Saturday, March 6, 2010

Who wants to be smart and who stupid?

Thursday started very early for Markus as the conference registration started at 0700 and due to the jet lag he woke up, but felt rather bad. The reason for the horrible feeling was definitely the sleep deprivation and not the fact that the New York Knicks used DJ Oetzi’s “Hey Baby” to get the crowd going the night before (which actually worked and the whole Madison Square Garden was noisy!). As the day progressed and the conference went well Markus felt better and better. For the late afternoon, when all meetings were over cocktails in the top floor of the hotel were planned giving a stunning view over Central Park and before they started Markus went top the room to freshen up and relax a bit. Unfortunately the next thing he remembered was waking up in his suit at 20.45 when the drinks were long over. He overslept. With almost 3 hours sleep on his account he was fresh and decided to go out for a walk, explore the city and have dinner somewhere.

Based on that, what is your answer to the initial question?

Friday morning Markus was top-fit and took more meetings than he initially planned until the conference ended at 15.30. He then got changed and walked down south towards lower Manhattan. And once he has left Midtown he saw a completely different New York. The streets got narrower and a bit dirtier, the fire-ladders (famous from various movies) suddenly appeared everywhere and the mix of people was completely different. After one hour of walking down 56 blocks he has reached the first destination of his “journey”: the Hollister store at 600 Broadway. He spent another hour inside the store of this new brand of Abercrombie & Fitch browsing through the three storeys of the store for numerous pieces of clothing that he has been highlighted by Kerstin, Lini and Peter.

Q1 sales of the A&F Group have to be strong after Markus’ visit

As he has been rather successful the next part of his walk towards the south tip of Manhattan was a bit more of hard work as Markus had to carry three shopping bags as well. By the time he reached the financial district not only the sun has set but also Markus was pretty tired. Nevertheless he wanted to see the building of the New York Stock Exchange in the famous, yet tiny Wall Street (it is rather an alley) as well as the 9/11 site. This huge hole in the middle of the Financial district has brought back the memories of the horrible events back in 2001 which he saw live on TV in his first months working in London and made him reflect and remain silent for a moment.

The twin towers are definitely missing here. As well as the lives of many!

The long journey ended first in an Irish pub in Greenwich village for a pit stop and a refreshing beer before crossing the street to a small Italian restaurant in Spring Street called Giorgione in which he had dinner with some colleagues. After the dinner they moved on to a small bar nearby for a few more drinks and they hit ground in the hotel at 0200 very tired.

Jakob, Kerstin & Markus

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