If I can make it here…

Renaissance by Marriott Times Square

Nothing prepared me for the sensory overload that was the Renaissance Hotel. The hotel sat right there in Times Square, where the sights, the noise, the lights, and all of humanity collide.

Renaissance Hotel by Marriott is in front of the famous M&M’s store, a two-story chocolate dream for kids and adults. In the confusing maze that was Times Square, that was my landmark. A block away is Duane Reade for quick grocery runs. The hotel has a bakery right beside it that sells the most incredibly delicious blueberry muffin. During the eight days of our hotel stay there, I must have gotten one muffin every day before going inside the hotel. The legendary Max Brenner is also beside that bakery and on slow days, the guy at the counter would let me have free samples of the most incredibly melt-in-the-mouth gourmet chocolates.

To get to the hotel, guests can pass through Times Square where the red boxes are. The red boxes are the ticket counters for last-minute Broadway tickets and there are usually long lines right after noon when it opens. One can also encounter the characters in Times Square: the naked man with a guitar, the Avengers, Superman, and a whole lot of entertainers taking advantage of the open stage. And Broadway is a stone’s throw away.

It really is in the middle of the action.

Not everyone gets the attraction of Times Square. Some see it as just a bunch of people getting together and taking selfies. I view it differently. To me, it’s a microcosm of the world. The theatres are there; so are the best chocolates, the best kebabs, the best sardine shop, the comedians we only see onscreen, and people from all around the world come here, maybe not to save the world, but just to see Wicked or a human dressed like Superman. It’s being among these people for me. So, I get it.

But I had trepidations when I saw our hotel. Everything was screaming excess and long-forgotten opulence. Everything was loud and touristy and too much to take in.

There was a tiny lobby right in front of the elevators where visitors could lounge in. The whole wall was wallpapered with New York views. The elevator doors were also covered with wallpapers featuring all the NY sights it looked like a tourism ad. There were chandeliers in the second floor where the restaurant with a view of Times Square was located. Everything was in excess and it was like stepping into the indulgent decades of the 70s.

When we arrived and my son and I son waited for the elevators, there were two Asians standing with us with the quiet Russians and gold-bedecked Black Americans. My heart was thumping. I felt like were were in a spy movie and something was about to bad. But that was just my imagination.

Inside the elevator was New York at its noisiest. It just was not decorated with loud wallpapers but had music to match them. It was enough to scare me, a typical petite introverted Asian.

Thankfully, when we got to our hotel floor, all was quiet. We were on the 20th floor and couldn’t hear the mayhem that was the 42nd Street.

We opened the door, and I thanked God for what I saw. A room so pristine it made me want to cry. Clean white sheets, clean and soft pillows, firm beds, and a clean modern bathroom that was well stocked.

And the sheets were newly washed and pressed and smelled like fine soap.

It was a sanctuary after all that noise and smoke and “filth” outside.

I opened the curtains and there was that view- a billboard of Wicked staring at me, the famous New York skyline in all its glory, the billboards and all the lights, and the sea of humanity down below doing their Times Square thing.

Thank you, New York. You do your thing right.

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P.S. Thank you to Johanna and Niko for finding this gem of a hotel and for the good price for an 8-day stay. Salamat.