“The great thing about New York is that if you sit in one place long enough, the whole world comes to you.”
― Brandon Stanton, Humans of New York: Stories
Society has made turning 21 into a sparkling mirage. I personally had no need for the parties, presents or prosecco. Birthdays now last for the month leading up to and after, not for me. I hate being the centre of attention in all situations, I must take after my mother who was mortified when we sung happy birthday at her 50th birthday party in front of 70+ people. So..when I got around to my 21st year on earth, I wasn’t sure on how to celebrate. My mum, as all mums do.. had the answer.
My gift from my parents being a considerable amount of money, I was given instructions for it to be put towards a flight ticket. Now still being young and at the start of my career, I hardly had the funds for two weeks all inclusive in the Maldives. I pondered..and then I got it. I was buying a ticket to the mecca that was New York City. I had been before, but only for a few days on a whistle stop east coast tour. Now I was facing a whole week in the Big Apple. I was able to stay with some relatives in Williamsburg, Brooklyn in their penthouse apartment. Being my grandmother’s (who has been gone for 20 years now) cousin, I had never spent a lot of time with these relatives. They opened their home to me, provided dinner on numerous occasions..not forgetting inviting me to a gala..the address for this being Number 4 Times Square. Really once in a lifetime experiences, and I will be forever grateful to them for their hospitality.
Now I am not going to list my many adventures that I had in this week in the big city…I would love to but it would be very boring. I am pondering today on the acts of kindness and politeness I have witnessed while in New York. The city can sometimes be considered to be big and brash, but the humans of New York are like no other people I have met.
The first time I went to New York with my parents, there was one experience that sounds out to me more than any other which we all still talk about today. I believe we were near Newark Airport and wanting to get back to Manhattan. We must have had the usual British tourist look about us, standing there with our map, looking around for signs to point us in the right direction. While we stood there in our confusion, a man approached us. He was a tramp, he was huge, in both directions. Big, terrifying, tall with arms as thick as tree trunks, he didn’t give one the air of someone to approach and ask for directions. Now I was only 16 at the time, I was ignorant and judgemental and I hold my hands up that I did judge this man before I gave him a chance.
‘Where you folks goin’?’
Now my mum, anyone who knows her will agree that she doesn’t have a judgmental bone in her body. She turned around to him and said ‘oh yes, thank you, we are trying to get to Manhattan, which train do we need to get on?’ We were told to follow him.
Mum keeping up with him, which was no mean feet as he was so tall and one of his strides was two of hers, me and Dad followed on behind. I remember looking at him, and he looking at me, we were both thinking ‘that’s it, we are going to be kidnapped and taken hostage, what is she doing?!?!’ If Mum hadn’t have been doing such a good job of keeping up with him, we would have run in the opposite direction. But she was steaming on ahead, so we had no choice. The only silver lining was that we would be together.
We could not have been more wrong, he was nothing but kind, polite and respectful. He took us to the ticket machine on the platform, pressed some buttons and told us it will be $15. As Dad took out his wallet (one thing I had been extremely nervous about) the tramp stood so far back from the machine to show that he had no intentions of swiping it. The transaction was done. Dad gave him a couple of dollars for his trouble and he said:
‘You want that side, it’ll be 3 minutes’
As we said goodbye and he was off on his way, the relief swept over me. This taught me a valuable lesson. I have always used the phrase ‘don’t judge a book by it’s cover’ which I thought I had been good at living my life by. But this really did hit home for me what assumptions can be made by someone’s appearance..and how wrong I was.
On my more recent trip to NYC, as it drew to a close, we thought we should get a gift for my relatives who had housed us for the week. We decided that some flowers would be a nice gesture. We googled while we were in Starbucks, looking for a reasonable but quality florist that would be able to make us a bunch of flowers to take back to Brooklyn. We found Starbright Floral Design, 140 West 26th Street. We entered and told the girl on the desk what we wanted and that we wanted to spend about $40, she left to make up the bouquet. She came back from time to time to check we liked what she was doing. It looked great and we were very pleased. It came to pay and I took out my purse. Being our last day we were keen to use our change, so there was a moment of confusion before I approached the desk with the correct money. We still aren’t sure if this was just a random act of kindness or she thought we didn’t have the money to pay the full amount, but she turned to me and said:
‘Just give me twen’y’
I stammered and was caught off guard so I pushed the $40 into her hands, but she rung it through and gave me twenty back. We were amazed. That someone who uses their hands and craft to make a product to sell, was able to give us half our money back. The amount of flowers in the bouquet must have totalled more than twenty bucks, so she wasn’t earning anything for her time. Again another lesson for me, that selfishness doesn’t make the world go round, selflessness does.
The generosity, respect and kindness I have been shown on both trips, not just from my own family, is really was like another world. In London everyone goes from A to B, no one acknowledges anyone else. We are invisible to one another and what we have to say is more important than what anyone else can contribute.
If you see someone lost in your local city or town, ask them if you can help. Ask if they need any guidance. I was asked numerous times while in New York if they could point me in the right direction. I remember looking for the Guggenheim, and a lady in her 60s gave me directions, despite me not openly asking for them. I have a feeling she was impressed that someone of my age was looking for a museum, instead of where Sarah Jessica Parker lives!
We could learn a lot from the people of New York.
travel is good for the soul 