With all that's been going on with the Europe trip and how time consuming the planning has been, the trip to New York has been given far less attention. As a general rule, I don't get excited for a trip until it's time to pack. I kind of screwed myself over and didn't have time to pack until we had 3 hours before leaving for the airport.
For Germany, I've met everyone going on the trip and we have weekly meetings to talk about what we need to do before we go (paperwork and paperwork) and the fundraising for the trip. I volunteered to help fund-raise because I'm an idiot. After shooting down most of the groups ideas, we decided on a silent auction which I didn't know what that meant but it sounded fancy. But before we could have a silent auction, we basically had to go around to businesses and ask for donations. It felt like begging for people to give me money for a vacation so I hated every minute of it. I can hardly explain what this Germany trip is about either, so me talking to businesses was not a smart move. What items we were able to be given were going to be auctioned off during this home living show at school, and then the money would be pooled and split between the six of us students. It was a nice idea, but only 2 people bothered to get items.
Fast forward a couple weeks and it's auction time. There's this convention thing at school going on where we had a booth at. It was the Saturday and Sunday of spring break and we had to basically sit there with our donations out on display for people to come up and bid on them. I agreed to babysit the booth on Saturday from 8:30 to 3:00 because I'm an idiot and apparently have all the free time in the world. I had worked until 2:00 a.m. the night before and had to get up at 7:00 to be there. I was an hour late, but another girl from the group was there so she had already set everything up. We spent the next 4 hours just sitting there. Mostly people walked by and ignored us but our booth was right next to a big garbage can. When people threw away trash, they had to make eye contact because we were literally a foot away. that was how we roped 'em them. With trash. I realize now that this was the lowest point of my whole week and I just had midterms. Thank you garbage can.
After we made eye contact, our garbage companions were obligated to ask what our booth was about. Since I can't explain the trip beyond "I'm going to Germany for some school stuff.", the other girl had to tell people what we were about. And she did a great job of selling it. The run down was this: We're from the school of businesses and natural science and we're going to Aalen university as ambassadors. Aalen has a great university that's very similar to BHSU and both schools want to create a foreign exchange program. To do that, we must first sent over some students to test the waters. It's a great opportunity blah blah blah" I stopped listening. But she did a very nice job of explaining it. After she was done, people would go "Oh, that's nice." and then leave without bidding, the bastards. But every once in a while someone would bid. In total, about several people did.
Around 1:00, another girl joined us. For the next 2 hours we talked about Germany until I left around 3. Then I rushed home, stuffed some food in my mouth, then got ready for work. I worked until 12:30 that night, then rushed home, stuffed some food in my face, and got to packing for NEW YORK.
Fast forward a couple weeks and it's auction time. There's this convention thing at school going on where we had a booth at. It was the Saturday and Sunday of spring break and we had to basically sit there with our donations out on display for people to come up and bid on them. I agreed to babysit the booth on Saturday from 8:30 to 3:00 because I'm an idiot and apparently have all the free time in the world. I had worked until 2:00 a.m. the night before and had to get up at 7:00 to be there. I was an hour late, but another girl from the group was there so she had already set everything up. We spent the next 4 hours just sitting there. Mostly people walked by and ignored us but our booth was right next to a big garbage can. When people threw away trash, they had to make eye contact because we were literally a foot away. that was how we roped 'em them. With trash. I realize now that this was the lowest point of my whole week and I just had midterms. Thank you garbage can.
After we made eye contact, our garbage companions were obligated to ask what our booth was about. Since I can't explain the trip beyond "I'm going to Germany for some school stuff.", the other girl had to tell people what we were about. And she did a great job of selling it. The run down was this: We're from the school of businesses and natural science and we're going to Aalen university as ambassadors. Aalen has a great university that's very similar to BHSU and both schools want to create a foreign exchange program. To do that, we must first sent over some students to test the waters. It's a great opportunity blah blah blah" I stopped listening. But she did a very nice job of explaining it. After she was done, people would go "Oh, that's nice." and then leave without bidding, the bastards. But every once in a while someone would bid. In total, about several people did.
