Village People...

Sorry for not having updated the blog lately,
but a combination of lack of internet-access and the
fact that I've been busy exploring New York has got to
take the blame for that.

I've been spending the past couple of days down
in Grenwich Village, and it's quickly become my favourite
part of New York City with all its bars, restaurants, shops, etc...
This is a great place indeed. I've met people, and I've found myself
a new favourite bar in this great world; Shade Bar over on Sullivan Street.

So, an update from last time around:
I've built on my "Room For Squares" tattoo.
I got a cheap deal, and I decided to go for it.
I'm pretty happy with the result also.
Grenwich Village is like the pulse of the city-life here
in New York with all its bars and restaurants on Bleecker St.,
the tattoo and piercing-parlours, the little shops where you
can find practically everything you've ever looked for
without knowing that you were looking for it, if you know
what I mean. If you ever come to New York, visit the Village!

In a couple of hours, I'm meeting up with Brian McD,
a friend of mine from the DMHN-community.
He managed to get us great seats for the Rangers-Senators
game in the NHL (National Hockey League) tonight.
Only 42$ a piece for seats that normally goes for around
100-150 bucks. The guy's got contacts, and good for me.
We're going to stroll around the city and maybe go to
Central Park before the game starts at 7:00 PM tonight!
He's also a musician, so we might head out to his place
after the game if it's not too late and jam in his studio.

Friday's coming pretty fast, though and I can't say that I'm
looking forward to the flight back home to old Norway, but
on the other hand, it'll be good to return home and sleep in
my own bed. There's no place like home, you know...

Until next update; take care!:-)

-Andrés-

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1: My newest art-work. Mars, Venus and Saturn inside the Squares
2: A 9/11 memorial-wall down in the Village
3: Washington Square Park and the famous Arc
4: The wall on one of the music-bars down in the East Village
5: The West Village neighbourhood. Pretty nice
6: Look closely, there's a squirrel in there...
7: Washington Square Park, the squirrel and chess-tables
8: Blue Note Jazzclub in the Village
9: I walk around in Soho and suddenly I discover a
Adidas-board with Gro Hammerseng on it. She's the
captain of the Norwegian Womens Handballteam!
10: Unique door on one of the West Village houses

Top picture: FDNY station in the Village


 

Nothing quite beats this feeling...

I'm now sitting at a Starbucks just across the street from my
hotel, and I'm having a hot-chocolate while I'm updating
this blog of mine and just watching the busy Manhattan-traffic
speeding by... It's only 8:15 am here in New York.
I guess I should tell you about the trip
and how my first full day in New York went...

I arrived at my hotel pretty late. I got up at 6 o'clock
and left for my first flight of the day; Aalesund-Oslo,
which were scheduled to leave around 9:30 in the moring.
When I arrived in Oslo, I went straight for the international
check-ins, and went onto my plane to Amsterdam. Since I flew
with KLM and there was no direct routes from Oslo to NY, I
had to fly via Amsterdam and I had a couple of hours to kill
at Schiphol International Airport before take-off to NYC.

I got in to JFK at 02:35 norwegian-time, so it had been a
pretty long day for me, so all I did after checking into the
hotel, was to take a stroll around the neighbourhood
and grab a slize of cheese-pizza at a joint nearby.

After catching up on my jet-lag and getting a good
nights sleep, I got up early yesterday and had myself
a small breakfast before heading out on Manhattan...
The city's surprisingly cold at the moment, but at least
it's not snowing today as it did yesterday.
Ironically enough, the first thing I bought in NYC, was a scarf!
I walked all the way down to 2'nd Avenue before turning
around and heading back home to the hotel.
Don't get me wrong, that walk's pretty long, and on
the way, I made plenty of stops, starting at the world-
famous shopping mall Macy's which is located
about 2 minutes from my hotel.
Macy's HUGE (and a bit expensive), but it's pretty cool.
It beats Aalesund Storsenter,
Aalesund's biggest mall, for sure!:-)

After I walking a little while, I found myself just outside
of Radio City Music Hall, and not too far from there;
the 5'th and Broadway, made famous for all it's
movie-apperances, like in "Breakfast at Tiffany's",
with the lovely Audrey Hepburn.

