Everything I know about New York
I’ve just finished watching Dolly Alderton’s absolutely perfect Everything I Know About Love. I could rave about the series forever - especially with it being the perfect antidote to SATC (why didn’t we have these stories when I was young and desperate for relatability?! Manolo Blahniks weren’t exactly in tune with my taste or my wallet.) Anyway...episode seven, where Maggie ends up staying on alone in NYC, made me happily reminisce about my time there in 2005…
New York can seem like a big unfriendly giant on speed to your frightened bunny rabbit touristy presence…but that definitely wasn’t my experience. I was 25 and about to celebrate my 26th birthday in Manhattan. The big city of dreams. And I’d travelled there alone. But I wasn’t alone for long…
My mum always said I somehow made my own luck. I’m not quite sure how I did it, but somehow I always managed to find a friend of a friend of a friend every step of the way. Of course there was no Facebook - I think we emailed, texted and used Friends Reunited (remember that?) to link in. There was even a pay phone attached to a wall at one point assisting me.
In New Zealand I met the lovely Kat, who landed in Australia literally a few days after I did - giving me a ready made best mate for the remainder of my stay in Australia. In Melbourne, Kat and I lived with Karen, Clare and Ben - a young couple from Perth. In Perth I stayed with Clare’s friend Lana who picked me up from the airport and put me up and took me out in between my various trips up the West Coast. I was basically friend hopping when I wasn’t bus hopping and the same happened in New York…there was always a friendly connection waiting to take me to my next destination.
Prior to Australia, when I was staying in Christchurch for a month, I’d moved in with an American girl, Stacey. And when I spontaneously decided to book flights to Australia, the US and Fiji instead of going home to face reality, responsibility and the fact I’d blown a boatload of money, Stacey put me in touch with a couple of her friends in NY. From there, it was like having a great big all-American family waiting for me with open arms, cocktails and saltwater taffy…
I had no idea where I would be staying the first night I got to NY. Stacey’s friend Doug was going to put me up in his apartment on the upper west side for the majority of my stay (so close to Central Park too) and, in return, I would cat sit his two feline friends while he was out of town - I mean, I couldn’t have struck a better deal if I’d tried. However, I knew he wasn’t around the very first night so I called Megan - Stacey’s other friend - from that aforementioned pay phone attached to a wall at the airport.
With Megan’s clear directions of how not to sound like a tourist in a taxi, I was at her place in Midtown pretty sharpish, where she poured me a cocktail before we headed to the Port Authority to catch a bus to Atlantic City with her mate Danny. I was about to stay with Megan’s gorgeous family for her sister’s 21st and hit the casinos. A bunch of us staying in one room - with her mum Maura too. So if NY isn’t friendly, I was clearly delirious because I had never been so well looked after and brought into the fold. I was this quiet British girl watching the Blackjack tables in awe and trying matzo ball soup and saltwater taffy for the first time - all the while being protected by the nicest gang of brand new friends. I was getting to experience all the joys of being a first-time US tourist (OMG - the NY taxis! The Manhattan skyline! The American traffic lights!) as well as hanging out with a bunch of family and friends so welcoming that I’ll Be There For You was stuck on a loop in my very excitable head.
Post Atlantic City things continued in much the same vein. Doug took me out for food then handed me the keys to his apartment with instructions for feeding his two kitties. Megan and Danny, although working as lawyers in the week, arranged to take me on shopping trips or out for pizza or to see the Yankees. When Megan wasn’t around her friend Jasmin stepped in taking me on a girls’ night out with dancing, cocktails, a stripper and a hen do.
During the daytime, if I wasn’t on some movie location bus tour, Megan’s mum Maura met up with me for food and clothes shopping and chatting as if I’d known her forever.
Needless to say, I didn’t need to ask anyone what to do on my birthday night. Megan planned it all - a meal out with some friends for Italian food with birthday cake and presents. I was spoilt rotten.
My stay in NYC ended with Megan and Maura taking me to see the Yankees play in the Bronx and travelling by Subway (which for a naive tourist feels exciting and daunting at the same time - even though we’re used to the Tube and the Metro back at home) and then asking me what I’d like to eat on my last night. Having spent so long in the sunshine in Australia and NZ (which I also loved) I was missing comfort food - so mashed potato and gravy had to be on the menu. Ask and you shall receive…
I don’t know if I was just lucky. But I never once felt alone in NY. Aside from that time I went on the movie locations trip and had my photo taken on the famous orange sofa from Friends - alone. I never bothered framing that pic.
There’s something about that time in life, when you have no responsibility and no set plan, that opens you up to opportunity. You go with the flow and muddle your way through one day at a time. I arrived at JFK with no idea where I was staying that night. And I left with a whole new bunch of mates.
I returned to New York in 2010 when my husband, Chris was performing on Broadway - and it was the perfect chance for a reunion - but this time with added husbands, wives, step kids and parents thrown in. I guess that was a continuation of us all growing our new network of cross-Atlantic friends and family.
Here’s our Sam drinking his first Shirley Temple…
I know from experience that if you look in the right places, NYC is full of fabulous new friends. So while New York might seem big and intimidating, just as Maggie did in Dolly Alderton’s Everything I Know About Love, you only need to meet one kind soul and you’ll soon feel right at home.