New York: The Return

Posted by Rachael Wright at 05:40 on 24 May 2010

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Oh New York, I have missed thee. It was a long, hard winter in England, but now I'm back in your summery bosom following various visa and volcano-based debacles, and I'm very happy about it too.

I‘ve actually been back in my beloved Brooklyn for a week and a half. Between the horrific jetlag and being struck down with a debilitating disease (otherwise known as the common cold), there hasn't really been room for feeling human or doing very much, other than moaning a lot.  Hey, I'm British - it's what we do best.

It's like I never went away. Yet at the same time, it feels like I haven't been here for 20 years. I've had to re-learn all my New York skills, like remembering cars come from the other direction to the one I'm looking in when I cross the street. I re-learned that one pretty quickly after almost getting intimate with a speeding Escalade's bonnet on Union Avenue this morning...

There's also the asinine yet very important stuff, like knowing a Chinese burn is called an Indian burn, pants just mean trousers and when I ask for a glass of water, I will inevitably have to repeat myself at least once. I'm sorry America, but I refuse to say ‘waah-der'.

I was so busy in the run-up to coming back and my packing wasn't nearly as OCD as I like it to be. Which probably explains why I didn't have to give Virgin Atlantic my best ‘yes, I'm aware it's a few kilos overweight, but I'm a good person and that luggage is quality Samsonite, so please let me off' smile for the first time ever. Among the vital goods I forgot to smuggle across the Atlantic were proper tea and proper chocolate. Disast.

But the disast has thankfully been averted. My friend Alex was here this weekend and following an emergency text sent before she left London, she brought me two big bars of Cadbury's Dairy Milk. And although I've never seen PG Tips anywhere here, in a brilliant stroke of luck, the supermarket near my apartment sells them. Hallelujah. 



My new favourite thing to do is have my morning cup of tea on the roof of my building in the sunshine, while looking at the Empire State Building and the Chrysler Building across the river... And that right there is where the Olympic-standard British moaning ends.

Until my next instalment, here's a photo of the best thing about being home in New York... Brunch.



Scrambled eggs, crispy bacon, toast and cwawfee at Pastis in the Meatpacking District, yesterday. Right before Alex, my Cadbury's dealer, had to fly home (boo hiss).

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