As soon as you leave the subway, it is quite dirty and everywhere is rubbish. Reminds a bit of the border districts of Berlin – Neukölln or – Kreuzberg. Dirty, but with charm. But hardly a few meters further to Chinatown, nobody hears or reads a single English word any longer.
Exactly the way I always feel in Wedding: Kepap stand next to Kepap stand and even the supermarket is turkish. At every corner, you are gazed at, and greeted with kind words, as a blond woman. The prices are surprisingly cheap and so you get for the price of a kebab, a generous meal for barely 10 dollars.
We decided on soup: fast, tasty, good. The share of Asians was at least as high as the Schwaben share in Prenzelberg. The shopping experience reminded me then a bit more to the Berlin Wall Park: many small booths, which are nevertheless selling all the same anyway. But it’s also Fun and for some souvenirs you always give away some money. But stop; let’s start with our subway ride! To spend our money on meaningful things, we decided to take the subway to Chinatown. Since Berlin also has a very good infrastructure, we thought: That cannot be so difficult in NYC!
After about 15 minutes’ walk we had found the station and got our own metro map. “Blacking” is not possible in New York, because you only come with a valid ticket through the monitored barrier. One ride: 2.80 dollars, just as expensive as in Berlin. The metro card can be refilled with any amount of cash at any time.
But I have to say, the subway is quite badly signposted, nowhere is information and a competent employee has directed us in the completely wrong way. We traveled once around in one direction only with a train. Unfortunately arrived exactly where we were also entered the subway. But never give up! And so we tryed again.
Me, as the only blond woman and Fashion Franky, as the only tall man, already gave an amusing picture in Chinatown. But even if I was taller than most people with my 1.58 (and flat shoes!),
Then you can imagine how huge Franky must have looked to the Asians.
As you can see in the pictures, the prices were much smaller than in Manhattan. For fruit you are paying about a third. But also meat and fish are offered much cheaper. Unfortunately, yesterday we had a somewhat unfavorable day, because the Asians celebrated their New Year’s feast. Therefore, not only most shops were closed but the streets were also in the exceptional look. Everywhere garbage, confetti and tinsel, as far as you could peek. So after 1-2 hours we went back to Midtown and ended the evening there. Next week we will definitely go to Chinatown again. Not only because of the shops, but also to get us our weekly grocery shopping!
