringing us made up shots. seriously, can't even begin to tell you what I drank. to give you an idea though - one of the shots was called a Tiger Blood Sheen shot. can you say winning?

private shopping parties

2011-02-23T20:55:00.000-05:00

a friend of mine from the non-profit I'm involved with somehow won a private shopping party at the Cynthia Rowley boutique for her and I'm pretty sure as many friends as she wanted to invite. the event wasn't exactly what I thought it was going to be, but it was still cool nonetheless. they had champagne (though I wasn't drinking since I'm in the middle of training for a half marathon) and small desserts for us. some of the clothes were quite interesting (I mean that in the nicest way possible) but others were really, really cute. the discount was 20% off of everything (they even had the brand new fall line that just debuted at fashion week!), which isn't a whole lot but when do clothes like this ever really go on "sale?" I unfortunately did not buy anything as I just booked a roundtrip ticket to Paris that day (for future travel, so no worries - it will be included in a later post) and couldn't really afford anything after that. however, it was cool to be able to say that I was invited to a private shopping party at a designer boutique! :)

hopefully there will be more in my future... (especially for Manolo Blahnik!! hey, a girl can dream right?)

heaven

2011-02-23T20:46:00.001-05:00

I'm not sure if everyone knows this, but my ultimate dream job is to be a wedding planner. and my ultimate dream idol wedding planner is Preston Bailey. I mean, look at this photo (borrowed from the lovely internet) of him. why wouldn't I want to be this? sitting in the back of what is sure to be a Rolls Royce, being driven around the city to your appointments, with as many gadgets surrounding you as you can possibly get.

so you can imagine how excited I was when I found out he was teaching a class at The Learning Annex. I bought my ticket right away (probably was one of the first ten to do so) and waited, impatiently, for the next month until it was finally time for the class.

it was at a hotel and there was legit a line waiting outside the doors for them to finally open so we could go in and sit down. I ended up sitting next to this woman who is a florist in Vancouver. she does the occasional weddings, but her main thing is movies. never thought about it, but all the flowers you see in movies are put together by a florist. she even said she got to do all the floral arrangements for the movie New Moon (all you Twilight fanatics will know what I'm talking about). the scene where Bella gets thrown into a table because a vampire is about to attack her... well, there are flowers on that table. ;)

the class itself was amazing. the first hour and half (was supposed to be just the first hour) Preston talked about how to be successful in this business. I ended up with three pages of notes! and second part was what the title of the class was, "How To Create One-of-a-Kind Events." which, in reality, was really just a chance for Preston to show off his work. but his work is gorgeous, so I didn't mind seeing it too much. ;)

after the class was over he stayed around to sign books and take pictures. I was planning on buying one of his books on Amazon, but when the man who is your idol is there signing books at that very moment you can't really wait for a cheap price (they were of course selling all of his books there - how convenient). so I bought his book (that's the cover of it below), stood in line, got him to sign the book AND got to take a picture with him too (GAHHH)!!

my entire walk home I was as giddy as a 12 year-old girl who just got to meet her favorite long-haired pop star.

snow tubing

2011-02-02T14:05:00.010-05:00

I absolutely love this city (what's not to love?), but it is an abusive relationship (mostly coming from the city side) and it therefore makes getaways, even if only for an evening, a must.

so Fabulous and I decided to do just that.
we went snow tubing in No-wheres-ville, NJ through livingsocial

the trip left from the city (we got to ride in some PIMP buses - Mercedes Benz no less ;) ) and we headed on over to Jersey. I really have absolutely no idea where we were, but the scenery was seriously like something straight out of a movie. I mean the houses were picture perfect, especially all covered with snow. they even came complete with snowmen in the front yard. and almost every tree had the correct amount of snow on it. I seriously don't think you could have gotten any better even if you could have photoshopped the whole thing.

the actual snow tubing was AWESOME. Fabulous and I were screaming like we were five years old. and I don't think I have ever laughed so much in my life. first, the lanes we went down were really fast and bumpy and I seriously thought I was going to eat it so many times. then the last few times I went down the kid working at the top spun my tube, so I was going down the lane forwards and backwards and I swear every which way in between. Fabulous and I even had a "race off" with a couple on the trip (the couple won pretty much every time).

(seriously what we looked like - minus the Asian part)

after the snow tubing was over we all got back on the buses (there were 3 of them each holding about 50 people, so needless to say, there were a lot of us) and went to a local bar for a buffet and drinks. I wasn't too impressed with the buffet - it was this lame pasta and then sliders and buffalo wings. I've been trying not to eat meat a lot lately so there really weren't a whole lot of options (going for that whole vegan thing, though it's going to take me a LONG time to actually be fully vegan but baby steps right?). so Fabulous (who is fully vegan) ordered sweet potato fries and we ate those :)

then of course Fabulous and I started a dance revolution. :) we didn't have the greatest choice in music to dance to (you can only bust out your moves to Ke$ha so many times) but still had tons of fun nonetheless. we even inspired a few others to start dancing too. and I don't know how it happened, but we managed to make friends with pretty much ever single one of the guides there (they mentioned they were hiring and I was thinking about applying, if for nothing else than to make better music CD's). while we were having our dance party there was almost the biggest game of flip cup going on that I have ever seen. I say almost because my flip cup game in Israel still wins as we had every single person at the bar, including the bartender, playing.
we unfortunately had to head back to city after that, but let me just say, I will most certainly keep my eye out for this deal again!! :)

favorite time of the year = restaurant week

2011-01-31T08:54:00.019-05:00

since I first arrived in NYC I have taken advantage of the wonderful invention known as restaurant week. the one time of the year when I can actually afford to eat at these high end places that usually cost you $25 for a salad that's the size of a dinner roll. NYC has restaurant twice a year - once in the winter and once in the summer. as the name suggests, it should only last for a week but they should seriously consider changing it's name to restaurant month considering it always gets extended past the initial week anyway.

this year I am visiting the most amount of restaurants ever. 3 lunches and 3 dinners. and I've decided to share it all with you (aren't you lucky).

restaurant #1: Lure Fishbar
I had actually never heard of this restaurant before, but my friend, we will call her Funny Face, wanted to try it out since her boss frequents this restaurant so much that they should just keep a table open for him every night. it was totally with me to go because I am a lover of all seafood. after finishing our meal my overall impression of this place is that there are probably much better seafood restaurants out there to spend this kind of money on. I had oysters as my appetizers - definitely NOT a fan of those little suckers. yuck. I had some sort of white fish as the entree (I honestly have no idea what kind it was) and it was tasty for sure, but maybe a little too heavy on the cilantro. and then a chocolate cake for dessert - I can never say no to chocolate. however, I've had better chocolate cakes and surprisingly the best one I've ever had is at Nobu Next Door, a Japanese restaurant - interesting right? however, the bar at this restaurant was totally crowded and looked like a fun place to hang out. so if I ever return here it will just be for a drink and for the decor of this place (the whole place looked like you were inside a gazillion dollar yacht!).

restaurant #2: Norma's at Le Parker Meridien
I was forewarned before I sat down to eat at this restaurant. I was told that a) to avoid the orange juice at all costs, b) I must order the Waza, and c) there is no such thing as no waiting.

I followed advice #1 considering I saw the price of the o.j. on the menu before sitting down to eat and it was NINE DOLLARS for one glass. seriously?! and apparently they charge you that $9 every time you get a refill. no thanks. and besides, as a native Floridian, I don't really trust anyone else's o.j. I did not follow advice #2 because the Waza is a giant waffle topped with what looks like the entire fruit section of a Whole Foods. I hate waffles, this option was automatically out. and then I discovered advice #3 was 100% true. even though I had a reservation at 1:45, we didn't sit down until about 30 minutes later. I've personally never worked in a restaurant myself, but I've had plenty of friends who have and this just doesn't make sense to me. you have a list of people with reservation times and then have you have walk-ins as well. but I made my reservation almost two weeks ago! I honestly think this is just a management issue that needs to be addressed. it also didn't really make much sense because once we sat down, the service was very, very efficient (i.e. slow service was not the reason for the delay in our sit down time). and to top everything off, I didn't find out until I sat down that they don't participate in restaurant week during the weekends. awesome. (though I kind of had a gut feeling they wouldn't be... shoulda listened.)

however, the food was ABSOLUTELY delicious. at least the breakfast quesadilla I had. who knew that eggs, bacon, guac, and tomatoes would taste so good together?! it was a perfect meal too because all I had was the entree, no appetizer and no dessert and I was completely full after finishing (the good kind of full). so when I've saved up enough pennies again, I'll definitely be going back. :)

restaurant #3: A Voce Columbus

well life gets in the way and this restaurant didn't happen. I was supposed to go with people from work, but people's schedules change and it just did not work. however, I've eaten at this restaurant before so I wasn't heartbroken over not going (and neither was my wallet ;) )

restaurant #4: Dovetail

again, this one got nixed too. only because it was participating in restaurant week for lunch and not dinner. I hate when I don't pay attention to the fine print...

