Sunday, July 30, 2006
New York City...
it's been like 4 days since i've been to new york city! the much awaited and anticipated part of our trip. our first 2 nights was spent at YMCA in manhattan... now we have moved to huixin's uncle's apartment at queens area. we had to put up at YMCA the first two nights due to power failure in this area. anyway, really appreciate him for putting us here despite the inconvenience we might have brought him.. he lives in this small apartment with a room, living room, small kitchen and bathroom. he works as a operations risk manager at JPmorgan. wow. he's been in US for 12 years and he studied finance and accounting... like me! :)
the room which four of us squeezed in.new york city was much more congested than i expected.. our room at YMCA was REALLY squeezy. i feel claustrophobic here. people say that NYC is like singapore... hmm... it's similar... but... more noisy and congested... and it is... filthy. but NYC is so different from virginia because of the types of people here. i feel that the reason why alot of people love new york is because of the much diversified culture that they have here. there are so many different kinds of people... from different countries all over the world. i love the feeling it gives me cuz nobody feels out of place here simply because there's all kinds of people here. in virginia we used to get weird looks from others because we were always surrounded by blacks and whites. we just looked odd in the midst of them. and we knew that nobody understood us when we mandarin-esed (word invented by jesse) away. but new york is different because you know there are alot of people who do understand you. which is scary. cuz you have to be careful before you speak. the feeling of exclusivity is not there anymore.
i was so disappointed with the subway system. i mean, i heard so much about it before.. and i must agree that it is extremely accessible.. but it just fell short of how i expected it to be. it's not as new, clean or high tech as i thought it would be. the stations will stuffy, hot and poor ventilated... and it was so dirty. i would have expected more since it's in the city... but i would say it's poorly maintained. the ones at hongkong and taiwan are so much better. and of cuz, singapore's one is good too.
how dirty their tracks are.i feel that i always get to fully appreciate the cleanliness of singapore whenever i am overseas. singapore is really such and clean and green place. like really clean. you appreciate the reason behind banning gums and spitting too. it really spoils the whole overview clealiness. and you also start to appreciate of why our singapore changi airport is one of the first in the world. it's just so good compared to the rest.
but yet at the same time you get to realize the negative stuff of singapore too. we were having dinner last night with huixin's uncle, eric. we talked and discussed about alot of stuff. he's an intellectual one compared to some of the americans i've known at work. haha. he's gonna move to canada soon... giving up his singapore citizenship to be a canadian. he's a pretty anti-singaporean i must say. but it was nice talking to him because he shared with us lotsa stuff.. and i learnt things which i never really knew about.
i am tired. will blog more about new york.. orlando and with more pictures next time.
YuAn® spun on 12:51 PM.
