Trip around the world

New York, heart of the United States, that=s where my friends and I landed. We decided that this will be the starting point for our trip. Well, one can not say it is a trip, because it is more like adventure, experience, .knowledge. As I said we landed in New York at nine A.M.. It was an extremely rough morning, all that baggage, all the suitcases, all those people. It is incredible how big Kennedy Airport is. Looking from one eend you cant see the other. And it is so busy, so many people, everybody is running, screaming, god that was a bad morning. Finally we get outside get the cab and get the hell out of there. Our adventure was not planned as it was supposed to be, of course considering the week notice before we left. We got to the hotel, but there were no rooms, only suites that cost more than my car. So we left looking ffor a place where we could stay for a couple of the nights. After good 2 hours walking through Manhattan, we find the Hyatt, where we decided to stay. It was pretty pricey, but who cares. We have five people ssplitting he cost, and living in one room till we leave the city. After waiting around for another three hours we are ready to go, ready to see what this New York is all about. We get outside and it is already dark, as winter is around the corner. Of course, no wind, I like that, all these buildings that are taller than the sky, blocking anything external from coming inside. It is like a castle, everything is closed from the outside. Of course it is good, but on the other hand…. not. Because we all can smell trash, and that stink just stays inside of you. We got our own first impressions, lets go and get some food. We ffound Mc Donald=s right around the corner. After we eat we thought we might take it easy this night because we=re all so tired, not used to all this busyness. We just walked around Broadway and 5th avenue, got back to the hotel around two in the morning and just went to sleep. The next morning we were all up way too early for our regular morning, but we are in New York. After we showered, eat breakfast, we all ccame out running out of our hotel. First thing we saw was the twin towers; well, the hole in the ground where they used to stand. Yeah it was a huge hole, but how did they look, how tall did they really used to be??? Many questions crossed my mind, so I decided to ask the New Yorkers. One guy points the finger at this huge building and says ADo you see the end? Well double it and that=s how tall towers where! And then I got sad, seeing that huge hole, seeing these buildings around ground zero with black cloth on the top of them. After staring through the fence for half an hour my friends dragged me to the Statue of Liberty. AHa, big woman!@ I said, and then picture time. We took the boat to see it, and it was amazing, the huge green lady on the island just standing there. We wanted to go inside of her, but it did not happen, as our boat trip did not include meeting the lady. Well it took us a good hour until we saw Central Park. I don=t know why it is so popular. I always thought its jjust a regular park, where people take their dogs, run, and homeless people sleep on the benches. Yes it is bigger, but its just another park with more statues, and more people. Well, I was not too impressed by it. It was around ten P.M. when we were done walking and looking around. So we decided we needed to experience the night life, on the way to this bar we saw the Empire State building, and it looked amazing. After I zoomed in on it, I noticed that there were four statues of eagles, one on each corner; something I had never noticed before, until I was standing in front of it. We finally got to the bar/dance club and started to enjoy our stay in New York. AAmazing!@, I hear my friends say, and im not surprised. With bars like that, they=re only seen on tv. Huge place, good music, everything that a guy would want. In a matter of hours, we had reached the state of drunkenness. Noone really remembers how we got to the hotel, but the huge headaches were the first things we felt that morning. That morning we had to leave our beloved city, and wwas a somber moment. But at the same time we are excited to continue our journey onwards. Fourty-five minutes till our plane leaves and we=re still in the room. AOh god@, I said to myself. I hear the announcers voice, who says ANew York to Toronto Canada at the gate 38 has arrived.@ Then it clicked, we are not done ,its just the beginning.

