8 places to go to in New York

Correspondent "Snob" in New York Ksenia Semenova chose eight places to keep away from.

Фото: Depositphotos

Empire State Building

The leader of the charts - the Empire State Building. This 102-storey building is known to everyone at least around the scene from King Kong, when a huge plush monkey with a leather chest, perched on a spire of a skyscraper, knocked down small airplanes with a paw, holding a kidnapped girl in another paw. This tower is the undisputed symbol of New York, appearing in all the films shot in this city; but actually getting on it is a boring and time-consuming business.

Immediately what the quotation is: rise up (standing for two hours) mostly those who do not distinguish the Brooklyn Bridge from Manhattan, they will not notice Broadway at all and hardly remember the difference between avenues and straights, the grid of which is interesting to consider from the height of flight. But people continue to stand courageously and be photographed in any weather and in any light, and even in the impenetrable fog.

It is much more interesting to look at the Empire from afar and to imagine what would happen if the idea of ​​the authors came true and the airships approached the spire.

And to think about the fact that this is the only building in the world that twice became the tallest in its life (the second time it won the title after the fall of the twin towers). Or that a woman once jumped off of him, and so beautifully landed on the limousine standing below, that she was now forever glorified in Andy Warhol's work “Suicide”.

It is also good to take a helicopter tour, in which the pilot acts as a guide, and then wander around the city in search of buildings seen from a height.

Central Park

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Almost inferior to the popularity of Empire. But I really do not like him, and if I find myself there, it is solely by the will of the acquaintances who first come to New York. Mainly I draw their attention to small islands of rock, “ripping up” well-groomed lawns - this was Manhattan from the very beginning, this is its foundation, on which all these crazy skyscrapers stand. The reason for my dislike is the innumerable crowds of tourists who seem to be purposely striving to get under the feet of the runners and under the wheels of cyclists.

The park is restless and uncomfortable. These are, of course, light cities, but how difficult it is to maneuver there among people with cameras who want to see the famous Jacqueline Kennedy Onassis reservoir - the most popular place for jogging movie characters of all stripes.

Better to spend time on the lawns of Bryant Park or Washington Park. In the first summer, they show an open-air cinema, in winter a great skating rink is flooded, and in the second, urban madmen, street dancers and very often excellent musicians constantly hang out, and you can listen to them for hours.

The Statue of Liberty

Most of my friends who have lived in New York for many years have never climbed a green lady. And they are not going to: there is absolutely nothing to do on a small island, except to walk around the ladies' legs, which you cannot even photograph from such close distances. Moreover, in recent years, it has been permanently repaired: either the head is repaired, then the body.

It’s much nicer to take the free ferry from Manhattan to Staten Island and back and look at the statue from afar. Here you have the feeling of an emigrant sailing from Europe, and a good view of the statue, downtown and the ocean (especially at sunset) and, in fact, a huge ferry that you can use to run around and take pictures of the surroundings from various angles.

Here you can feel yourself not as a tourist, but as an ordinary resident: in the evening, tired managers move from one island to another, chatting about this and that; listening to their conversations is like sitting at a Moscow kitchen. By the way, Americans say among themselves more and more about food.

"Best" restaurants

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In the restaurant, about which American friends say: delicious, amazing, stunning, incredible, o-bal-den-ny !!! - It is better not to go, or carefully choose a visit time. Because, most likely, there will be a huge line (the Americans love to stand in lines), and the food will not stand out anything special.

In New York, much is said about in the highest ratings, the tradition is this: here everything is the best, the most tasty and the most unusual.

In part, this is true, and it makes it extremely difficult to use applications like Yelp and Foursquare; scolding is bad form and you will find out that it is in this particular place that the best pizza in the world is on sale, however, in that restaurant around the corner they also serve the best pizza.

Therefore, listen carefully to the application tips and boldly go where you like the interior, the smells, the atmosphere, etc. In New York, food is everywhere at a high level. The big problem is only with Russian restaurants. Why? Riddle.

McDonald's

Perhaps the biggest disappointment in New York. After Moscow’s McDonald’s, for example, on Pushkinskaya, which is almost a restaurant, and where couples with flowers are in love, students are generally pleasant, and where the food is generally tasty, and the coffee is generally good, American McDonald's "- dirty, disgusting eatery.

And the best anti-advertising of an institution is the wide-open doors through which a very large human being squeezes through. Potatoes and burgers for all that just tasteless. Approximately the same situation with the network giants Burger King, Dunkin Donuts and Baskin Robins.

Times Square

Actually, I love Times Square. And I always wave a huge screen, where they show me and a dozen more people. I feel at the same time a complete idiot, but very happy. Times Square is a place where you don’t need to go according to all the rules, but in fact it’s really worth it. Here is the energy of all of New York, there is a huge traffic of people and cars, a crazy ultramodern advertisement that almost penetrates you, besides, there are several children's stores, in which even adults usually disappear.

The most banal thing is “the crossroads of the world,” but you can’t say it more precisely. The only day you definitely shouldn’t come here is December 31st.

At midnight, a crystal ball is lowered from the skyscraper, marking the arrival of the new year. But in order to wait for this moment, you need to stand on the fenced square for at least four hours without toilets and alcohol. It always amazes me how people in such a situation manage so sincerely to enjoy some kind of ball.

Musicals

Every evening in Times Square there are queues at the red box office with large letters TKTS. Here they sell tickets for the evening musical at a discount. Ticket worth an average of 80 dollars.

And at the Metropolitan Opera at this time give “Manon” with Netrebko, and at the Brooklyn Academy of Music - a performance with Kevin Spacey, and at the IFC cinema - an evening of rare films, and in the Blue Note - the performance of the famous jazz quartet, and in the hotel “Carlile "Woody Allen plays the clarinet, and all of this is comparable in price or even cheaper than a thundering, bright and completely meaningless musical like The Lion King."

Harlem

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It is necessary to go to Harlem, but not for what the impressionable readers of the guidebooks follow. And they go there to meet at their own risk big and scary African Americans. It would seem that the very idea of ​​unhappy motorists who have accidentally stopped at a traffic light, shooting without warning and stealing cars, is naive nonsense, but this attitude still occurs as often as the Americans think that bears are walking around Moscow.

Bears, by the way, walk the streets in the neighboring state of New Jersey, and blacks are better off afraid to travel to Queens, while at night, while screaming hysterically: Nigga! However, for the word nigga can be obtained in a respectable area of ​​Manhattan.

Harlem is beautiful area of ​​Sugar Hill, where beautiful old mansions rise on the hills, churches, where real Negro hooligan masses take place in the mornings, and music institutions, the most famous of which is Apollo Theater: here at the dawn of a career Michael Jackson sang in the family group Jackson's Five.

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