New York, NY

I went to New York City for a workshop with the agency that I hope to volunteer with: ICEHA (International Centre for Equal Healthcare Access). For those of you who do not know, I am hoping to volunteer in Africa this year with a healthcare professional mentoring program that assists with AIDS education/treatment. I was introduced to this program by a colleague who also spoke at this workshop.
Martin addressing the workshop group

This workshop was a prerequisite prior to the next step of pairing me up with a country/program match.

I arrived in New York City for the third time in my life. I was fortunate to find a downtown reasonable-priced hotel....with the caveat that I share a bathroom with the other hotel guests. This hotel had character! It was like a neglected grand dame sitting among a party of social inferiors. After I checked in I was happy to find an old-fashioned elevator equipped with a metal sliding door, and, what I thought was a doorman. An elderly man was in the elevator when it arrived at my floor. Right away he said "Welcome to Hotel 31" and proceeded to grab my suitcase and asked for my roomkey. As we rode the elevator up I took a good look at him. He was wearing a pair of worn slippers and an old wool vest. Now, I know I may be Canadian, but I wasn't born yesterday. As he showed me my closet-sized room and pointed to the bathroom down the hall, it became apparent that he was a resident of this building looking for a little extra cash...my inauguration to NYC began.

Hotel Elevator

My hotel was in walking distance to so many attractions. Every morning and night I would walk past the Empire State Building.

I discovered the way to avoid lineups was to do all the touristy things late at night. Below is the lineup to go up the Empire State building at 10:30pm.

And this is the view from up top (with me gripping the side of the building as I point and shoot the camera in a random fashion).

I LOVED New York City at nighttime (and hated its dismal, dirty appearance in the daytime). I wandered through Broadway and Times Square on a Friday night and this city was ALIVE!

However, it was annoying to see an army recruitment station set up right in the middle of Times Square (desperate times means desperate measures)

As I meandered around the city I noticed some neat items such as this elevator parking lot...

......this underground conveyer belt (underground shipping area??)

....this gold-leafed building ediface.

.....the sheer number of Orthodox Jews.

....the BLADE RUNNER style subway plasma TV screen.

.....plasma TV screens inside every Taxi Cab.

Overall I had a great experience and I'd love to return again someday as I barely scratched the surface.