This is a guest post by an anonymous Blighty bloke (just learned that is British slang for England!) Best read with a British accent, believe me. This blog will throw you back 15 years to 2003, photographs, popular films, and all. Read on for that true culture shock of visiting NYC for the very first time.
New York City and clichés eh?
If there is one city on earth that the first time you visit, you want to adhere to the stereotypes, it’s New York City. The people, the buildings, the shopping, the bars, the sports teams: they are all there and magnified 200% by the gloss of relentless media coverage. I can’t think of a city that has featured as a backdrop to more important films, TV series’, magazines, bed covers, posters and record covers than New York.
This was the New York City I came to as a 19 year-old back in 2003. I had volunteered myself as a Camp Councillor at a US summer camp in Connecticut. But first a two day orienteering session in the Big Apple. Bring it on.
New York Cliché: JFK
I arrived into JFK at almost midnight, the place was huge and bustling, even at that hour. After retrieving my luggage and finding our guide, we were shuffled onto a bus bound for Columbia University. I went to look at my watch…”Oh shit, my watch, where is it?” Terrific, I’d been in town less than an hour and already had been pick-pocketed. Better not tell my parents that in the first phone call home. That was a cliché I could have done without.
The drive from the airport to the city was (thankfully) uneventful, we were all dog tired. Then, just on the horizon a shape started to pick itself out against the sky, like palm trees in a desert oasis, but this time dotted with tiny diamonds. The Manhattan skyline. I’ve forgotten the majority of that trip in the intervening 15 years, but the one thing that will stick in my memory forever is that drive into Manhattan. Specifically coming to the end of the Queensboro Bridge and being welcomed onto the island by Reese Witherspoon’s gigawatt smile. The gaudy pink wardrobe of Elle Woods from Legally Blonde: the boiled down version of the American dream, much like New York City itself.
After a 30 minute tour through the city streets, all of us glued to the bus windows, fascinated by our new surroundings, we were dropped off around 1AM on Broadway. No not the famous bit, sorry kids, they don’t tell you that its, like 12 miles long.
New York Cliché: Columbia University
We were pointed across the campus quadrangle to our lodgings for the night. Now if anything was a cliché it was Columbia U. We’re used to seeing American college flicks, even here in good-old Blighty, and if there was one place that met my visual expectations (and then some) it was Columbia University. There were huge old lecture halls, gigantic new tower blocks and halls of residences fit for thousands of potential Elle Woods in dayglow pink platform shoes.
After what seemed like no time at all, it was 6:30AM. After breakfast, we were frog-marched in the rain to the International Affairs Building and subjected to a morning lecture on how to behave whilst at camp. All thrilling stuff naturally. Then we were free. Our lift to Connecticut was not due until the following morning so we had the remainder of the day and evening to explore perhaps the most famous city on Earth.
New York Cliché: Times Square
We took the subway down from Columbia to Times Square and went topside to see this fantastic location in the flesh for the first time. If I’m honest, I don’t seem to remember being massively over enamored with that football field sized cathedral to capitalism. We went for lunch in a little diner that apparently was frequented by various members of the Rat Pack back in the day. I couldn’t really imagine James Dean sitting there myself, but hey, apparently Eric Clapton used to have his own table at Hard Rock Cafe in Park Lane. Rock Stars, eh?
At least the rain had cleared up as we further explored Midtown. It’s not until you actually visit New York City yourself that actually understand the concept of “Downtown”. I always thought that it was slang for the business district. No, it’s literally the bottom part of Manhattan Island.
To be honest I was a little disappointed with the City up until that point, just canyon after canyon of concrete and glass. We crossed over to 5th Avenue and then for no reason at all, at one of the many, many cross walks I happened to look up and see it.
New York Cliché: The Empire State Building
I can’t really describe the feeling that seeing the Empire State Building in the flesh for the first time gives you as its an odd one. Yes again its only concrete and glass but it’s like it’s taken on a soul all of its own.
If Elle Woods were the flesh and bone embodiment of the American Dream then the Empire State Building is the bricks and mortar equivalent and it is outstanding. You see it for the first time and you cant help but smile. I couldn’t anyway.
Seeing that building changed New York for me. What started out a disappointing, rain soaked, unfriendly, grey, architecturally-challenged city suddenly made sense. The rushing masses, the corner drugstores, the mid-block bars, the taxi’s, the noise, the relentless hum of an infrastructure serving the needs of millions of people gained a face. I understood the draw.
We explored that day until our feet were numb. We caught the train back to Morningside Heights and curled up in our horrid beds that night, enlightened to the slogan that has appeared on certainly more t-shirts than that little polo horse or block of colour ever has. We left NYC the next morning, with the knowledge that even though we would be gone for the time being, we would certainly be back.
New York Cliché?
I heart New York!
♥
Thank you so much to this anonymous poster for sharing his very first NYC experience with us! If you’d like to share a New York Cliché story, I’d love to feature you! Drop me a line at marylane[at]newyorkcliche[dot]com
