Day 21 - New York to San Fran

Our final day in New York. Time is money, and by money, I mean spending it. We've been holding back from buying souveniers and postcards the past few days and left it all til today. Today, is a day to SPEND. We pack all of our luggage and drag it downstairs to the lobby where they locked it into their storage room. Having had Tick Tock for 3 days in a row, we decided to go across the road to Cafe 32 instead. This was like a huge sandwich bar that had the options to make fresh omlettes etc for breakfast. Seeing their wilted and brown lettuce drowning in mayonnaise and butter, I went for the healthier alternative of omelettes. We scoffed our greased up meal of eggs cooked in oil and butter topped with greasy melted cheese and headed out to do some shopping.

As we walked out, we spotted a Target next to the cafe so we quickly ducked in to look for some DVDs. We walk out empty handed when Moishii sees this guy sitting on the side of the road. He proceeded to throw a bunch of spare change into the guy's cup. This is when I noticed that he just gave money to the "homeless". A "homeless" that was wearing these state of the art stereo headsets that even I couldn't afford. And its not like you don't see them. They look like ear muffs! Who the hell goes around begging in with headsets like that? This even bets the woman begging with her leather handbag. On second thought, who gives change to a homeless wearing headsets like that!?

We cross the road where we spot these Tshirts that I just HAD to buy for Cookiez. The Tshirt read "F*** you you F***in F***". Of course...without the asterisk...I thought that represented Cookiez in the best way :D

We decided to walk from the hotel up to Broadway since there were numerous souvenier shops. We started grabbing postcards and books. Tshirts and Caps. Miniture versions of the Statue of Liberty. I thought I should buy a second one as a souvenier for my relos who were currently visiting in Sydney, but the one I found was so overpriced compared to the one I had bought earlier. I placed the statue back on the shelf when the guy comes up to me and asks me if I wanted that. I said no of course when he kept insisting that it was a good bargain etc etc and its the last one. This is when I turned to him and started screaming about how overpriced it is and how I bought a cheaper one elsewhere etc etc. This is when he suddenly offered me a discount. A light switched on in my brain. You can bargain. Shifting gears, I turned back into the vicious Grand Bazaar chick and slaughtered him good for the statue. Feeling better as I walk out of the store, we headed into the nearest shop we could find and immediately started pulling tshirts and singlets off the wall. A guy comes up to us and I immediately started the bargaining process. Of course, things aren't as inflated as what is in Turkey, but we still got a good amount slashed off the price. Plus the guy threw in a "New York Princess" bracelet for me.

Arms loaded with bags, we spot a Starbucks and quickly rush in for a quick rest. As we were enjoying our drinks, we spot a porn DVD store across the road. Now before you get your head in the gutter, alot of porn stores actually sell normal DVDs. Just that 90% of their stock is porn as opposed to what the rest of the population watches. We walk in and quickly make a beeline for their Movies section. All they had were a few dodgy Kung fu DVDs and thats it. This is when a guy comes up to me and asks me what I was after. When I told him that we wanted TV series boxsets, he told me to go downstairs. My face turned green when he said that. Mainly because they had a HUGE neon flashing sign that stated that if we wanted HARDCORE stuff, we go downstairs. He must've seen the look on my face because he quickly explained that its not just "HARDCORE" stuff downstairs, they also have all the TV series boxsets. We quickly make our way downstairs before we're spotted and scanned their cabinets. No Ellen and no Desperate Housewives.
We quickly leave the shop and find another Porn shop down the road. We quickly duck into the store and found racks and racks of Movies and TV series. Moishii spotted the Ellen DVD boxset on a shelf way beyond our reach. We convinced the guy to grab a ladder and climb up there to grab Season 1 for us. The guy gets down and puts his ladder away when Moishii suddenly wanted to see the Season 2 boxset. The poor guy had to grab the ladder again. He passes the box down to us and Moishii is standing there going "hmmm...I don't know which one to get. which one should I get? Which one has that annoying chick in it? I think I want to get season 2, but then I should get season 1 instead of 2" etc etc etc. Meanwhile, the poor guy is standing ontop of a wonky ladder, 3m up in the air ready to topple over whilst Moishii is umming and ahhing over which box to buy. I quickly tell the guy that we're going to have a look around and drag Moishii away just so we don't get crushed by the guy. Whilst Moishii decides, I found the Desperate Housewives DVD for sale. It was only $36USD and for some reason, I didn't buy it. This is something I would regret later.

Moishii finally shuts up about Ellen once he paid for the boxset. Content that he's spent over $350 on DVDs, we head over to Broadway and continue our shopping. It was around 1:30 by the time we were done. We ducked into Roxy's, the famous NY Deli on Broadway for lunch. This place is frequented by famous people all the time, especially after a late night in town, they usually duck into Roxy's. The whole place was decorated in caricatures of celebrities.

They should update their caricatures...