I opened my eyes, and here I am, Toronto Canada. Arrived late so my guess was to go to the hotel, and go to sleep, but no sleep for me. My friends took me to see a Toronto Raptors game; as they planned this all along, because they know that my favorite Raptors player is Vince Carter. The game started at 10:45 at night in the Air Canada Center, which was so amazing for me as I had seen a NBA game before in my life. After the game I finally got some sleep and was ready for new day. In the morning we went to downtown, got some food, and started familiarizing ourselves with the city. I could not believe that Canadians have Wendy=s there too! Big city, with a lot of new and

big buildings. The most interesting area was around Bay and King street, because most of the skyscrapers appeared to be in that district. The Toronto City hall building caught my eye while I was passing it. I don=t know why, but its so cool. It is a building made out of two buildings forming a U shape. After that I saw Roy Thomson Hall, and that looks like a nuclear building made out of glass. It=s all round, getting thinner aas it towers upwards. After that we finally saw the Sky Dome. It looks like a zeppelin factory that the Germans used to have after WW1. It is huge, and has a retractable roof that opens, but we did not have the pleasure to witness it move. The National Trade Center looked like high school, just on a much bigger scale. After that my buddies got hungry again, so we got some food around the CN Tower. Afterwards, we started eexploring the tower. Because of its height when you get on the top of it, you can actually see all of Toronto city. The CN tower is 1815 feet tall and has everything you can imagine. Three restaurants, a movie ttheater, even a ride for children. But we could not do it because we were not 42 inches and smaller. Due to our latter arrival then most of the normal tourists, we did not enjoy the tower for more than an hour; but we were leaving Toronto anyways. It is seven o=clock now and we don=t know what to do in Canada anymore. But then we picked up a brochure that talked about the biggest university in Canada. After I read A The University of Toronto is Canada=s largest and most distinguished university@ everybody just stopped and looked at me. And then my friend says AHey, its Thursday and it=s the biggest University in Canada. I bet there=s mass parties ggoing on tonight!!!@. We decided to go to the hotel, change and see what this university can offer us. We ended up at St. George campus, where is supposed to be around 42,000 students. Somehow we got to the College and Spadina st. intersection, and we see this huge party going on across the street. Of course we had to see what=s going on and how Canadians party. We just walked in and now we are the most popular kids iin the whole neighborhood, that was something else. People were so nice and friendly there, I wish it would of been like that in New York; but hey, it was good times anyway. We woke up on the couch at the house where we were partying just in time to get back to the hotel and then airport.

We finally arrived in Vilnius. The capital of Lithuania; the place that feels like home to me. When we got here the whole town look dead, so we relaxed in our hotel lounge. After resting up a bit we went downtown, or what lithuanians call the old town. If you were to compare downtown Vilnius to downtown anywhere else, it would look empty. No skyscrapers, no big buildings, nothing! It is so quet and calm, yet elegantly beautiful. Huge Vytautas castle which sits of rolling hills, many 17 century buildings, roads made out of stone, the town just has kept its history. As we were walking by the white house located in town hall square, we saw Lithuanian president Valdas Adamkus going into black Audi A8. We tried to talk to him but with no luck, for his body guards simply hurried hhim into his car and drove away. Passed the white house was a huge white cathedral, the Lithuanians call it Cathedral quare. The area around it is covered with white stone, and the whole building is pure white with four story entry doors. When we got inside of the cathedral nobody appeared to be there, just the old ladies who sit there with nothing else to do but constantly gossip to each other. After an hour calming relaxation, we were off to see the castle of Vytautas the Great located right behind the Cathedral square. It was a cold day in Lithuania, but the vigerous walk to the castle warmed us up, due to its location on the top of the mountain. After our hike we went back to the hotel to relax and meet some of my friends. Everybody showed up and I mean everybody, and god it was good to see them! We did not waste any time and immediatly went to see the TV tower, the highest building in Lithuania. Reporting to be 1071 feet high, the ride to the top was painful. Because the elevator is so fast your ears start to hurt under the pressure. AAs we did not seem to be hungry, we did not go to the restaurant; but we herd that ir revolves 360 degrees in one hour. We went to the podium where we could enjoy the night view of the Vilnius. It was breath taking seeing river Neris and old town all lit up.