Weekend in New York

This week, for friend makin’ Monday, Amber wants to know what we did this weekend. I’m so glad she asked. I went to New York City this weekend!

Some friends of mine from China (by which I mean they lived across the hall from me when I lived in China; they aren’t Chinese; Christine is Australian and John is from South Carolina) are visiting New York this week so Chuk and I went up to see them.

We took the bus from DC to New York early Saturday morning and got arrived around 11:00 am. We checked into our fantastic hotel, which was a steal at $119 for a four star hotel in Midtown Manhattan. The hotel is totally in the art deco style and we had a corner room on the 26th floor with windows on two sides and a view to the south and west.

Chuk and I walked around downtown seeing Ground Zero, Wall Street, the Old Federal Building, and Chinatown. It was the perfect time to visit Chinatown since it is Spring Festival and everyone was celebrating. We chanced upon parades and people setting off confetti bombs in the street. I treated Chuk to his first bubble tea, which he liked.

Then we met up with my friends, who had never met Chuk. We all walked around Little Italy and then went back up to Midtown to see Grand Central Station, Bryant Park, the public library, Times Square, the Ed Sullivan Theater and the Hello Deli, and finally had dinner at the Carnegie Deli. The deli was expensive, but the sandwiches were as big as they are rumored to be. It was certainly an experience.

Chuk's pastrami on rye.

We said goodnight to my friends, who were staying with another friend of theirs’ in Brooklyn, and Chuk and I headed back to our hotel. Our room had a big, deep, old fashioned bathtub, and I took a nice, long soak after all that walking.

Sunday morning, Chuk went out and got us authentic New York bagels and then we met up with John and Christine again to do some more walking. We saw the Empire State building, the Chrysler building, the UN headquarters, Rockefeller Plaza, Radio City Music Hall, had lunch at an Italian restaurant where Chuk and I split a pizza, and then we went to Central Park.

Chuk and I had to catch our bus back to DC, so we said goodbye to John and Christine, which was sad, but I’m sure we’ll see them again soon. We went back to our hotel to pick up our bags, stopped by Gray’s Papaya to get some hotdogs and papaya drink for the bus and then caught the bus back home.

We had so much fun. I’ve been to New York lots of times before, but this was Chuk and my friend Christine’s first time really being there, so it was great to sightsee through their eyes. Everything was exciting for them, which made it exciting for me too. We did a lot of walking and eating junk food, but it was great.