We were still full from our greased up breakfast, but thought we'd better eat something if we didn't want a repeat of the NY transfer. Now I've seen the famous Roxy sandwiches before. Its ridiculously huge. If you went and ordered a pastrami sandwich or something, you would get about 15cm of meat inbetween two slices of bread. And the guy sitting on the table next to us was truely struggling.

We decided that we've had enough grease to last us a lifetime, so we opted for a grilled chicken breast sandwich. This is when we found out that a their "grilled chicken breast sandwich" was exactly that. Chicken breast, lettuce and bread. No tomatoes, no any other fresh vegetables to chuck into the sandwich. Infact, we were dying for any unprocessed food, that we paid an extra $3AUD just for 2 slices of tomatoes to be chucked in. Thinking the sandwiches were going to be huge, we decided to get one between the 2 of us, saving some room for their famous cheesecakes. This is when the waiter pointed out that we need to pay an extra $3.50 if we wanted to share a sandwich. The alternative? Pay $3.50 for a bowl of fries. We can't even eat healthy without fried food rammed down our throats.

Our healthy sandwich...

...with a healthy side dish......hey, potato is a vegetable!

Now remember the burger I got at Tom's Restaurant? And the burger I got at Tick Tocks? well the sandwich we got, came with the biggest bowl of pickles and coleslaw that was slathered in mayonnaise. Tasted damn good, but I felt my arteries hardening immediately. By the time we were done eating the fries and the sandwich and all the pickles and "salad", we were too full to even get cheesecake. We did contemplate ordering a frozen hot chocolate though.....yes thats right. A frozen hot chocolate......

Now something I've forgotten to mention was that everywhere you go in the US, you had to tip. You eat, you tip. You catch a cab, you tip. The bill comes and we put the money down with a $2 tip. The guy comes up to us, flips through our money and says "Its a standard 15% tip. Thats not enough". And he basically stood there dictating how much tip I had to give. I understand that alot of their wages are based on getting tips. However, I think they have forgotten that a tip is NOT compulsory and that you only get a tip if you provide good food and services.

Feeling stuffed, we caught a subway back to the hotel and on our way, stopped by this shop that was selling Tshirts. I spotted one that was perfect for me "Don't piss me off, I'm running out of room for the bodies". That an some Tshirt that said "Psychotic". I managed to bargain the guy down to a good price for both Tshirts when I suddenly decided that I only wanted one. The guy starts chucking a fit when Moishii suddenly decides that he wants to buy a "New York" Jersey. Of course I bargained the with the guy again and got it down to the price Moishii wanted, when HE suddenly decided that he didn't want it either. So we were standing around arguing with the guy who kept insisting we buy it because of the good price he is giving us and us refusing to pay. I eventually grabbed Moishii's arm and physically dragged him outta there before we got our asses kicked. This is when we see in the next store window, the exact jersey he wanted to buy, at a price even cheaper than we bargained for. And even then he still didn't want to buy it!!

We quickly head back to the hotel to collect our luggage since we needed to pack all the crap we bought. I sat down in the lobby with all of our shopping bags whilst Moishii went into the luggage room to retrieve our stuff. This is when about 6 backpackers stormed into the hotel and started surrounding the luggage room trying to get their luggage checked in. There was a lot of ranting and raving and we eventually found out that they wanted to leave their stuff at the hotel, but they're not even staying there!! The guy practically kicked them out of the room, and they stood around outside arguing about what to do. Fine if you want to be that way. But atleast get out of the frickin way! They had basically thrown their backpacks onto the ground, and poor Moishii had to try and drag 4 suitcase via an obstacle course, and none of the inconsiderate pricks even bothered moving their stuff outta the way!

We shove our shopping into an empty suitcase and search for our ride. The hotel has private SUVs that drive you to the airport for $50. We arrive at the airport and I quickly jump off in search of a trolley knowing that Moishii and the guy will take care of the luggage. I come back 2mins later and Moishii comes running up to me asking if I had any money. I opened my wallet and before I could say a word, he had grabbed all my cash and ran off. He comes back a few seconds later as the car tears down the freeway with a few dollars left in my wallet. Apparently he had handed a $50 note to the guy and didn't tip him. The guy then starts screaming at him saying how could he not tip etc etc. Moishii panics and insists that he didn't know that the $50 didn't include the tip which was why he came running to me. He thought the guy would deck him!

