I am back with my New York trip update. Plan was to leave on 17th June, 2000 Saturday early in the morning (me and Guru). Meet Guru’s friend Krishna at the World Trade Center (WTC) Station. As planned we left by train to WTC, and reached there by 10:30 PM. But, guru’s friend was yet to arrive. Guru hadn’t had his breakfast so he had sandwich and I settled with StarBucks (the famous American coffee). I actually had cold coffee, because was bored with the usual black coffee and wanted a change, and the surely the cold coffee was good. Then we rang up his friend but he had already left so we came back to the place we were supposed to meet him and we found him.
Then, we started our journey to explore New York. Places which are usually visited by anyone going to New York are Statue of Liberty, Empire State building, Times Square, 5th Avenue and we were going to do exactly this, but with Guru’s friend as our guide since he stays very much at New York. He is an archietect. He did his B.E. in Archietecture from BMS college came over to New York and did his MS and now works at New York itself. He knew the city really well. So he had a plan for us. As he guided both of us purchased the Metro Train card for the entire day, which he said will be the best because we could switch to any train or bus and need not keep paying. Now before I start explaining our trip here is some of the facts I gathered or concieved about New York. It is the most densly populated city in US. It is also one of the most unique cities in New York. I call it unique because the entire life style and pace is really different here. In all other cities which I have seen till now, a car is a mandatory and good thing to have. But in New York you better off without a car because you don’t have parking place. But, the public or metro trains and bus transport system is so good you need not repent that you don’t have a car. Since it is the most densly populated city, when you get on to any train station or roads it is all fully crowded just like any other city in India, which again you won’t see in other places in US. Actually, you have to be careful with your purses and other belongings in train and buses and even while walking just like in India, that is the advice I got from everyone, and I feel that is true. For population it might be like India city but as far as advancement goes, it is like huge tall buildings all through the roads, on average each building being at least a 50 floors and maximum is the Empire State Building with 102 floors. Each of these contains all the offices, this is in the central place. The residential areas are also very densly populated. But you have to travel by train for half an hour to any of these from the central concrete jungle. Since the city and population grew and they wanted a good public transportation which was difficult by bus they have planned these trains so well you have to appreciate their planning. All the rail-roads are underneath, that is they have dug tunnels for all the train and it is virtually throughout the city. Between these for small transport they still have the buses. So the metro transport is the heart of the city, which runs 24 hours 365 days, I think if this is stopped or if there is strike even for half-an-hour like our BTS strike the entire city will go totally out of control. Also, all these trains are electric trains, with no passenger and they are almost always full and full to the extent of standing. Doors are all automatic, it stops at each station for 1 minute and the station stop name is announced, so you have to be ready to get down or else the door will automatically close. So swipe your card and enter the station and then find the right track and get on to the train you want. So you 100% need the map of the metro rail and bus route showing you how the city is connected, each rail route is numbered and also they have color coding and marked with North, South, East or NorthEast directions. So direction sense and understanding of the map and the figuring out the train number and getting on to the right train is very important. You might ask me how long is the wait, maximum is 5 minutes, but after 10 PM in the night it will be 15 to 30 minutes that is the frequency is reduced (that is what I learnt from my friend), but during the day you just need to get to the track you will get the train. So it is more or less the city that never sleeps.
Now our friend had the plan ready, he asked us if we would like to go to his place and also a temple close by where we could have good lunch also. It was a long time since I had gone to a temple, so we took the Metro train and by 12:15 we were at the temple, which was at a place called Jackson Heights, which has the most Indian population migrated to New York settled. On the way we also saw the US open court that is where the US open tennis is played. My friend was telling me if I am here till August we could go to US open and watch it live. Now the temple was really good, there was all our dieties (Shiva, Muruga, Lakshmi, Venkateshawara, also opposite to the temple there was a small Brindavanam, which is Raghavendra temple) in a single temple but the main god was our Ganesha, there was also the Brahmostavam going on. After all the prayers and prasadam we went down to the canteen. This was where they had all our food but at a very nominal price. I had Masala Dosa and VenPongal. So after lunch we took the train back to 5th Avenue, this is the place just like our MG Road, that is the pretty much offices with every building around 50 or 70 floors, with full of shopping complexes and offices. But, everything was just very expensive. This is the place where all the Hollywood folks or rich folks do their shopping so we did our window shopping. Then we went to Krishna’s office which is also in 5th Avenue. It was nice to see the architecture office theirs is the 5th largest architects office. He was working on the a building for Supreme court which was again 58 floors and they had the design goes for around 2 years and then building it itself will be another 3 years. After a brief rest and coffee at his office we started off and headed to Statue of Liberty. Took another train and reached there, but we could not go to the Island since we were late, they close to boats that take to the island by 3:30 PM. So we saw the liberty statue from the far, and took pictures thinking of getting back to the island later. This is the island which was the entry point for all the immigrants entering US in 17 and 1800’s and they have a lot of history.
Then we took the train back to Empire statue building. This building is 102 floors and they took one year to build it. It was built in 1932, and they take you in a lift to 86th floor. The lift that takes you up to 86th floor is so fast that it is less than 2 minutes. Now up there at 86th floor you can see the New York skyline and all the other tall buildings from the tallest building of all. But this is the second tallest in the world with the first being in Malayasia, Kaulampur. It takes $9 to take you up and the view is really worth it. Then we came back to Times Square. This is the central place where all the major channels head quarters and broadcasting stations are present. Like the MTV, CNN, ESPN, ABC (American Broadcasting Company and even the WWF live show that is shown on Star etc is right over here. Next time probably might watch one of the WWF shows. It is like most of the stuff that we see on TV are right over here. We took some pictures and then went to McDonalds had dinner. I was totally exhausted with walking and the train journey that is standing in most of the trains, so finally took the NJ transit train back to Morristown and was too happy to find a seat, fell asleep for the 1:15 minutes journey to Morristown.
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