Only in New York...?

Sophomore year is OVAHHHHH!!

And now I'm back in Queens until I fly out to Tokyo on June 10th. I don't normally come back home during the school year (a laughable thought, considering how much I do), but after getting back to the good ole NYC on Monday afternoon, I basically devoted my entire week to seeing as much of NY as possible.

My friend Matt, who is also BR '11 and lives in Dallas, stayed with me for a week again this year. My parents (both of them) picked us up in a cargo van thingy, but my dad hadn't thought of where Matt and I would go...we ended up sleeping on the floor of the cargo hold lol. That only added to my exhaustion; I had barely slept the night before (womp womp).

But exhaustion could not hold us back! We had planned our trip somewhat in the past week and did almost everything we set out to do: the Met (I had never gone before!), the Museum of Natural History (love that place), Times Square, Rockefeller Center, Central Park (with the emo kid), thought about TKTS (that line was RIDICULOUS), and basically ate ridiculously well and walked like it was the only way to get around.

Some of my favorite things about the city, though, are the random shtuff that goes on. I LOVE those "Only in New York" moments, when you see something so ridiculous, and yet almost just pass on by because outrageous things happen all the time here. I remember that I was in the city with my friend Andi, also from Queens, and we were waiting at a corner to cross like 3rd avenue or something, when a troupe of clowns on bikes passed us by. Yeah. Clowns on bikes. We looked at each other and realized we would NOT have that in New Haven. I mean, seriously, New Yorkers have such originality and personality and disregard for what others think of them--how else could this amazing city be filled with all these eccentric, fascinating people??

Walking in Times Sq, we saw what were apparently auditions for some sort of competition between the NY street performers (really???). We only managed to see one (long and tedious) act, but it was one of those, "I have to tell someone about this, it's too crazy" (ahem). It was a guy playing the ELECTRIC VIOLIN.



And then there were just ridiculous things, like this ad--nothing supports underachieving quite like calling yourself the 4th largest network. Except maybe being even more explicit in saying there are 3 networks that are bigger and better than you are.



And now that I'm in the photo mood, I'll include another only-in-NY moment. La Plaza Cultural at 9th St and Avenue C (Lower East Side of Manhattan) is a community garden that was started by some ex-gang members that decided that they wanted to channel their energy into creating a community, not destroying it. Today was the Yale Day of Service and I dragged my mom along to help out for a few hours. I've never done so much manual labor in one sitting, and came home and slept for 2 hours (and would have kept on sleeping had I not been awoken =P). The concept of the garden is awesome and there were so many of us digging, transporting wheelbarrows of dirt, carrying stones, spreading out sand, hacking at roots, patting down and leveling out soil, taking out garbage, digging out a pathway, and laying it down with stones (all level with each other--definitely the hardest part). I love it when people come together to do something amazing =]






I've traveled a lot in my life, mainly with the US team for karate (another post, perhaps??), but I've never, ever, found a place other than NY that I would rather call home. I cannot imagine living, like actually living, in any place but New York City. A lot of the reasons are intangible, and possibly arbitrary because there are plenty of cities in the world that are gorgeous and wonderful, but still. Nothing can beat New York.

Funnily enough, the city that has actually come the closest is Kyoto.

So this will be an interesting trip in that sense as well. So many expectations surround Tokyo in my mind right now. I hear so many things about it, have seen so many movies, see so many pictures. Even Lonely Planet has me convinced that Tokyo can rival New York.

Tokyo has big shoes to fill.