restaurant #5: SD26
I had been looking forward to this restaurant since I made all my reservations weeks before had. I had gone here a little over a year ago for Fabulous' birthday dinner. at the time her friend, the Belgian, had been the General Manager so got HOOKED UP. one of those dinners where it should have cost the seven of us probably $1,000 but only ended up being about $500 (including bottles of wine. yes, that was plural). so my friend, the Million Dollar Fundraiser, and I went for a Friday night dinner. we got there a smidge early and were going to sit at the bar, but ended up getting seated right away (this has a significance later on in the story). the restaurant now has something really cool and new, well at least new to me, you order your wine off an iPad. first you pick whether you want red, wine, sparkling, etc. and then you can sort by region, price, vintage, etc. it was really cool. (please excuse the bad quality of the picture as it was taken with my iPhone.) for dinner I of course had the "Uovo" soft egg yolk filled raviolo with truffled butter. this dish, granted it's just one giant ravioli, is quite literally one of the best things I've ever tasted in my life. I'm talking serious foodgasm here. you will seriously never taste ANYTHING like it. I was talking it up so much to my friend that she wanted to try it. I made her order her own though, because there was no way I was sharing this thing. I just can't even begin to describe how AMAZING this little ravioli tasted.

for my main course I had the sea bass and I don't ever do this at restaurants, but I had to send it back. the fish was just way too fishy tasting (I know it's fish and should therefore taste like fish, but this was just too fishy - if that makes any sense). but the waiter was so nice about it and I changed it out for a pasta. the rest of the dinner was great and the dessert was really delicious too. the waiter even brought us each over a glass of moscato (my fav wine!) as a sort of "I'm sorry" gesture. well let me tell you, it won me over! we sat there a little while longer and they also brought us over a little plate of cookies and biscotti. and the daughter (it's a father and daughter team that own the restaurant) even stopped by our table to say hello and see how everything was going. that's one thing that I love about this restaurant - the owners actually walk around and talk to their customers. the one time I was there before the father came by our table to say hello. to me, it's just a very Italian way of doing things but at the same time it gives your dining experience a nice, personal touch. another great thing I like about this restaurant (last one, I promise) is that they let you sit there as long as you want to enjoy your dinner/talk/relax/whatever. very Italian way. Million Dollar Fundraiser and I were there for about three hours! it's one thing I miss about Italy - the meals that last for hours at a time. it's definitely a sure bet that I'll be back to this restaurant. :)

restaurant #6: Park Avenue Winter
to be honest, I would have to say probably the only cool thing about this restaurant is that its decor changes with every season, as does its name. last restaurant week Million Dollar Fundraiser and I went to this restaurant, when it was known as Park Avenue Summer. this time around, really not much had changed. menu was still the same (it is apparently supposed to change with each season). to be fair though, both times we went on a Sunday for brunch and maybe that menu stays the same all year. what I do like about this place is that on Sunday's during restaurant week they actually serve brunch. most other restaurants either do lunch or dinner. not brunch. and seeing as how Sunday brunch is legit an institution in this city, it's nice to know you can have it for restaurant week too. so the atmosphere was nice (though I think I like Summer better) and the food was good - nothing too spectacular, but not horrible at the same time - but to be honest, I don't think I'll be returning to check out Spring or Fall. unless of course I decide to come for lunch or dinner - then hopefully I'll be pleasantly surprised to see the menu change. :)

one should always read the fine print

2011-01-15T09:42:00.008-05:00

I've been to the opera once in my life (a high school friend was kind enough to take me when his aunt was able to give him tickets). I absolutely loved it. it was such a beautiful form of art, from the singing, to the costumes, and even just the atmosphere of the theatre. I haven't been since high school, let's just say it's been a few years, so I decided to treat myself and go The Metropolitan Opera here at Lincoln Center. I decided for my first opera back I would pick one that was well known (usually for good reason), so I decided to see The Magic Flute.

once I arrived at the theatre is when I realized that I should have read the fine print on my ticket. actually what should have given everything away was the fact that I was seeing the performance at 11am on a Monday (I was lucky enough to have the day off of work). huge mistake on my part because it turns out that specific performance was geared towards kids. probably the part that upset me the most was that the performance was all in english - huge disappointment. I wanted to not be able to understand any of the words I was hearing. I wanted to have to fight to find the balance of reading the subtitles while simultaneously trying to watch what was going on onstage. don't get my wrong - the signing was great, I could just understand every word. for some reason, that made the performance not seem as powerful. but maybe I'm just crazy. and even though it definitely was not my favorite performance, I'll still go see another one. :)

architecture walking tour

2011-01-15T09:25:00.004-05:00

one of the great things about NYC is the varied, and sometimes random, amounts of things there are to do here. you have your typical tourist things, restuarants to gorge yourself at, bars to get drunk and make bad decisions in, and parades to cheer on. but one thing I like to do (maybe it's because I'm a huge fan of art) is go on these architectural walking tours (architecture is art too). this one guy does tours every Sunday, they have a different theme every month (except for January, February, and August - all months that are totally understandable to skip), and all you have to do is show up and pay your $15. then for the next two and a half hours he takes you around showing the different buildings and such. I think the best part about it though is that he also has a binder that he brings with him with pictures of what everything looked like back in the day. so you get to see how everything looks now (obviously, since you are standing in front of the building right now) and then you can also see how everything used to look. the tour I took was the Gargoyles in Manhattan. apparently there are a lot more than you think. we were around the Flatiron area for most of the tour, though I couldn't stay for the whole thing as I had a prior engagement. but what little I did see made for some cool pictures. :)

(these were actually legit dragons on the top of this building)

p.s. - if you are interested in taking a tour it's called New York City Cultural Walking Tours (http://www.nycwalk.com/)

champagne & royalty

2011-01-05T22:55:00.005-05:00

Governors Island.

polo match.
Prince Harry.

yuppie-Hamptonesque-vibe.

flowing champagne.

pretty much sums up my entire day at Governors Island for the Veuve Clicquot Manhattan Polo Classic. kind of felt out of place because I wasn't wearing a giant hat. I have the feeling that some of these people were trying to treat this event like Ascot or the Kentucky Derby, which when you think about it this polo match is the closest thing NYC is ever going to get to that. I went with Gossip Girl & friend and we got there a little late, so we unfortunately did not have the greatest spot in which to watch the match. but once enough drunkies left because they had too much sun or something (as an native Floridian, this is never something we say) I was able to get close enough to get pictures of the match. and of course, ended up with pictures of none other than HRH Prince Harry. I mean it was about a two second shot before they went racing down the field in the other direction, but it was enough time to snap a picture. :)

(he's number 1 - nothing less right?)

Brand New New Yorker on Location: Egypt

2010-11-06T08:59:00.031-04:00

I must forwarn you - this post is going to be LONG. I was in Egypt for 2 weeks and took close to 1,000 photos (don't worry, I'm not putting ALL of them up here). only the ones that I think (well, hope) will give you a good sampling of what Egypt is like.

the first stop on our trip was of course to the Great Pyramids at Giza. now I went on this trip back in June, it's now November (I know, I'm a little late), and to be honest I still cannot believe I actually got to see one of the Seven Wonders of the Ancient World. it is still very surreal and I cannot seem to wrap my head around the idea. and not only did I get to look at them, but I also got to climb on them AND crawl inside. I unfortunately do not have any pictures of the inside as they would not allow any cameras. :( seriously, they had a check point before going inside the pyramid to make sure you didn't have a camera. you couldn't even have a cell phone! (since most cell phones these days have the ability to take pictures).

we even went to visit the first pyramid ever built - the Step Pyramid of King Djoser built by Imhotep. Imhotep is argued to be the very first architect, but I had a hard time thinking of him this way because the only time I've ever heard the name Imhotep before was in the movie "The Mummy." and Imhotep was the bad guy in that movie, so I had to keep reminding myself that the real Imhotep was just an architect, not an evil-Pharaoh-killing-obsessed-with-my-girlfriend-bad-guy. anyways, back to the pyramid. so I was about to take a picture of the pyramid when this guy (see picture below) just jumps in my photo. I wasn't too angry because I did get a picture of the pyramid by itself and also this guy just kind of fit with the photo, don't you think? however, I was annoyed that after I took the photo he expected me to tip him! I didn't ask to take a picture of you buddy, you jumped in of your own free will so why would I tip you?!

