New York

During Thanksgiving Break, my family and I finally went to New York, which I consider the better coast despite being a Californian native. First when we reached there, I was first surprised and excited that our hotel was literally in the middle of Times Square.

Once we reached our hotel room though, I was extremely tired because we had taken a night flight and went to bed for a few hours while my dad got pizza from the nearby pizza shop Carnegie (you should definitely go if you have the chance by the way).

After we all got ready at around one o'clock, we took the subway to the American Museum of National History. I really had wanted to go here because of the movie Night at the Museum being based off of this museum. We got to go on a tour and see all the different countries animals originated from. My sister and my friends like to call me T-rex as a nickname sometimes, so I took many pictures standing next to the ginormous creature.

It was especially interesting to know that many of the skeletons were the original ones that had been dug up, meaning that we were looking at what actually used to be dinosaurs, not just replicas of their bones.

We spent the rest of the day at the museum and had dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe in the dead middle of Time Square. It kind of felt like a secret dig-out type of restaurant due to the place actually being underneath stairs inside a rock store. And even inside the restaurant, there were realistic looking rock icons like Elton John made out of wax there which you could take pictures with.

The next day we had to get up early (at 8.00 a.m. am not a morning person at all) because we were going to visit the Statue of Liberty and Ellis Island. We took the subway to get there. The statue was ginormous, and of course the food on Liberty Island was good.

After that, we took the ferry to Ellis Island, which was where all immigrants coming through the East Coast had to pass. On the island, there was a building which has stood there since the start of the 20th century when all immigrants trying to enter the U.S. had to be detained and had to have background checks done on them before getting permission to enter the country.

We got to watch a small documentary inside the building where immigrants that had actually gone through the island's security were interviewed. I learned about the interviewing process, and how many of them had to lie to get into the country and how many families were separated for additional questioning when the security didn't believe them and their stories.

We practically stayed there until the night and took the last ferry back to the mainland.

Where we then went to one of those fully glass buildings, except this one was exceptionally massive and tall. It was called the One Vanderbilt, and it basically took us through an elevator where at each level we could get off and walk into a completely glass room with different lights and objects in it hundreds of feet off of the ground, meaning that we could see the whole New York skyline and even parts of New Jersey too.

We finally finished the night by going to the Grand Central Terminal to obviously catch a train but more importantly, take pictures of me being in there.

The next day we went to the UN. I know, the UN. There was so much security to even enter the building, I mean of course there was - it is the UN. We had to first go across the road to a shop on the other side where my dad had to get scanned, and only then could we enter the building back across the street, after which we had to go through heavy airport-like security.

We went on a tour where we got to go into a real-time conference happening in one of the rooms, and although the tour guide explicitly told us multiple times to duck under the projector that was playing in the room so that no one there would notice us passing by, my dad walked right past it, and members of the UN from all around the world saw his shadow during a serious meeting (definitely a highlight from our trip).

After the tour got over, we walked around to the New York Stock Exchange and the Trump Building (that was funny), Zuccotti Park, and later went to the 9/11 Memorial and Museum.

And then, we went to Hamilton. It was definitely the best part of the whole trip. We got to see Hamilton on FREAKING BROADWAYYY. Even though I'm not a theater nerd, my friend got me to listen to the musical around a hundred times on Spotify, so actually understanding what the whole musical was about while watching it was amazing and so fun.

After that, it was already around 11pm to 12am, and so while we were walking back to our hotel, we stopped at Time Square and got to take pictures of the whole view which was still equally bustling as it was during the daytime.

The next day was Thursday, aka Thanksgiving Day. Which means, of course, the MACYS DAY PARADEEE. Yes. That famous parade that you see on TV every year with the huge and ginormous floats that pass by. Except we weren't exactly in the middle dead center where the crowd you see on TV is, but instead one of the side alleys instead that the parade passed through.

I know, it sounds quite underwhelming, but I was not about to wake up at 7am to watch a parade for three hours, no matter how much I love it (again as I said before, I am not a morning person at all, like 10am is still too early for me ok).

Then that day in the afternoon, we went to Central Park where I found the scene of Jessie. My childhood. And I got to see where Yoko Ono lives today, which is in the building right outside of the place where John Lennon got shot. Which was pretty sad but cool still.

We also went to the Friends fountain and did their pose there, which was one of the coolest things to me. Also I thought before that Central Park was literally just a small park, but I found out then that it was literally one of the biggest parks I've ever been to.

I also got a self-portrait done there, which has really boosted my ego since then.

That was the last day. After that, the next day we took a flight in the morning and left, heading back to the sunnier, and sadly the worse coast.