After the New York Experience

         New York, after the experience, has a entirely new light shown on it. Originally I saw the city as more of a feeling. You needed to have the right look, the right coffee in your hand, and the right time of day for the city to feel "right". Now I see that New York is a way of life, and it has been for centuries for tons of different people. These people built this city up from the ground to create every little nook and cranny that now makes it unique in its own right. New York pays tribute to these people and hard times that they went through with all of the amazing museums to showcase what they did, and why
they worked so hard to do it. We can see why they did it every week, to create this culture of New York as a whole. New York has so many separate areas known for the ethnicity or economic level that resides there. Areas are known for not only their present, but for their past which follows the area either showing how far they've come, or how far they've dropped, or possibly just simply how much the type of people living there have changed.
          New York is also a Mecca for art. There are so many different styles, levels, and concepts of art available for people to admire. This art can be anywhere from on the streets, to in the MET (the absolute largest building I think I've ever been in....containing art at least). I was able to see more art then I ever even thought existed. Sometimes I wasn't extremely enthusiastic, but other times I couldn't stop taking pictures I thought it was so intriguing. I loved that New York was home to so many different kinds of art, historical, modern, graffiti, and also from so many different cultural backgrounds. This really solidified the fact that New York really is the melting pot of America. 
         Another aspect of this class that I loved was of course the food. I've always viewed New York as a go to place for great food, but I've never really stepped outside of my comfort zone when it can to types of food I ate. I was able to experience Indian, and Thai food, both were surprisingly good and both very different from the normal "red-sauce" Italian style meals I'm used to. I know that so many different backgrounds of people reside in New York, but I have to admit I'm always ethnocentric in the fact that I assume everyone eats pasta and meatballs. Seeing that there are so many different kinds of food, preparations, and traditions relating to food in different areas really made me want to venture away from my norm and see what else is out there that I might like.
         This class really opened my eyes and was a wonderful experience. I really can't wait to go into the city next time and be able to understand where I am, and understand how all these areas started. So many known names for these areas I had no idea how they got them such as the "meatpacking district" or the "diamond district" obviously I knew then had something to do with meat or diamonds, but the actual history of how they started and how they became known by the world as this.The city is so much more to me then a night out on the town, its a historical landmark. Every building, street, store are all historical in their own right and I will always see the history behind New York's land from now on.