the rest of this information is going to be out of order because, let's face it, it's been a while and I don't remember. before I get into the rest of the details, I must say that Cairo is one of the most interesting cities I have ever been to. it is such a juxtaposition of extremes that the city becomes absolutely beautiful. and for the first time in my life I was able to truly see what extreme poverty looks like. I must shamefully admit that in all my research of Egypt I only concentrated on the monuments and not the actual country itself. so, it took me by complete surprise that Egypt is as close to a third world country as I have ever been to. (I'm not sure if it actually is a third world country, as I still have not checked.) the city of Cairo is HUGE! almost 20 million people live there (and I thought New York was big)! the roads there are some of the scariest things ever as all traffic signals, signs, etc. are merely suggestions, which of course no one follows. and not only is it cars and trucks, but they also have donkey pulled carts! and then you have the people seriously just darting in and out of traffic.
one of the days we were in Cairo we went to visit the Citadel and saw the Alabaster Mosque of Muhammad Ali. the place was gorgeous and huge. to go into the mosque you had to either take off your shoes or wear these little bootie things over them (think hospital garb). you also had to be covered up quite conservatively. I thought I was (had on a crew neck shirt with sleeves and a skirt that went past my knees), but apparently it was not enough because as soon as I walked into the gates some girl rushed over to me and threw this long cape thing over me. whatever - it's their customs, not mine. though the thing did kind of smell...another place we visited in the old part of Cairo was what they call the "hanging church." the church itself is pretty spectacular, decoration wise, but what makes it really cool is that they discovered later that the church had actually been built on top of some old fortress walls. they had some sections of the floor of the church cut out and replaced with glass so you could see the walls below.
while we were visiting the church they were in the middle of restoring it. I thought it was pretty cool because you could see all the details of how the restoration process worked. below is a picture of a girl repainting some of the details on an altar piece.the rest of the afternoon, what was left of it after lunch anyway, was spent at the Khan El-Khalili bazaar. the place was supposed to be humongous, but unfortunately we only had time to stay in the tourist area where they try and sell you all sorts of things you don't need. like sparkly, shiny let's-leave-nothing-to-the-imagination outfits. 99% positive I didn't see a single Egyptian woman my entire trip wearing anything like that.

the next stop on the adventure was the city of Aswan. first however, we made a stop at the Egyptian Museum (you were not allowed to take any pictures whatsoever, otherwise I would have included some - those next two below were "borrowed" from the internet). it was not the best organized, nor informative, museum I have ever been to (and I have been to my fair share - trust me). but they had so many cool artifacts that it didn't really matter. my two favorite parts were the collection of King Tutankhamen (I got to stand thisclose to his gold funerary mask) and the mummies.
they had the mummy of King Ramses II (this character had about eight wives and over 100 children and was the pharaoh well into his 90s! busy man) and it seriously looked like he had just died a week ago. there was still hair on his head!after the museum we finally made it to Aswan. and just in time to watch the sun setting over the Sahara. :)

there is not much to do in Aswan itself, but there are pretty cool things around it. our first stop was the Philae Temple. like many of the monuments around that area, it had to be moved because it would have flooded when the new Aswan High Dam was created (which is how Egypt ended up with the giant Lake Nasser). it was pretty exciting because it was the very first Egyptian temple I had been to (I sound spoiled for saying this, but it honestly became old hat by the end of this trip).after the temple we went to a papyrus factory and the gentleman there demonstrated for us how they make actual papyrus scrolls. we of course then had the chance to look in the shop and buy something for ourselves (it was kind of like at Disney, where after you finish a ride you conveniently have to exit through a gift shop. for every ride).

the next day we got up at the crack of dawn - wait, I lied. we got up before dawn because on our bus ride to Abu Simbel we stopped to see the sun rising over the Sahara. I am not really a happy camper that early in the morning, but it did make for cool picture.Abu Simbel was really neat and semi-sort of strange at the same time. maybe surreal is more of the word I am looking for. there is absolutely nothing there but the two temples (the main one for Ramses II and the second, smaller one for his "favorite" wife Nefertari) and Lake Nasser. it of course would have been a lot better to visit when there was no one around, but fat chance that is ever going to be the case. the temple for Ramses was enormous. and sooooooo many statues of himself (he was a bit of a narcissistic guy), but one thing that I found that I thought was interesting is that people carved their names into the stone with a date - "so-and-so was here" kind of thing. but what made it cool was that the dates next to the names were ones like 1762 and 1887. not really the kind of dates you see on the bathroom walls nowadays huh?
another interesting thing was that this was the first time you were able to see (albeit, just a tiny amount) how colorful these hieroglyphics used to be! check out the illegal photo below (you again were not allowed to take pictures inside, but they allowed you to walk in with your camera here - so I just snapped a couple of shots, minus the flash, while the guard wasn't looking). the best examples of colored hieroglyphics is in the Valley of the Kings - but they won't allow you to bring in a camera nor a cell phone (sneaky buggers - they are up with the times) into any part of the area, not just telling you know right before you walk into the tombs.
don't remember the exact days these next few thigns were done on, but does it really matter? ;) we took a felucca ride one evening up the Nile (yes, up - it flows in the opposite direction, remember?). apparently our captain, Mr. Mustache as they called him, is famous and has been on the cover of magazines. I have yet to find him though... but the Nile is an amazing river. it is much bigger than I expected and the land on either side of it is so fertile! the only place I have been to that can rival the green of the plants along the Nile is in Ireland (and trust me, they do not call that place the Emerald Isle for nothing!).

one morning, again I had to get up before the sun which is something that should totally be illegal on vacation, we took a hot air balloon ride over the city of Luxor (ancient Thebes). I was a little nervous, not going to lie, since this whole motion sickness thing and I do not necessarily get along. but it was great! my first hot air ballon ride and I LOVED it!! we weren't really that high up, but it was really cool to see everything from a bird's eye view. we passed over a few farm homes and everyone had their beds on the roof! apparently with the wind off the Nile, it was a lot cooler to drag your mattress up to the roof and sleep there. I think we woke some people up when we flew over them though, oops.

the last temple we visited on the trip was Luxor Temple. probably also my favorite. mostly because we were there right as the sun set so we got to see the temple all lit up at night. normally these Ancient Egyptians are all about their straight lines and symmetry, but not here. since more than one pharaoh added on to the temple it somehow did not end up perfect (which I still don't really understand, but whatever).

we went back to Cairo for one more day and night before heading back to NYC. and even though it was hotter than hell (literally it got up to 130 one day) most of the trip, I still really did not want to leave. I LOVED Egypt (though if I never eat another eggplant again in my life I would be ok). it was so different than any place I have ever been to and granted it definitely does not have all the comforts of home, I could still appreciate it for what it was. I am not sure when, but I will most certainly be back again for a visit. :o)

can you be both a Mets and a Yankees fan?

2010-08-25T16:35:00.008-04:00

my baseball friends will tell me no - this is impossible. to be honest though, I don't care for baseball in the least, so I'll "cheer" for whatever team you ask me to. (I only mention this because in one of my earlier posts I said I was a Mets fan.)

on that note, Best Friend came to visit for Memorial Day weekend and we decided to go to a Yankees game. so I got my $10 Yankees hat (it was a kid's hat which is why it was so inexpensive), donned my navy and white and headed up to the Bronx. although I am not a fan of baseball, I will admit that I had a lot of fun at the game. the atmosphere of a baseball game is actually quite intoxicating. sitting there eating your hot dog (nothing but Nathan's of course), drinking beer and listening to (sometimes joining in) the dozens of different chants and cheers. plus, the new stadium is really, really nice. I never made it to the old stadium, but I am not sure I would be wrong in saying that the Yanks definitely traded up. I know the other had a lot of history and was the "House that Ruth Built" and all.. but the new stadium is seriously awesome. so even though I do not like baseball, you better believe I'll be going to more games.

a weekend jaunt

2010-08-22T08:09:00.007-04:00

one of the most fantastical things about living in this city is the weekend jaunts to the "countryside." after all, this is a concrete jungle and it's nice to see green grass every now and then (I know we have that GIANT green space in the middle of the island, but having greenery be everywhere around you is quite different).

one weekend then, I hopped on a train then with Gay Uncle and we headed up to his home in Connecticut. he lives in a gorgeous farm house complete with the most amazing kitchen I've ever seen. so amazing in fact, that it made me want to cook full course meals! [and for those that know me, me cooking (let a alone a full course meal,) is definitely few and far between.] my cooking skills only made it as far as making an omelete. however, it was probably the best omelete ever - solely due to the fact that every time I've tried to make one it's always ended turning into scrambled eggs.
(I am pretty proud of this omelete, so I decided to share it)

during the day we took a drive to go antiquing, consignment, and yard sale shopping. things that are little hard to do in the city, especially the yard sale owing to the fact that pretty much no one has a yard.
other than that we didn't do much else - mainly just relaxed. though I did play a Wii for the first time. on the giant (I'm talking huge - I'm pretty sure it's the biggest TV on the market today) TV and I learned one very important thing. I absolutely suck at Wii Tennis. I am, however, quite good at bowling. at least much better than I am in real life considering I can never seem to get a score above 100.
(kind of what I felt I looked like when trying to play tennis)

Brand New New Yorker on Location: DC

2010-08-05T00:38:00.009-04:00

My friend and I, we will call her Man-Eater, decided it would be a fun, grown-up thing to attend the official Cherry Blossom Festival Gala Dinner Cruise.

