Hi there friends and family

I have been able to keep it a surprise for a lot of you, but here it is: I am currently in Brooklyn, New York! I will explain later how I got here, but first I need to tell you a little about a 2 day stop I made in between Toronto and NY: Buffalo.

Buffalo is a medium sized town in the north of the state New York. In fact it is very close to Toronto. My flight to New York departed from there, so I was going to stay there for one night. Unfortunately (or with the experience I have now, fortunately) my host in Niagara Falls kind of disappeared which left me no choice to stay in Buffalo for 2 nights. I was going to stay with a girl, but when I got there, I was unable to get in touch with her. Luckily I had a phone number of someone else who also lives in buffalo, so I called Shawn. To be honest, I was a bit worried. If Shawn didn’t answer, I would be stuck in a city I didn’t know and who has some dangerous neighborhoods… Fortunately Shawn answered and immediately agreed on taking me in for 2 nights! How cool is that?!? He even picked me up at the airport.

We drove to the house he and his roomies live in. A very nice and clean place in quite a fancy neighborhood. I was welcomed by the dog they were pet sitting. We went out to buy some beer and installed ourselves in the couch. Shawn is a very nice guy and really cool to talk to. We had a great conversation together before Mark, his roommate, came in. Also a super nice guy! Man, was I lucky! We took a walk with the dog and went to a place to have dinner. Great Burrito’s! After some beers we decided to call it a (great) day and we went to sleep.

After a good night of sleep, Shawn went to work and I wrote the past blog entry. In the afternoon I went to have lunch in Elmwood street, a cosy street with lots of shops, bars, restaurants, … After lunch I explored the park and the rest of the neighborhood. I was surprised that everyone there was so friendly to me. It is a fancy neighborhood, so a lot of rich people live there, but not many snobbish people, I discovered.

After that I went back to the house, sat on the front porch with my book until Shawn came in. We had falafel for dinner in a mediterranean place. A friend of his joined us and we went to pick up some Belgian beers. We got back home and started with some beer. Then we joined some neighbors who were playing a game where you have to throw metal rings in a box. Looks very easy, but it’s in fact very difficult and a lot of fun. Then it got too dark to play and we took off to some bar. I don’t remember the name anymore, but it was fun. Then we went to another bar, had some more beers, had dinner for the second time and finished this wonderful night with some more Belgian beers in the house. I have no idea when we went to sleep, but it was quite late.

Shawn promised me to give me a ride to the airport before he went to work. We both overslept though (could it have been the alcohol…?). We got up way too late, I packed in 5 minutes and we drove to the airport. As I was there very early, I was able to take an earlier flight without additional costs. So I arrived almost 2 hours earlier in NY. Great because that gave me more time to explore the city.

In the subway I had a nice conversation with a woman who used to live in NY, so she gave me a lot of good information. She also gave me directions to get to Central Park. A great place to start the day. And to be honest, I stayed there for almost the rest of the day. I got off the subway at Central Park South and walked all the way North. Oh and for those who don’t know Central Park, it’s HUGE! I stopped a few times along the way to rest because I was carrying my heavy backpack all the time. Central Park is the nicest park I have ever seen. Really impressive. The atmosphere there is just wonderful. People sunbathing, doing sports, talking, eating, … That was absolutely not something I would have expected in New York, even though I must admit that I didn’t know much about this city before I came here. I settled myself at Central Park North near a fishing pond and fell asleep a few times. Amrita, a girl I hosted in my apartment in Roeselare, was going to call me when she finished work, but my Canadian sim card didn’t work in the States, so I sent her a text message to tell her she needed to call my Belgian number. She was supposed to call me around 5, but nothing… At 6 still nothing, and then a little before 7 I got too worried and tried to call her again. It turns out she didn’t receive any of my text messages. Anyway, she gave me directions to the place where she is currently staying and I used the subway to get there. It’s in an area in Brooklyn where a lot of Hispanic people live. When I got out of the subway and looked around, I got a bit worried. This looks like a pretty dangerous neighborhood. Now I know better of course, but for me, small city guy, it looked scary. Amrita did a good job though convincing me from the opposite, so I immediately felt much more comfortable. I discovered that she is actually couchsurfing herself with Meg. She is renting her couch for one month and Meg was so friendly to take me in. She is a very lovely girl and I felt welcome right from the start. We took the subway to Times Square to have dinner in the Hard Rock Cafe. Times Square is very impressive and it’s almost brighter than daylight because of all the huge screens and all the lights there. Great experience. After dinner we decided to return home where we enjoyed the NY skyline from the roof of the apartment building before we went to sleep.

