SOS -NYC Trip

A lot of things are going through my mind right now concerning jobs, and traveling. However, I am still going to postpone those discussions to tell you about my weekend in NYC for Cambouri’s bday!

First Lesson I learned on my trip: NEVER EVER TAKE CHINATOWN BUS!
By all means, take Vamoose, book Grey Hound for the same price online, or splurge and take Acela…it is never ever worth the agony and pain for $15 less.

Ten and I met at Starbucks in Chinatown. As usual, I was a stress ball (my nickname from Freckles and Ten), anxiously staring at my watch as we only had 40 mins to make it to the bus (the bus was located 2 blocks away and in my mind, after my many travels in foreign countries, I have learned that you are never “safe” until you are actually on the bus.) We bought our snacks and water and after a horribly scaring incident in the Starbucks bathroom where I was unable to actually pee do to said experience and a uncharacteristically pleasant incident using the Chinatown bus bathroom which in comparison to Starbucks was spotless) we were bladder-emptied, safely seated on the bus without a hitch.
5:30 pm- Chinatown bus leaves on time. (WHAT! I know…) So we were off to a great start, till 10 mins later we found ourselves in nose to tail traffic. We crawled away for the next 2 hours, Ten listening to music and getting a call from his boss about possible full time position (as his current position is technically “Intern”), and I was reading my newly purchased “Glamour” and at the exact same time as Ten got his call, I got a call from a Hotel in West Hollywood (which is another story). 2 Hours and 15 mins later: I notice the front of the bus starts turning around with eyes wide open in horror, surprise, shock and other emotions that apparently are felt when a person sees massive plumes of smoke coming out the back of the bus. Yes, Massive Black Plumes of Smoke.

7: 45 pm: We pulled off of into a deserted parking lot off of Exit 87. Our bus was dead...

This was the dead time, we were all questioning, wondering what was happening, reviewing the situation, checking out exactly how stranded we were (3 miles to nearest gas station)...

9:15 pm: At this point, there was still no helpful information coming from the driver, the passengers began to actually make friends with their neighbors, GASP! Some great questions coming from the peanut gallery included, “So how long do you think we will be sitting here? Do you expect another bus is coming? Has this happened to you before? Do you think we will be forced to start a Bus Gang and mug passersby for food and water for the rest of our lives?” (true real life question)
The hunger and thirst began to overcome us, and rather than reenact the Donner Party, someone had the great idea to figure out that we were stranded off Exit 85 and the closest Pizza Hut was at this number. Immediately, everyone was on their cell phones, phone calls sounding like, “Hi, I am with that stranded bus group off exit 85, I’d like to place an order for delivery.”
10:00 pm: 2 hours and 15 mins from smoke billowing incident, the 7:30 chinatown bus showed up next to us. Most of us where ecstatic! Another bus has come!! But of course, it was an almost full bus that only allowed the first 10 people on. As Ten and I were not the first ten people on the bus and did not feel like stampeding the passengers in front of us, we watched with sadness as our bus emptied slightly and the 7:30 went on to the Big Apple without us. Luckily the melancholy mood on the bus did not last that long, because unlike the Titanic, the lack of space on the 730 bus did not mean death, and the pizza showed up as the 730 bus was departing! YAY!
The gnawing in our bellies was finally satiated as a slightly confused pizza delivery woman came onto the bus to provide us with 8 pizzas, lots of water and sodas (to note: Chinatown bus did not pay for any of this).
Highlight of the evening was the girl sitting behind me, realizing that she would not be making it to the big apple in time for the party she was attending pulled out 2 bottles of Kettle One and proceeded to pass it around the bus!! PARTY on the stranded Chinatown bus!!

After the pizza and vodka was finished we settled in for a movie. Good old Chinatown bus driver (still not providing us any information, ominously put a movie on, we hoped it wasn’t a sign of exactly how long he was expecting us to stay) and unfortunately for us, 15 mins into the movie, the bus battery died…as the lights dimmed, the heat slowly dissipated, we wondered if maybe our bus was fated to end like poor Lyuba (the 40, 000 year old Baby mammoth found perfectly in-tact after being frozen in Russia).

