Philip Liu Economics Website

New York City (23rd-26th Dec): See the photos for New York here

Day 1: Since I will be alone here in the US for Christmas, rather than being alone in DC I decided to go and do a bit of traveling. My first stop was New York City. On Saturday 23rd Dec, I jumped on a bus from DC to NY, it only costed $20. Despite the holiday traffic, we arrived in NY Chinatown around 3pm. It took me awhile to navigate my way to the place where I was staying using the metro. After checking in and getting organized it was time to go out and explore. I was in Time Square for a little while before meeting up a family friend that I have not seem for 18 years. They were from the same village as mum back in China and their family immigrated to the US back in 1991. Surprisingly, I meet up with them without much trouble outside their local metro station. It was good to see them again and listen to some stories about me when I was young, obviously I had very little recollection of most of the things they said.
Day 2: Next day, the first stop was the famous Liberty Statue. It was relatively easy to get there for first time via Metro to South port then on to the ferry across to Liberty Island. I must say the security check at the wharf didn't impress me that much let alone lining up for nearly an hour in the cold. The view from the ferry back on to NYC was really magnificent and also the statue as we were approaching the island. I was going to go up to the tower but gave up in the end because the line was too long. I thought I must have better things to do than waiting in the line all day. Next stop on the ferry was Ellis Island to the immigration museum. This is where all or most immigrants would have dock upon their arrival to US back in the 1800 and early 1900, and nearly 98% were allowed to stay in the US permanently. I think this might be the same island that Will Smith took the girl to in the movie Hitch. After I got back to NYC, I walked across to Wall Street for a look. Every inch is a gold they say...Also visited the world trade centre site as well before heading back to Time square to observe the Christmas eve celebrations. There must have been at least a million people around the streets and everyone wanted to see the Christmas tree in front of the Rockefella plaza. The tree wasn't that impressive but the atmosphere was great.
Day 3: The next day (Christmas day), I was quite surprised that everything was still open. I visited the Madame Tussauds wax museum before making a trip over to see the UN building. Too bad the tours were closed. As night falls, it is time to go and see NYC from the top - the Empire State Building with a viewing deck on the 86th floor. After lining up for nearly 1.5 hour and going through security scanning again, I was at the top. First word, "Awesome", second word "Cold". Despite the rain, I managed to get a few good shots with my camera. The following morning was off to Chinatown again to take the bus to Boston.

Boston, MA (26th-28th Dec): See the photos for Boston here

Day 4: The bus ride was relatively pleasant and with a quick stop somewhere, I don't know where, along the way. Since I got down to the bus station earlier, I was able to take the 9am bus rather than 10am as I initially booked, I arrived at South station around 1pm. It was relatively easy to get to where I was staying using the Metro. After checking in, it was time to explore. Even though the weather wasn't that exciting but I decided to do the Freedom Trail. Boston is one of the oldest cities in the US with history stretching back to the early 1600s and it played a significant role in signing declaration of independence. Statues and memorials of Paul Revere, the local hero and a patriot in the American Revolution, was everywhere. At night, I joined a few other people and went to some comedy show. It was cool, good time and place to rest the foots.
Day 5: AS well as famous for its history, today Boston is also well known for its world class universities located across the river in Cambridge including Harvard, MIT and Boston College etc. So my first trip of the day was to visit Harvard. Upon arriving there at the Harvard metro station, it was relatively hard for me to navigate and figure out where I was since I couldn't find a map for the area. At the end, I just took a brief walk along some part of the campus (where they had the statue of Harvard) and left to go back into town. I was going to go to the aquarium but again the long lines at the ticket booth put me off. It appears to me no matter where you go in the US, there are big long lines. The last option was to take a walk downtown and do a bit of shopping. I ended up buying some levis both for myself and dad, they were extremely cheap at Macy's - $US28 for 505's and $US35 for 501's. I even heard they still can be cheaper in wholesale outlets. At night, I went to the local fine arts museum. It was no match with the national galleries back in DC but there was a lot to see and definitely above my expectations. I had to get up fairly early the next morning to make my flight to Buffalo, NY.

Buffalo, NY and Niagara Falls (28th-30th Dec): See the photos for Buffalo and Niagara Falls here

