America - Days 5 - 8

Day 5: Salty

It was a busy day at work again - and by this point, me and my other international colleagues felt that we needed some nutrition. For dinner, we decided to cut up a lot of fruit (a whole Pineapple was involved) and cereal. It was actually, really nice. We sat there, talking and crunching on bran flakes and apples. 

During the day however, a colleague of ours bought in some better, hotter and more softer pretzels, also eaten with mustard along with a variety of Water Ice flavours. I have to say, the experience for eating both again, but this time - a better version of both, was much yummier! Although I think I am done with pretzels for a long, long time!

Day 6: Busy, busy, busy

It was a very busy day - as it was our last day in Glenside, and we had back to back meetings all day long. Our colleagues took us out to an Indian restaurant called Tiffin, which smelt gorgeous as you walked through.. However, the first time I started to feel a little queasy on this trip was after I ate the food there. I know, how ridiculous is it that I, an Indian felt ill after eating Indian food. But I think, due to my food snobbishness (I am obsessed with everything being fresh, with no additives - be it colouring or flavouring) I felt ill from the moment I saw my BRIGHT RED Paneer Tikka Masala. It was unusually red. And I could feel my body resist the consumption of this food, but I was hungry and I wasn't about to become a total snob. I have to say though, it was just a great experience, despite the whole food thing - because we got to hang out with are very cool and very nice colleagues!

By the end of the day, the only thing that was on my mind was getting rid of the bad stomach ache I had, and the awful migraine that came upon due to the bad stomach. It started raining as well, and the overall temperatures started getting colder too. I decided to meet up with some of my old students and it was really lovely seeing them again as well.

Day 7: "Fairytale of New York"

We left Glenside for NYC early that morning using the Bolt Bus (like the Mega Bus), and it cost us only $13 per person and it took about 2 hours to get there. The drop off point was great, because it was about two streets (or as they say in America, two blocks) away from our hotel. 

The hotel we chose was bang down in the middle of the Garment District. At first, I thought it was a grungy area, but as we wandered about a bit, we realised in fact how extremely centrally we were located inside Manhattan. It was great for a 24 hours stay, as we could walk everywhere, see everything we wanted to see and get back to the hotel which wasn't that far from any of the districts we were visiting.

So, to begin - after getting to our cosy hotel room (which by the way, was a Nutrition based hotel - Just what I needed!) we decided to freshen up a bit and head off with a map in to Greenwich Village and Soho and see what we could see for the rest of our afternoon. We took the subway - which was a total chaos for me, because it was so dirty, so smelly and so absolutely gross - that it traumatised me - and figured out quickly what each station meant. To be honest, I wasn't that excited by Soho or Greenwich village, partly because I was still feeling a bit ill from the food, and partly because we were really exhausted by this point. 

We ended up finding our way to Ground Zero, where they are currently in the process of building I believe 4 new world trade centre towers. It felt really strange being there - to us, obviously it meant nothing personal as we weren't there when the 9/11 fiasco took place, but to see others there with all these emotions, it was pretty interesting. It didn't seem like anything spectacular or that even a tragedy took place there - because there were building works all over the place. 

We found a small stall of souvenir t-shirts where we decided to buy some. This decision was based on the fact that the man selling these t-shirts was Pakistani, so I decided to talk to him and feel a bit at home in a city so claustrophobic and overwhelming. He was really nice, and I had a chance to practice my Urdu - which let me tell you, is bloody awesome! He obviously gave us good discounts, and I happily went with the whole thing.

We decided to walk on and head off in to the south, towards the port that had ferries to Staten Island. At first I was reluctant to get on to anything that floated on sea, because I always get so sea sick. But this ferry was massive, it didn't rock and it was actually one of the best bits about the NYC trip. It was great, because the air was fresh, it wasn't too hot but the sun kept shining! Obviously I took lots of Statue of Liberty pictures as well as views of the entire city of Manhattan. It was lovely to say the least. 

After the ferry, we managed to make our way back Uptown where we wandered off to find a couple of shops and buy a few things. We passed by the Empire State building too - and I didn't realise it was there until my friend pointed it out. It was very anti-climatic, once you've seen taller and more impressive buildings/towers like the Petronas in Malaysia and the CN tower in Toronto. However, due to it's overly romanced nature in Hollywood movies, I decided to take a couple of pictures. I assume though, seeing it at night and actually getting to the top would have had a whole different effect - alas, we hadn't bought any tickets prior to our visit and we weren't up to queuing either by this point.

