Michele's travels

After a night in luxury at the Ramada Hotel in Mexico City Airport, I was all set to fly back to the U.S., once more on this trip, this time to the East Coast and the Empire State of New York! I landed in New York JFK and went straight to New York City! I took a cab (yellow, of course) to Midtown Manhattan, where my hosts, Ollie & Abi, had kindly offered me to stay in their 2-bedroom appartment with stunning views over the city's skyline, including Empire State Building!I hadn't seen Ollie in ages (5 years) and never met Abi, so I was very excited to meet them! After a warm welcome, I took the plunge into New York life pretty much straight away, as Ollie & Abi took me out to a lovely Italian restaurant with an al fresco garden dining area, great food and great wine (chosen by Ollie, and later on complimented by the restaurant's sommelier!) After a good night's sleep in the "city that never sleeps" ;-), I was ready to make the very most of my 2 days and 2 nights that I had to spend here, before heading upstate for Paul & Sara's wedding. In a city like New York, that has it all, and much more, where do you start? Well, Midtown turns out to be a great starting location, because from there, you can roughly divide Manhattan into uptown and downtown - and that's exactly how I spent my 2 days! On day 1, I took in iconic upper Broadway, crazy Times Square with its infamous naked cowboy (I wonder why there is no naked cowgirl???) and went up to the "top of the rock"; (the Rockefeller Centre) from where you can enjoy the best views over both sides of Manhattan. I took a stroll through Central Park, past Strawberry Fields (commemorating John Lennon's death), the Metropolitan Museum of Art and the Guggenheim before heading back to Midtown on a local (very slow) bus along 5th avenue. For the evening, Ollie & Abi had organized a little aperitif-type picnic on the Western edge of Manhattan, and we arrived just in time to catch the last glimpse of the sunset over New Jersey on the other side - fantastic! Turns out that the world is rather small, and Jon, another former CRUK PhD student, happened to be in town too, and he joined us for a beer later on in the West Village, the only part of New York that does not have the grid-like street system. On day 2, I learned that Manhattan was an even smaller place, and I met Sebas, who I had worked with in the lab during the first 2 years of my PhD, at NYU medical centre, which was right next door to where Ollie and Abi lived!Sebas took me out for a great (and enormous) New York style Pastrami sandwich, and we caught up on the gossip from London and his life in New York - great fun! For the afternoon, I headed downtown, through Soho (=South of Houston Street) and the southern stretch of Broadway, popping into the odd shop left and right... I eventually arrived at ground zero, the site of the former World Trade Centre and twin towers. The site is currently still (and has been for years) a construction site for the hugely controversial and massive rebuilding project. It was rush hour when I arrived and hundreds of Wall Street workers crossing the street at the corner of ground zero. To them, it was their everyday journey. To me (and lots of other tourists), it was an eerie empty space, literally a hole in the heart of Manhattan. I had not imagined the space that the twin towers used to occupy to be so big. Around the corner, on Wall Street, heavily-loaded guards stand watch in front of the New York Stock Exchange and the imposing Trump tower. I found my way down to the Southern tip of Manhattan and caught the free Staten Island ferry for breathtaking views of the famous Statue of Liberty and the skyline of Manhattan. It is still an impressive view, even without the twin towers. On the return ferry ride, looking at the skyline, I was thinking to myself: I really like this city! I had not expected this, because I am not a fan of big cities. Living in London has been a great experience, but I always missed to be relatively far away from nature and outdoor. activities. Yet, there was something about the buzz of New York that made me reconisder my judgment on big cities. Maybe it was just because I was on holiday. Maybe because the weather was nice. Maybe because it was Carrie Bradshaw's city. What is true though, is that Manhattan is surprisingly compact and easy to get around. You can easily walk to a lot of places and it won't even take you forever. Then Central Park, on the contrary to Hyde Park in London, truly represent a green and tranquil getaway from the city's hustle & bustle. But there was something else crossing my mind: maybe the experience of living in London, with all its highs and lows, has changed my attitude towards big cities and shaped my approach of dealing with the less pleasant side of big cities, and enjoy the good one: a young, multinational and multicultural community, the 24/7 availability of everything, just around the corner, great concerts, shops and restaurants... And so, as I stepped off the ferry and down to the subway, I couldn't help but wonder: you can take the girl out of the city, but can you thake the city out of the girl?