New York
Seeing Manhattan rising in the distance is always a treat. I am not sure it’s possible for anyone brought up around these parts to appreciate entirely what New York, the idea of New York, meant to us who came from the old continent. I was 11 years old and had seen only war and devastation. Dead, stinking bodies in the city parks, bullet-scarred buildings, people starving on the sidewalks, too weak to die in the privacy of their hovels. Then I was suddenly whisked from home and into a TWA first-class ‘stratocruiser’ stopping in Rome, Paris, London, Shannon, Gander, Boston and, finally, New York. I had a bed and had fallen madly in love with the stewardess but quickly forgot all about her upon seeing the sights: the Empire State building, the Chrysler building, Grand Central Station, Fifth and Madison Avenue, High Fashion on Park, Money on Wall Street, this was no mere city but a romantic notion, a dream come true.
Still to this day, when seeing the place from afar, the frisson is there.
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