NYC

Me and the twenty-five other people lucky enough to go on this trip met at Bob Jones at 5:00 in the morning. Painfully early for summer vacation, but for New York, sleep seems like an easy sacrifice. We all piled on the bus, and drove for Atlanta. It was a four hour drive, and crazily enough Emily and I (we sat next to each other) talked the entire way down there, just about anything and everything we could think of. We stopped once for a bathroom break, and that was about the extent of the bus trip. We got onto our plane no problem and took off. Two hours later (in which Laura and I talked the whole time (you can see that there's already a lack of sleep thing starting)) we landed in Newark, New Jersey. Excitement was extremely high as we found our luggage, met our tour guide and hopped onto the tour bus. We drove for about twenty minutes and then the city came into view. I was ecstatic to just be looking at it, let alone actually getting to spend a whole week there. We drove through the city, and everyone (including myself) was snapping pictures right and left of this building and that building (this was still in our 'we're in New York so we're gonna take a picture of EVERYTHING' phase). We pulled up in front of our hotel (Comfort Inn and Suites) got off the bus, took our luggage up to our rooms, 'freshened up,' met our roommates (I was rooming with Gray West, Teddy Wong, and Richard Smith), and decided sleeping situations. Gray and Richard shared one bed, and Teddy and I were supposed to share the other, but I chose to sleep on the floor instead. We left the hotel after half an hour and walked to Grand Central Station for dinner. They have a massive food court in the basement, which was where we ate that night. What really hit me there was how purposefully and fast those New Yorkers move. It was crazy. I almost stopped just to take in how fast they were moving, but I knew they would run me over if I did that, so I controlled the urge to do so and kept moving until I was out of the way. That night I had Indian food for dinner with a vitamin water, which was probably my favorite food of the trip (not my favorite meal though). Then we took some underground routes from Grand Central to the Gershwin Theatre where we watched Wicked. It was SOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO good!!! If you ever get the chance to see it, take that chance. Even if I annoyed you with the soundtrack, the show is absolutely fantastic. Even Craft, who doesn't like musicals loved it. When the show was over our whole group made our way back to the hotel (which was just a few blocks away from Times' Square), and when we hit Times' Square we realized just how many people are in New York. We had to hold on to each other or get swept away. Finally the whole group ducked into a store on the side of the road and we decided to split up into smaller groups. Mrs. Davis was gonna take the kids who wanted to go with her to Hershey's and M&Ms worlds (two different stores just across the street from each other). Craft was taking his group to Central Park (he turned out not doing that, but stopping at a Pizza shop), and Mrs. Hughes (Emily's mom) took the rest of us back to the hotel. I went with her, and had time to read my scriptures and write in my journal before my roommates came in. I think they thought I was a little weird, but Gray West and Jim Law are best friends, so hopefully he understood slightly.
Day Two:
We got up pretty early so we could walk to an old Jewish Synagogue where they had a stage set up for our workshop. Our workshope was on audtions and he had people get up and read a script that was totally awful. I didn't really do it, because I didn't want to that much. The guy seemed kind of full of himself, because he was making it as an actor in New York City with 7 million other people trying to do the same thing. I'm not sure he got his numbers right, but whatever. After that our group headed out, and those of us who paid extra to see Mary Poppins went back to Times' Square and grabbed some lunch in a little pizza shop (it was some of the best tasting 'cheap' food in New York, we all had pizza at least twice). Then the Hughes (my third family) and I went searching for souveniers and then went and visited Toys 'R Us on Times' Square. That was the biggest, coolest toy store I have ever seen in my life. They had a FERRIS WHEEL inside of the building!!! Then they had the Empire State Building, The Statue of Liberty, and a lot of other cool things made out of legos upstairs, as well as about every type of cards imaginable!! Then we hurried over to the theatre that Mary Poppins was in. It was an amazing theatre. They had carved so many intricate little things into everything in the theatre. It was so cool. Then the show started, and it was GREAT. Not as good as Wicked, but it was so different from the movie that it kept you guessing the whole time as to what would happen next! They changed so many songs, got rid of the lame ones and put in some really fun ones. Then after that the Hughes and I went back to Time's Square to see M&M World and Hershey's World. M&M was cooler than the one in Orlando, but still kind of lame. Hershey's was a total let down. It was lamer that the M&M World in Orlando. But then our group met back up with Mrs. Davis and company at the Stardust Cafe. The food there was only decent, but the waitors were all starving wanna-be Broadway stars, so they performed and sang for us the entire time. They sang "Let's Hear it for the Boy" and "Sweet Home Alabama" on our request, and we danced and sang along the whole meal. Then after that we went to The Lion King, which was fairly well done, but mainly a techie show. All the technical stuff was FANTASTIC, but the acting and story were just like the movie. Oh well. Then I called home and found out that Elder Butler (probably my favorite missionary to live with us) had been transfered while I was in New York. I got to say goodbye to him on my cell phone, while I waited for our group to get together to go back to the hotel. We walked back again in small groups, and that night I had remembered to take my camrea out of the hotel (I forgot the first night), so I got some great shots of Times' Square at night. We got back to the hotel, and I had time yet again to read scriptures and write in my journal before going to sleep. The problem with our room was that Teddy snores more spurratic and louder than I ever thought possibe (and I've heard Jeff snore before). It was terrible, but thankfully I had my iPod, so I did get to sleep around midnight.