But luckily for us only 45 mins later at

11:00 pm: Our recovery bus arrived. We pryed our frozen hands from our neighbors that we had huddled close to for warmth and we made it onto the bus. The entire bus (luckily not the driver) fell directly asleep. I awoke around 1:45 am as the bus was careening into New York City. I assume the bus was going at 80 miles an hour through the Lincoln Tunnel, I grabbed onto Ten's hands for dear life as each bump in the road caused the bus to catch air and land and continue on a death hurtle towards the Big Apple. But to our delights, the bus did not crash into the big apple, it stumbled its way to Penn Station, where the nightmare was almost over.

Instead of trekking to 110th St. to Cambouri’s house we stayed with Ten’s friend who lived nearby in the Village. 3:00 AM finally came and we found ourselves being offered reclining chairs to rest our heads….hmm…had I not been so tired I would have protested but beggars can’t be choosers. We awoke the next morning with cricks in our necks and a very tired disposition, which took 2 cups of coffee to begin to cure. And a long subway ride for me to get very very lost on which definitely woke me up.

My recommendation number 1:
YUCA BAR in the Village was amazing. The best brunch for only 12.95 it included mimosa (bloody mary or screwdriver) and coffee and tea and the most delicious Huevos Rancheros.
I met my long lost friend from Arizona (we will call her LT), and Cambouri for this fabulous brunch. LT and Cambouri had their eggs scrambled while I got mine over-easy. They came on top of a black-bean quesadilla with guacamole, green huevos rancheros sauce, salsa and sour cream. AMAZING!!
We spent 2 hours catching up on life, men, and jobs (The 3 necessities) and laughing (possibly due to the mimosa & my sleep deprivation, and possibly due to my pleasure to see both LT and Cambouri).
After brunch, Cambouri and I gallivanted across the city, seeing different sights, and hanging out. We bought some accessories for the night and of course the “shorty” bottle of Grey Goose to drink while we got ready. After spending some re-cooping time on Cambouri’s couch I made a mistake, I did not have the 3rd cup of coffee I would need to stay up for the rest of the evening…

Lesson 2: Always drink a cup of coffee before you go out! Especially if you are sleep deprived already!
After taking the subway ride into the city for the 4th time in one day, we ended up at another one of
Blonde Features Recommendations for NYC on a budget:
Cooper 35 – Asia Pub. This restaurant was located in the East Village on Cooper street.
The $4 dollar drink menu was amazing ( we drank Sea Breezes all night out of large glasses with Bobo Tea type straws) and nothing was over $7 dollars and most was like 5 or 6 and they all came with individual portions of rice. It was amazing! The bill was insanely cheap for the 12 people who came to dinner.
After the chaos of dining with 12 people, we made our way by Cabs to Lucky Jacks, A bar in the East Village. Um, I wouldn’t exactly put it on my list as it was crowded, too hot in the basement area where we were, I was also so tired that Ten was leaning me up against a wall for most of the night, as my eyes drooped lower and lower. Finally, after my insistence that I was fine, I wasn’t tired, and I would no way want to sleep on the reclining chairs again…I was magically placed in a cab (I think I had fallen asleep) and whisked away to the reclining chair of my choice. I ate a little bit of pizza from Joe's which as I remember was very good and slowly drifted to sleep in a reclining chair that decided to not recline that night. I awoke at 6 am with a tummy ache, another crick in my neck and the thought that I would rather wake up, and go get on the train to Poughkeepsie (our next stop to visit my parents) and sleep on the train then spend any more time in this hell. However, I managed to fall back asleep.
My alarm went off at 10am and after much coxing & swearing that I was a fool for making plans so early, (mostly coming from Ten), I got him out of his reclining chair, packed up and headed on our way to our last stop, Poughkeepsie.
My parents just moved to Poughkeepsie which is a small town in upstate NY about 2 hours by train. We hung out with my parents, Ten and my dad watched the football game, we went to a great dinner (the Culinary Institute is located there) and finally got my mom, the dog, Ten and I out of Poughkeepsie and onto home.

So that was my weekend trip to NYC.

I blame the Chinatown bus for ruining my weekend due to lack of sleep I did not get to stay out as late as I planned celebrating with Cambouri and friends. But there will always be a next time and I know better now than to trust my weekend with Chinatown Bus and I hope this is a warning for a future commuters!