Thanks to Jenna M. from Provo, Utah for this week’s topic:
There are people here from every non-North Korea country in the world. So tell us about the city, state, or country where you live or grew up. What are some things we might not know? What are the best and worst things about it? Common misconceptions? What should a visitor do that they won’t learn about in guidebooks?
Tim’s Answer: I’ve lived in New York for the last five years. It’s the best and the worst ever. I’ll save general New York thoughts for a future post, but some advice to visitors:
- It’s a great walking city. If the weather’s decent, a good day plan is to just start walking in no particular direction and to go slowly and notice details. There are so many details in New York—it’s like a concentrated 300-year collage made by humans from every possible country and culture. In Manhattan, it’s hard to find one block without something interesting on it.
- For longer trips or bad weather, get a metro card and subway map and just figure it out, you’ll save like $150. Plus something weird happens on 20% of the rides.
- If you want to make a little field trip, go to the pizza restaurant Di Fara in Midwood, Brooklyn. The same guy has been making pizzas there for 40 years—he’s the Jiro of pizza. Of course, they’re outrageously good. Here’s one I got last year and the dude making it.
- If it’s your first time, know that there’s nothing at all dangerous or scary about New York. If you walk around a not-great neighborhood at 2am alone, something bad could happen, which is true of every city in the world. But in my experience, it’s a completely safe city.
- Times Square is a hilarious cartoon-version of New York. It has nothing to do with the actual city.
- Realize that when your friend’s apartment is the size of your fingernail, it’s not because they’ve fallen on bad times.
You can sign up for the Dinner Table email list here to be notified about the new topic each week, and remember to submit future topic suggestions to [email protected].
