Hi everyone

I just came to the USA for the first time and spent the last few days in New York. I’ll use this newsletter to share some of my impressions and thoughts that I have during this trip.

🚏 Getting around

I often heard those stories about the New York subway being dirty 🐀 and underfunded. I also saw several clips of crazy homeless people on the New York subway, so I had kind of low expectations. Honestly tho, the subway works just fine. Trains arrive all the time, it’s cheap, it’s not overcrowded and the thing does it’s job. That said, the whole system has a very ‘industrial’ feel to it. There are raw metal beams visible at almost every station, water is dropping from the ceiling at many spots and the ride experience is not smooth.

Yesterday I also tried a bus to get to the Metropolitan Museum of Art and that also worked just fine.

The city is also supposed to be ‘highly walkable’. That’s true when talking about distances, but it is also true that due to the grid system one has to cross streets all the time. Every 80 meters there is a traffic sign. so when I walk north only 1km I have to stop more than 10 times. They never have any overpasses or tunnels or anything to avoid this. That makes the whole walking experience in New York rather not fun.

🍔 Food

As a big international city, New York has a fantastic variety of food to offer. Chinese noodles, Korean BBQ, Japanese sushi, Mexican tacos… it’s all here. It’s not the cheapest, but with the dollar being just 0.78 Swiss Franks these days it’s not that crazy either.

What I ended up not liking so much are the local delicacies. New York style pizza is just overloaded with sugar, whereas I prefer pizzas without added sugar. The lox spread balge cream was too fatty for me so I had to remove half of it. I’m glad I was able to try it, but for the second half of my trip I’ll stick with international food.

Oh yea I also finally tried some tacos from Chipotle. Those were okay but nothing special really.

🗽 History

The history of New York is incredibly interesting. I’m actually listening through several books during this trip and I really enjoy the experience. There is a lot to learn. I didn’t read through all of them yet, but I think these are great books:

• Gotham: A History of New York City to 1898
• Greater Gotham: A History of New York City from 1898 to 1919
• The Power Broker: Robert Moses and the Fall of New York

It’s find it fascinating to learn how this city developed from a small Dutch settlement several hundred years ago to the worlds most populous city at the beginning of the 20th century, and how it was shaped by waves after waves of all kinds of migrants.

In some way it is similar to Switzerland because there was never any king to impose order over a long duration. Different groups always negotiated and struggled to get their way. In this sense it is really an American city.

The sight that I already visited were also all really interesting. The 9/11 memorial is so well done. It is really moving to hear all the different stories of how people wer affected by those events and how many heroes rose up to the occasion to help those in need.

The statue of Liberty and Ellis Island (where immigrants used to arrive by ship) are also both really worth the visit for anyone interested in history.

🌃 Overall

What I really like here is how nice and friendly most people here are. People hold the door open for each other, apologize when they bump into you by accident, don’t drive too aggressively, and are just generally always trying to be kind. I’m sure there are also exceptions to this, but overall the people here are really great.

Some things are also a bit ridiculous. For example the heating in my hotel room is so loud, it sounds like a small power plant or something. They curtains in my room also don’t close properly so I need to use my towels to protect myself from the constant flickering from all the displays outside.

Anyways this is a great trip and I am glad I used the opportunity to finally come visit the USA 🇺🇸. What a great country!

Cold greetings from New York 🥶

Gregor