I guess the time difference kicked in a little, for the first 3-4 days I could've easily waken up at 5am.
I think, my getting here deserves a notice. Me and planes are not the best of friends. Things never go entirely smooth, and this time was not an exception. My plane was supposed to go 7.35 in the morning, I had to wake up at 5 so why go to sleep at all, as I hadn't seen Keiu for a year, we had to catch up. My plan was to sleep on the plane. Well.. Got to the airport and learned the first plane will be half an hour late. Got worried already as my layover was a little over an hour long. When already inside the plane, they told us there is traffic at Brussels airport and they haven't gotten permission to take off for at least another hour and a half. Shit! When finally arrived to Brussels, obviously my plane had left. They sent me to a place I could change my ticket (free of charge as it was not my fault), the desk was in the back end corner of the airport. Finally there, it took another hour to find sth suitable, a lot of planes were delayed, some flights were cancelled.. The lady wanted me to stay in Brussels for the night and take a flight to NY next morning, I did not wanna accept that, so when she dug deeper, she found I could fly to Frankfurt and to NY from there. Only thing was that the flight was gonna leave kind of NOW and well, I was very far from everything. Thankfully there was an angel named Kevin. An airport worker with that small car they drive around in airports. He was fixing sth next to me and apparently listening to our conversation. When he heard the last part he shouted sth like "Damn, I come from New York, you gotta make it to my home town". I quickly got the ticket and he took me to the gate with his car. He took everything out of that machine, honking the horn at people to get them out of the way and was sooo over-speeding, I laughed like crazy and boarded the plane! Thank you!
First flight was short, around 30 minutes, an 1.5 hour layover and then a Lufthansa flight to NY, slept on and off, held cool conversations with a 6 year-old sitting next to me and watched "The cider house rules". I knew nothing about the movie, but it was really good and apparently it's a 1999 academy award winner. The landing was through a powerful thunderstorm, and when on ground the plane stopped really suddenly. We were said that the plane can't go on any more and we have to wait for a truck that would escort us. I don't even wanna know what happened, just when I finally got out into the tropical air and headed to Brooklyn, it felt so damn good!
A week has passed like a second. It has been such a roller-coaster ride! I love summer in here. The city camp where I came to help out, by teaching and supervising, is ending tomorrow, it's a little sad, the kids are super fun. Also, some of my little ones I used to teach when I lived in NY in spring were participating. My favorite line still comes from little J. One day he just grabbed me from my sleeve and was like: "Husky is callin me a peasant and I ain't likin that" with as demanding face as possible. How Jess and Thomas bursted into laughter behind him and acted as they were having their own conversation and I had to remain serious and ask Husky to behave.
Woke up one day at 7 o'clock in the morning, met my friends at Grand Central terminal and took a train to the beautiful Cold Springs village in New York State. Decided to go hiking! Planned around 2 hours of walking around and hitting a nearby beach then, well, nature had a little different plan for us. Firstly, the track was a little harder than we expected, instead of walking around, it was damn straight rock-climbing. Plus the mountain was pretty high, all in total the hike took us 5 and a half hours, but during that we conquered two tops and the views were exquisite, at some point we were truly on the edge of the mountain and the stones got slippery, was a great feeling after, mainly when, we made it down and crossed a street and were able to jump into the river.. heavenly! I collected quite some bruises and cuts but well, it was an awesome day. Grabbed a late lunch from a french restaurant near by and got on train exactly as a massive thunderstorm hit the town.. it was beautiful tho, to follow through a train window at least!
In the evening supervised the kids in Brooklyn, made it right on time, made them think out and perform a short choreo of what they have learned during the week, which kept them happy and occupied.
First two days I lived in a youth hostel, then moved to Jess's place, which is on the same avenue in Brooklyn. I love the surroundings and we have our own little deli-shop, where the greek owner and workers already know exactly what we usually buy and experiment new goodies foodies on us and give us special prices.
With the camp kids we one day had a field trip to Atlantic city, the location was my idea as I have always wanted to go there. It was a fun day, we didn't take the kiddos to the casinos of course, but the famous boardwalk and the beach itself was more than enough, saw famous places, played games, swam and enjoyed the day.
Other than work and dance, well.. the second night I was here, tried to take things easy, went to sit in the courtyard with Jess and Helen and enjoy some wine until Peter, Olu and some other guys joined us and we ended up plaing a couple of games of "ring of fire" which led us to the city, Central Bar and the CS Weekly Meetup.
The next day, or should I say night, me, Ali and Talha took a roadtrip to Long Island to "Burning Couch" festival. The trip there was creepy, empty highway which made us skeptic and crazy. The camp was on the grounds of an old farm-house. Just over a field we could head to the beach. We ended up not sleeping that night, it was awesome to see all my friends and meet new people, there were a lot of local musicians, they took their instruments out, along the traditional ones, also couple of old african and south-american ones. We jammed till sunrise and went to watch that on the beach and swim in the tropical water, next day discovered more of Long Island and ended up on Fire Island, which reminds me of Florida, Miami beach for example!
Met my dear roomie Emnet on monday and we had a nostalgic day at Coney Island, found the sushi place which we visited around thanksgiving and tested the attractions in the amusement park.
After work met up with Daniel and Amalie and spent a fun monday night in one of my favorite neighborhoods of NY, Williamsburg, first used the specials at Rosemary's, then free pool and free popcorn at Abby's and ended in Union Pool, there are free concerts every monday: "Reverend Vince Anderson and his love choir"!!!! That reverend knows how to get the party started! "The Reverend lasted 3 months in seminary, where upon he felt that God was calling him to minister in bars and taverns. He grabbed his accordian and piano, and promptly started holding weekly "Services" in New York's Lower East Side and in Williamsburg, Brooklyn." In a way it was like going to church, but the vibe and atmosphere were like old times, sunday morning, a small church in some southern state and a gospel choir enjoying themselves to the fullest!
And can't forget the incredible view at Sophie and Amil's place in Brooklyn, right besides the Williamsburg bridge.. Incredible view, good food and tons of travel stories, pregaming there again!
To conclude this long post I am so thankful of all my friends here, of all the wonderful new people I have met this week, some of them have truly inspired me, of all the discussions and new experiences!
It is amazing to be back and I know one hundred per cent that it was a right decision to work full time as soon as I got back to Estonia, save money and come back here before school starts again and I'll be tied up in Estonia. 4 more weeks to go, good night, I'm out!
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