My trip to NewYork

The irony continues.... My 2nd post too is going to be written by someone else .. But this time here is some part of me cause basically its a copy of an email that i wrote for Amjad (my office colleague) so here it goes:

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DISCLAIMER: This email is a joint production of Sameer Durrani and Ali Bhai Associates. The use of this email in boring meetings is hereby authorized and encouraged. The email may be too long to read in one go; take your time. If you don't finish reading it, somebody will get hurt. Read on.

Bhai,

I think this email will prove that we're alive; of course, this could be an email that my laptop was programmed to send. Maybe, I'm an other-worldly creature now :-(.. Perhaps .. Rather.. Figuratively…. :)

The combination of late working hours and inherent laziness has kept me from writing any emails. I can also vouch for Sumeer (Ali.. Why are you spelling me wrong) being very tired by the time he goes back to his hotel. It also doesn't help that to access the internet, we've to leave our seats and go up 3 floors. I'll endeavour to do better, but I won't promise anything :-)

Yup NY was fun for the most part; we did have an unpleasant encounter with New York's finest. All of our other problems stemmed from inadequate planning.Google map was the main tool that planned our whole trip.. It helped us plan the most of our trip as it not only gives the map diagram but also the directions.. The start of the trip wasn't auspicious (Ali.. How do you find such difficult words)..(Sameer.Shut up and let me write) either; we were lost after driving for 5 minutes.We left for New York from our hotel and after 15 minutes found ourselves at the hotel again.. I used to think that the Americans are better road designers than Canadians; I'm not sure of that anymore. The only interesting thing during the road trip were some deer that we saw standing in the woods.(Shit I only saw the dead ones…on the way back. Ali. You could have woken me up at that time). The route that we chose winds through Pennsylvania which was really hilly and lovely. The terrain isn't anything special by our standards, but it was still a welcome relief from endless plains. Anyway, after being on the road for over 12 hours, we were within 20 minutes of New York. Anticipating that New York would be really expensive, we had decided to stay in New Jersey which is the closest state to NewYork and is much cheaper. However, we hadn't picked a hotel; so we wandered for nearly an hour in search of a hotel. The town where we began our search was a rather sleepy place with no hotels. It looked more like an area of G-8 Islamabad as the roads were narrow and the cars were all parked outside the houses at night. After asking many people for directions, we finally entered the TownHouse hotel; it was good for sleeping, but not for much else. It was a seedy hotel where we saw many couples (please take the word couple in its truest sense.. Ali bhai is not being figurative here.. Perhaps..) coming to stay for the night without any luggage.. :) Perhaps they were not really travelling.. There was a good SPECIAL channel among the TV channel list but we could not find its proper timings till end .. :) Anyways, We ended up calling the hotel as the 'love hotel'.

The next day was black Friday: The biggest sale in America is held that day and it is a great day for bargain hunting. Of course, we weren't the only people who knew that. People were like waiting for the stores to open since morning.. Near 4 am.. They really stampede in the stores in the form of big masses when the stores opens.. Some of them had been waiting outside the shopping store since night.. We could not do any such thing as we slept very late at night. We woke up in morning near 9:30 got ready and reached the nearest shopping mall.. It was extremely difficult to find a parking spot in the closest mall. Sumeer bought a very good jacket for $40. The normal price was $80. The others bought a digital camera each with accessories..Sameer was trying to find a wireless headphone for you.. (I have already told him this morning ) but he didn’t get any.. I didn’t buy anything at all because I don’t have much cash (Perhaps Ali bhai has not even applied for the travel advance yet… hehehe) ..(Offcourse I have.. .....the damned F&A people are not replying to my emails) ..Sameer (see I spell it right when I write my name) also bought a jeans . The lady at the shop asked her if he wants to have something for the top..For some reasons she thought Sameer is deaf and showed him some sign language that could have a lot of many other meanings ..She later told him her name and asked his too.. But unfortuanetly the story ended there… :(
(See.. I am still attractive even with my big tummy ) .On our way back to the "love hotel", we were lost again..