The cruise was actually a lot of fun. sat a table with people we didn't know. and the couple next to us was quite interesting, as the woman couldn't really believe we were at the event. because I guess apparently young girls do not attend galas, but only go to bars and get drunk (her words, not mine). minus that little blip though - the night was great.

the ship was huge, the drinks were free (ok, maybe there was some truth to her assumption...but not really), the food was delicious, and surprisingly the music was pretty good too. it was also a lot of fun to get all dressed up. oh! and not only did we get all the stuff mentioned above, but they also gave each of us an official Cherry Blossom Festival cupcake and pin.
had an enjoyable next two days in the city playing tourist. went to the Capitol building, National Cathedral and the Jefferson Memorial - three places I had never been before. we also made a little stop over at the zoo, where I basically became obsessed with this monkey. seriously, this little guy was so cute!

here are some pictures of the National Cathedral:

we of course also had to go to the Cherry Blossom Festival parade. and I will admit that it was not exactly what I was expecting, but then I cannot really tell you what my expectations were to begin with. we saw a band dressed in Colonial garb, a Mustang car club, Japanese drums, and of course both the U.S. and Japan Cherry Blossom Queen. and quite randomly some floats of the Veggie Tales. they also had floats of giant Japanese lanterns with cherry blossoms painted on them. those make sense, but the Veggie Tales?? quite odd and unexpected if you ask me.

all in all, a fantastic experience that I definitely planning on doing again next year! :)

I really do heart Fashion Week

2010-03-02T21:48:00.005-05:00

so just like I did in September last year, this February I volunteered again for Fashion Week. I was not really looking forward to it at first - mainly because I can only ever volunteer after I get off work and the hours are long and I am exhausted by the time I get home.

however, this time it was TOTALLY worth it.

I was in the Tent both of the shows I worked (those are the fashion shows that you actually hear about on the news, for those of you who have no idea about any of this). the first show was Narciso Rodriguez. it was interesting because the set-up for his show was the EXACT same as it was last year. however, this year I was able to see Anna Wintour!! (she was at the show last year, but sitting on the opposite side of where I was standing so I never actually saw her) it was so cool, because not only was she there but also Grace Coddington and pretty much the ENTIRE editorial staff of Vogue. what was also cool was the fact that watching her at the show was literally like watching the movie "The September Issue," but live. she was there with her fur coat, her little bob haircut, and true to Anna style as soon as the show started her sunglasses went on.
the next show I worked was the best of them all. not so much for the designer (Tommy Hilfiger - I really just cannot seem to get into his clothes), but because it was the last show EVER at Bryant Park. I am not sure why they are moving Fashion Week to Lincoln Center now because whenever anyone thinks of Fashion Week they ALWAYS think of Bryant Park - I mean heck, they have been doing it there for 18 years! so yes, not only was the show cool because it was the last one ever in Bryant Park but also because it was my first show where men were walking the runway as well.

and now for the greatest moment of all. you would not believe the amount of "celebrities" at this show. Anna was there again (of course, though I would definitely say that if it weren't for the last show you probably would never see her at a Tommy Hilfiger show), also Ashley Olsen, Hayden Panettiere, Rosario Dawson, Penn Badgley (Dan Humphrey from the show Gossip Girl), and the best news of all.... Chuck Bass!!!! (a.k.a. Ed Westwick) there was even a moment when Chuck and I locked eyes - like a little 12 year-old-girl with a playground crush, I shall never forget that moment. ;)
(yeah, I was standing behind all of them at the show)

I seem to know the right people

2010-01-11T19:44:00.004-05:00

so the Little One (a.k.a. my sister) came to visit me in the City for New Years. now she is only 19, in college and absolutely loves to party (I am pretty sure she can out drink most boys too). her little 19 year old friends were in town as well and were looking for something to do.

so in swoops the greatest big sister ever and I call this promoter I know to see what was going on that night. after a few texts, I told the girls to get ready because we were going out. we ended up at a place called greenhouse (one of your stereotypical NY clubs that charge a beyond ridiculous cover and the place usually is never worth it). but we got in free and the girls were beyond stoked because The Prince (a.k.a. the promoter) took us up to VIP and we had vodka free-flowing all night. I was slightly impressed as well because it wasn't just seem cheap, no-name brand - it was Absolut (not top of the line, but definitely better than the cheap shit). I have no idea how, but we stayed out until 4 or 5 in the morning and of course stopped at a place on the way to get drunk munchies (the girls had to have the full New York experience).

now according to the Little One, I am not the "coolest" person in the world. but I seem to know the right people. I just hope she doesn't expect this EVERY time she comes to visit the City. guess that means I've got to start meeting more people...

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I'm definitely going to events by myself from now on

2010-01-11T07:01:00.007-05:00

as a Christmas/Chanukkah present to myself this year (well technically last year since it's now January) I decided to by myself a ticket to the Cafe Carlyle to see a live performance of a really great singer.
the Cafe Carlyle is in The Carlyle hotel in the UES. it's a fancy-shmancy hotel that I could never afford to stay in (hell, I could barely afford attending the performance), but it has that 1960's high society type vibe. the kind of place you would have gone to all dolled up in your fur coat, while your husband made business deals over scotch-on-the-rocks and you gossiped with the other high society ladies about which "new money" gal was never going to make it.

not sure how many of you know this, but Father of the Bride (both I and II) is my favorite movie. a few of the songs on the soundtrack (Sunny Side of the Street and The Way You Look Tonight are sung by Steve Tyrell. I just absolutely love the sound of his voice. so when I found out he was going to be playing at the Cafe Carlyle, I couldn't pass up the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity (ok, it may not be once in a lifetime that he is singing at the Cafe Carlyle but it's once in a lifetime for me because I don't have $80 extra bucks to spend all the time).
well he was the one performing at the Cafe Carlyle. so I saved up my babysitting money to buy myself the $80 ticket to see him perform (mind you it was $80 just to sit at the bar - if you wanted an actual table...well that would have cost you more).

I got to the Cafe a little early (I wasn't going to risk not getting a seat at the bar). so I settled down with my Egypt book (I'm going on vacation there in June) and made friends with the bartender - Pablo. Pablo even introduced me to a waiter who was from Egypt and taught me a few words in Arabic. after a little while the place started to fill up and a woman sat down next to me. turns out she was Steve Tyrell's manager! I mentioned that I saved up my babysitting money to come see him and she loved it. before Steve took the stage she braught him over so I could meet him!! then I met Steve's doctor as well. along with a gentleman named Tony Desare, who is also a singer and performs at The Carlyle hotel. somehow, and I do not know if it was me or the Manager that told him, he knew as well that I saved up all my babysitting money for this.

the set was amazing. I was enjoying my wine and cheese listening to one of my favorite singers. he first started with Christmas songs and then sang the songs from Father of the Bride. I cannot explain in words how happy I was. I seriously had the biggest grin on my face the entire time. then he sang some other classic (and great) songs.

when it was over the Doctor was gracious enough to pick up my entire tab! $150 he told Pedro to put on his card. I couldn't believe it! but he was so sweet and basically told me that he was at a point in his life where he could afford to do this - so he wanted to. and he also gave me his card and said that if I ever need help in anything in life - just give him a call. how cool is that!?

to top it all off, after everything was paid for and I was getting ready to leave the Doctor walked me over to where Steve was hanging out in the hotel and I got to take a picture with him!! it was, by far, one of the best moments of my life. :)

it's just a little culture

2010-01-11T06:15:00.007-05:00

first, I am very late with this post since this event happened in September...but better late than never right? that's what I thought - so here goes!

on a beautiful Monday morning (it was Labor Day, so I had the day off of work - don't want you to think I was skipping or anything), Fabulous and I ventured to Brooklyn for the annual West Indian Day Parade. and let me just say - wow. that is a site to behold. the streets were jam-packed with people. delicious smells of food everywhere. music playing non-stop (great dancing music if I do say so myself). and some of the most brillant costuming I've ever encountered.
Fabulous and I met one of my co-workers there. she was even gracious enough to give me a Ghana flag to wave for the day (even though I clearly was NOT from Ghana - but details right?). initially we ventured from our meeting spot to find a place along the parade route that we could watch. and along the way I decided to pick up a place of jerk chicken (when in Rome...) - which turned out to be amazing!! you know the saying "go big or go home?" well I did just that - not only did I get jerk chicken, but also this sort of fried fish ball things and also some potato stick things (don't ask me the name of them because I couldn't tell you for the life of me). I had the woman put a little bit of sauce on the chicken and only a little bit because I wasn't sure how spicy it was going to be. well after one bite I went right back to her and asked for me - lots more. needless to say, by the time she was done I probably had enough sauce to feed a small village.