I also paid a visit to the Manhattan Mall where I
got down to some serious shopping. Most things are actually
cheaper here than in Norway, would you believe?
One thing I always buy when I'm in a foreign-country,
is new shoes, so I got a pretty sweet deal at a pair of
Adidas' on Footlocker. I also bought a birthday-present
to my kid brother who turned 10 on February 24'th.
I found a great t-shirt store where you could get 3 tees
for 20 bucks, which is VERY cheap indeed.

Last night I just had a great dinner on this sportsbar place
over on 6'th Av. Luckily for me, the hotel's got its own
gym, so I can work all this food off in a hurry;-)

I can't tell you how much I love this city, it's amazing.
This truly is the city that never sleeps and I can't
wait for the continuation. I hope everyone back
home is doing great. It got to my attention that
the spring had arrived in Aalesund (of course), when
I left the city, while here in New York, the breeze
makes it even colder than it is...

That's all from New York City for this time,
but this is so cozy that I'm thinking of making it
a habit to go to Starbucks, enjoy a warm drink after
I get up and just tell you guys about how great I'm doing
HAHAHA!!!:-D

Take care, y'all :-)

-Andrés-

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1: A picture taken at Schiphol, Amsterdam before boarding
2: Me on the plane, a bit tired...
3: In-flight picture before landing at JFK
4: Window view from my hotel
5: Macy's on Manhattan
6: Madison Square Garden
7: 5'th and Broadway
8: Radio City Music Hall
9: Trump Building on Wall Street

Top picture: Scenery above the skies

Strolling around Manhattan...

So here's a quick update!
I've spent the day exploring Lower Manhattan by foot.
I met up with Jamie,  actually a detective at the NYPD, around noon.
He's one of the DoubleMinors (DMHN) guys and a great guy too!
We got on the subway and on that short trip from here and down to
Ground Zero, which was our destination, this mental guy got in
Jamies face, screaming at him for a technicality, for no good reason.
Just one of those things New York has to offer, I guess...
Anyway, after we got off, we were down at Ground Zero,
and I gotta tell ya; that was a very special moment.
You go around living your life as normal, thinking that terrorism
is something that'll never happen to you and then suddenly
it strikes. Kudos to the FDNY and NYPD and to New Yorkers
in general. Experiencing such and then go back to live
a normal life afterwords, gotta be hard...

After we left Ground Zero, we went down to the esplanade,
just strolling around for a good hour before we went
up to the Wall Street area. Pretty cool place, I might add...
After grabbing some dinner and 1 (!!) beer at this Irish place
just around the corner from my hotel, Jamie had to leave for
work, but we've got plans to go out and grab some more
sometime next week... I on the other hand, have plans
to go back and grab some more as soon as I'm done writing:-)

So take care, you all!

Until the next update from NYC, have a good one:-)

-Andrés-
 
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1: Me and Jamie
2: Jamie's police badge
3: City scape from the piers
4: Wall Street
5: Ground Zero
6: Empire State Building entrance
7: Empire State Building seen from below
Top Picture: Brooklyn Bridge

Just a quick update...

I've now arrived at my hotel and New York City's cold as hell,

but it's SOOOO awsome here...

I haven't gotten my connection on my room

to work yet, so until then, I won't be able to upload any

pics or videos that I've taken, I'm afraid...

It was a long flight, but it's all worth it...

Later boys and girls:-)

-Big City Boy-

The sky is always blue...

The trip has officially begun, and I'm currently
located at Schiphol International Airport in Amsterdam, Holland
where I will be for the next three hours waiting for my
plane to JFK will departure.

On the plane to Oslo this moring, I ran into an old and
dear friend of mine whom I went to school with
for three years; Linn-Beate...
(That's me and her on that pic below)
It was nice to see her again and catch up before I had
to run to the pass-control and go to my Amsterdam-gate.

As tired as I might have been at 6 o'clock this morning;
I was excited too. It's great that the big day finally arrived upon me,
and the only thing that stands between me and New York City
right now, is 3 hours of waiting and an 7 hour plane-ride to the
promised land...

I'll try and post some updates and more pics as soon as I get settled
at my hotel, which by the way, is located just across the street from
Madison Square Garden on Broadway!
Speaking of which, since Pat couldn't make the trip down from
Montreal after all, I'm gonna see if I get tickets to the
Rangers-Pens match @ MSG the 11'th. If not, I'll probably
take the train-ride down to Pennsylvania and Pittsburgh to catch
the Penguins play live for possibly (and sadly), what might seems to
be their last season as Pittsburghers...

Take care, and we'll be catching up soon:-)

-Andrés-