We then stayed at the hotel for a while cause the whole shopping time was very very tiring. After resting at the hotel for nearly 2-3 hours, we decided to drive through New York. Parking wasn't an option and we just wanted to compete a circuit of the "burra sayb" (NewYork is also called Big Apple). If all had gone according to plan, we would have reached Times Square..The trip started out well enough, but we drove through Lincoln tunnel instead of taking the George Washington bridge to New York... When we were near Times Square, the small street signs of New York , the sight of bright shop lights and the attractive faces of the mulitcultural denizens of new york (oh bhai ..oh bhai.. Hum nay koi larkiyan to naheen dakhein) (Acha.. You can say that for you) and our mapless confused brains combined to make us lose our way again. We kept roaming around the area in search of the Times Square .. Neither did we get to the Times Square , nor were we able to have a glimpse of the statue of liberty... But that roaming around was not event less.. Cause while driving on Canal Street to get back to W 42 Street(thanks to some directions given by an indian cab driver) , the part of our car next to the front right wheel was scraped by a big SUV passing by . we got out to inspect the damage and found a big dent. The other vehicle had no traces of any damage at all..It was a truck after all.. :( ..The driver accused us of hitting his car. Hamid, who had been driving all the time, told him that we were in our lane (and yes we were I saw it myself that we were on our lane when he hit us), and there would have been no accident if he hadn't tried to overtake us. He was in a hurry and wanted to part ways after exchanging insurance provider information. Hamid called the rental agency to inquire about the whole procedure ; they told him to inform the police. The police arrived after an interminable wait. There were two cops in the patrol car. A short height one who was very rude and a taller bald guy who was kind of polite.. The taller one inspected Hamid's license and informed him that the license was valid, but a AAA license was a requirement if he planned to stay in the USA for a long time. Then they wrote down our names and descriptions, inspected both vehicles, and questioned both drivers. Then they went back to their patrol car. After some time, after some stupid thinking , they came out and told everyone except Hamid to go inside our cars. The shorter cop now started hassling Hamid. Upon hearing him shouting at Hamid, Sumeer came out of the car, but the cop rudely ordered him to stay inside the car (Yeah.. He gave a stare to me and said "Stay in the car"). The rude cop didn't think that Hamid's license was valid in New York; he said, "it might be valid in the States, but that isn't so in New York. You've to use a AAA international license. Car rental agencies are greedy and don't check driver credentials". He fined Hamid $90 for the offense of driving a vehicle without a license. He also told him to get a AAA license asap. He said, "you don't have to pay the fine. When you come back to the USA, and get another ticket, the police will note that you've an unpaid fine from your previous visit. Then you'll be thrown in jail".

After this unexpected encounter with New York's rudest, we only wanted to go back to the hotel. As is our wont, we were lost in New York. Trying to take any bridge leading away from Manhattan, we took the Brooklyn bridge, and ended up in:

BROOKLYN

We asked assorted shopkeepers for directions. Sumeer asked a tattooist for directions(yeah!! And I felt very much like getting a tattoo on my body too). We even asked a chinese man who didn't speak any English. Finally, we managed to locate E 42 Street, but found it to be a one way going in the wrong direction. Wandering around, we caught our first lucky break and saw a sign leading to Lincoln tunnel: we had used the same tunnel to enter New York. Everything was going right on the way back to the hotel; Hamid was staying on the right side of the road to ensure that we didn't miss any exits. We didn’t miss the exit; we just took the one we were not supposed to take.. :) …so we started again from the lincoln tunnel to our hotel… missed the route again.. Travelled from lincoln tunnel to our hotel again.. Finally reached close to our hotel, saw its lights and the board, shouted with happiness and took the right lane which took us somewhere else..we got lost..after a whole we found ourself again travelling from the lincoln tunnel to the hotel… this time we took extreme precautions... Our clueless band finally reached the "love hotel" around 2 am on Saturday.