We slept in on Saturday and went for breakfast in a local bar/restaurant. Amrita had to leave though because she had classes in the afternoon. But she had arranged a meeting for me with another couchsurfer: Rachel. It turned out that her plans worked out perfectly with mine and those of Amrita. She is a lovely person with a great knowledge of Brooklyn. She showed me the most beautiful places in the area where she lives in and then we went to Manhattan because she needed to go pet sitting for a dog. We took the dog out for a walk and she showed me around some more while we were walking the dog. Great meeting! Too bad it didn’t last too long. She is a very nice person and we got along very well. But she had other plans in the late afternoon, so she had to go. Amrita joined me again after a while and we had a nice walk through a part of Manhattan, had the best (and cheapest) falafel ever, went to a Belgian beer bar and had delicious ice cream.

Because our visit to Times Square of Friday night was quite short, we decided to go back there because there is a lot more to see than the things I already saw. I must say that it is incredibly overwhelming. I was speechless for a while. So crowded, all these lights, all the big screens. Incredible! Also the atmosphere is something you must experience to know what it feels like. They even have a huge 3 story M&M store there, can you believe it???

At Times Square we met up with some friends of Amrita to get ready to go to the party she set up for her birthday. It was in a club called Pacha. It took us a while to get in as the security was worse than airport security, but we finally got in. The club was very nice with different things happening on each floor, but we stayed only on one floor where they played house music. The music was good, but after a few hours it started to sound a little monotone. I had a good time though with some of Amrita’s friends. We took a cab back home and were home at 4AM. Good time to go to bed…

We got up very late and Amrita was not feeling too well, so I decided to go and explore the city on my own. I took the subway to Manhattan and got off somewhere in the middle of China Town. Great atmosphere there! It didn’t feel like NY. All the vendors trying to sell their fake stuff, food stalls and a lot of people. After that I went to the financial district, walked halfway across Brooklyn bridge, went to the port, walked on Wall Street, went to Ground Zero, … I think I saw all of Manhattan. Exhausting… It was extremely hot, so I was back at Meg’s place pretty early. Great day though. An hour ago we had a delicious dinner here and talked a while and now I am ready to go to sleep.

My New York experience is one to never forget. The people I have met have been the reason why I experienced New York not as a tourist, but as a New Yorker. A unique feeling!

Tomorrow I’ll take a plane from Newark airport to Quebec City where hopefully more adventures are awaiting me. I’m sorry, but I don’t have the time to upload pictures, but I promise I will upload some this week.

Check back soon for more updates.

This was Steven, reporting live from Brooklyn, New York City.

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Een klein woordje nog in het Nederlands voordat ik ga slapen.

Zoals je kan afleiden uit de titel ben ik momenteel in New York. Een verrassing voor velen, maar de keuze was vrij logisch eigenlijk. Ik heb minder betaald voor een busticket van Toronto naar Buffalo, een vliegtuigticket van Buffalo naar NY en een vlucht van NY naar Quebec City dan wat een ticket kostte van Toronto naar Quebec City. En bovendien woont Amrita in New York (ze heeft een weekend bij mij gelogeerd in Roeselare). Dus de keuze was snel gemaakt.

