If you really want to experience an area, you have to live like a local. New York is a pretty tourist-y place, and I can guarantee you that the tourist areas are often wastes of time and money. If you truly want to experience the true side of New York, find those hidden gem restaurants. Shop at the local fashion districts. Climb up onto a roof and bask in the lights of New York’s skyline. Live like a real New-Yorker.
I love my Chinatown.
I really mean it when I say this. Chinatown is a place that only very lucky cities have. For those who don’t know what I’m talking about, the New York Chinatown is a densely populated neighborhood, filled with a variety of foods stalls, shops, and bubble tea cafes. At first visit, Chinatown might be unsettling to you. The streets are always crowded, the area is very loud and sometimes, it doesn’t smell like a bouquet of roses. But once you look past that, Chinatown is truly an otherworldly place. I seriously don’t feel like I’m in New York anymore when I enter Chinatown. Usually, I go to Chinatown to eat whatever they have to offer. Usually, my family and I go for hotpot, spicy soup or Szechuan cuisine. Either way, we always go home with filled bellies and me fanning my mouth from the spice of some of the certain dishes. To cool down, I usually drink bubble tea too, which is slowly becoming one of my favorite drinks. At first, I thought it was really weird. Why drink and chew something at the same time? But gradually, I learned that bubble tea is an acquired taste for some, and I started to like it more and more. With our drinks, we will often walk around, either around the street, observing the foods being sold and the things up for sale, or we’ll go to a mall and window shop. Often though, we pick up fruits from Chinese groceries, as their fruits are really cheap and of good quality. After the day is done, we end up home, usually skipping dinner because Chinese food is that filling.
Sometimes, stuff in life happens, and although it might be bad at first, it’s really funny afterward. For example, in the image above, my father and I have just taken out the GPS box built into our car. At first, we were a bit worried as to if we broke the thing, or if the GPS was going to ever be fixed. However, the absurdity of it all was quite humorous and both of us laughed at the fact that we had actually deconstructed our car. In the end, though, things worked out really well. After cleaning the circuits and intricate gears of the GPS, when we put it back in its place, the GPS started working again! It was a bit of a shock and both of us laughed again. Things find their own amazing way of fixing themselves, and DIY-ing the GPS repair saved us around 3,000 dollars.
Sometimes, your instinct will just tell you to do something. Like an idea will pop into your head, and your brain will just force you to follow it. In your intuition, you know that this idea just feels right. This phenomenon happened to me on the day this photo was taken, where I dyed my hair four different colors. Yep, four colors. Cyan, Blue, Hot Pink, and Magenta. It sounded crazy at first, and the more “logical” side of my brain completely rejected the idea of me going through with this style, but the other part of me was just nagging me to do it. So, I succumbed to the latter and decided to have my hair cut short and dyed. It was daring for me to pull off crazy hairstyles like this, but it gave me a rush of adrenaline and the sort of chill that I liked. In the end, it worked out really well. I was incredibly pleased with the vibrancy of the colors, and how none of them damaged my hair. For a while, my hair was a reminder to do more daring things and trust my instincts.