Those of you who follow me on twitter already know I have accomplished one of my life-time dreams. Just a few days after I visited Barcelona I flew to New York for two weeks. This time, there was no business just pure pleasure. To be honest it was pretty stressful in certain points.
Fun with paperwork
We arrived on Vienna airport with a nice time reserve. So far so good. I should say that we booked the cheapest flight which went from Vienna to Dusseldorf and from there to Big Apple. So here we are on the airport waiting to get the flight approved so we can move on to the duty free zone. I came to the guy who was going to check the passport and bagage and hand him over our passports and the “codes” which works the same way as Visa used to work. Here comes the fun part. The guys said I need the confirmation email not the code. I obviously did not have anything print out as I am the one who lives in the digital world, right? I had all the necessary data stored in my iPhone that wasn’t enough for this guy. We spent some pretty stressful time looking for the place where we can print the necessary papers. You know what was on the paper? The code, nothing else, not even my name. I wish everyone was thinking digital. We arrived to Dusseldorf and waited about an hour for the flight to NY. I was asked a funny question again. Do you have the return tickets printed out? Obviously, no. I live in the digital age. Secondly we were not even thinking to buy the return ticket from US as we wanted to travel father down the country and we were not sure when we are coming back. Luckily our plans have changed and we had return tickets, but not printed out. The stuff in Germany was useful and found them them-self as we were flying back with the same company.
Big Apple
So yeah, we finally made to NY after pretty fast (about 6 hours) flight. New York is huge city but actually did not feel that big to me. I was expecting everything bigger, even the skyscrapers. We have spent most of the time walking around different parts of city, taking pictures, tasting some local food and cafe, obviously. The weather was pretty hot, about 30 degrees so we were trying to walk in the shadows of those massive building as long as possible.
My poor laptop
I managed to get appointment in Apple store on fifth avenue where I asked them to repair my laptop. The cover of my screen was coming off, nothing big (that is what I though). They gave it back to me after seven days with replaced screen, new hard-rive and something else I can’t remember. I was thinking that is pretty cool. I have a new laptop again, but only until I came home and opened it. Something is making funny noises and I do not think it is fan or hd. The noise gets better when I plug my iPhone cable in. That is wired. I have already find repair store here in Slovakia where I am staying for the next two months.
Nice places
So back to NY. I really liked Central Park. It is one of those places with lots of positive energy, where you can relax or exercise or enjoy nature. It is huge. There are several lakes and lots of different interesting places. I can see myself siting there every day during the summer time if I was living in NY.
I also like a lot the Chine Town, Little Italy and the whole south part of the city with all its cool shops and libraries where you can get ice-cafe while you reading some cool magazines. Fifth avenue is the most busy street but it feels the best of all of them. Specially the area around the Apple Store.
Overall experience
New York is a nice busy place. I am glad I had a chance to see it. Hopefully I will have a chance to see other parts of US some day.