By the end of the evening, we were totally shattered. I decided to call it a night, repack my suitcase and just relax for the evening.

Day 8: "Imagine, all the people sharing all the world"

The morning started out really nice and sunny - and with absolutely yummy and healthy breakfast options at the hotel. We flew out later that night, so we decided to eat well and spend the remaining day walking the city. 

We walked to Times Square, which was about 3 streets away - and although it was wonderful being there, I couldn't help but feel claustrophobic. There was way too much happening there. I imagine at night it would look prettier, but probably would leave me feeling a bit worse. I don't really like bright blinking lights, so that would be useless. Nevertheless, I have to say that I was thoroughly excited to be in the middle of Times Square, taking pictures in the hundreds. We stopped at Toys r us and the Disney store - although we have both in London, we had to visit them both because lets face it, there's still a massive child inside me. I took several pictures with Dory and the very cool Cheshire cat. Toys r us was impressive as it had floors of sweets and a small Wonka world - basically all gobbly things that could rot your teeth just by looking at the displays! We didn't ride the infamous Ferris Wheel because there was a queue and we wanted to explore the city further.

We decided to continue our journey towards Central Park, leaving the best for last. Along our way to the Park however, we stumbled across FAO Schwarz Toy Store.. Yes, the store they show in Big - the Movie. I was terribly excited, to the point where I screeched a little as well. The toy store inside was like Toys r Us or any other toy store out there, what was fascinating though was obviously the Piano, which they have unsurprisingly labelled "The Big Piano" - I didn't get a chance to go on it and take pictures due to long queues. 

Walking on in to Central Park, we came across a lot of Horse Carriages.. Don't get me started on Animal Rights and all that, as I have PLENTY to say about how they treat their horses in the city - and none of it is positive. Anyway, moving on - we walked around the Park, and it was gorgeous. There were obviously a lot of tourists about, and naturally crowds of people at certain points - such as the Imagine design on the floor of the park, near Strawberry Fields in memory of John Lennon. It was actually quite moving and a little bittersweet being there, just because I grew up being a massive Beatles fan, and reading about as well learning about them a lot through my Media course at A-Levels. We saw the Dakota, where Yoko still lives, and apparently walks to the Park every morning. We didn't see her, but as I said, being there was just very surreal.

After that, we headed to a restaurant as my friend was adamant on eating pure American Mac 'n' Cheese before we left - I didn't have any, due to still feeling ill in my stomach. We continued walking back to the hotel where we then left for our very turbulent flight back to the UK.

All in all - I will say that the trip was great. NYC didn't live up to the expectations I falsely created in my mind, though parts of it was just gorgeous. I think I was thinking through my Sex and the City eyes more than anything. Damn you Hollywood! Never thought I'd fall for all of that. I think for me, it was the sheer exhaustion, lack of good food (obviously there are wonderful places to eat there, but we hadn't a clue where to find these), and just not having the right type of guidance through the city that bought me to my conclusion that NYC - is grungy, dirty, smelly yet strangely charming. I wouldn't want to go there for longer anytime soon. Philly on the other hand, was a better City and Glenside reminded me a lot of Egham, which is why I warmed to it quicker than any other place I've been to. I do however look forward to my West Coast trip to California later this summer! I am told that there are immediate differences with the East and West coast, so I am sure I will have a lot more to add after that.

America - Days 1 - 4

It's taken me a good while - but I finally made it out to the US this past week. Although this trip was largely a work-business related trip, we still managed to do a lot of touristy things, which is pretty great.

So here's my brief 8 days in the US.

Day 1: Streets of Philadelphia

After landing in to Newark Airport, my colleague and I headed in to Philadelphia, where we were met by another colleague. He took us on a great drive through the city in to Glenside, which is a town just outside of Philly. The drive consisted of taking us through a variety of towns and streets - such as through the very dodgy Mount Airy, which was just like something out of a thuggish movie. It was scary, and I rolled up my windows so I didn't seem so foreignly scared. The weather was absolutely wonderful - sunny, hot and completely gorgeous! 