we watch the parade for a while - taking in the costumes, atmosphere, and of course dancing to the music. then we decided to join everyone in the parade (you can do this sort of thing at this parade). we just kept walking down the parade route and stopping at various trucks to dance to the music. (side note: there were 18 wheelers carrying nothing but speakers that went down the parade route blasting different music - whether it was for a group or a country, it didn't seem to matter as people were dancing to it all). it was actually a bit scary at one point because there were so many people jam-packed into one area and they were making us all move quickly that we could have almost been trampled. the only thing I was concentrating on that whole time was staying standing upright - figuring out my direction and hanging on to Fabulous and my co-worker were second priority.
but we made it through and continued walking with the parade (in the correct direction this time) and away from the extremely crowded oh-my-god-I-almost-just-died section of the parade. by the end of it, we were so tired from all the dancing that we just hopped on the subway and headed home.
but what a fantastic experience! I will definitely be there next year - maybe I'll even dress up in costume. ;)

you have got to be kidding me

2009-11-30T16:55:00.003-05:00

so the other night I was leaving an event and decided to take the bus home. call me crazy if you wish, but I love taking the bus. yes I know it takes longer than most modes of transportation (sometimes including walking), but I would much rather be able to look at things rather than being stuck underground. now a post about buses probably does not sound too exciting - but wait til you hear this story.

I get on the bus at a stop (cannot recall which one, but it is not really pertinent to the story). the stop was before the light. the bus stopped, people got off and people got on. we then left the stop, got to the light and had to wait because it was red. I am sitting in the front and next thing I know this guy in a wheelchair comes racing through the crosswalk, screaming and PARKS HIMSELF RIGHT IN FRONT OF THE BUS! I kid you not - he stopped his wheelchair right in front of the bus so we could not move. and we legit sat there for about 20 minutes waiting for this guy to move.

some pedestrian even tried talking the guy out from in front of the bus. but Mr. Crazy kept screaming something about the bus driver left him on purpose. (I don't necessarily think that was the case, but then again I wasn't the one parked in front of a bus). there was even a point where the guy took his bottle of soda and chucked it at the windshield. I can't imagine how hard it must have been for the bus driver later to clean off sticky coca-cola. one passenger was genius enough to call the cops. the showed up a bit later and literally as soon as they came he moved out from in front of the bus.

the best part of it all - while he was "defiantly" parked in front of the bus, THREE other buses passed that he could have easily taken instead.

even though I was frustrated at the time (I really just wanted to get home), it sure made for an awesome story. only in New York right?
(this wasn't exactly the image I was going for, but it was the closest I could find)

why yes, of course my night doesn't start til midnight on a weekday

2009-11-12T10:33:00.012-05:00

So last night was the One Man Boy Band's 21st birthday.

that should give you an idea of what the night was like right there.

the night started with a little pre-gaming action at The Instigator's place and Fabulous and her Plus One joined us as well. every good night should start with a little bit of bubbly - so we did just that. White Zinfandel Champagne (I never knew there was such a thing) mixed with Strawberry Champagne = amazing. (and an amazing headache the next day too) so we finally leave the apartment at about 12:30 (the party did not start until midnight), leave Plus One on the corner and hop in a cab and head to Kiss & Fly (anyone ever heard of it? because I sure haven't). it was your typical Meatpacking District club, complete with douchbags and trashy B&T girls.

when we get there the bouncer starts looking at me weird and asking me if I was with the other two, because apparently I was messing up the "chemistry" of the group. interesting. Fabulous was, well, fabulous in that she basically told the guy that I was their best friend and she didn't appreciate his remarks, he was being very rude, we were there for a friend's birthday, on the list and to just let us in. it was amazing. the adventure wasn't over yet. we get inside and the guy there is telling us it's $5 to get. I guess there goes the point of putting names on a list. we didn't know quite what to do because none of us had cash on us. so after 30 seconds of standing there he makes the comment "if you can't afford it then you can leave." I really wanted to tell him - son, I make more than you do in a year so don't talk to me about not being able to afford it, I just didn't have the $5 on me at the moment. he even tries telling us that it is a reduced cover and that it is normally $25 to get in. really? you are in Meatpacking. and it's already about 1 in the morning by now. and it's a Wednesday night. you aren't that special to be charging $25 covers...

but we wanted to see the One Man Boy Band, so Fabulous decides to go to the ATM that they conveniently have there and take out money to get us all in. and we still had one more obstacle to go. apparently at this place you HAVE to check your coat. the next bouncer wouldn't let us through without checking our coats. and the coat check was $3 each. and you couldn't put two coats on the same hanger (lame). well since we only had a $5 bill left, Fabulous hung up hers (because it was bigger) and the Instigator and I just put our small jackets in Fabulous' purse.

finally we made it in the club. no more obstacles (unless you count the drunken people mingling about). make it to the middle of the place and FINALLY see the One Man Boy Band. all the adventures before that was worth it right there. the One Man Boy Band is an amazing person and being able to help him celebrate his 21st birthday (it only happens once) was worth everything that night.

so we dance. and dance. and dance. and the liquor is flowing (I tried to be a good girl since I had to work the next day). of course there is a fight - boys cannot seem to control there testosterone. but then everyone goes back to dancing. they even played Frank Sinatra's "New York, New York" and EVERYONE in the place was singing it. :) and later the One Man Boy Band kind of shoves me to dance with his friend - a Chuck Bass look-a-like (almost. it was dark - cut me some slack). well it turns out Chuck Bass is a great dancer. :)

oh, and quite randomly - two members of the Black Eyed Peas showed up. so of course the DJ played their songs (again, because we had already heard them by this time of the night) and the guys grabbed the mics and started singing along. really? I already know what you sound like when you sing, so you just singing over the lyrics that you've already sung is not that big of deal.

the night eventually comes to a close because it was 3:30 in the morning and all of us had our big girl jobs the next day. so we said goodbye to One Man Boy Band (I said goodbye to Chuck Bass) and we left. when we get outside I discover that Fabulous had a slight altercation with a boy who must have thought he was the Maharaja of India or something. not sure of the exact story, but it essentially went like this:

Maharaja grabs Fabulous to dance.
Fabulous says no (I think it was more in of the form of body language (i.e. pulling her arm away) rather than using actual words).
Maharaja calls Fabulous bitch.
repeats the name.
over.
and over.
and over.
interspersed throughout "bitch" he claims that he will throw her out of the club.
somehow gets bouncer to come over.
bouncer basically just stands there, cannot believe what is going on and finally leaves.
it may have been at this point that the Maharaja realizes he wasn't going to win, with either Fabulous or the bouncer so he gave up.

so Fabulous hops on the subway and the Instigator and I get in a cab and we all head home. at 4 in the morning. works starts at 9 in the morning. awesome.

but the night was completely worth it. ;)

volunteering has it's advantages

2009-10-28T12:42:00.003-04:00

so it is quite common knowledge that I volunteer - a lot. but it does come with many advantages. and many of those are free. case in point - last night.

at the MET we have preview receptions for our higher paying members (i.e. $1000s and above every year) where they get to see the new exhibitions before anyone else does. now I don't have $1000s of dollars to donate to the museum of year, but I do donate my time (technically speaking). so last night I was invited to attend one of these receptions for FREE. and not only did Fabulous and I get to go to the museum after hours (which it is really cool at night, I must admit), but we got to drink wine for FREE. and they didn't have just wine - there was an array of liquor choices as well. so Fabulous and I sat at one of the tables they had set up amongst the sculptures, sipping on wine and eating these delicious little cracker cheese stick things (which of course ended up being my dinner).

(this isn't exactly what it looked like at the MET, but you get the general idea)

Why yes, I'll have more champagne

2009-09-27T18:27:00.004-04:00

so Gossip Girl and I were going to partake in Fashion Night Out, and by partake I mean stand in line at Bergdorff's because the Olsen twins were bartending.

well Gossip Girl and I tried to this, but to no avail. we were only 30 minutes late from when the twins started bartending (mind you the "event" was going on for a few hours). but by the time we got up to the restaurant they had already closed the entire floor! it was beyond crazy up there and even harder to back down to the main floor. thank god there wasn't a fire or anything or we would have burned up for sure (and without seeing the twins too...).

scratch that idea then. Gossip Girl decided to go next door to Fabulous' work and just drink free champagne. and it was the good shit too - Perrier-Jouet. it was free flowing all night. and the special guest there was an opera singer (most would not find that aspect too exciting, but I enjoyed). so I spent the night filling up on the bubbly and let me just tell you it was an interesting next day at work...

