I have always lived in the biggest and cosmopolitan city of Karachi, previous capital of Pakistan, until I got married to a boy living in United States. Obviously after a very long visa procedure, I finally got Visa to come here, in New York, to start my life with my husband. It was my first time to travel outside Pakistan, so I was very excited but a bit sad too, as I was leaving my family, my loved ones and friends for someone I just know for less than a year.
After an extremely long flight of 18 tiring hours, I finally reached John F. Kennedy Airport of New York, place from where my new journey has to begin.
New York is the third most populous and indeed most popular state of America, indeed everybody’s dream to visit here at least once in life time.
When I came out of J.F.K. Airport, I thought I will get lost in the flood of running, hustling, bustling crowd of people. To my surprise and contradictory to what I been thinking, I came across people of all races, white, black, Asians, Europeans, tourists and locals. It was March, and still so chilly and cold that made me wondered how cold will it be in the December and January, where places like Karachi even get chilly.
New York has 5 burrows, Manhattan, Bronx, Brooklyn, Queens and Staten Island, 62 counties. My family lived in Long Island, which is island linked to Queens and Brooklyn. It has separate towns and good part is you will not have hustle bustle of city, no crowding, no traffic horns (P.S. you will get heavy tickets if you honk for no big reason). Manhattan is the business center and biggest tourist attraction in New York. Manhattan is known for its parks, sky scraper buildings and crowded streets in all seasons and round the year, round the clock loaded with tourists from all across the globe.
The most famous place, which is always on top of all places tourists plan to visit in New York, is Statue of Liberty. If you want to visit the green lady, you have to go to Ellis Island via ferry from Manhattan. Well I had never stayed in a line for 3 hours, but that day I did. Statue of Liberty is a gift from France, the Roman goddess “Libertas”, in a green robe, with torch in raised arm and holding a book in other hand is an emblem of freedom gained in July 4, 1776. The ferry ride was itself a wonderful experience, with clear blue waters. We took hundreds of pictures before getting there. The Statue is 151 feet 1 inch (46 meters) in height and height from torch to ground is 93m.
It is indeed the biggest tourist attraction in the world with more than 3 million visitors each year. There were so many gift and souvenir shops around that area, selling T shirts, pens, key-chains, post cards, and what not.
Over all, it was a wonderful and tiring full day venture. After the terrorist attacks of 9/11, security is the biggest concern as the statue represents American Liberty and Freedom.