TRAVEL | BY JESSICA ESPINOZA
New York, a Ghost Town
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ew York City, the beautiful historic city, with millions of people living on top of a random rock in the Atlantic Ocean. I have traveled to New York City several times, but this experience was a bit different from the previous ones. As I booked my trip to New York, I was excited to see the beautiful historic buildings, the people, and to taste the amazing food. I was actually excited to see the huge rats. Well, that is not exactly what I saw this time. New York during the pandemic was an experience I did not expect. It is said that there is no place in this world like New York during Christmas, it’s like a movie, and the experience did feel like a movie — about a ghost town. This was my fourth time traveling to New York. I had visited during the fall and summer of 2016, pre-COVID days, but I wanted to see what Christmas in New York was like. I landed in Newark, New Jersey, and hopped an Uber to NYC. As I got to the city, I was a little confused. No one was
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on the street. There were a couple of cars but there were no people walking, stores looked closed and empty, and there was absolutely no sign of human movement. I understood we were in a pandemic and a huge snowstorm had just happened a couple of days ago, but it was three in the
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afternoon and there was no human soul on the street. I arrived at my hotel and got ready to explore the city. I walked a couple blocks down to SoHo and many stores were closed. Some restaurants had outside seating but even then, the tables were empty. I was