I'm On A Boat

2009-09-01T16:20:00.006-04:00

So one warm summer evening, the girls and I decided to take a booze cruise.

$39 for an hour and a half of open bar and a cruise around the NY harbor. not too shabby, if I do say so myself.

and it wasn't just any boat. as you can see above, we actually were on a legit sailboat. how cool is that?!

so the cruise started at 7 (well 7:30 technically). and of course my friends and I were the first ones on line for the bar. (we were thirsty, can't can I say).

the cruise was actually a lot of fun. mainly because of the copious amounts of drinks involved, but also because it was at the perfect time. sunset. (see photos below for your viewing pleasure). there is not much else to say about the cruise. just use your imagination. it was a boat + (free) drinks + the city at sunset = heaven. :)

I'm officially a Mets fan. well I was a few weeks ago anyway...

2009-08-28T11:04:00.004-04:00

this isn't really all that exciting. me and the girls went to a Mets game. that's the story.

however, it was my first time ever being in a professional baseball stadium. so that was sort of cool. and then before we hopped on the subway to Queens we stopped at Chipotle. I was waiting until we got to the game so I could get a hot dog (hot dogs and baseball just go together), but I did get myself some beers there (they would have been cheaper than in the stadium) and definitely brown-bagged that in the subway.

classic New York

2009-08-28T10:56:00.002-04:00

so I'm not sure if this is necessarily "classic" New York. but it was definitely one of those perfect summer nights doing something you can only do in the city.

a movie in Bryant Park.

Fabulous and I met at the park after work (well after work for me anyways), spread out our blanket (which is amazing by the way - all weather blanket at Bed, Bath & Beyond. check it out.) poured the wine, and sat back and relaxed while waiting for the movie to start.

it was real classy too in that our wine was definitely in water bottles. red wine no less. their was an event at my work in which there was wine and cheese, food and yep, water bottles. so I grabbed two of those water bottles, dumped out the water and poured in the wine. :) I even made a little plate of cheese to take with me as well. we step up the classy-ness a little when our new friends gave us "wine glasses" in which to drink our wine from (see photo). one of the guys also got a pizza - which they totally shared with us. a fantastic night if I do say so myself.

however, for the life of me I cannot tell you what the movie was about. think I had a little too much fun drinking that wine...

"that's just delicate"

2009-07-08T15:47:00.004-04:00

I have never seen a Marilyn Monroe movie until Monday night.

There is a festival that goes on during the summer called River to River. They host movies, concerts, dance, etc. This past Monday night Fabulous and I went to see a free movie:

The Seven Year Itch

It actually was a really, really funny movie. I loved it. The space in which we saw the movie was also amazing. It was down in the Financial District and it's called the Elevated Acre. Essentially it is this open courtyard between two buildings that is open and also borders the water. The festival set up a "grass" area (a.k.a. astro-turf) and a giant blow up screen in which to watch the movie on.
Fabulous and I managed to squeeze ourselves into a small space on the "grass." We were chillin for a little while and realized that we had a bit more time before the movie started. So I scrambled on over to the Duane Reade next door and bought us a six-pack. The movie pretty much started as soon as I got back. Fabulous and I were enjoying our beers, which we were able to get open thanks to our lovely neighbors who had a bottle opener (since of course, Fabulous and I didn't think about that before I bought the beer) and eating fruit snacks (great combo with beer - I know).

All in all, a great night. :)

no better way to celebrate

2009-07-07T10:02:00.002-04:00

4th of July this year was rather interesting. I guess you could almost say it was done New York style.

A friend of mine was in town for the weekend and I was going to take her somewhere along the Hudson River to see the Macy's Firework show. However, plans changed a little the Friday night before when my friend, we shall call him Med School, informs me that a friend of his lives down in the financial district and invited us to join him on the rooftop to watch the fireworks. Mind you this building was around 50 stories tall - I wasn't going to say no.

So Saturday rolls around and we had to wait for Med School to get out of work, which he didn't until 8:30pm, then of course we had to stop at the liquor store to grab some libations. We got to the building around 9:00pm only to be told (rather rudely I may add) by the security guard that they were not letting anyone else up on the roof. I would have been pissed had I actually lived in that building and was just coming home or something...

But luckily Med School had another friend that also lived in the financial district (actually on Wall Street I might add), so we went to that building instead. We get inside and the guard stops us. Med School tells him something to the affect of we are going to visit a friend to watch the fireworks and that the "friend" is already on the roof. The guard states that he has to call the apartment anyways, so we wait. Guard calls, no one answers, he sends us up anyway. When we get to the roof Med School informs us that his friend actually doesn't live in the building anymore - he moved out 2 months ago!

Since we were already on the roof though, we decided to make a party of it. Even though the view was not that great - we had to stand on chairs and could only really see a sliver of the fireworks going on - we still had ourselves some wine, some absinthe (poured into a Gatorade bottle no less), snacks, and a Crackberry "blasting" Pandora.

Not exactly the scenario I had in my head when Med School originally told me a "rooftop party," but it was still enjoyable nonetheless. :)

I ventured to Brooklyn again

2009-06-11T11:55:00.005-04:00

So this isn't all that exciting, but this past weekend the Canadian (a friend) and I walked across the Brooklyn Bridge. It was my first time ever doing this and it was such an enjoyable walk!

The view from the bridge was gorgeous! No matter where you stood, you had a perfect view of both Manhattan and Brooklyn. The fact that it was 75 degrees and sunny probably helped matters too.

Also, we somehow ended up walking down Division Avenue and I had a very scary vision. We had perfect timing to make it on this street right when synagogue let out and the streets were filled with nothing but hasidic Jews. The scary part was that every single Jewish girl on that street was pushing a baby stroller. Many of them also had other little rug rats trailing behind them. But this is what nice Jewish girls do - they grow up and have nice Jewish babies. They become nothing but Jewish baby breeding machines. I think this is my grandmother's vision for me - grow up, marry a nice Jewish doctor (or lawyer or whatever other profession makes boku bucks), and then have nice Jewish babies. At least she is not requiring me to become hasidic....

p.s. - please ignore the snow in the picture as this was the only picture I could find. it was 75 degrees and sunny the day I took a stroll down this hell street.

this is why I love New York

2009-05-19T14:06:00.003-04:00

In such a crazy and big city as the Big Apple, it's good to know people who know people. Case in point - last Friday night I went with my fellow law school dropout to a birthday party for her friend. Now this friend of hers is a promoter for certain clubs in the city and as such the party was at a place called Citrine Lounge. There was an open bar from 10:30-11:30 and while I had never been to a club/bar/lounge/whatever that early, I couldn't say no to free drinks! So come 11:30 when the open bar officially ended and I had had one too much vodka cranberries, my little happy drunk self was dancing up a storm. Not only did this place have many cute boys to boot (though it could have been alcohol goggles telling me so), I seriously made a new best friend. We bonded over cheap shopping finds (her: a fun black, cutout shirt bought for $7 on the streets of LA and me: black peep-toe "Christian Louboutin" heels for $12 from Marshalls). [Side note: I say Christian Louboutin's in "" because there is no way I will ever be able to afford real ones.] And we became facebook friends that night (no joke).

After my buzz started to slowly wear off and my friend's feet started to really hurt from her super cute shoes, we decided to call it a night and drag our happy butts home. However, on our walk home we come across this place called Duvet. I proceed to explain to friend that there was an episode of Sex and the City where they go to a place called Bed - which is based off of Duvet. The gentleman outside tries to get us to go in - I told him we would only go if it's free. Next thing I know he hands us 2 tickets, we skip the massive line waiting to get in, go through security (no joke - they had women with metal dectector wands checking everyone that went in), and finally make it inside. It was a cool place and they literally have beds everywhere. Now there was great music playing, so of course I drag friend to the dance floor. She finally cannot stand the pain in her feet anymore, so we leave Minorities R Us (literally, I have never felt like more of a minority. lol) and catch a cab home.

We get in the cab and after telling the driver there would be two stops the conversation went like this:

Him: "Do you like music?"
Me: "Definitely."
Him: "Would you like me to sing to you?"
Me: "Uh, ok."

The cabbie then proceeds to serenade us with Indian music all the way home.

A very interesting night if I do say so myself.

this is why I don't do boroughs...

2009-05-10T14:08:00.004-04:00

So Fabulous and I decided to venure out one night to other side of the pond, a.k.a. Brooklyn. Now mind you that I must preface this story with the fact that we had started drinking MANY hours before we even left...

