New York

Hello New York City!

It's been a long time comin', but (four months later) I've finally found the time to write about my trip to New York City. In Mid-August, Caiqian and I came to visit Grummy and her dogs, Roxy and Mr. Gruffyd Babyan. Immediately upon arriving, we knew this was definitely the Big Apple.

Not your typical Austin sights

I love seeing Grummy, and Caiqian enjoyed meeting Grummy for the first time. I've always enjoyed hearing Grummy's tales. While we were in the Harvard club, Grummy told me about a time when Luke was young, and he thought that she looked like George Washington. Based on the photo evidence below, I see what he was talking about!

Which is the original image?

Funnily enough, Grummy wasn't the only historical figure who lived in her apartment.

Her Royal Majesty, Queen Roxy

Anyways, after catching up with Grummy, we spent our first day on top of three double decker buses,  learning all about the history of NY.

Day One was Bus Tour Day

Throughout the rest of the week we went to many, many places around the city. One of our favorite events was going to see the Book of Mormon musical. Weeks later we were still ourselves humming the songs.

The Boooooooook of MoooooooOOOOOOOOoooormOOOOOOON (Click me)

We also had fun at Times Square at an Absolut Vodka Advertisement had a camera pointed towards the crowd below. Where's the couple in the picture below?

Our Fifteen Seconds of Fame at Times Square

Another cool place we visited was the High Line, which is a park that was built on a historic freight rail line. My favorite part of the High Line was one of the vendors, who made handmade shaved ice by actually shaving a large ice cube with a grater.

Fun on the High Line

We also had the opportunity to see the One World Trade Center building and the 9/11 Memorial pools. The pools in particular were impressive because we couldn't see how far the inner depression went. It was like the water just fell into an endless abyss.

World Trade Center Memorial

We got this picture of us and the Statue of Liberty while on a Water Taxi tour. Need I say more?

Mandatory Statue of Liberty Pic

After many long days full of walking, we found a foot massage place in our price range in Chinatown, so we thought, why not? The people there were really nice, but spoke broken English. At one point, the owners got a call and handed the phone off to Caiqian so that she could tell the patrons on the other side what the store hours were. I had a good time 'cause they kept complementing my large american feet.

Foot Long Live

Museums, Exhibits, and Toys

We also had lot's of fun indoors as well. One of our favorite buildings was the Museum of Natural History.

Our favorite exhibition at the Museum of Natural History

We really enjoyed all the scientific showcases, but this one below we felt used a bit too much of the scientists' imagination.

Extrapolating Much?

We also thoroughly enjoyed ourselves at the MoMA and the Metropolitan Museum of Art. The art museums were especially fun because we were able to interact/pose with a lot of the exhibits.

Art you can interact with is the best 

In addition to museums, we also had fun at many of New York's more famous toy stores, like the Toys R' Us superstore and the M&M's World Store.

Toys!

We also had the great fortune of getting to see one of our friends, Matthew Drews, during the middle of our trip. Matthew, Caiqian, and I enjoyed going to F.A.O. Schwartz, the Brooklyn Ice Cream Factory, Pommes Frites, and Grimaldi's, as well as just hanging out and catching up.

Fun with Matthew!

Food

After waiting in line for an hour or so, we all made it into Grimaldi's Pizzeria, which featured very peculiar (albeit very delicious) cupped pepperoni slices.

Grimaldi's Pizzeria

We also gorged on some Pommes Frites, and tried out a lot of their unique fry sauces. While we were there Matt introduced me to my new favorite, Mexican Ketchup.

Pommes Frites (Hint: the red & green Mexican Ketchup is the best)

Caiqian and I also enjoyed our fair share of eateries after Matt left. One place we came back to several times was The Original Soup Man, otherwise known as the Seinfeld-famous Soup Nazi. Every soup of his was great, but the lobster bisque was truly above and beyond. The bowl was just packed with lobster pieces. Every spoonful we ate had lobster chunks in it. We highly recommended it for anyone who can eat seafood.

Enjoying some Soup from the Soup Nazi Original Soup Man

Speaking of Lobster, I'm also going to quickly endorse Luke's Lobster as the best place to get a Lobster roll. We tried several places, but this was the clear winner. The bread is to die for.

Our first Lobster Roll. Thanks Luke's Lobster!

If you go to the Oyster bar in Grand Central Station, our advice is to actually go to the bar, not one of the tables. If you sit at a table, you have to buy entrees. If you sit at the bar, you can get away with only ordering oysters, which is important at a pricey place like the Oyster Bar.

Enjoying some of the world's most expensive oysters

On the other end of the price spectrum, we found a hole in the wall in Chinatown that sold a large quantity of fantastic food at the lowest prices anywhere. This was Caiqian's favorite.

The best food $3 can buy

Swinging back to the expensive side of the spectrum, why are these dirty looking sea cucumbers so expensive? Seriously, $118/lb?

Anyone Else hungry for a $118/lb dried sea cucumber in a sketchy plastic box? I know I am!

While we were exploring the fruit vendors in Chinatown, I discovered a fruit I love even more than lychees - rambutans. They have the same texture and sweetness, but with more flesh. Another plus is that before you peel them they're all awesome and spiky and red.

Lychee's Badass Older Brother, Rambutan

Dessert is the last pat of a meal, so I'll have it as the last part of this post as well. Caiqian was pleasantly surprised to find that Ladurée, a macaron store we found in Paris, had a NY establishment. We had fun tasting what they had to offer.

It's no Pierre Hermé, but we'll never turn down a good macaron

Ladurée was fun, but the Lindt store was better. For one, every time we entered, they gave us free chocolate. Second, the store was like a modern-day candy shoppe.

So... Much... Chocolate...

However, our favorite desserterie was Serendipity 3. Their frozen hot chocolate was so good that we bought ourselves powder so we could make more once we got back to Texas.

The 3 stands for how many times we ate there.

Well that's it for New York. Based on my current posting frequency, You'll be able to read about my next update in another four months! Next up... Braaaaaaains.