Well, if you have not tried it, you have not been on a serious, real, progressive public transportation system. This is a system that has been around for over 100 years. New Yorkers know how to get around.
Word to the wise DO NOT TAKE THE TUNNEL! DO NOT DRIVE IN MANHATTAN AT ALL! You can hang it up because you will get no where very slowly. Old ladies will pass you and get to they’re business before you even pass through the “Box”, to the lay person that is the intersection.
Do your homework before you go. I found myself in New Jersey carrying luggage all the way to Harlem. It took me four hours because I did not do my homework first.
Path train and the Subway are VERY different. The Path trains are trains that take you from the mainland, NJ, Hoboken etc. to the island, Manhattan. There may be a Path to Brooklyn, but I was not there long enough for thorough P.T. research.
If you have a friend in NY listen to their directions and not the bus drivers. I say this because everyone in NY thinks that they know where they are going. The thing is, there are multiple ways to get to one place and everyone seems to be an “expert.”
Staring is still not cool. This rule still applies in the “Apple”, but there are so many different types of people there, that your rules may vary depending on where you are and who you interact with.
Even if you look lost, nobody cares. I was walking around with a suitcase and no one bothered me. The thing of it is that everyone’s kind of lost too. There are so many tourists walking around and so many native “Yorkys” they all blend in.
New Yorkers are nice and mean. There are some who will give you directions and be nice about it. There those who will lie to you about not knowing nothing about a part of the system that they travel daily. This did happen to me but I gave the lady the benefit of the doubt, why? Because there are so many people trying to hustle you on the street that the best form of defense would be to say, I don’t know leave me alone, and they will do it.
If you take the renting a car route people are rude and nice. You will hear or see the occasional car rage brawl, people will not let you into a lane, but if you roll down your window and ask nicely they will, it is the weirdest dynamic.
If a New Yorker is rude let them be. This is the most disorganized chaos of a city on the planet. If you live there, you will get frustrated quickly, if you don’t live there ditto. They have stuff to do, see, say, express, elaborate on. They’re human and are only responding to the frustrations around them. If you can’t get info out of one of them go to the next person the Nice Mean rule will always apply.
Next article: Your not a loser! You’re just trying to save the world.
I digress this was just on my mind. Choa.