Our adventure began just on our walk to the subway. Fabulous and I were jamming out to her iPod and these little girls stop in the middle of the sidewalk and start breaking it down with us! Literally we were having a dance party on the sidewalk and, I am sad to say, that the 11 and 12 year olds definitely schooled us. Then just a block later a little (well actually I am pretty sure it was GIANT) rat ran across our paths and scared the shit out of us!! Seriously, I don't think I have ever screamed so loud in my life.

Finally we make it to the subway and get on the train to begin our looooooooooooong journey to the borough. We are just sitting there minding our own business, jamming out to tunes when these boys get on with a video camera. They literally videotaped us for half of the trip down the island. I wouldn't be surprised if it showed up on YouTube, though it would be the most boring video ever because literally Fabulous and I did nothing while he was filming.

We finally make it to Brooklyn - somewhere on Smith street. The first bar we went to was a bit boring, making us think we never should have ventured out there. But then we went to this place called Creol (I think that's how it is spelled) that had karaoke. It turned out to be the best time ever!! Fabulous and I were jamming out to people singing (or attempting to sing) for the rest of the night. Then the two best surprises were that at the end of the night. First, one of the bartenders busted out with the song "Suspicious Minds" and I seriously thought he was the actual singer!! He was that good! Second, the VERY cute waiter/barback/whatever, complete with an Irish accent, sang the last song of the night - Ice, Ice Baby. We stayed and danced for a little longer and then started our venture home...

First off, there was definitely a girl fight breaking out right by the subway station. I was expecting to see weaves start flying all over the place. So we make it to the subway platform only to realize that we were on the wrong side as the train was headed to Coney Island (definitely not where we wanted to go at 3 in the morning). We go back outside, walk by the fight again, and down to the other side we were supposed to originally be on. The best part was that Fabulous and I both have unlimited metro cards so we had to wait a certain amount of time before we could swipe them again. And as luck would have the train passed while we were waiting on the outside. boo. Finally, we were able to use our cards again. Made it on to the platform, waited literally about another 10 minutes for the train. Now mind you that we only had to take this train one stop (stupid construction). So we get on the next train, which we though would take us home, only to find out that this train took us all the way over to the west side (we live on the east side). Finally we get out of the subway and just take a taxi the rest of the way home.

Did I mention that this entire time I was sick with a cold?

moral of the story: it's going to be a long while until I venure out to the boroughs again...

Really? Are you serious??

2009-01-05T21:59:00.006-05:00

So sometimes I really think the homeless are ungrateful.

Seriously, you are living on the streets, BEGGING for money so you can get something to eat (because let's face it - alcohol will only get you so far for so long).

A few weeks ago I decided to go to Burger King (I know - don't say it - I have already repremanded myself for going) for dinner. I passed this homeless guy standing outside McDonald's begging. He had no coat on (it was December mind you) and was about the size of a toothpick. I had no cash on me (I never carry it because I will only spend it), but I decided to be nice and get an extra 99 cent burger for him. It was only a dollar and I could afford to spend it, so I figured why not (besides Santa still had to come - so I had to be a nice girl). When I walked past him again and handed him the burger he didn't even say thank you!! Seriously?? I just bought you dinner and you can't even afford to thank me?!

Maybe he was upset that I bought him a burger from Burger King rather than from the McDonald's he was standing in front of...

So I think I'm becoming cynical...

2008-12-05T09:52:00.004-05:00

So this past Wednesday was one of the first times I was REALLY mad at the tourists here in the city.

Here's the story:

I had to run to the theatre after work to buy Broadway tickets for friends that are coming to visit. After getting the tickets (on 45th street) I decided I would go visit Fabulous at her restaurant, which was just about 10 or so blocks away. Unfortunately I made the mistake of deciding to walk down 6th Avenue - not remembering that that night was the tree lighting ceremony at Rockefeller Center.

Well the crowds of people were UNBEARABLE!! Seriously there were so many goddamn people it was ridiculous. I really wanted to try and convince the cops to just let me go around because I don't give a rats ass about the effing tree! It's just the same thing I have in my living room (only times 12). Needless to say, they didn't go for that.

Then at one point as a crowd of us are crossing the street and we get to the other side, this woman just stops in the middle to answer her cell phone! I was so fed up at that point that I actually yelled at her - legit screamed so that everyone could hear me that she had to keep walking and couldn't just stop in the middle of the effing sidewalk. I know it wasn't the nicest thing to do, but at least her and her husband will have a story to tell people that they met an "angry New Yorker" - I guess there goes the city's reputation of being one of the nicest cities in the nation (no seriously, New York was voted that - Google it).

So when I finally got to Fabulous' restaurant I told her that if we ever do any of these tourist things (i.e. Macy's parade, tree lighting, etc.) it's going to be from the inside of a plush hotel room where we are sipping on the bubbly and making fun of the people crowded down below.

Smoke: A Jazz Club

2008-11-26T12:31:00.002-05:00

So last night I went to my very first jazz club. Now I must admit that while I listen to jazz all day at work I really do not know much about it - except that it sounds nice. However, seeing it live is such a different and interesting experience. I now can pick out what kind of instruments are playing what sounds in the song (don't get me wrong - I could pick out a drum and a saxophone before).

This place was rather on the small side - seriouslyyouwerethisclosetothepeoplenexttoyou. But there was not a bad seat in the place, because anywhere you sat you could see the stage - even if you were all the way at the back. There was also a really nice mellow vibe to it (not sure if that's just the nature of jazz clubs in general) and not a lot of loud noise. It was really nice when they started playing because pretty much everyone there just shut up and listened to the music.

All in all, I would definitely recommend going to a jazz club at least once in your life. :)

There's A First Time For Everything

2008-11-19T09:36:00.002-05:00

So it's official.

I finally fell asleep on the subway and missed my stop.

The funny part (at least I think so anyway) is that I definitely was not drunk. No, I was on my way to work. All I had to do was go from the 96th Street stop to the 116th Street stop. Only a total of 3 stops.

But next thing I know I am being snapped awake by this bright burst of sun shining on me. It was right then that I realized I missed my stop, because in all my traveling underground on the subway - not once has the sun shone down there. However, the 125th Street stop (which is the one I had to get off at since I missed 116th) is outside - hence the sunshine.

This might have been a funny story if also on my way to work this morning, the bus was not 10 minutes late; I decided to skip getting on the bus in front me to avoid the "crowd" and get on the bus right behind, which that one of course was absolutely packed; then it literally took about 1-2 minutes to actually walk down into the subway station (normally it takes seconds) because there were so many people; miss my subway stop and have to get off at the next one = a longer walk to work in the FREEZING (seriously - it was 26 degrees this morning!) cold weather!

Oh the joys of commuting to work along with a million others and using public transportation.

"The World Fascinates Me"

2008-11-18T00:09:00.006-05:00

Andy Warhol definitely said it best - "the world fascinates me." And it truly does. Seriously, I have decided that people will never, ever cease to amazing me because let's face it - we are all crazy somehow, someway.

Of course some people like to display their "quirks" a bit more than the rest of us do.

Take for instance this situation:

So there is always that girl that is just a little bit off and while sometimes she can be really funny, other times you really don't know if you should laugh with her or at her (come on, we all knew someone like this in high school). And not only was it the things she said that we interesting but also some of the "clothing" choices she so confidently decided to wear in public.

Fabulous and I decided one day to go to the AMNH (that's short for American Museum of Natural History - in case you weren't up-to-date on your NYC "lingo"). It was a rainy day so we figured why not - plus it is a really cool museum. Another spur of the moment decision we made was to see the planitarium show while we were there. So we buy our tickets and head for the line. Little did we know what was waiting for us in line... standing right there in front of us was this:

Yes, ladies and gentleman if you look past the two giant yellow balls (which I have yet to figure out what they are supposed to be - any thoughts?) you will see the girl wearing a tail. And not just your run-of-the-mill-cheap-party-store-cat-tail but a full blown, big, furry wolf tail (that's my guess as to what it is). Uhm.....what?!

However, I would like to thank this lady for deciding to pull this out of her closet and wear it for the rest of us to see - I mean how else would we have entertainment?!

I love FREE food!!

2008-11-17T20:23:00.006-05:00

So Fabulous and I decided to go out to dinner one night...and we ended up at Spice Market. We sat at the "chef's table" basically - a.k.a. the bar right in front of the kitchen. Had a few appetizers and some wine (we always have wine) and overall just chatting away.

Then of course Fabulous sees someone she knows from the restaurant industry. And also of course it turns out he is a manager at the restaurant. Manager goes away and then... the free food starts coming!! A few more appetizers:

And then after that the actual dinner:

When the meal was over the best part came - a reduced bill!! Who can say no to fabulous food that you don't really have to pay for?! :)

Fabulous Night in the City

2008-11-10T15:28:00.004-05:00

Ok, so New York is really about the only place you can have so many fantastic things happen to you in one night!

