One week ago today was my first night at my new family's home! Unfortunately my old host family had some financial troubles and had to let me go, but I luckily found a new family in Hastings, which is a 30 minute train ride from the Big Apple!! I'm working with parents and thei twin boy and girl, 9 and their youngest boy, 5.
The first week went by fairly well, it was kind of odd for me having this feeling of being new but not really and starting again but not so much - very unusual. But I'm settling in nicely.
The town is quiet small and is on the Hudson River (hence the name). It has beautiful views - you can see the Manhattan skyline from here, and across the Hudson is New Jersey. NJ has beautiful cliffs called the palisades. There's some nice family owned stores and restaurants, the only bad thing is I'll have to join a new bank because mine isn't in town :( Its a ten minute walk to the train station, and 5 - 10 to the centre of town/shops etc.
Behind the house is something called the 'Aquaduct'. It runs along the Hudson into New York and use to bring the city its water. Its no longer used for that but instead a track. You could literally walk into New York City. We use it to walk Master 5 to school, which takes about 10 minutes. Its a nice walk, with big trees (bare at the moment) on either side and even though I only walk in the day it is still slightly spooky. After you walk out of our house you can go left or right, and it kind of seems like the decision that Belle's father makes in 'Beauty and the Beast' when he is going to the fair. And his horse wants to go the nice way but Maurice chooses the scary dark way!! Well even though I go the "nice" way, I still worry that any minute I'll be attacked by a wolf, bear, cougar...or the very least a rabid squirrel! But its definitly nice to be walking everyday - forced exercise is always the way to go haha.
I met my new LCC co-ordinator, she is lovely, but I haven't had an LCC meeting yet. It was suppose to be tonight, but wasn't very well organised and so has been post poned until next weekend. Unfortunately, I have already booked bus tickets to go back to Philly to see my old host family for next weekend, so I guess I miss out! Oh well. I have met Alice and Alyssa from Australia (so many A's aaah!) who live in the next town (so about 10 minutes away) and are in my LCC group. I also have Emma, ten minutes away, who is from Tassy and flew over to the US with me in Jan. Another aussie Nicolette who flew over with us, is 30 minutes from me, and Kate from NZ who went to the training school with us is on Long Island. Yay instant friends haha!!
Alice and Alyssa picked me up Friday night for a girls night in of chocolate and boardgames, then tonight I went out to dinner with them and Emma.
Saturday, however, was the big, second trip to NY wooh!! Well technically third I guess, hehe, if you count the trip with the training school. Emma and I walked up part of 5th avenue and I saw 'Prada', 'Louis Vuiton' and a barage of other designer stores. Then, my dream store - World of Disney!!!! YAY! We didn't spend long in there and I didn't get to see everything, but don't you worry I'll be back soon! I want to do the whole 5th ave walk, and actually go into the shops lol Even though I know I can't afford anything (and I'm sure the shop assistants will know that too!) and I will then go back to Disney shop and see everything and spend some money of course!! tsk tsk.
After 5th ave, a quick cut through the bottom of Central Park to Columbus Circle (the south west very bottom corner of the park) to meet up with Kate and some other aupairs. We had some lovely lunch then split ways with the other aupairs and Kate and I decided to do some wandering. We walked through Midtown and bumped into the Flatiron Building, which (once i get some pictures up for you to see) is an amazing sight! We did a bit of shopping, had some dinner, then decided to mozy on over to the Empire State Building!!
It was a bit of a rip to get in, but boy, what a view! Being night, all the lights sort of blurred together and although it was amazingly awesome, I can't wait to get back in the day to be able to look down and tell what building is what and each neighbourhood etc. The Chrysler Building, my favourite architecturally, looked stunning with its lights. I must admit I was scared shitless when we did make it to the top! I am fine with heights on rides (although I do freak a bit with the Giant Drop) and I thought I would be fine, but it was just so so ridiculously high! It took a bit of convincing from Kate, and a lot of bravery from me to actually stand at the edge (it was so well fenced, but still scary) and look down. I had to sit on the ground to be able to look up the top of the building and even thinking about it all now is making me queasy haha. I took some video footage though, so I can splice together a lovely little NY video with that!!
Well off to bed for me - tomorrow is a snow day YAY. so the kids are home from school and it will be my first chance to have my first snow man, snow angels, snow fights etc, because I haven't had those on this trip!!
So I will write more about my adventures another day - and if your reading this try to comment on a blog or two!
xxx
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment