Margit’s Note: New York Walkabout

A trip can be a journey to Singapore or it can be a jaunt around the block. Both can do wonders to change your perspective and open up your mind. Come to think of it, I’m having a bit of writer’s block, so let’s go outside.

First, I head to the Starbucks across the street on Broadway to get my usual green iced tea but a sign on the door reads, “Due to an emergency, we’re closed,” with a note about other nearby locations.

Huh, ok. Recalculating.

I stand for a minute and watch other people’s reactions. They stop dead and look around, confused, as if they can’t quite believe their daily routine could dismantle and/or what the hell kind of emergency makes a Starbucks close. Moving along…

I walk to another Chinatown coffee shop and along the way notice this cool Basquiat-Warhol poster — a throwback to an older, grittier downtown. Dodging women hawking knock-off “Louis Vuitton-Michael Kors-Marc Jacobs” bags, I watch tourists pull off to the side and hover over a map. I think about scale; how I feel like this is my hometown, as comfortable to me as a t-shirt, but to visitors it is so many sharp smells, overwhelming crowds and glistening orange ducks in the window. Still, I notice so many new things when I really look up, down and around. This beautiful fire station. These elegant subway lights. The old and new.

NYC always surprises and delights and occasionally terrifies the tourists. What more do you need in a trip?

***

We’ve got a double, jam-packed issue this week, with dispatches from all over the world. And we’ll be reading travel tales live tonight at our sold-out event at Yahoo, featuring many of this week’s writers.

Our journey:

Happy travels!

Margit

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One Response

  1. Chandrakant Kulkarni

    You may come across a hearse vehicle during the jaunt around your block.
    If you are a religious person, you make whatsoever sign according to your Faith and say ‘Goodbye! Happy Journey!’ to the unknown dead.
    It’s a strange feeling to ‘connect’ with somebody you never knew, AFTER his / her Death!
    A thought momentarily flashes somewhere deep in your mind: ‘Well, one day, I may also be transported like this!’
    ‘जातस्य हि धृवो मृत्यु:’ …Death is a must for everyone who is born.

    Reply

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