Linkmeister

not to be cynical, but that station is in a heavy tourist area, and most of the folks lingering around are not New Yorkers. The native NYers are the ones in the background hurrying to their destination (and probably rolling their eyes at the group singing in the main section of the subway). That said, it is an amazing place, and I was very glad to have had the chance to experience it five days a week for a year. Was still always glad to come home at the end of the work week, though!

I've also only been there once. My mom let me and my sister each pick where we wanted to go, and the vacation has gone down in family lore as "That time Juli dragged us all on a tour of the public library instead of letting us go shopping!" (Seriously, the NYPL is great, and the tour was wonderful.) We also got dissed at the Russian Tea Room, because we weren't dressed well enough to eat lunch there. It was fun.

Steve - when we have unlimited funds, what say we do a literary tour of NYC? We can see the brownstone on West 35th to start with, and go from there.

skatemom, it's non-staged entertainment by amateurs in a public place. I think that's its appeal. I remember being on an AMEX tour bus in Bavaria and some teenage tourist persuaded about half the rest of us to do the chicken dance with her (granted, it was a pretty boring bus ride that day).

Juli, I'm with you. Oh, and all the things the family didn't buy? Overpriced. You saved 'em bundles.

Well, we were in NYC last summer (someday I MUST get those photos up), and one of the memories I have is of subway or bus ride, can't recall just where, on which several guys suddenly began a 5-part a capella version of one of the classic 50s doowop songs. Did it very well too. We couldn't see them singing (standing room only), but after they stopped, 5 middle-aged black guys filed off the bus hopefully asking for contributions! I may do a post on NYC street music.