We somehow managed to get all our luggage to checkin counter with a good 1.5hrs to spare before takeoff. We hand over our passports and tickets and check in our luggage. The woman hands our documents back and 2 boarding passes. She explains the seat number and boarding time to Moishii. She then turns to me and and goes: "You don't have a seat"
Me: EXCUSE ME?
Her: You'll get your seat at the gate
Me: Why can't I have my seat now?
Her: You'll get your seat when you get to the gate
Me: Does that mean I don't get to fly?
Her: No. You'll get your seat at the gate
Me: Why can't you just give me my seat now instead of later???
Her: YOU'LL GET YOUR SEAT WHEN YOU GET TO THE GATE

Bitch. We grab our hand luggage and literally power walked to the gate to make sure I get a seat. We storm our way to the departure gate only to find the whole place empty. We found a security guard who told us that the gate doesn't open until 20mins before departure. With that, we headed back to the food court we passed to bum around a bit. Thinking with the time difference and the long flight ahead, we better grab a quick snack before the flight. We spot a maccas so I go line up whilst Moishii minds the bags.

There was 2 lines. One super huge one, and short one. Of course I line up at the short one and immediately got told by the woman at the cashier to join the long queue. I join the queue that wasn't moving, and 5 mins later, the woman tells me to join her queue again. WTF? Its like she wanted to play musical chairs. I ordered their double cheeseburger meal which was the cheapest on the menu and asked for some ketchup as well. This is what I ended up with:


Who the hell gives 10 packs of Ketchup? who the hell NEEDS 10 packs of Ketchup?? The American's always take it that one step too far...after we're done eating, we walk back to the departure lounge only to find a souvenier store. Uh-oh....Moishii shoves me out of the way and practically throws his hand luggage at me whilst he grabbed stuff randomly, until I pointed out the price. He throws everything back but then realises that he needs to buy something so he could cash his travellers cheque in without having to pay any fees. He ends up spending $30 on a tshirt he didn't want...

We get to the gate and surprise suprise, there was someone at the counter. I shove my way to the front only to be told that they won't be issuing tickets until 20mins before departure. We sit on the bench closest to the counter so I could make a mad dash if need be. 10mins later, I see people walking up the counter to try and get their seats changed from a window to an aisle and vice versa. I went up and handed them both of our tickets asking to be seated together. They take our tickets and shooed me away. We sit and wait. And wait. And wait. Then I started freaking out. What if this is the 4th road? What if I can't go to San Fran? Suddenly, there was an announcement. Due to the flight being overbooked, they were looking for people to give up their seats and they will get a free return economy fare for free. No bloody good to me. I refused to give up my non existent seat. The airhostess pulls a few people aside and asked them if they wanted to give up their seats. The woman refused, and later went back up to ask if she could ive up her seat and then changed her mind. The announcements kept going off every few minutes and our departure time got pushed back 20mins. Apparently this is the norm in America. They always overbook flights. They always try to find volunteers to give up their seat for free tickets. This is so well known, that this guy called up his friend and tells her that he's scored ANOTHER free ticket. People also keep insisting that they change seats. They hand their old ticket over which gets ripped up, and they're allocated a new one. Infact, 75% of the people on the plane would be issued new tickets. We kept waiting and eventually people start giving up their seats. Unfortunately, every time someone gave up a seat, they would check another person in which means someone else needs to give up their seat. Finally enough people give up their seats and we're ready to board when the same woman walks up to the counter asking if she could give up her seat now. She basically got abused by a screaming airhostess for changing her mind and now its too late.

We finally get our tickets and we get seated together. As they started the boarding, they announced that First class and Business class will board first. We sit back down and wait for them to call the boarding for economy class. 5mins later, we turn around and 80% of the people in the departure lounge had lined up. It seems like most of the plane is First and Business class? There was like 10 people sitting around waiting for the economy seats to board! We get onto the plane and practically get concussion from a guy swinging his suitcase around trying to get from the back of the plane to the front of the plane. FFS sit down and get out of my way!!!

The flight from New York to San Fran is a good 4 hours flight. We settle in and try to nap. We managed to score a pair of headsets before they ran out. What is it with airlines and their lack of headsets? The food trolley comes around, and would you believe, this is the healthiest meal we've had in the whole time we were in New York? It was basically wilted salad and some pasta thing that looked like a huge ravioli. It was "healthy" after I scraped the cheese out and just ate the pasta.

The plane touches down and we collect our luggage. I find an information desk and was told that for the price of a shuttle bus, I could catch a taxi to our hotel. We grabbed our suitcase and headed towards the taxi ramp whlist freezing my ass off. 20mins later, we pulled into this dark street that had graffitti all over the walls and homeless people everywhere. Thinking we were going to get mugged and murdered, we freaked out until we spotted the hotel sign. We unload our luggage and practically run into the hotel. We check into our room which is absolutely gorgeous. Soft but firm double beds, thick fluffy doonas, silky smooth bed sheets and a clean shower with horoscopes as reading material. This is a new age hotel and the design is all about the 5 elements, nature and our soul etc etc. And for $60 a night, it was well worth every cent we paid.

Hotel lobby

Not wanting to have our throat slit in the middle of the night, we went across the street to 7 eleven, grabbed a processed hotdog, chocolate, chips and drinks and pigged out at the hotel before passing out for the night.