42 Hours in New York City
I decided to visit New York City this past weekend on a whim. A friend of mine is completing a summer internship there, so he was part of the reason I decided to go. Another reason was finally turning 25 the past week and having a quarter-life crisis. My early twenties are complete. I am not sure if I am happy with how I spent them, but is anyone?
The person who spends their early twenties going to school and finding a job right after college wishes they were less of a square. The person who decides not to go to college and instead works at a low-wage job wishes they finished college for better career opportunities. Artists suffer. College itself is expensive and those unfortunate enough to deal with student loans become stuck between working to afford their payments or abandoning school altogether. These are sweeping generalizations, but it seems like no matter what someone does there is always the opportunity cost of the other option to reflect on.
The plus is side is 25 is still pretty young. I've heard a coworker say late twenties are the better part of the decade because you're still young and have a bit more resources to play with. Everyone pushes the "get my shit together" agenda which supposedly is the whole point of your 20s; finding something you halfway enjoy doing for a living wage (because a job is a job, afterall), figuring out where you're going to live, how geographically close you want to be to your family ('emotionally' being whole 'nother story), and deciding the general direction your life is headed. It's a thing to behold seeing childhood friends carving out their own paths. Same age, completely different lives.
These have been big asides, but this was all I was able to think about while I was in New York. I showed up at 00:00 on Saturday where I met my friend and hung out at his place until the sun came up because getting stabbed is apparently a real possibility. Saturday morning we ate breakfast and began walking around. I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out that Saturday was the worst combination of heat and humidity New York has seen this summer so far. I hadn't packed shorts so I was walking around in jeans. I was under the impression my hostel reservation wouldn't accept check-ins before 4pm, so there was considerable amount of time to kill, and when it's hot as fuck outside sight-seeing becomes less of an attractive option.
I watched the new Spiderman, learned a bit about the subway routes, stopped for food, and finally checked into my hostel. Sunday's location history looked pretty much the same. My friend temporarily lives in Battery Park, and my hostel was on the upper west side. In the 42 hours I was in New York I ate breakfast, visited the nintendo store, ate sushi, drank in koreatown, visited Time Square, ate breakfast, saw the statue of liberty with my own two eyes and the bridges at night. All of my time was spent in Manhattan, so maybe next time I visit I'll spend more time in Brooklyn.
On the bus ride back, it occurred to me no matter how much I travel, I don't really fundamentally change as a person. Maybe I do change, but very little. Over the course of the past 2 years and between several cities, I feel like I've only changed slightly. A large portion of this change came from my career and the people I've met, not the cities I've visited. It's possible people seek different things when they travel; some people get a lot of pleasure from taking nice photos and sharing them on social media, some people want to eat as much food as they can while vacationing, some people seek art like galleries and live music, and it seems like other people travel for abandon, to momentarily pretend everything troubling them is gone like family, a job, the future, a purpose. Almost but not quite like an addiction to ease the burden of normal life.
I think I travel to run away from myself. I like the idea of travel because I feel like I can act or think a different way than I normally do. It's liberating to be able to afford a ticket out of my current hell. A lot of my friends, coworkers, family, tinder matches would agree that travel is great. Is it inherently good though? It is becoming more clear that traveling is synonymous with running away.
The person who spends their early twenties going to school and finding a job right after college wishes they were less of a square. The person who decides not to go to college and instead works at a low-wage job wishes they finished college for better career opportunities. Artists suffer. College itself is expensive and those unfortunate enough to deal with student loans become stuck between working to afford their payments or abandoning school altogether. These are sweeping generalizations, but it seems like no matter what someone does there is always the opportunity cost of the other option to reflect on.
The plus is side is 25 is still pretty young. I've heard a coworker say late twenties are the better part of the decade because you're still young and have a bit more resources to play with. Everyone pushes the "get my shit together" agenda which supposedly is the whole point of your 20s; finding something you halfway enjoy doing for a living wage (because a job is a job, afterall), figuring out where you're going to live, how geographically close you want to be to your family ('emotionally' being whole 'nother story), and deciding the general direction your life is headed. It's a thing to behold seeing childhood friends carving out their own paths. Same age, completely different lives.
These have been big asides, but this was all I was able to think about while I was in New York. I showed up at 00:00 on Saturday where I met my friend and hung out at his place until the sun came up because getting stabbed is apparently a real possibility. Saturday morning we ate breakfast and began walking around. I wouldn't be surprised if it turns out that Saturday was the worst combination of heat and humidity New York has seen this summer so far. I hadn't packed shorts so I was walking around in jeans. I was under the impression my hostel reservation wouldn't accept check-ins before 4pm, so there was considerable amount of time to kill, and when it's hot as fuck outside sight-seeing becomes less of an attractive option.
I watched the new Spiderman, learned a bit about the subway routes, stopped for food, and finally checked into my hostel. Sunday's location history looked pretty much the same. My friend temporarily lives in Battery Park, and my hostel was on the upper west side. In the 42 hours I was in New York I ate breakfast, visited the nintendo store, ate sushi, drank in koreatown, visited Time Square, ate breakfast, saw the statue of liberty with my own two eyes and the bridges at night. All of my time was spent in Manhattan, so maybe next time I visit I'll spend more time in Brooklyn.
On the bus ride back, it occurred to me no matter how much I travel, I don't really fundamentally change as a person. Maybe I do change, but very little. Over the course of the past 2 years and between several cities, I feel like I've only changed slightly. A large portion of this change came from my career and the people I've met, not the cities I've visited. It's possible people seek different things when they travel; some people get a lot of pleasure from taking nice photos and sharing them on social media, some people want to eat as much food as they can while vacationing, some people seek art like galleries and live music, and it seems like other people travel for abandon, to momentarily pretend everything troubling them is gone like family, a job, the future, a purpose. Almost but not quite like an addiction to ease the burden of normal life.
I think I travel to run away from myself. I like the idea of travel because I feel like I can act or think a different way than I normally do. It's liberating to be able to afford a ticket out of my current hell. A lot of my friends, coworkers, family, tinder matches would agree that travel is great. Is it inherently good though? It is becoming more clear that traveling is synonymous with running away.