Thanksgiving in the States (Or: Photos of cold places)

A few weeks back Marco and I were in the States for Thanksgiving. First we went to Chicago to be tourist-y and then Indianapolis to see my folks again. Actually, Chicago was chosen because there are no direct flights from here to Indy, so we usually tack on an extra city somewhere…

It was a lot of fun, but I had a hard time adjusting to the cold that first day, which was around the freezing point, or just a bit warmer. After doing some tourist-y stuff near our hotel, we went to a Cheesecake Factory to try and keep me awake. This backfired, since the restaurant keeps their lighting so low I can barely see the menu. As a joke (mostly), Marco pulled out his phone to use the flashlight option. A joke, until we realized the couple across the aisle did the same…

Our hotel was pretty nice. Just around the corner from the Magnificent mile. A few factors went into our decision for this one:

• Price
• Wifi
• Location
• Fridge (although until we were there I couldn’t absolutely be sure we had one, which we did… the official website doesn’t mention it for our standard king room, but some review sites do).

The one interesting thing was that there was (and still is) a strike going on at this particular hotel. Back in September lots of hotels went on strike (background information here) for better pay, health insurance during the slower winter months and protection against too much work (number of rooms cleaned during the day, for instance). While I was concerned, we barely saw anything of it – yes, there were picketers outside in the morning and early afternoon, but both they and the hotel staff were courteous to guests and each other. And with our room being on the 14th floor, we didn’t hear them at all. 

On one of the days we went to the University of Chicago to see the Oriental Institute. If you’re in the area I highly recommend it. The suggested admission ($10) was more than reasonable, and we almost had the museum to ourselves that afternoon. Not really a museum for (most) kids, though. 

While waiting for the next bus to take us back, we stopped for a coffee. I couldn’t resist snapping a picture from our table.

That’s it for now!