Our first day in New York City!! We headed out this morning to explore, get our bearings a bit and start getting a better handle on the city. High on my priority list was finding a battery charger for my camera so I could take pictures like I was oh-so-excited to. We checked around a couple of places near our hotel (legit places like Radio Shack) but I ended up getting a “forty dollar” charger from a sketchy little electronics shop for “only” twenty-five dollars. Probably not worth that much, but I needed it, so it was. We made our way to the nearest subway station and bought Metrocards for the week ($29 for 7 days of unlimited subway and bus rides- a fantastic deal) and started trying to learn the subway system. We figured out enough to get us to the Times Square stop and came out of the subway in an entirely different world. Suddenly, we were in New York. Like, the stereotypical skyscrapers-and-a-million-people New York. The first building was The New York Times. Like…THE New York Times. We walked around half-stunned for a while, almost unable to believe that we were actually here. Actually in New York City. Everything was so loud, so busy, so crowded, so shiny, so…everything!

We walked a couple blocks, trying to let everything start to sink in, the smells of all the food carts, the enormity of the buildings, how to dodge a hundred people walking at you, the sounds of cars, buses, subways, all of the sensory overload all at once. But then, we hit Times Square. Two observations about Times Square: 1) It’s not a square. 2) It’s really really reallllllly bright. But really, Times Square was mind blowing. A gajillion lights and signs and people and stores and things happening all at the same time. We stood and stared and tried not to get run over as we started trying to take it all in. So insane.

Our hope for tonight was to watch Book of Mormon and Audrey, champion of all things musical, knew the only way to get tickets was going to be through the lottery held before the show. We showed up…along with about 300 other people, all hoping to get the 22 tickets that were available. Unsurprisingly, we didn’t end up getting tickets, but we had a lot of fun starting to get a feel for the process and people who we’d be involved with for the rest of the week as we try to get affordable Broadway tickets.

After the lotto, we headed out for lunch. We were going to check out a place that Stephanie recommended, but ended up at The Counter, a custom burger place right across the street. It was there that I ate the best burger of my entire life. Everything about the burger is your choice, the meat, cheese, toppings, even the bun. I had a beef burger with brie cheese, dried cranberries, green chile, grilled pineapple, and apricot sauce all on a honey wheat bun. Absolutely amazing. My mouth was very very confused but also incredibly happy.

Very full and content, we hopped back on the subway and headed towards SoHo and Greenwich Village. We wandered through quite streets with lots of little shops and cafes. We saw NYU and an arch that I’m pretty sure belongs in France somewhere, not a little park by NYU. While we were in the park, it started snowing! Nothing tremendous, just enough to remind us that we were DEFINITELY not in Houston and further separating this “New York wonderland” from our regular life.

Audrey has a friend from high school at NYU, Nick, who we met up with for the afternoon. He walked us around the area and down to Chinatown where we got Boba (my favorite). We had a nice time chatting and hanging out in his apartment, getting out of the cold, and he and Audrey got to catch up a bit too.

We left Nick’s headed back to Times Square, what I suspect will be our most frequented location this week since it’s central and right by all of the Broadway theaters that we’ll be running between. We waited in a relatively short line and got tickets to see Porgy & Bess, a Broadway musical that Audrey was soooo excited about. $37 dollars for fourth row orchestra seats. A good start to the week!! Apparently, being a student, willing to wait in lines, and okay with gambling whether you get a ticket or not is going to work in our advantage for getting cheap/awesome tickets. I’m excited.

With two hours left before the show, we decided to keep wandering the area. We made our way to Rockefeller Center: building, stores, lit trees, and a hundred national flags surrounding an ice rink, statue, and fountain. I’m sure it’s even more impressive with the famous Christmas tree up, but it was beautiful anyway.

From there, we decided to try out one of the Halal carts dotting the sidewalk. (Halal food is some sort of Mediterranean/Middle Eastern food that we saw a million times today and that came highly recommended). We headed towards the one that we’d heard the most about and were greeted with a long (but fast-moving) line and, eventually, a humongous/delicious pile of lamb, rice, salad, pita bread, and a mysterious “white sauce.” I approve.

Finally, it was time for my first Broadway show! We made our way back to the theater and found our seats, right in front of the stage. Porgy & Bessis the story of a woman from a questionable background and a cripple who she falls in love with, all the time wrestling with the horror of her ex-husband. It starred Audra McDonald and Norm Lewis, both amazing actors/vocalists. Audrey loved every minute of it, but it took me a little while longer to warm up to it. I was not super engaged for the first act, but the acting in the second completely blew me away. Leaving the theater, I was completely blown away by the quality and the power with which Audra McDonald, especially, played their part.

After the show, we stage doored- basically, you go and wait for the actors to come out after they get out of costume and then you get to meet them, take pictures, they sign your Playbill, all that jazz. The first time Audrey told me that was normal, back when I saw my first show in December, I thought she was insane. But turns out that, as normal, she was right and it’s a ton of fun.  It’s really cool to meet the people you just saw on stage, tell them what you loved, etc. Audra McDonald is actually pretty famous and she’s the person that Audrey was most looking forward to meeting probably out of the entire week. We even got to take pictures with her. Audrey just grinned ear-to-ear the entire way back. Definitely a great start to the week.

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