No Sleep til Brooklyn

As I wake in the morning its ridiculously cold out. As I make my way to Penn Station our second class of the course we are going to be exploring Brooklyn. I am excited even though I am sick like a dog. As Mike makes us huddle up and calls out everyone’s names. He tells us that a freshman class is going to tag along with us to Coney Island. We make our way down to 34^th street we spotted Macy’s and other stores. Then we had to hop on the F train and I was an unbelievably long train ride. As we arrived to Coney Island I realized that there were not that many people on the beach but on the boardwalk there were people running, locals chatting by the Nathan’s Famous or shops. Coney Island is an important place for entertainment for New York immigrant population. Coney Island was settled by the Dutch, who named the area as Konijn Eiland because of the vast amount of rabbits found there. (BG, 492)

As I walked the beach with a few classmates all I could think was how it looked like in the 1800s-1900s with all different types of people on the beach. The beach was quiet and amazing I felt like I could stay there all day and not worry about a thing. Then a few of us made our way to Nathan’s Famous and had some hot dogs and french fries. When I think of Nathan’s hot dogs all I think of is when July 4^th comes around and everyone comes to Coney Island to see the hot dog eating contest. One day I would like to experience the rush of excitement of being there and saying, “hey I was there when so and so beat the hot dog record”.

After we left Coney Island we had to hop again on the train and headed towards the New York Transit Museum. At first I thought we were going to ride another train and didn’t realize it was the Transit Museum. I was amazed how there was a two-level subterranean unused Subway station (BG, 468) and how devoted NYC is to keeping the history of the public transportation running. As I walked downstairs to the lower level of the museum my eyes were wide opened with all the different styles of the trains from different decades. I walked around in and out of the trains and just sat in each one and just stared at the advertisements. I would prefer the comfy seats back in the 1900s than the ones we have now.

We then went to the Brooklyn Historical Society it was founded in 1863 as it was formerly named the Long Island Historical Society. (BG,472) As our tour guide told us that the building was recognized as a National Historical Landmark and what I enjoyed most was the library which they had old love letter written by husbands or wives and maps of how some of Brooklyn buildings are still standing.

Towards the end of our day in Brooklyn we had to make our way to the Brooklyn Bridge. The Brooklyn Bridge goes from Brooklyn to Manhattan and the crosses the East River. As we made it to the half way mark I started to feel like stopping. I don’t know why maybe it was the cold I had or the meds were kicking in finally. All I could think was can this bridge be any farther away from Manhattan? My answer was YES!!! The Williamsburg bridge is shorter in length that’s just my opinion. Fuggedaboutit we leaving Brooklyn to go to the East Side of Manhattan.