Tuesday, November 4, 2014

New York, New York!


       I Love New York


Where is New York? It’s in New York, of course! This might seem a little strange, but let me explain. New York City is in the state of New York, although the state capital is Albany. Its nickname is “The Big Apple” (la Gran Manzana) and the people who live there like it so much that they started a fashion: The heart of the city is Manhattan. The Dutch bought the island from the Indians at the start of the 17th century and a city called New Amsterdam was built there. In the 1660s, the English captured it and named it New York in honour of (en honor de) the Duke of York.

The Statue of Liberty
Did you know that the Statue of Liberty, on Liberty Island in New York Harbor, was a present (regalo) from the French to mark 100 years of American independence? In fact, there is a replica on an island in the River Seine in Paris. The Statue of Liberty was the first thing that millions of immigrants from Europe saw when they arrived in America. She carries a torch (antorcha) in one hand to light the way (iluminar el camino) and a book in the other to represent the American Constitution.

         ciudad, puente, manhattan, Estados Unidos wallpaper
The City today
Today New York is divided into 5 boroughs (distritos)– Manhattan, the Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, and Staten Island. It’s the biggest city in the United States with a population of over 7 million and it’s a major business and cultural centre. As you might imagine, a city this size needs a sophisticated transport system. New York has a subway (the American word for underground), its famous yellow taxis and lots of bridges and tunnels.
The streets in Manhattan are very easy to follow; there are 11 avenues that run north-south (ir de norte a sur) and they are crossed by streets. The avenues and streets don’t usually have names but are numbered. That's why the U2 song calls it the place where "the streets have no name".

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