Around 1:00, another girl joined us. For the next 2 hours we talked about Germany until I left around 3. Then I rushed home, stuffed some food in my mouth, then got ready for work. I worked until 12:30 that night, then rushed home, stuffed some food in my face, and got to packing for NEW YORK.
I'm so tired. I packed pretty light, which sounds good but really means I only brought 2.5 outfits. Around 2 a.m. we lost an hour thanks to daylight savings. My mom and I spent more time getting ready, and then it was time to leave at 4:00 a.m. I am so tired. We drove to Rapid, got on a flight at 6:30
Goodbye Rapid
Went to Minneapolis, hung out there for 30 minutes before getting on a flight to Newark which I don't even know what that is. The flight took about 2 or 3 hours and I napped then ate a Quiznos sub on the way. Then we flew into New
Jersey!
Hello Manhatt- eww there's snow everywhere.
We flew into New Jersey but passed by Manhattan. I saw the Statue of Liberty and everyone else on the plane saw it too because once she came into view I heard a couple iphone pictures being taken. We got off the plane and my mom called our ride. It was around 2:00. Our car arrived and we drove to Times Square. The drive took about an hour and was... intense. I've been in Denver, Seattle, and Orlando, but this was by far the most anxiety filled car ride I've ever been on. New Yorkers shouldn't drive. I daydreamed about how many accidents our driver had been in as we pulled up to the hotel, the Intercontinental in New York Times Square. One of the employees opened our door, got out our bags, and asked where we were from.
"South Dakota." I answered.
He said they didn't get a lot of that. I believe him.
After checking in and riding the elevator to the 25th floor, we got to our room. It's pretty nice. Small, smaller than my bedroom, but nice. The bathroom had a sweet shower so I hung out in there for an hour and came out smelling considerably less disgusting. I didn't pack shampoo or conditioner, so I used the hotels. it smelled like fruity pebbles. We didn't hang out too long before my mom was ready to hit the streets. I didn't understand how the whole avenue street thing worked, so she led the way. We were going to Chelsea to meet up with Emily, my mom's best friend Terrie's daughter. On the way I popped into a Rite Aid and bought some coconut shampoo and conditioner for $20.
Lots of walking, maybe 40 minutes later, we made it to Chelsea Market. The place reminded me a LOT of Portland to the point where I was surprised when I remembered I was in New York and not on that sweet west coast. We found Emily who is so pretty it should be a crime and the three of us did a little walking around as we caught up. She brought us cupcakes from Georgetown Cupcakes (this famous cupcake store. They had a show on TLC, but not the one about the obnoxious guy who makes rice crispy and fondant displays). I had a peanut butter one. It was amazing.
Then we had dinner at this pasta place whose name I never bothered to remember, but I remembered the prices. I had a lobster ravioli and a mixed drink and it cost over $40. Way too expensive. And the drink, an italian greyhound, was great. All the food was great. My mom ordered a mushroom and truffle oil ravioli that she says "was the best pasta she ever had" and Emily ordered something that wasn't on the menu, some squid ink noodles with curry. All of it was delicious.
After dinner we did some walking around. Chelsea Market has a lot of weird things. There was this booth where you could make pick out charms and make a necklace or bracelet. I made a Game of Thrones necklace, with sigils from four houses (Greyjoy, Baratheon, Stark, and Lannister) and would have had a fifth sigil but they didn't have any dragon charms. But then my mom found a really cute "My sun and stars" charms, so that went in the center. If I was sober I probably wouldn't have bought the charms and necklace but what the hell. I really liked the necklace. It was $75
My necklace
After that we decided to walk back to the hotel. We walked with Emily for about 20 minutes before she parted to take the subway and we walked another 40 minutes (I have no idea if it was 40 minutes. I have no concept of time anymore.) back to our hotel. Times Square was full of tourists. Hours ago I didn't understand the whole 50 aventure and 100 street thing, but now I get it and was able to get us back without a problem.
The view from the hotel is much more pretty at night. We got back around 9 or 10. I wrote this lengthy blog post and went to sleep at 11.
Goodnight New York
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