China Town Bus/ New York City

Kirsten and Daimon decided to drop us off for the bus on their way to work. We said our goodbyes on before we left, because the drop offs would be on the go. We drove by Kirsten's work and she exited. Then Daimon dropped us off at the China town bus. Marie and I had our bags and a printed ticket from the day before. We walked up to the first bus we saw, showed our ticket and they ushered us aboard. We waited until the bus was full and the driver took off, 5 minutes before scheduled departure. A woman in back yelled for the driver to stop, frantically dialed her cell phone and tried to explain to the driver that her husband was coming, the driver told her to sit down and just took off. Beyond that, there was no complication. We drove past Baltimore and onto the Jersey turnpike. Our driver for this trip was great. Marie and I read books, and listened to music for the four hour busride. We started to get close to New York and tall buildings surrounded us on the skyline. We saw the profile and then back of the statue of liberty and then drove through the Holland Tunnel. We arrived in Manhattan's China town and called my cousin Patrick who lives uptown at Mt. Sinai Medical School. We hopped on the subway and met Patrick at our stop. He walked us to his apartment which is all student housing, but very nice and the most spacious stop on our journey. We sat and chatted and prepared our visit. Patrick had to take a test that afternoon/evening, so after a nice rest, Marie and I went to purchase groceries as Patrick took his test. The grocery store was small and cramped but had TONS. The aisles were shoulder width apart, but some people chose to try and maneuver shopping carts around. When we were done, I had never experienced the type of panic and disrespect as I did when it was time to stand in line for a register. It was my first taste of New York attitude. There were no "excuse me" and if you hesitated at all your spot in line disappeared to a more impatient person. Wow. We returned back and Marie and I waited for Patrick to finish his test.
We then went out for a night in New York. We stopped at a fallafal place and got food to go. We walked five blocks to Central Park and sat on a bench eating. Patrick explained how he did not believe the stigma of Central Park being dangerous after dark and he had jogged many times at night. As we sat we saw lots of people and many single female joggers. I do not believe it either. We then walked to the edge of the Jackie-O resevoir. We were treated to a great view of the city lights and Patrick did his best to pick out the sky scrapers: Chrysler, Empire State, Trump Towers, Rockefeller Center, etc. As we sat there we decided, heck, lets go to Times Square.
We took the subway and when we came out, we were immediately bathed in the tremendous glow of the lights. Even the sign for the Subway was glitzy. Every building had a giant Television projection on the side of it showing ads or the station's programming if it was housed there. There were lights everywhere, and tourists everywhere. The strangest thing is that there is no sound except the passing cars and an occasional honk from a cab. Many of the movies show time square in slience or hidden behind a soundtrack, but it is how it actually feels. We then walked by Radio city Music hall and found Rockefeller Center, where NBC is housed. We saw many of the broadway play houses, and Patrick showed us one FREE site in NY. There is a glass elevator in the Marriot Hotel nearby and it goes very high and very fast. We took a ride and I recommend it if you happen to be at Times Square.

We then saw the South part of Central Park and rode home. We met Patrick's roomates and stayed up late discussing medical school experiences, and novelties. It was a great intro to the big apple.