So first off, it's a Friday night. I met Fabulous after work at a new restaurant that just opened up last week (Aspen Social Club). We had a bottle of libations and a few choice little tapas. I am sure we could have gotten something for free if we had turned up the flirting a little bit with our very cute waiter.

After dinner we headed over to the theatre because we had tickets to see Mary Poppins (yes I realize it is a kid's show - but don't you have those times where you just want to be a kid again?). Our seats were decent - in the mezzanine and nothing too special. However, we had the most goddamn annoying kids ever sitting behind us!! First, it's the theatre so why they sell little bags of candy I'll never know. But these children I swear to you were eating their Skittles (or M&M's or whatever) literally one at time. And not only that, but I really think they were eating all the same colors together (yes, I realize it is dark in the theatre so you really would not be able to see the colors - so this is further proving my point). And then on top of all that they were eating the candy so loud! The ENTIRE first act was not enjoyable at all.

At intermission then Fabulous and I decided to try and find seats elsewhere in the theatre. We ended up going upstairs to the balcony and while I looked for seats Fabulous ended up talking to a gentleman who thought we were lost. Turns out he works for the theatre and basically we ended up sitting in box seats!!! You actually don't get a great view from there, but still - how many times do you get to sit in box seats for FREE?!

After the show finished we took a walk and ended up in Bryant Park at the ice skating rink. We were just enjoying people watching (especially laughing at the people who were busting their asses on the ice - yes I know I am destined for hell). The best part was that there was this guy with LIGHT UP ice skates and the best rastafari hat I've ever seen who was clearly skating to the own beat in his head. So one time when he came around the rink, Fabulous and I started dancing on the side with him - he then skates over and gives the last of the "calendars" he has. They were literally wall calendars printed on a home computer featuring our guy - Bladie Flowness. Yes, that was his name.

We then leave the rink and head to the Bryant Park Hotel (for the bar). There was a rather significant line waiting to get in, so Fabulous walks right up to the guy with the clipboard (who was oh so handsome), talks to him and next thing you know we skip the line and head right in!

All in all, one of the best nights in this city so far!

Does anyone cheer for the Knicks anymore?

2008-10-31T13:09:00.002-04:00

So I haven't been in this city long, but I am somehow getting the feeling that no one around here really cheers for the Knicks.

Of course there are those die hard fans (what team doesn't have those), but every time I mentioned the team people seriously laughed at me.

Fabulous and I went to a game last week. We paid $15 each for our nosebleed seats (still a pretty good view though), did pretty much nothing but drink beer, get drunk, made friends and had one of the best times ever! It was seriously so much fun! And despite the rest of this city's opinion of the team we are definitely going back for more games (and beer of course).

GO KNICKS!!!

P.S. - I can maybe see why people in this city don't like them - we lost the game 111-110 to the Nets. But hey, it was only preseason - maybe there is hope during the regular season.

Number 3

2008-10-23T13:02:00.003-04:00

This is by far the best subway "musical" act begging for money that I have ever seen.

No lie, it was a two man bluegrass band. Complete with the country accent that made you just want to slap your knee to the beat of their song. If you need some sort of visual, think George Clooney's band in "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"

Their instruments included a paper bag with their coins in it that was the tambourine (I guess) and a rolled up newspaper the one guy was hitting against his hand as a drum. All they needed to complete their band was a banjo player. They even wrote their own lyrics! The best line of one of the songs (oh they definitely had a few they sung - seriously - I can see an album coming out next year entitled "Subway Blues") was "Smile. It won't even ruin your hair."

These guys were seriously a riot and I hope that you one day get to experience their subway concert!

Something I've Never Seen Before

2008-10-23T12:57:00.003-04:00

So this is completely random and of no real importance, but I decided I would share anyway.

For the first time in all my years of visiting the city and now living here I saw a woman driving a cab the other day. Not that I am trying to be stereotypical or anything, but I can honestly say that I have NEVER seen a woman driving a cab before!

Subway Crazies

2008-10-10T11:23:00.005-04:00

So this will be a continuous posting of all the crazy people I meet in the subway.

The subway crazies (as I like to call them) are not only interesting for their antics, but also because...well first, it is a well known fact that New Yorkers are not exactly known for being the nicest people ever nor do ever really talk to strangers. Everyone just minds their own business. But these subway crazies make these I-am-just-minding-my-own-business-New-Yorkers ban together essentially. And when you think about it - it is kind of cool.

Subway Crazy #1:

This man was not necessarily crazy, but just kind of off. He was an older gentleman and walked hunched over. So we get into the subway train (which of course was pretty full) and crazy is standing next to me. It smelled sooooooooooo bad on the train and when I looked over at crazy... you could see a line of wetness down one of his pant legs. Yep, crazy had peed in his pants. Now I actually felt kind of bad for crazy because I really do not think he was all there upstairs and thus did not realize what happened.

But the smell was beyond horrendous. Seriously, I do not know if I have ever smelled anything so bad. The comical part of course was that everyone around him - we were all making faces together and laughing about how bad it smelled.

Subway Crazy #2:

This subway crazy really was crazy.

First, he tried to jump on the train when the doors were closing. So of course he got stuck in the doors, was yelling at the conductors to open the doors and then was finally let into the subway. He then proceeds to start talking at the top of lungs about who knows what. Complaining in general about people. I turned up the volume on my iPod to drown him out (my normal response to the people who get on the trains explaining their tragic life story and asking for money - I am not a horrible person I swear. it just gets a tad bit annoying after about the 10th tragic story, which of course is oddly similar to the nine stories before it..).

Then we get to the next stop - people get off the train and people get on. And the crazy (who was at the other end of the train car) gets back onto the train at the doors right next to me!! Aghh!

He goes into some rant about how we are all disgusting for standing so close to one another (meanwhile he is the one who wedged himself onto the train when there was clearly no room). Then he all of a sudden became a prophet or archangel or something to that effect and that he was there to save us. (p.s. - the entire time he is talking he has a cardboard box around one side of his head and an opened folder around the other trying to block anyone from looking at him).

The funny part was that these girls who were standing closer to him at the stop when he originally got on the train moved to the doors closest to me at the next stop to try and get away from him. Clearly that did not work out too well for them because he got on the train right next to them again. So this crazy was spouting off his prophecies or whatever, one of the girls starts singing (really well actually) to try and drown him out. It actually worked and he shut up (for a bit anyways). She then proceeded to ask the train car for requests. The entire car was laughing and some people even started to shout out songs for her to sing.

All in all, a very interesting train ride.

Spiderwoman

2008-10-09T09:07:00.003-04:00

When I first moved here to New York I had no place to live. So Fabulous and her roommate, the One Man Boy Band, graciously let me sleep on their couch for a month. It was kind of a crazy system we had because there were only 2 keys to the apartment. Both Fabulous and One Man Boy Band work in restaurants so they were gone in the evenings, while I was at my 9-5 corporate america job.

The system was that when Fabulous left for work, she would leave the key under the mat so I get into the apartment when I got home from work. Then I in turn would leave it under the mat for her when she got home, so that she would not have to wake me in the wee hours of the morning when she got home to let her in.

Well one rainy day I come home from work, walk the five flights up to the apartment only to discover that there is NO key under the mat.

Great.

I tried contacting One Man Boy Band to see if he was maybe heading home early. No such luck there. I then tried contacting Fabulous. No luck either.

My only option then - scale down the fire escape. Yep, I walked the two more flights up to the roof (which had a gorgeous view by the way) and started climbing backwards down the fire escape. Not gonna lie in that it was definitely a little scary. But I made it to our apartment (thank god we leave the window open) and crawled inside.

It was actually pretty exciting times now that I look back on it. :)

Some Like it Hot

2008-10-08T14:12:00.006-04:00

So my friend, we will call her Fabulous, had a moment in her life that was seriously straight out of a movie. Really, things like this do not happen to us normal girls. But since she is Fabulous, it of course happens to her.

Fabulous works at a rather upscale restaurant in midtown. One of her managers, Dreamboat as we will call him, was leaving the company. So one night after the restaurant closed all the employees stayed after popping bottles of the bubbly to celebrate Dreamboat's last night. Fabulous and Dreamboat had always had a big brother/little sister type relationship. However, things changed that night.

Basically when Fabulous decided it was time to drag her drunk ass home, she went downstairs to the office to grab her things. Unbeknown to her, Dreamboat followed her. As she opened the door he came up behind her and whispered in her ear "I want to ____ you." Well the man is named Dreamboat for a reason, so what girl in their right mind would say no?!

Moral of the story, Fabulous had that great, passionate high-heels-still-on-skirt-pulled-above-your-waist-and-pulling-on-his-tie-to-bring-him-closer sex.

All I can say - good lord I sure as hell hope that happens to me one day. Don't you agree?

p.s. - his girlfriend still doesn't know ;)