THE WEEKENDERS

New York City is a popular destination for those looking for non-stop excitement over the weekend. For many who work here Monday to Friday, they cannot wait to get on the train/bus and head back to the suburbs for some peace and quiet at the end of a hard week. I don't fit into each of these two categories. I love New York City seven days a week. I am grateful to those who come in here and work their socks off, helping to stimulate the economy by spending their money on clothing, food, entertainment and transportation. I also love the weekend revelers who come to appreciate and utilize all that is good about the New York City life and continue to spend on the above when the workers go home for a couple of days.

Weekends in New York for my family involve a lot of activities within our immediate neighborhood. The Upper East side is very residential. Within a few blocks of our apartment building is our place of worship, plenty of parks and playgrounds where organized sporting activities take place, there are movie theaters and a whole plethora of restaurants. We have chosen our location to live based primarily on the amenities available and the vibe of the whole neighborhood. The weekends are clearly quieter as many New Yorkers have second homes outside of the city and who experience city life during the week and suburbia and countryside at weekends. What is noticeable is that with schools being closed on the weekend and many off work the hours of busy street activity varies dramatically than what is witnessed during the week. There is no rush hour as such. There is a noticeable increase in pedestrian activity around lunchtime as families venture out for brunch or lunch on each weekend day.

In the evening it is just as difficult to try and hail a free taxi between seven and nine o'clock as it is from five to seven during the week; as the whole world and his wife look for transportation to the theater in midtown and or to restaurants all over the city. On every conceivable corner of the Upper East side, there are hoards of people frantically searching for cabs on Saturday nights running up and down avenues trying to outsmart all the other potential competitors. Sprints break out at the sight of yellow lights on top of taxis and fights break out when an injustice has been committed. The problems of taxi hunting on Saturday nights is exasperated by the fact that at the weekends the number of taxis on the roads of New York City is considerably reduced. With the exception of the prime time two hour spurt and the immediate half an hour after Broadway spits out its customers ,post shows ; the demand for cabs is so much lower than any weekday. Thus the drivers stay at home to be with their own families.

I love weekends in Manhattan. I get to spend a lot of time with my family and explore my own neighborhood as well as venture into others . I take my kids to new places all the time. We spent one Sunday in the West Village. We have spent others in Little Italy, Nolita and Chinatown. We have very little to do with the tourists who flock to more notorious sites in Manhattan. We don't feel the need to ride to the top of the Empire States building or visit Times Square at night or at all. We are grateful that there are less people around and that the pace of live is considerably slower. It is even possible to stroll hand in hand with my wife on the sidewalks without being bowled off our feet by those visiting midweekers who frantically move about the city.

New York City at the weekend can be anything you want it to be. I have spent evenings dancing the night away and some tucked up in a cozy little cafe engaged in political conversation. We often visit the theater for live entertainment and frequent our local movie theaters for just as thrilling taped presentations. What I don't like about the weekends in New York is that they fly by so quickly. Before I can even blink its Sunday night and even my thoughts start speeding up just to keep up with the blistering pace of life that springs into action first thing Monday morning.