After spending a few hours in New York, I couldn't wait to see its glamour at night. After checking into our hotel, which was outside Manhattan, we had to get to the Empire State Building, because we wanted to see the whole city from above. Getting to Manhattan turned out to be a problem for us again. The hotel had told us there was a bus, but the last one was at 10:30 PM, which meant we would have no way to get back. As you can guess, it wasn't free either. We decided to go anyway, but the idea of five girls alone at night in New York didn't sit well with us, and we wanted to arrange a ride back to the hotel before leaving. While we were arguing with the man selling bus tickets, an Indian man (who seemed to know the driver) offered to pick us up, but said he wanted us to pay him $70 right away. Since we didn't have much choice, we reluctantly paid him the money, and as a guarantee that he would pick us up, he gave us a piece of paper with his name on it. Now when I think about it, it makes me laugh, but back then it wasn't particularly funny. So we agreed that he would pick us up at 3 o'clock at night in front of a building, but if we were even 1 minute late, he would leave.
We took the last bus to Manhattan with mixed emotions. On the one hand, we were happy and enjoying everything we saw, and on the other, we were worried about whether we would be able to get back to the hotel, because another day in the big city awaited us.
After getting off the bus, we headed straight to the Empire State Building. It was quite late and we assumed there wouldn't be many people, but to our surprise there was a long line, and we didn't know if we would make it in, because it closed in about an hour. We went through security and waited impatiently. When we got into the elevator, which climbed so fast to the 86th floor, I felt a huge thrill. From this tall building you could see thousands of little lights twinkling and giving the city a special charm. We probably spent about an hour at the top, yet it felt like we had been there only a few minutes. This was one of the moments when I realized I had to go on a student summer job again. After that we headed to Times Square and strolled along Fifth Avenue, and a little after midnight the streets started to empty. Our worry started again, because the time of our meeting with our driver was approaching, and there was no sign of him. Just as we started wondering how we would get back, two minutes before the agreed time, just like in an Indian movie, a car pulled up at breakneck speed, honking its horn. It was our "friend", the Indian man. We all felt some relief and went back to the hotel happy.
Work and Travel 2014
Toni