Needless to say, I was pretty exhausted, what with the sudden time change. I kept telling everyone how weird it was that I had to put my watch back 5 hours, and how I relived those hours again. It was a concept I was totally in awe with. Clearly! All my travels in the past few years have always been in similar time zones, or ones that were ahead. This was going backwards. Anyway, after the journey to Glenside, came our welcoming in to the Office, which was so lovely! They had a welcome sign up for us, and it was so sweet. We met a couple of my colleagues, and then headed to the apartment to just freshen up and drop off our luggage. Once at the apartment - which by the way was really well laid out - and we had so much space just between the two of us - I really felt the jet lag and tiredness kick in. That evening, we had dinner with a couple of colleagues - we went out to a Japanese Hibachi restaurant. It was pretty exciting for someone who was fresh out of a 7 hour flight and looked like death. There was an exciting display of fire, and fast chopping that was accompanied with a funny Japanese chef. It was great, and the sushi was gorgeous! The only thing that surprised me a lot was how much Coke Americans drink. They drink it like it's water - with constant refills. It's actually pretty nauseating. 

After failing to catch a hot shrimp thrown at me by the Japanese chef, we decided to call it an early night and head back to sleep.

Day 2: Summertime

I woke up very early on Saturday morning. I did however manage to watch about 3 hours of non-stop American TV, which was both traumatic and great. Great because I watched re-runs of The Nanny, which was a favourite growing up - and traumatic because of how openly they advocate the taking of Anti-Depressants and other very harmful medication during TV advert breaks. For someone who is totally against medication as a whole, forget anti-depressants, I absolutely dislike taking Paracetamol even - this was the worst thing I could see on TV. To think that masses of people in America are drugged by such harmful medications, because they feel it is the right way out of their pain/mental health instabilities. It's completely worrying.

After the initial jet lag wore off, we headed to work for the second half of the day - as there was an Event we had to be a part of. It was pretty exciting - and I will leave out all details pertaining to work, for confidential reasons of course.

After work, eating a Pretzel with MUSTARD (so strange!) and having some "Water Ice" - which is a fancy word for extra sweetened and artificially flavoured Slush - another colleague of mine was sweet enough to take us out to the second biggest shopping centre in America or the World, I can't remember - King of Prussia Mall. It was nothing too special to me, seeing as I grew up in Dubai - and well, big shopping complexes were a part of all of that. It was nice however, to see shops like Macy's, Bloomingdales and of course my favourite - Bath and Body Works!

The day ended with some yummy food - a yummy pizza. And by this point I was convinced that portion sizes in the US - were in fact, ginormous. I couldn't possibly eat anything for days after eating a couple of the slices, and it was apparent that it was the norm to take left overs home in a doggy bag - a concept here, that isn't as usual.

Day 3: "It's the Eye of the Tiger, it's the thrill of the fight"

Sunday was our day off - thankfully! It was about 30-35 degrees Celsius, and absolutely hot. We spent the day in Philadelphia, and walked around the ENTIRE city - managing to see everything we set out to visit. 

We saw the Liberty Bell, Independence Hall, Benjamin Franklin's statue, The Art Museum (yes, we did the whole Rocky thing too!), Old City Hall and even went down to 16th Street to do some shopping. By the end of the day though, we were all so shattered - the heat didn't do us well, and the food was just, as previously stated - massive. 

We ate lunch at a small but quirky open-top restaurant. It was like something out of Camden, and had great decor. The only thing I started to suspect was - how much corn they put in food. And believe me when I say, they put corn (white, yellow - flour, whole, crushed, all sorts of ways) in all kinds of food I ate. So pretty much, everything. It started getting a little sickening after that day, I have to admit. It was hard to digest food beyond this.

Day 4: Philly, Philly!

Monday was pretty intense, as it was a start of the working week - and I had quite a few presentations to be a part of, as well as some meetings. There was a lot of information, so the highlights of the day were - having Dunkin' Donuts for breakfast. The last time I had Doughnuts from Dunkin' Donuts was a few years ago when I was in Dubai. My sister and I used to eat "Boston Creme" the most, and I managed to pick the same one for breakfast, as my colleague bought in a variety with a lot of (very bad) coffee. 

The second highlight of the day was going out for dinner at this place called Cosi. By this point, my stomach was totally refusing any and all food that didn't have any nutritional value - I wasn't eating well, and if I was, it wasn't good food. That night I wanted something with just vegetables, and that's exactly what I had, in the form of a sandwich. Following this, my colleague thought of introducing us to proper American smores. It was very sweet, but such a fun experience. 

The waitress bought us a whole platter of chocolate, marshmallows, gram crackers (digestives to us Brits) and a small pot with fire where we roasted our marshmallows. The whole idea was to get the marshmallow to a wonderfully soggy and brown texture without letting it burn, and putting it on top of the cracker with the chocolate pieces so it would melt in to one another. It was really yummy, but I think one would do it for anyone with a sweet tooth!

.. More to follow!