Jet lag woke me up early.
I had just landed the night before and was unable to experience the city one bit, despite the excitement to do so.
I had all kinds of ambitions for arriving on a Saturday night. I told myself “There are so many events happening. I can just take a nap, a shower, and boom, we’re out experiencing New York baby.”

I was in bed at eight.
I just had the energy to eat, scouring through the three blocks around my airbnb, searching for something local. A slice of pizza at a corner shop will do. Little did I know this would be the best pizza I’ve had during this week. Funny how things work, heh.

This early bedtime brought a welcomed early rise with the poignant motivation to not fuck this day up.
I headed outside to a freezing cold, calm Sunday morning.

Prejudices would have had me expecting loudness and mess.
I don’t see many cars around and only a few people walking to grab their coffee. It’s mostly silent, and I’m stunned that this is my first real experience of the city.
I am reminded that whatever ideas I had about this place are to be discarded once here.

And with a clear mind, I get walking.
I am staying on 137th Street and set my mind to make that number go as low as possible just through sheer steps.
My eyes are open, and I won’t wear headphones, I just want to be distracted by whatever is around me.

It is 6am, and the first order of operation is finding a coffee place to get the day started at, I walk down a few blocks to a spot that feels already lively.
I sit down with a hot Americano. I didn’t know that the name came from Italians, maybe judging the way war enemies would pour a ton of water over their espresso.

The cafe is fully wooden, walls and everything, I fees cosy.
It has one of those millennial quirky signs that says, “There’s no WiFi here, make a friend” or something.
Half of the patrons in the shop are on their laptop, tethered to their phone’s connection.
I admire the rebellious mind of the capitalist browsing sneakers websites at 7am on a Sunday.

A firetruck rolled in next to the shop, and through came out, you wouldn’t believe it, firemen.
They kept on rolling out and into the cafe. The place is instantly loud, so loud, they must be talking about ladders and stuff.
I was semi-hopeful for an emergency and seeing all of them running out, leaving their oat latte on the spot, but alas, they just kept chatting, and I wanted out of the cosy anti-wifi coffeshop.

The next few blocks brought me down to the famous Central Park, where I met, in droves, this aggressively healthy type of local: the runner.
I don’t know where they were running, but boy were they all ready for it.
They were packed to the gills with feeding gels and bone conducting headphones and a special vest to carry their multiple pouches of water.
Some were by themselves with the company of their headphones, some were running in groups, some were in groups with their headphones (rude).
I wish I could briefly hear what all of them were listening to, it would be like skipping through TV channels quickly.

Some others were speaking on the phone (or to themselves, no judgement) while those in groups were conversing with their running partner.
I was walking in the opposite direction of them all, only catching a glimpse of their conversations and their faces.
People were talking about their business or their lovers or something, it was cute.
I quickly branched off to parts of the park that didn’t have any marathon lanes and discovered some details of this place, it felt peaceful and calm and so cold.

I stepped out there after to also see the second most populous group of park dwellers, dog walkers.
This one sparked a little more joy, the combination of person and dogs is always interesting.

I crossed through more and more blocks, and everything felt somewhat the samey for a while.
This blur of restaurants, shops, cafes, and businesses made me walk even faster.
I was only reawakened once in a while to say hi to another cute dog, which happened often.
It felt like I could potentially stop and admire, but I didn’t feel like it, it got too hectic for me to enjoy.

I was tired, overwhelmed, needed to eat and stop.
Only a few more parks and meeting spots made me wander around and slow down more.
But that was mostly because people were being silly.