New York, New York
Trip Start
Nov 13, 2007
1
104
106
Trip End
Oct 08, 2008
New York City,
New York,
United States
Wednesday, October 1, 2008
well the US so far has been nothing short of awesome (with the sole exception of my utter loathing of the american obsession with tipping which has just spiralled out of all control IMHO: *mini-rant* - why do you have to tip a shuttle bus driver when you dont tip a regular bus driver? why doesnt the postman get a tip, he provides a service? why do hairdressers get tips and people working in supermarkets dont? im sure the hairdressers are earning more than the people in the supermarkets.....its in a word: Ludicrous.)
i flew from honolulu to LAX on the 24th and that was fine though isnt it mad that on a 5.5 hour flight american airlines dont have to give you any food?! i always thought there were rules about if a flight was over a certain length of time then they had to feed you? clearly not!! LA was just mad to arrive in - even the airport. people dressed up beyond belief, enormous cars, just totally living the LA dream, it was cool. because i arrived in quite late i stayed over in the radisson ahead of my flight the next day to SF
so on the thursday i flew from LAX up to san francisco with southwest airlines - my new favourite airline!! its all very low-fi, low-key, casual. its free seating (though there is a queueing number system to board which is genius). the crew wear very casual clothes and make jokes and sing on the tannoy and it was just a whole new flying experience for me!! shane met me at the airport and after a brief but awesome tour of the city we headed back to his apt which is basically just up the road from the city centre so in a great spot. we went for a walk down the marina to check out the sun setting behind the golden gate (and to check out the riverside houses that will set you back $4.2m!!) that night we dined on superb local italian and drank too much wine.
friday shane went to work at ludicrous o'clock and i dragged myself out of bed at 8 (solely because the water was being switched off at 9 and i wanted a shower). spent the morning wandering around union square, shaking off the hangover, doing a little shopping and also checking out a live performance of Wicked. in the evening we went down to the riverside and i met up with kim (who i used to work with in dell) and her husband jeff. it was so cool to see her again and catch up and we had some great mexican and margueritas and it was a lovely evening.
on sat morning i went to work with shane on the other side of the river and then after that he dropped me up to haight ashbury where i wandered around happily for a couple of hours. i wondered if id see the homeless guy wearing my doors t-shirt that mum stole from me in 1993 and left there but no luck (!) i stumbled up the stupendous amoeba records where i couldve happily spent my life savings as well as seeing some amzing grafitti. after that i took a cab down to fishermans wharf where i wandered around and took a cool boat trip out up under the golden gate and around alcatraz. that evening we met up for dinner with 2 of shanes mates from bray who were over too - went to a lovely greek place and had a lovely meal.
on sunday we took an early morning drive to the golden gate and marin head which undortunately were both shrouded in heavy fog so not much to see! but a scrumptous breakfast in mel's diner got rid of any sadness thats for sure. spent the afternoon wandering around downtown and chinatown before a dinner of chinese and beers in the local irish bar.
headed back to LAX on monday and took a cool mini-shuttle thing down to manhattan beach. i realised it was last official beach trip / sunset of my trip so that was kind of a sad moment, but on the other hand i cant think of a better place to have spent my last beach - the most gorgeous sunset in a while.
my flight to NYC was made all the more exciting (!) by a sighting of bryan mcfaddon who was on the same flight (he looks the exact same in real life only a bit taller and a bit chunkier.) the flight was pretty empty so had 3 seats to myself - result! and then last night i made my way here to stormi's apt where we drank wine, dined on the most delicious fajitas and frozen margeuritas and caught up on life after india. its been so good to meet up with her again and reminisce over travel tales and rum-induced mischief and mayhem from kochi to orissa :-D
tonight we are off to celebrate my final 31th night in the speigeltent down by the river (im pretty sure its the same one from the EP so that should be awesome) and then we are going to hit some bars in tribeca to ring in my 32nd year (oh my GOD i am getting so O.L.D.!!!!!!)
anyway hope you're liking the pics - am also going to put up some from hawaii (the same as on facebook) for those that didnt see those.
still missing you all lots and cant believe ill be seeing so many of you again so soon.
xx
