Weekend in New York

Hi my friends, I was away for the weekend with Rob, and I thought I’d share with you the places we've been to and the things we did. Please read on and I hope you enjoy the trip too!

We had a long weekend in NY and it felt good to escape from household chores once in awhile, . I’ve been there at least five times, and each time I went there were particular things to do – to tour, to shop, to watch broadway shows or to entertain family and friends. This time, it was to apply for UK visa. For the past 2 years, my husband and I have been planning to visit his dad and relatives in England but for some reasons it keeps getting deferred for another time. This year it is finally coming through. Since I’m not a citizen yet I need a visa to visit England and another one to visit other European countries. The interview was very straightforward, the officer just asked me if this is my first time to visit England, and an hour later, I got the visa!

But of course we didn’t go to NY just for the visa, a lot of things happened in NY minute, . Another thing that Rob and I enjoy doing is EAT OUT (meaning pig-out ), we explored different restaurants in Chinatown, Little Italy and around midtown Manhattan where we stayed. Rob is fascinated with restaurants that are Zagat rated. If you want to know the best restaurants around, just refer to Zagat Survey booklet, this will give you the rating of local restaurants in a certain city based on food, décor, service and cost. So you don’t need the help of the concierge actually for some idea of where to go.

But sometimes we also try restaurants that are suggested by friends. On our first day, we felt like eating chinese so we headed for Chinatown to look for Dimsum Go Go, a resto suggested by a friend. It was out of the way from the subway station and it was quite a long walk to get there. If you’ve been to NY, you'll find the subway a bit confusing to use, at least for me anyway , but I admire my husband for having a very keen sense of direction. I didn’t pay much attention to directions and just followed his lead all the time, so I was like a hawk keeping an eye on him, if not I will get lost in the city . On a weekend, Chinatown is overflowing with tourists and sidewalk vendors, so it was so hard to walk without getting pushed, but then it was worth the walk going to that Dimsum place, the dumplings were great but the soup was superb, its called Duck Soup with Chinese Mushroom and served with Shanghai bread. Afterwards we had desserts in Lo Spuntino in Little Italy. Rob had Bitches Brew, a mocha cappuccino with Baileys and Brandy topped with whipped cream, chocolate syrup and cinnamon, while I had fresh strawberry crepe topped with Pistacchio gelato, they were yummy.

On Sunday, we had breakfast at Brasserie Pigalle, a French resto at the ground level of our hotel Hilton Garden Inn Time Square. Then we heard mass at St.Patrick’s Cathedral and it was a Filipino priest who celebrated the mass. Afterwards we went to NBC Studio to buy some souvenirs, I got a Saturday Night Live tee while Rob got a key ring with his name engraved on it. Then we went back to Little Italy again to have lunch at a Zagat rated Positano Ristorante, their mixed vegetable soup was really good. Then at night we just had light dinner of grilled shrimps, crab cake and salad in Brasserie Pigalle again and capped the night with Margarita and Martini.

But the highlight of my visit was my trip to Serendipity 3, the resto that I’ve been wanting to see to taste their popular Frozen Hot Chocolate. This resto was shown in the movie with the same title top billed by John Cusack and Kate Beckinsale. When I saw Oprah featured this dessert in her show and Rachel Ray had it in her $40 a Day show in Food Network, it became my dream to taste it too. It finally happened on this trip, the place was just tiny but very popular, good thing we came in early so we got a table right away. It is so popular that people didn’t mind queuing a long time to get a table. Rob thought the dessert was overrated, but I thought it was really good, anything chocolate delights my taste buds, , but the lunch we had was just ok, not really great.

We couldn't leave NY without having my favorite sushi, sashimi and tempura, so we went in another Zagat rated Japanese resto called Kodama Japanese Restaurant. The sushi and sashimi were so fresh, the salmon and tuna literally melted in my mouth, oh loved them! Plus the staff were so nice and friendly. For a drink, Rob had his favorite hot sake and I had green tea.

Another highlight of our visit was going to Hard Rock Café NY which just opened in August 2005. In every place we go, part of the trip is to always look for a Hard Rock Café, Rob has been collecting t-shirts from the store, he’s got quite a few from every cities and countries he visited, he got two from Hard Rock Café, Makati Philippines too!

Of course aside from good shops and restaurants, NY is known for broadway shows, so we didnt pass the chance of seeing a broadway show, another favorite thing we do together. We saw Spamalot, the winner of Tony Awards for Best Musical, Featured Actress and Best Director. At first I thought it might be boring because I had something else in my mind to watch actually. I wanted to see Three Days of Rain where my favorite actress Julia Roberts is starring in and of course Paul Rudd of the 'Clueless' and 'Object of My Affection' fame, but the tickets were almost sold-out and the only ones left were premium seats that cost $500+ or $1,000+ for both of us which is very outrageous for our budget. So I just settled for Rob's choice, Spamalot which turned out to be superb, very funny and entertaining, we were laughing the whole time.

So that’s how my weekend went, a lot of pigging out don't you think? , I’m sure we must have gained a couple of pounds again, this is just the downside of vacation , but what the heck, we enjoyed it tremendously anyway, .