( Ali..I don’t think Amjad will be reading it anymore..you have dragged it too much)

We woke up the next day and located nearby public transport. Decisions of taking a public transport was made because of the event we had the day before and the fact that you don’t get any parking in NY.. So we found that NJ Transit bus 161 was our ticket to New York.It was very near to our hotel.. We were at its stop by 1040. The scheduled stop was at 1046, but the bus turned up at 1112. We reached New York in some 30 minutes…We met an old friend of Hamid there in New York; the poor guy had been waiting for us since 0800. He'd come from Vermont which is 5 hours from New York. He led us on an abbreviated but fun tour of ManHattan, New York. We ate Knish, a potato based snack famous in that area, walked to Times Square, used our recently bought cameras to snap pictures, gave up on reaching Empire State's top as the queue ,they said ,was 2 hour long, gaped (what is this word???) in the Grand Central Terminal (the largest train station in New York), and rode a surprisingly smooth and fast elevator to the top of Rockefeller center. We travelled from 2nd floor to top in some 45 seconds... This 68+ storey structure was made by the family of John Davison Rockefeller: a filthy rich industrialist and philanthropist . He was born in 1839 .. Died in 1937....(Ali bhai.. Stop giving the history of the place.. Just continue with the adventure). The view from the top is great. You can see most of Manhattan (yeah.. But we were not able to see the Statue of puberty.. Opps I mean liberty)... Of course, more photographs were snapped.. (Oh.. You know what.. I was even able to take a pic of the WTC towers.. My strong psychic powers made me see them and I also took a picture of them). Then we made our way to Times Square: the heart of New York's theatre district. Sumeer bought T-shirts and Caps from there. Sumeer (why are you misspeeling my name.. :( ..Alu bhai) also had his photo taken with a human version of the Statue of Liberty. Sumeer felt that his heart had been cleansed of any ill will towards the big sayb. After grabbing dinner from a Japanese fast food place, we left New York to collect our car and luggage from the "love shack".

We left the "love shack" at 2045 after noting all the sizable towns along our way back; thanks to Google Map, we had planned to stay at the Holdiay Inn in Clearfield: a town in Pennsylvania. After stops for coffee, it was around 0200 and we were nearly 1 hour from ClearField when Hamid felt that he couldn't go on. We located the nearest hotel; luckily, this was a decent place. Not only was this hotel better in every way than the "love shack", it was much cheaper too . Sumeer's search for educational TV dealing with human zoology was unsuccessful there as well (Acha..and what about your search for James bond movies???? Atleast you were successful) . Unfortunately for him, ShowTime started educational programmes after he went to sleep.

After Sumeer and I had breakfast, we resumed our journey to Detroit. Imran and Hamid ordered egg burgers at McDonald's which had bacon strips melded with the egg (they were not melded.. They were just placed there.. We could have consumed that egg burger by simply removing the bacon from it.. There was no point in throwing it away).. Sumeer and I stuck to egg and beef which was good and free of pork. We later had lunch at Burger King; almost all of us had the spicy fish burger. We continued our journey back.. Near Detroit , we stopped at a store for a break.. Where we had some biscuits , jiuce and Salsa..(Ali.. I hate salsa..i told you even that day.. I have even mentioned that on my blog) Salsa is really tasty; Sumeer is a philistine..Near southfield, We took the wrong exit when we were less than 10 minutes from our hotel, but managed to reach it shortly thereafter. This ends the saga of our odyssey from Motown (its another name from Detroit; Detroit is also called MotorTown or MoTown) to New York. The journey was perilous; there were ogres and fair lasses but no damsels in distress (Ali , can you close your dictionary for a while..).(oh but there was a damsel who asked me to buy a shirt).. We offer some advice to the prospective traveller:

1) Never leave without street maps of the area you're going to
2) Never leave without deciding where you'll be staying; you should have more than one place in mind
3) Choose your companions wisely: there should be more than one driver with a valid license. We'd only one driver: Hamid. Sumeer might have been fine, but we were unsure of the validity of our licenses. (What the hell.. I have a proper valid AAA license.. It was not MY license that we had doubt on..It was your expired canadian license that we were unsure of.. In my case, its just that I drive too slow and am not very familiar with these Automatic cars)

Now, of course, it is back to the daily grind; we miss our band in the abode of the pure (He means to say that he misses all the friends back in Pakistan). Even though the employees of DCFS who are working with us are helpful and friendly, our time at work is filled with boredom interspersed with tedious work. The food at the cafeteria (we have our office cafeteria , its called Corporate Cafeteria) is good enough if the price is considered; salad and fruits are available too. At the hotel, we eat together at night ; the usual eating/ gathering spot is Imran's room. Sumeer isn't staying with the rest of the team from Pakistan. His hotel, Embassy Suites, is across the road. I'm staying at the SpringHill Suites of Marriott; the rooms are big and well-appointed (but my hotel rooms are bigger.. And it’s beautiful.. It is taller.. It has 9 floors and Ali bhai 's hotel has only 3 floors.. What else.. My suit is like 2 rooms .. His room is like a big room that may look like two room but which IS NOT two rooms.. In short my hotel is GREAT..It has so much space there.its great.. I feel like I am in America..In his hotel I feel like I am in some Peshawar moore hotel.). (Oh khudaya.. Oh khudaya!! I say keh hamaray hotel ki quality behtar hay) There are a lot of restaurants nearby: ..we frequent Burger King, Thai Peppers, and Aladdin: a Bengali restaurant. I've paid one visit to a Pakistani/Indian restaurant: Tuwaa. Sumeer could tell you more. (I cant .. Its already been too much )

We hope that your days are more interesting, and that you'll survive reading this email.

Hoping to read your missive soon,
Ali





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From: Durrani, Sameer Shaida
Sent: 29 November 2006 09:10
To: Khan, Amjad Muhammad
Cc: Khattak, Mohammad Ali khan
Subject: RE: Mar Gaye ho Kya

As if you are always on line..

I come online nearly daily mostly in morning (that is my night) .. Near 8 -10 am of your time.. Depending on how soon I reach my hotel and how late I go to sleep … YOU ARE NEVER EVER EVER ONLINE… and that’s not all.. YOU ARE NEITHER ON YOUR SEAT EVER..

Even yesterday I asked Fouzan to call you to come online ..He did ..you were not on your seat.. :(

Yeah…we went to NY…It was great.. It was fun.. There is so much to tell but so little time .. I am very tired since that trip and am not feeling well..cause of continuos cough…upper say mera calling card bhi khuttam ho gaya hay…

Now I am about to sleep…as I am not well..and I don’t want to spend another day in office in sleepy state..

Wish me luck..and health..

And hey you!!!!1 how is DT going…how is life on your side…how are you spending your khaaney ka time.. Missing us??
And how many new movies… Kindly make an excel sheet and start sending me your daily status.. :)

Take care man.. I had never imagined that I will be missing any people once I will go abroad… America is great..no doubt.. But I honestly miss the few friends I have over there in Pakistan.

And about that talkative burki… Amjad!!!! .. You Just stay away from him.. :)

And for God sake start coming online in morning…i.e the moment you turn on your laptop when you reach office.

-Sleepy Sam

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From: Khan, Amjad Muhammad
Sent: Tuesday, November 28, 2006 5:15 PM
To: Durrani, Sameer Shaida
Cc: Khattak, Mohammad Ali khan
Subject: Mar Gaye ho Kya

Bhayoon,
Long time no Hello hi,
Ahere r u guys,
Today Usman told me that u went to NYCity,
Hope u enjoyed the trip,
I was also busy in the last week,
I attended the Mehndi, Shadi and Waleema of Ammad.
TC

Regards,
Amjad Muhammad Khan,