NYC Diaries: Touchdown

The bed has never been as enticing. I arrived at Bill’s house after 19 hours of air travel. I never had jetlags but today, tonight rather, my body is screaming for sleep. It’s only past six in the evening but the skies are dark and the cold beckons Orpheus. The boys are out for dinner and not responding to my messages so Bill, my host, opted to prepare my bed in case I need to rest. I insisted that I am okay and can waste another hour but after sitting on the white sheets and feeling the cool softness of the mattress... my body betrayed me.

The journey had been both comfortable and mediocre, balanced out by what I liked and abhorred: plane seats were not comfy but the food was surprisingly good. I busted my ears with a movie marathon while en route but my plane had a charging dock. I almost missed my plane from Manila, by the way, and I do not want to talk about it. And unluckily got one of those awful middle seats when I asked for an aisle. Immigration matters were breezy, though.

From my lay-over in Abu Dhabi, I waited for four hours to get on board. While on the plane, I got aisle seats but barely finished my readings or watched Encantadia because my Hindi seat mates made bathroom trips every 30 minutes. I appreciated the leg room, though. I arrived at 4:30pm but was only able to get my baggage after an hour. My little jade piglet bag tag was missing. I shrugged it off--here I am, finally in the Big Apple! 

A traveller can say a lot on a city based on the quality of the transportation system. The AirTrain was not working when I arrived in JFK and I ended up with a taxi who got a killing out of my wallet. My driver is a Latino man (Mexican, he said) whom I chose because of a friendly smile. On the way, he told me that after a week, I will decide to ditch Manila because I will "like to live here". He said Filipinas are the nicest and can say so because a friend was married to one. He assured me that where I'm staying, a Jewish neighbourhood in Flatbush Avenue, is safe--so is most of Manhattan. But he did ask me to shell out $200 for a 30-minute ride to Brooklyn.

"I bet taxis are much more expensive in your country."

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My temporary house is one of those picturesque Tudor row houses with three floors. We occupied the big room on the second floor, which, according to the host, has been consistently temperate during the winters. Bill is like a grandfather raising three felines in a house that was too big for him. He is a pleasant man--I like him.

"You want me to prepare your bed?"

I'm good, I said. "Not sleepy yet." Later on, I realised that in America, people actually take your response for what it is. So, he took his time screwing the bed posts and placing the mattresses, went OCD for the sheets, the pillow cases, and the blankets. When he was done, I was raring to drop.

The clouds found a home in my brain. I misheard the name of Bill’s cats. Big Ben for Venicci, Baby Georgie for Boy George, and the third one who stayed downstairs. That probably explained why Bill gave me weird stares when I tried cooing those that strayed into my room. Jason arrived later on to correct my mistakes but I have been too dozy to care.

My only thought before completely shutting down: Here, the sun sets at four in the afternoon.