NY Day 4 - It's smaller than we thought.

Day 4 has been shopping day. New York is famous for it's shopping; people fly half way around the world for a weekend of Christmas shopping and everyone comes home with at least one iconic brown, yellow or blue bag. The LSH's work colleagues had all said, "Your wife will love the shopping!" He was, rightly, unsure about that. 

I bloody hate shopping!!! 

I just can't see the point of it. Some of those big department stores are in beautiful buildings but if you've been to Selfidges then it's all very similar. We did everything, though. Macy's (disappointed not to be able to see Father Christmas for a 34th Street Miracle), Bergdorf and Goodman, FAO Swartz, Saks, Lord and Taylor, Tiffany's, Bloomingdales, a few electrical stores and every tiny Pharmacy (to try to fill our daughter's make up wish list).

So much of New York appears smaller than you imagine. Film really does add a few pounds. Yesterday we thought the Statue of Liberty was smaller than we'd imagined and today we thought the Tiffany's windows are tiny and the piano from Big in FAO Swartz wasn't very big at all. We did get there at just the right time though. The photographer had just gone off for a break and a woman broke through the barrier with toddler in arms and performed a perfect rendition of chopsticks.

Shop assistants are similar to those in the UK. You get some really grumpy ones like the woman in the shop where I bought a new SD card (I might have taken too many photos) who walked off leaving my purchase behind the till after she had taken my money, through the normally friendly to the properly overfamiliar. In Lord and Taylor a camp assistant on the make up counter had a long conversation with us about where we were from, what we'd seen and our plans for the day. Finally, he said, "At then end of the day, when you've done all your shopping you come back here and see me and because you're from England I'll touch you up for free." The LSH sniggered and he said, "You too, if you like."

Even though I hate shopping we made the best of it. We saw the New York Public Library (no books!) by Lord and Taylor and took the brilliant cable car over to Roosevelt Island by Bloomingdales.

For one of the items in my daughter's shopping list we had to go to the Flat Iron district. So much of New York is like Lego - they just make bricks the shape they need to be to fit in the gap. It was there that we started to relax. It says something about my relationship with shopping when stopping for a peanut butter milkshake is the highlight of my day.

New York has some fantastic green spaces and we ended our shopping day by exploring some of them. Greenwich Village and Washington Square park was full of freshers and the smell of weed and joss sticks but it was such a happy little place - with a fountain you could actually put your aching feet in.

Then we found the Highline at the end of the Meatpacking District. This is an amazing oasis of calm, where they have turned an old railway line into a park. It goes all the way up to 34th Street along the Hudson River. They have planted along the tracks and people walk and sit and sunbathe. Actually, the green spaces might be the only things in New York that are bigger than you imagine.