Day 6: As you guys can imagine, I am pretty tired already by this stage. I was looking forward to a bit more relaxing day in Buffalo. Buffalo used to be one of thriving cities in the US mainly due to its location among the great lake cities with many ships passing through here. The Niagara river also provided abundant amount of water resources to generate cheap electricity. As the result, a lot of steel mills and manufacturing plants were set up here in the late 1800s and early 1900s. There were a lot of beautiful, well designed and built buildings remaining their until today. Interestingly, Buffalo hosts the headquarter for M&T bank and also HSBC US. However, the so called globalization (what ever that means) changed the playing field for manufacturers in 1970s and rail became a much cheaper way of shipping goods around. At one point in time in the mid 1970s 30,000 people lost their jobs when the factories closed down. As the result today, Buffalo is now a much poor cities with many locals moved outside to search for work. So what exactly did I do there, I took a self guided walking brochure and explored a bit but spent most of the afternoon in a cafe catching up on the emails. At night, I took a bus ride to Niagara to see the famous Niagara falls. It was spectacular with lights shining the falls from the Canadian side. Crossing the Rainbow bridge took me over to the Canadian border. I must say there is nothing much to see on the US side of the border. As a bonus, fireworks lit up the sky around 9pm - a very impressive sight.
Day 7: It is time to venture back to Niagara Falls and take a look at the falls during the day. Unfortunately the weather wasn't that great but nevertheless, it was a stunning view. I did make a few attempts in trying to get closer but I was soaked by the mist from top to toe. Around 4pm the sun finally came out from the clouds and you wouldn't believe it my camera ran out of batteries. Feeling disappointed it was time to go back to Buffalo. It was Buffalo wings for dinner, apparently the place I went to is where the wings were originally invented. Tomorrow, I will take the bus over to Toronto (only a 2.5 hour ride).

Toronto, ON Canada (30th Dec - 2nd Jan): See the photos for Toronto here

Day 8: Toronto, the largest city in Canada and the fifth largest city in North America with a population around 4.5 millions. The first impression, the city is very different to its neighbour the US. On the other hand, the layout, street names, buildings and etc are similar to Home and Australia. I guess the commonwealth countries share quite a lot in common. The first stop after unloading my luggage is to Chinatown for lunch, this is suppose to be the second biggest Chinatown in North America and later on I found out this was only one of the Three Chinatowns around the city. I was surprised by how cheap everything were from fruit to groceries after staying in DC. After lunch, the first stop is to the Art Gallery of Ontario. Unfortunately, the building was under construction and there were not that much to see at all, plus it was rather difficult to navigate inside without a tour map (they didn't have any). As the result, I didn't end up staying that long. After that, I toured around the main shopping center a bit and man there were a lot of bargain hunters for the Boxing day specials. I also bought a few souvenirs and it was time to eat again. It was not really my favourite hobby to walk around at -3c so I decided to go home and call it a day.
Day 9: Last day of 2006 ah... First thing as planned was a trip to the zoo and this was my first time taking the public transport in Toronto, man it was confusing. In order to get to the Zoo, I had to take metro (with 2 change overs) and a bus connection - a more than a hour trip each way despite the zoo wasn't even that far from downtown. The weather is obviously pretty cold with some snow still left on the ground from the previous night. Since it was winter, there were not that many animals on display but I got to see most of the animals I wanted to anyway including the Polar bear, Indo-tigers etc. After returning to the city, I went out to some famous dumpling place with a Italian girl, two boys from HK and Taiwan both studying in Canada...it was nice. Well time to start the New Year's celebration with some wine. After that, we joined three British boys to go to the City Hall for the New Year's celebration. Man there were a lot of people and it rained all the time with very little cover. The atmosphere was great, followed by live music by some random Canadian artists. 10 mins before the countdown was a bit of disaster with everyone pushing against each but we made it at the end -- to 2007. The firework display was not that speculative, oh well, time to go to the pub to warm up a bit and dry up. I managed to get home fairly early around 2am.
Day 10: I really wanted to the Royal Ontario Museum but it was closed on New Year's day so the next substitute was the Science Center. It was a bit like a kids' center though there were a few interesting exhibitions on display. After getting back to the city, I hang around a coffee shop till dark before heading up to the CN Tower. The tower, finished in 1976 stood as the tallest freestanding building in the world at 553 meters. Probably not for much longer, they are building another taller one in Dubai due to finish in couple of years' time. The CN tower only took three years to build which is pretty amazing. Due to the strong wind, the open platform was closed to the public but I managed to get some pretty good views and pictures from the glass platform. They also had a clear glass deck looking straight below the tower on to the streets, a pretty scary sight. After that, it is time to venture up to the sky pod viewing deck. That's another whooping 100m above the main glass platform. The viewing space was a lot more confined but the view was magnificent - the CN tower was definitely worth the visit.
Day 11: Well my flight back to DC is late in the afternoon so I got up fairly early to try and go see Caso Loma and the Ontario museum (both were closed on New Year's day). First stop was the medieval castle, former estate of Sir Henry Pellatt who built it for his wife Lady Mary. After less than 10 years, the Pellatts were forced to abandon their home due to financial difficulties and since 1937 it is now owned by the city of Toronto and operated by the Kiwanis Club and opened to the public. Since the Pellatts already sold most of their beloved belongings so the castle is a lot more empty than once it was. Nevertheless, it was worth the visit. Next was rush over to the Ontario Museum for a brief visit. I was surprised by the big collection of Chinese antiques though. Even though I didn't have that much time but I managed to see most of the exhibits. Well to finish off the trip, the body search I encountered at the airport definitely adds to the "excitement". Apparently (they tell me anyway), that everyone boarding United flights to Washington must be searched carefully, that kind of made me feel a bit better. A relatively short flight, we landed in Dulles within 1.5 hours and that pretty much concludes my trip.






	visitor no View My Visitors