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We started our morning at an eclectic little coffee shop where they hand pour hot water over the freshly ground coffee beans into your cup. It does take a bit of time but the hot cup of caffeine is well worth the wait. We sat outside at a table and sipped our coffee before strolling along the street towards the Wilmington Bridge to cross over from Brooklyn to Manhattan. The view on the bridge was stunning…the whole NY skyline was surrounding us as we walked towards it.
Our breakfast came from the Doughnut Plant…true doughnuts aren’t so good for you but…this place was on the food network show of “best thing I ever ate”. Do you really think we could just walk by the tiny shop with a line running out the door and down the street? There must be something inside there in need of being tasted. We got in line and after about 25 minutes, ordered the square PB&J doughnut as well as the carrot cake doughnut. Picture this…delicious doughnut dough shaped into a square, filled with homemade jam then sprinkled with chopped peanuts and sealed with a sweet glaze-GET IN MY BELLY!
After eating our doughnuts in a small park in the middle of the busy city, we stopped in at Essex Street Market which was a typical food market for locals to purchase their fruits/veggies/cheeses etc. After walking around a bit, we found Rice to Riches. This place looked and felt like an ice cream parlor with the counter of selections and toppings. It had fun signs hanging everywhere reminding you to indulge and not worry about the billion calories about to be consumed. The selections consisted of every type of rice pudding imaginable. We ordered the french toast rice pudding with oatmeal crumble topping. The experience was fun and the sweet creamy flavor was good but the rice was mushy and it was so rich-only two bites or so were really needed in comparison to the huge portions they offered.
After feeling the pudding go straight to our hips, we walked it off as we fought the crowds towards Chinatown. There were so many people out being it was a gorgeous Saturday. We had one more food stop before getting back to Brooklyn. We found it in an alley of Chinatown. A place called, “Tasty Hand Pulled Noodles”. Yes, it too was on the food network and was known for its handmade noodle soups. We ordered two, a beef noodle and a shrimp/beef/egg/noodle soup. Both were tasty and we did as we saw by slurping it with bowl to our face.
Bellies full, we hurried back to Brooklyn so we could get ready and meet Candice at her art Gallery and go to a museum party…it was her birthday! We mingled at the party and looked at the exhibit in the museum before jumping in the car to go back to the apartment where we ordered NY pizza and drank wine.
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Published by Giff Kabat
I grew up in Ohio as a kid, so of course I went to college at “THE” Ohio State University. I graduated in 2001 with a major in business finance. A month after graduation, I moved out to California with my college girlfriend (whom I married in 2005)…and started my career in sales (industrial sales for 5 years…then moved into medical laser sales for 4 years).
In 2009 I was 31 years old. I had a great job, a new house, and a beautiful wife. Just when I thought things couldn’t get any better…my wife and I found out we were going to have a baby. Everything was going according to plan…and I couldn’t have scripted a better life for myself.
Then in the same year…everything changed. My wife, Brandey, called me when I was on my way to work and told me over the phone, something I never thought could be possible in a million years. My beautiful 30-year old pregnant wife was just told that she had breast cancer. At that moment, everything stopped all at once. I immediately went to her…and learned of our new plan…which began with her needing surgery immediately…and the rest we would find out later.
The day we returned from the hospital after Brandey’s surgery…my father died. He had been battling an aggressive cancer of his own…and although he was the one person I wanted to speak with about Brandey having cancer…I never told him. My sister, Brooke, had just gotten married a few months ago, and although he was weak, he was able to walk his little girl down the aisle of her wedding. On the night before my sister’s wedding, Brandey and I told him that we were pregnant and about to make him a grandfather. It made no sense to tell him that everything had changed for us…so he died in peace knowing everything was “the way it should be” for his only 2 children.
2010 was the worst year of my life. We had lost our baby…and for 12 months I watched my wife fight cancer with multiple surgeries, chemotherapy, radiation treatments, and drug therapy. It was a difficult year for us…but we made it. When you go through something like this in life, you learn a lot about yourself and the people around you. I was amazed at the strength and courage of my wife…and how many good people there are in this world. I will be forever grateful for the ones who never ceased to amaze me with their kindness during this hard time. Family, friends, and sometimes complete strangers…helped us make it through this. I am, and will always be especially grateful to my mother, who was with my dad at the very end, when I couldn’t be there, and when things were at their worst. She has been so supportive throughout all of this, and without her everything would have been so much harder for me.
It’s 2011 now…and the plan we have for our life this year…is to make it the best year of our lives. Brandey is officially in remission from breast cancer and she has a 95% chance the cancer will never come back. Besides the love that I have for my wife and family, the loves of my life are food, wine, and adventure travel. My wife and I love traveling to new places, seeing natural wonders, and meeting new people from different parts of the world. So for the next 400 days…we’ve decided to travel the world…and celebrate our lives. There are so many things I took for granted in life that I will never take for granted again. My father worked for over 30 years at the same job with the same company…rarely took time off…and died at 64 years old right after his retirement. For me, this trip is a combination of a tribute to him, along with wanting to spend the time of my life with the “love of my life.”
* The only thing I will miss while we are gone is our family and friends (who we hope will meet us somewhere throughout our trip) and especially our 3 little kitties we left with my mom in Ohio to catsit for the next 400 days. I will also miss watching “American Football” over the weekend…but I’ll do my best to check the scores in the middle of the night.
GIFF
View all posts by Giff Kabat
Spinning Around The World 