Tipping is part of our economy...its important and other New York City, NY Local Custom Tips

See, the thing is...if you refuse to tip, it might not affect you...although you will get extremely dirty looks at the very least. But tipping is really a legal requirement, cuz here, waiters only get paid about $2 per hour usually. This is way under the legal minimum wage of almost $7. If everyone were to stop tipping, resteraunts would eventually be legally required to pay thier staff a minimum wage of $7...which would drive prices way way up(and thier already sky high)
So again, tipping is important to our economy...if you don't tip, everything gets screwed up.
Also, its jsutr the decent thing to do. There's nothing worse than a tourist who knowingly breaks the social laws. When your here, you have to do your best to act like us.
And for everyone who complains about being on a budget, at least you have a budget in which you can travel, waiters do not.

Leave a Comment

New York is full of street vendors selling food. THese include all teh places people have mentioned, such as hot dog stands, middle eastern vendors, and ice cream stands.
However, two more important sources of food on the street are teh fruit carts, which are cheap, obviously healthy sources of food.
The other thing people haven't seemed to mention yet are breakfast carts, teh source of breakfast for many new yorkers on the run. There you can get coffee, tea, bagels, muffins, even eggs or bacon. Other than possibly a bagel, breakfast carts are the cheapest as well as tasty ways to eat breakfast. There pretty common, although much more so around midtown manhattan.

Leave a Comment

If you are lacking the money to eat at a sit down restaurant, fast food chains aren't your only option. McDonalds is actually pretty expensive. A mush cheaper way to eat is at a take out place, usually pizza or chinese. Take out is the authentic new york cuisine anyway, its what everyone eats around here. It tastes good also, although its not too healthy.
An even cheaper food option is to get a bagel, again, a very usual source of food for new yorkers. A bagel with creamcheese should only be $1-$1.50 too, just don't get it at dunkin donuts, go to a real bagal place.

Leave a Comment

Nothing will make you look like more of an idiot than standing on teh corner waiting for the light to change. You'll quickly notice, no one else does. Now i won't advise walking straight into traffic-- if you're not used to it, you will cause a scene. But if nothing;s coming, feel free to walk anytime.
Now here's teh big secret:
The car wants to hit you less than you want to avoid being hit. Well mayybe not yout, but any native new yorker would feel this way. THe driver will get into all sorts of trouble if he hits you. On teh contrast, if you are hit, teh vast majority of the time you will get up and walk away. So teh driver will stop if you get in the way, even if they cut it mighty close.

Leave a Comment