Na 2 schitterende dagen in Buffalo waar ik ‘last minute’ nog een slaapplaats heb kunnen vinden door Shawn op te bellen, ben ik vrijdag vanuit Buffalo naar New York gevlogen. Vrijdag heb ik de hele namiddag Central Park ontdekt. Schitterende plaats. Ongelofelijk eigenlijk dat een stad als New York zo’n groot park kan hebben. Echt overweldigend! Prachtige sfeer. Overal mensen aan het zonnebaden, sporten, eten, lezen, socializen, wandelen, vissen, … Ongelofelijk!

’s avonds heb ik dan met veel moeite Amrita kunnen bereiken, want ik had geen idee waar ze nu woont. Zij kon mij niet bereiken omdat mijn Canadese sim kaart hier niet werkt en mijn sms’jes met mijn Belgische sim kaart zijn niet doorgekomen. Enfin, ik heb haar kunnen bereiken en ze heeft me dan directies gegeven naar het appartement waar ze momenteel woont. Ze logeert in Brooklyn bij een couchsurfster. Ze huurt eigenlijk de couch van Mel voor een maand. Vanuit de metro had ik een goed zicht over een deel van Brooklyn, want de metro loopt hier een heel stuk boven de straat. Ik moet zeggen dat ik wat bang werd. Deze buurt ziet er echt gevaarlijk uit. Er wonen heel veel mensen van caraibische afkomst. De meeste mensen hier spreken Spaans en overal zie je veel vuilnis rondslingeren, kapotte wagens staan, graffiti, slogans die ik niet begrijp, … Enfin, het ziet er hier dus echt wel gevaarlijk uit. Gelukkig blijkt het achteraf heel goed mee te vallen. Ik voel me hier echt op mijn gemak.

’s avonds zijn we naar Times Square geweest en hebben we gegeten in Hard Rock Cafe. Daarna zijn we teruggekeerd naar het appartement om nog wat van de New Yorkse skyline te genieten vanop het dak van het gebouw.

De dag erna had Amrita les tot 17u, maar ze had een ontmoeting geregeld met iemand van CouchSurfing: Rachel. Het is altijd spannend om iemand nieuw te ontmoeten en ik had zelfs haar profiel niet gelezen, dus het was echt wel spannend. Rachel bleek een heel sociaal meisje te zijn en het klikte heel goed tussen ons. Ze heeft me wat rondgeleid in haar buurt, en daarna zijn we naar Manhattan geweest waar ze moest babysitten op een hond. Ze heeft me dan een stuk van Manhattan laten zien terwijl we de hond uitlieten. Daarna is Amrita teruggekomen en zijn we nog een stuk gaan wandelen, hebben we superlekkere falafel gegeten, een Belgisch bier cafe bezocht en een hoegaarden gedronken en daarna ijs gegeten. Dan zijn we teruggekeerd naar Times Square omdat ik blijkbaar nog lang niet alles gezien had. Amai! Echt niet normaal! Je moet het gezien hebben om te weten wat het is. Overweldigend!

Enfin, daarna zijn we naar een nightclub geweest voor haar verjaardagsfeestje en we waren rond 4u thuis… Lang uitgeslapen en Amrita voelde zich niet zo goed, dus ben ik alleen op stap gegaan. China Town, Brooklyn Bridge, Financial District, Wall Street, Ground Zero, de haven, … Ik heb zo ongeveer alles gezien in Manhattan wat er te zien valt. Ik ben niet te laat teruggekeerd omdat ik bijna stierf van de hitte, we hebben wat gepraat, superlekker avondeten gegeten en ik ga straks slapen.

Mijn New York experience was echt schitterend. Ik was wat bang van ‘de grote stad’ en had eigenlijk heel weinig verwachtingen, maar de ontmoetingen met de mensen hier hebben ervoor gezorgd dat ik New York niet beleefd heb als toerist, maar wel als New Yorker! Uniek!

Morgenmiddag neem ik een vlucht vanuit Newark naar Quebec City. Later deze week hoor je hoe het daar was. Ik heb nog geen tijd gehad om foto’s te uploaden, maar ik hoop dat binnenkort te kunnen doen. Ik zet hier zeker een berichtje als het zo ver is.

Groetjes aan iedereen in Belgie en tot binnenkort