Day 3:

Day 3 started as a lazy day, we got up late and by the time we got ready it was almost lunch time. Our desi taste buds had started craving for Indian food, after 2 days of deprivation. Plan was to cover Empire State building and Time square etc, so we searched an Indian restaurant near Empire state building and headed there. It was a bit difficult to find, we found it just when we were about to give up looking for it. The food was okay, but I got to eat pani-puri, that I was carving for it for don't know how many days. So I was happy with the food.

Empire State building was couple of blocks away, and when we reached there the crowd was as expected on a weekend. I really could not imagine, so many people would come to get to top of that building to have a view of NY city. And I would not think a lot of New Yorkers would come here on a normal weekend, to spend 20 bucks and wait 2 hours to see the very city they have been living for ever. So, that meant they were all them tourists(!). On any normal weekend, day time! I would guess the city looks much lovlier on the night and crowd would be much more during that time. Well we had to wait in the unending queues for the ticket, then for the lift and then to get to the balcony of 87nd floor. It was a long and tiring 2 hours wait before we could get to the top; actually the top floor is 102nd floor, with probably another long queue and another 15 bucks to dispense. But we were not quite in a mood for that. All this waiting and the crowd at the 87 th floor made us loose our interest in viewing the lovely city. The skyline, high rise buildings and the water bodies were adorable from the top though. But the central park was not as green as I thought it to be; it was silly of me to expect a green park at end of winter . We stayed up there for about 15-20 minutes and came down, luckily that was quite fast.

We saw a Macy's store when we were about take the subway, and that was the world's largest Macy's (found that out later taht evening) and some flower festival was going on there. Looking at the mannequins clad in gorgeous dresses made of flowers, enticed us to get in there and take a glimpse inside. It was worth the visit; the entire 3 storied shop was decorated with fresh flowers, it looked more like a florist's shop... a huge one.

Next on our list was the Time square; seemed half the city's people were there. Probably that was the normal weekend crowd in time square. Huge billboards, hoardings, neon lightings, and shop... shop... shops everywhere. Well I was really excited to be there, it was my kind of place. We roamed on the streets for a while, and then we went to Ripley's Believe it or not; the museum of the odd, the unusual and the unbelievable. We bought the ticket, got inside and browsed through all the weird stuff that was in there; shoes of the smallest and largest feet (on the world!), a head-less chicken that survived for several years, a two headed calf, a white giraffe, a happy man statue made up of shredded $500 bills and other stuff of that kind. The section that interested me the most was the one where the artifacts of treating prisoners in 17th-18th century was exibited. Another amazing (scary though) section was of the shrunken heads; which is specialty of the Jivaro clan and it probably had some religious significance. Once we were out of Ripley's, Madame Tussuad's was just next to it, but we had already visited the one in Las Vegas and not very much in a mood for another museum. I would recommend to visit this though, if you have not been to one already, and becasue the one here is one of the largest Madame Tussuad's in the world. We were tired already and planned to go back to hotel to take some rest before planning anything for that night.

After couple of hours of rest, we had the famous NY style pizza at a nearby pizzeria and headed for Rock feller center. It is the commercial and business center that was built during 1929's US stock market crash. Today it houses many top notch business centers; GE building, Radio City music hall, the fine art auction house Christie's just to name a few. Our main interest there, was the ice skating rink. We reached there very late (10 pm ish), but were really happy to ifnd out the last slot (10:30 pm - 12:00 am) for that night was still available. We rented the skates and got into the rink all enthusiastic and excited. Ah! did I mention it was first time for all of us. Boy! that was one tough job... slippery, hard, cold ice and you have to move on a pair of blades... huh! It took me about an hour to let go of the railing, I could not even remember how many times I fell (luckily not flat on my face even once). My friends were doing much better than me though, but then it really did not matter, neither were the tricks other amateur skaters were doing in the rink. But at end of the day (it was really end of the day.. 12:00 am in the morning), I was just happy that I could let go of the railings and was able to move over the ice. When we got back to the hotel, none of us knew how many muscles and limbs were sore and what would be the condition when we wake up next morning. But we all knew, it was hell lot of fun we had that night.

Day 4:

This was our last day at NY, and none of us were in a very good shape thanks to out previous night's adventure. We had to check out at 11 am from the hotel, so we packed our stuff and got ready. The plan was to visit Central park and the famous Metropolitan museum of art or the Met (I still could not figure out why they call it that though). It was a cloudy and lazy Sunday afternoon, and believe me, when we got into central park... with all the people jogging, or came with their pets for a walk and the kids with their parents or grand parents.. it really seemed like about 8 am in the morning. For the first time in NY I finally saw some trees (even though not green) and pools of water (lake... that's what they called it here), I could imagine how much the people of that busy city needed this park. Whoever planned to build that in heart of Manhattan, needs to be thanked for that.

We had started to get hungry when we reached the Met, and I had heard the canteen in there is quite good. So we got our entrance tickets, browsed the Egyptian section and headed for the cafeteria. Food was really good and price reasonable; we had a hearty meal with dessert (a yummy chocolate cup cake). The museum is really huge, I don't know how many days would it take someone to cover up all the exhibits. And we had just few hours before we had to catch the cab to get to the airport. So we checked out the map and decided to cover some of the art and photography sections. That took us good 2-3 hours and after that we had to get out of the museum. The modern art section was pretty interesting; we could not figure what most of the paintings were about and what message they intended to convey. But it was fun, going through all those paintings and trying to figure out what the purpose of that painting is. Also we troubled a friend asking him all these paintings and art pieces, who is little bit into art. So the Met was our last stoppage in NY city and it was time to go back home.

The trip was quite satisfying and we had tons of fun. And even though we went back with sore muscles and tired limbs, it was an experience that would be in our memories for a long long time. Well, anyone who is a planning a trip to NY for the first time, just a piece of advice, plan your trip before getting here; that would make the trip much more enjoyable.