New York City- March 15-16

The next mini adventure before departing for Belgium was New York City.  We had to go there to get our Visa's for Belgium.  Each Belgian consulate in the US has certain states it is responsible for, Ohio belongs to NYC, so off we went.  Well, actually, it took much preparation because every document that has ever been created for us was required for the application. An FBI background check (note: Molly stinks at doing fingerprints), birth certificates, marriage certificate and a ton of documents pertaining to Tyler's employment in Belgium.  That seems easy enough, until you find out these documents have to be sent to the state department for a special seal of approval (an Apostille).  Not a quick, easy or cheap task!

Our appointment was on Monday so we flew in on Sunday morning.  It was a quick trip because Tyler had to be in Belgium by Tuesday.  We made use of the time we had and made a visit to the 9/11 memorial and museum.  Neither of us had been to NYC since any of the work had been completed at Ground Zero.  I don't think either of us expected to be as moved as we were.  The museum was done very respectfully, and we were very happy we spent the time and money to go, with that being said, it was also a very heavy day.  We finished late and headed to a Mexican restaurant for dinner (we have been eating Mexican food as much as humanly possible because it will not be readily available in Europe and if anyone has seen Molly in front of a basket of chips, you know this will be difficult.)

No trip to New York is complete without pizza

Subway selfie

One World Trade Center

9/11 Memorial Fountains

Chips and Salsa!

And Enchiladas

Our appointment with the Embassy was Monday morning, we had spent countless hours making sure we had everything right so we wouldn't have a wasted trip.  Failure #1: We only made one appointment since Molly was a dependent of Tyler, this makes sense...NO you must have individual appointments... OOPS! Luckily the woman at the embassy allowed us to have our second appointment after helping others.  Failure #2: We had the wrong insurance form for Molly.  Again, luckily the Embassy lady was super nice and said we could e-mail it to her! Failure #3: Since Tyler was going to Belgium, he could not leave his passport, we had been told this would be fine... and it was... sort of.  We would have to mail it back to get the Visa put in it.  Therefore, when he got back from Belgium, the passport would have to be mailed to NYC, the visa added and then everything (including both passports with Visas included) would be mailed back... Oh and the woman we dealt with at the embassy was going on Holiday so we would have to count on her colleague to do all of this.  Note: Everyone in Belgium is constantly on holiday, getting ready to go on holiday, or just getting back from holiday. It's a great way to live!

After the appointment, we were both starving. We headed for Shake Shack, the In-n-out/Five Guys, of New York for burgers and a milkshake.  Delicious! With full bellies, we headed for a walk in Central Park before we both had to start our treks to the airport (Tyler to JFK and Molly to Newark).

Shake Shack

Central Park

We then parted ways for Tyler to go start his job in Belgium and start getting our new life in action!  We had a great yet brief trip to New York.  I (Molly) love New York and it was great to visit again.  I haven't been very many times in my adult life but I still love the adventure just as much as I did when I was a kid (even though some family reading this will say I hated going there).  I am grateful to my dad for teaching us as kids how to navigate the subway because it served me well on this trip and most likely will in the future.