Choosing to get our visas in New York City rather than mailing them was a great idea.
Trying to get everything needed for your Visa can be extremely stressful. Fortunately, the staff at the Thai Consulate were very friendly and helpful.
Here we were, 15 days away from moving out of the country, and surrounded by about 5,000 different time-sensitive requirements not only for the flight but also our visas, pet travel, moving out of our house, shipping hundreds of things, etc.
Lauren and I took a Wednesday off and left for New York City, driving to the Hamilton Train station and taking the train to Penn Station.
We stepped out of the train station and I was immediately hit with that wave of love that I feel when in one of the greatest cities in the world.
I love New York City. I’ve seen countless concerts there, attended events, and I spent a couple of weekends there at my buddies place in Brooklyn.
Simply put, I love cities. It’s a melting pot of culture and has such character. Constantly moving, never bored, always something to see, and a lot of networking opportunities.
The first order of business was to walk to the Thai consulate. Fortunately, it was absolutely beautiful weather that day regardless of it being January.
Walking to the consulate we had to pass the United Nations.
Looking at the UN building and all of the surrounding consulates, I felt a great sense of warmth and pride. As someone who typically feels very anti-establishment, it was beautiful to see a place where all different cultures and walks of life come to work together.
George Carlin once said that the major issue with society is that cooperation and competition are out of balance. Cooperation and competition are what creates progress. A major issue in society today is that cooperation has been redefined as obedience and not as teamwork.
If I viewed cooperation as obedience, especially social obedience, I highly doubt that at 29 years old we would be packing up our life, our pets, and leaving for a foreign country. We would be playing it safe.
But life is not one-size fits all. Culturally and historically speaking, this corporate culture that we live under as a “norm,” is just shy of seconds old when you consider the age of progressive humanity.
But anyway, I’ll try to keep my cultural rants to a low.
Next, we walked to the consulate. They were very friendly, welcoming, and helpful. We handed in all of our documents with our return label and off we went.
Almost ready to go!
Now the day was about to get… wait for it… legendary. We went to McGee’s Pub from How I Met Your Mother. There were photos everywhere from the show and honestly, neither of us can get enough of that show.
I ordered a Barney Stinson scotch drink and Lauren ordered Don’t Drink Tequila.
One thing that is awesome about technology is that you can have such close friendships with people from so far away and retain those relationships for years without meeting them in person.
My longtime friend and incredible mix engineer Jake Antelis met us at McGee’s pub. Jake had helped me a lot with launching my studio business when I was living in Orlando and he was right outside of New York City.
It was really fitting for us to meet before the big move. Naturally, we walked to the giant B&H store and gawked at all kinds of gear. There was a microphone and preamp room where you could audition any mic and preamp combination.
Audio nerds, rejoice!
After we parted ways with Jake, Lauren and I ventured into Central Park for a nice stroll. After about an hour, we made our way to Hell’s Kitchen for some food and drinks.
We stopped in two bars and a Thai restaurant where our bartender told us about how she lived in Phuket. When we went to the back to the bathroom I saw this entertaining sign. Dammit Cooper, how many times do we have to tell you?!
With blisters on our feet and smiles on our faces, we took the train home. If this New York day was any inclination of the days to come in Bangkok, I think I’m going to be a lot happier than I ever was in New Jersey.
We can’t wait to get to Bangkok!