Day Three:
We woke up around six in the morning so we could be on the Early Morning Show (this was probably the biggest day, so hold tight). We hopped onto a Double-Decker tour bus around seven and took off. All of us started on the top deck of the bus, but then it started raining and the wind picked up, and only the Hughes, Heather Cerney, and I managed to tough it out. We were shivering and freezing, but when else would we get to ride a double-decker bust through New York for free? Never. The early morning show was kind of lame. It was like a news cast where they told us when to cheer and when to be quiet. As if we couldn't figure that out. Oh well, now I can say I was on TV, even if it was for a grand total of about five seconds, and no one I know saw me on...it was still really cool. Then the whole group walked down fifth avenue (which is the famous rich people shopping district) to the Rockefeller Center, to grab coffee (except for me, I was too poor to even try and get a hot chocolate). Then we walked to another actor workshop, and this one was in another really cool building. It was one of those older buildings kind of in disrepair, but not really, just a place where you'd expect an actor to reherse. This time we learned about improv, and it was much more fun. Then we met one of the actresses from In the Heights, which was the show we were going to see that night. She seemed nice, and she didn't seem as full of herself as the other guy. After that the Hughes and my plan was to go see the Manhattan Temple. We got really hungry on the way so we stopped at a street vendor, grabbed some food and went and ate in Central Park. Then we continued our walk and got to the Temple. Fun fact: Did you know that the Manhattan Temple doesn't take up the entire building. They have a visitors' desk, and then the Temple doors and then the reception desk. The cool thing was that the "Holliness to the Lord" thing is above the temple doors INSIDE of the actual building. I was searching and searching the outside and couldn't find it, so I asked the guy at the Visitors desk and he pointed to above the doors. We got to go into the temple to the reception desk. The other cool things were the fact that when you walk through the doors to the temple all the noise of down town just fade away, even though your in down town, and then there were the stain glass windows of Joseph Smith's first vision, that were absolutely beautiful. I wanted to go in for baptisms, but I didn't have a recommend and the Hughes aren't even members, so that didn't work. But the really cool thing was that they were willing to go see the temple with me, even though they aren't members. Then we decided to walk back to Central Park. On the way we saw the funniest sign. It said "Caution Blind Persons Crossing." How do the blind people know that that's where they're supposed to cross there wasn't any brail on the sign...but there it was. Then we walked through some of Central Park. It was really cool, because you know you're in New York City in Central Park, but you aren't in the city. You're surrounded by it, but in Central Park the air is clean, and everything is so peaceful and green. It was crazy. We kept looking for the bridge from Enchanted, but we never found it. Oh well, there were some other neat bridges. Then we walked back down fifth street again and stopped in at Tiffany's and FAO Shwartz. Then we stopped in St. Patricks Cathedral, where it was a really pretty building, but there wasn't the same spirit that was at the temple. I hope the Hughes felt that. Then we headed back to the hotel because we were so worn out by this time. We grabbed some dinner at a pizza shop across the street from our hotel and then went into our hotel to crash until that night's show. In the Heights was probably my least favoirte show, but it was still cool, because it was Broadway. Then we went back to our hotel, and Gray West and I ended up staying up until 2 in the morning discussing religion. It was really good. He's not getting baptized anytime soon, but it was still a really good discussion.

The next morning we were planning on going to a Lynel Ricky concert early in the morning, but we slept through our alarms, because we had stayed up way too late the night before. Luckily only Craft was going with a group and Davis was sleeping in like the rest of us. We managed to get up to go with Davis to Chinatown and Little Italy. The cool thing about Chinatown is the fact that they are illegally selling fake name brand purses and jewelry. They have secret backrooms where the wall will open up, and you go in the back. One of the best was when we had to sprint through the whole store to get through the back wall before they closed it. Then we went to Little Italy for lunch, and then headed to Ground Zero. It was kind of lame, because we had a girl who couldn't pay for the tour because she spent all her money on knock off purses and a 1000 (yes one thousand) dollar bracelet from Tiffany's I don't understand it, but there you have it. Then we went back to the hotel and crashed until the dinner dance cruise around Manhattan Island and up close to the Statue of Liberty. It was the best way to spend our last night in the city. We got to see the beauty of the city from the river at night when it's all lit up, and then the Statue of Liberty up close and personal. It was all just amazing. I can't believe we were so lucky. Then after we got our fill of the beautiful sights we went back downstairs and danced for a while, until we docked again. Then we hopped the subway at midnight and got back to our hotel.

We woke up the next day ready to go home, but we had until 4:30 walking around the city. We grabbed a Jamba Juice for breakfast and wandered around finishing up last minute souvenier shopping. Then we stopped one last time in Times' Square for a break. Then we walked to Macy's, which was kind of a let down, but it had really cool wooden escalators. Then we rode the subway to Central Park where Emily and I street performed for a litte while (we sang) then we hopped the subway went back to the hotel, and got on our bus sped to the airport and were delayed until 10:00. We got back to Atlanta at midnight. And got home at 5 in the morning. And that was my encounter with NYC