My excitement didn’t let me get a good night’s sleep before I started my journey. Not knowing what being jet-lagged is like, I read whatever I could to make sure I avoided it and made the most of my limited time in NYC. Claude suggested that I don’t sleep on the plane, so I didn’t. Waiting in the passport control line for close to 3 hours didn’t make things easier for me.

I left JFK and took the AirTrain to Jamaica, Queens. I had that “okay, I’m in New York” feeling the minute I stepped outside the station in Jamaica and smelled weed in the air and heard people arguing loudly. The typical New York image for me was always “gritty”, so that’s what I expected.

I called an Uber to get to the place I was staying in the Bronx. The car had a taxi partition. I don’t think I ever rode in a taxi with a partition before, so that was also new to me.

My face was glued to the window the whole ride. I had a huge smile on my face. I wasn’t even seeing the impressive side of the city, but I loved what I saw.

I snapped this photo towards the Bronx end of the Whitestone Bridge.

I reached the place I was staying shortly after and went straight to the bed. It was around 1 AM.