Once again, New York

Warning: heavily loaded with pictures :)

I went to NYC during labor day weekend to meet up with my high school classmate and my other 2 friends from college. It's pretty awesome thinking that the four of us came from different countries!

Surprisingly, with all the skyscrapers and glass windows all over the town I could still find a street market!

It's not a surprise that NYC is called the melting pot of the world. The street market festival, running two blocks from 5th Avenue to 7th Avenue, on 52nd Street, is filled with goods and food from multiple cultural backgrounds.

Roasted corn is worth $3. How expensive! Back in U of I I could get 2 cobs for $1. Well, I guess it's another form of "Welcome to New York" sign.

According to my friend, this dish is called dolma. It's a vegetarian dish comprising of rice and pickles inside. I think of it as a sour, mini meatless lo mai kai.

Spices, herbs and tea leaves

Food shaped magnets!

Spanish food

Churros!

Went to a karaoke place called Chorus at Korean Town. Happy hour is $20/h, normal price is $36. They have a good collection of songs :)

(I sang Luka Luka Night Fever while dancing)

In Korean Town there's a bakery called Paris Baguette and without knowing that it's pretty famous, I went there with my friend to grab some cakes.

Despite the name, it's actually a Korean-owned shop, so you'll see some Korean/Asian baked goods here too. They look awesome!

I bought this back to share them with my coworkers. Yum!

Isn't it pretty?

Very simple color combination but it looks very pretty. Very shibui? LOL

This is cute too!

They have small sized cake pieces. Perfect for me!

The strawberry cake is really good!

So does the berry cake

Next to Paris Baguette there's a place called Mandoo Bar. And hey, this is not a drinking bar. It sells mandoo (korean dumplings).

Freshly handmade.

When I saw this sign I thought Miss Korea is a person, but it's actually the name of the restaurant haha

We went in to a Korean cafe/restaurant where you can grab whatever you want and get them reheated in the microwave. Everything is self  service but because of that it's a great place to hang out (they won't chase you out no matter how long you've been sitting there eating a tiny bowl of kimchi fried rice)

The adventure goes on. People who know me should probably know that I'm a foodie. But aside from that I also tend to look out for strange things around.

Bicycle traffic light!? That's new to me!

Cake shaped birthday candle

 

Heavily artificial color loaded birthday cookies. I know it's somehow the trend in US to make giant cookies as a substitute for birthday cake but I still can't get used to the idea of it. A cake has to be.. a cake, not a cookie (to me) haha

Back to food, but it's a weird one. Icelandic yogurt called skyr. It's very thick and concentrated

And what's even newer, it's orange and ginger flavor. It's the first time I've seen this combination of flavors for yogurt!

McD in Chinatown. It's pronounced màidàngláo

I don't know if he's some sort of religious / cult practicioner but he's definitely doing something weird on the streets.

Weird road marks. Are those arrows? Like >> >> >>?

I find this graffiti somehow cute but disturbing..

Food truck is very common. They even have Kimchi Taco Truck!

There are people who decorate their emergency stairways

It's probably the same artist as the one who decorated this building's "wall".

And also, an Art Gallery Truck! So aside from the food trucks they also do art exhibitions on a truck.

And of course, the most stylish way of "homeless man sleeping on the street"

A very odd looking building. It's unique but it's just weird, as if a giant samurai came and slashed the building haphazardly.

The trip was fun. It seems like there is always something to see on every street. It's a very hectic city where people walk really fast you'd think they just received a news from a hospital saying that their relatives are in an accident and they need to immediately rush to the hospital. Aside from the tourists, which are very obvious because they have SLR cameras hanging on their necks, walk leisurely and tend to be pretty cheerful.

New York City, a good place to hang out but not a good place to spend my whole life there.