It was on 3rd Avenue and I was on the way to my hotel in Midtown Manhattan when I saw a guy that looked like Anthony Bourdain after 3 or 4 glasses of wine, trying to get a cab. The fact that I stood there, a couple of steps away from one of my idols, watching him waving at taxis passing by – and not getting one – told me a lot about New York.

You might be famous – people don’t care. This is not L.A. You might be rich – you still take a cab. This is not Dubai. You might be one of the greatest travel professionals out there – you can still fail at transportation. Even if New York is your home town.

Welcome to Midtown, the part of Manhattan that everybody knows and almost everybody defines a bit differently. What’s certain: Midtown is what the world thinks of when imagining New York. Skyscrapers like the Chrysler Building. Shopping at 5th Avenue like the Sex and the City gals. Big corporations like NBC or Citigroup. Donald Trump – like you wouldn’t believe.

I’ll be honest, staying in Midtown Manhattan can be a bit much sometimes. It’s expensive, noisy, hectic and overwhelmingly impressive. But you can’t beat its super central location and the sheer amount of possibilties. This is just a small selection of things located in this area:

• Grand Central Terminal (love it!)
• The Empire State Building
• Broadway
• The Chrysler Building (the prettiest of all sky scrapers)
• Time Square (hate it!)
• The best part of 5th Avenue
• St. Patrick’s Cathedral

I love Midtown especially very early in the morning. If you are jet-lagged after a long flight to New York, make use of the insomnia. Get out in the streets as early as 5 or 6 am. Walking through the canyons between skyscrapers that the streets of Midtown are, at a time when they are empty, is such a surreal experience – you shouldn’t miss it.

The silent change of shifts. The occasional opening preparations in a shop. Steaming sewers. All of it with the backdrop of an upcoming New York sunrise, accompanied by an ever growing stream of women wearing yoga pants and earpods, holding an iPhone in one and a Starbucks coffee in the other hand, rushing to their pre-work workout, training for survival in the shark tank of Midtown Manhattan.

While Midtown is the part of Manhattan that everybody imagines when thinking of New York and Williamsburg is where trends emerge, Greenwich Village (or just "The Village") is the part of NYC where everything is a bit different and quirky.  

Entering Greenwich Village means stepping out of the rigid grid system of Manhattan. Literally. Streets in the village are not geometrically organized as in the most parts of New York, so it feels instantly different when you enter the neighborhood. Greenwich Village feels more like an actual village, a bit old-timey and european. 

The streets are not the only aspect of the Village that is not straight. Traditionally good soil for counter cultures, Greenwich Village is home to a lively gay community, off Broadway theatres, comedy clubs and for a long time was the cultural center of New York City. Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs, Truman Capote, Bob Dylan, Jimi Hendrix, Simon and Garfunkel and The Velvet Underground are just a few of the artists living or working in the Village.

Today Greenwich Village is one of the most expensive neighborhoods of Manhattan and thereby of New York. This drove out artists that aren't highly successful yet of course. It is the old tale of gentrification: artists make an affordable area of a city interesting, that attracts real estate developers and wealthy people who want part of the action, driving up prices and thereby forcing the artists into another neighborhood ultimately. But the Village vibe ist still there, you can feel it when walking the small streets, just everything is a cleaner, safer, more established. With the vibrant East Village neighborhood right next door you can switch between both worlds if you want!

Williamsburg is loved by many, but not by everyone. Some call it "hipster apocalypse". I call it one of the best neighborhoods to stay in New York – as long as you know what you are in for.

Formerly characterized by industry that had mostly left the neighborhood at that point, Williamsburg had it's fair share of crime and unemployment in the 1960s and 70s. Low rents attracted artists, bohemians and newly arrived residents of New York in the 1990s, making Williamsburg the birthplace of the hipster movement. The vibrant scene combined with improved public transport, connecting the neighborhood more and more with the nearby Manhattan caused prices to skyrocket, ultimately driving out parts of the artist and hipster communities into other parts of Brooklyn.

So what is Williamsburg today, you might ask? A neighborhood with a view of the skyline and a quick connection to Manhattan, but without its crazy pace. An area of NYC that is not completely dominated by the (sometimes annoying) hipster movement anymore, but with all the great food, nightlife and craftsmanship they established here.

Since Brooklyn became the borough where new things happen and trends arise to spread not only in New York City but the whole world, Williamsburg for sure is one of the most attractive alternatives for staying in Manhattan. The L train will get you across the East River in 15 minutes, so no worries about missing out on something. Quite the opposite, think about it: you will miss out on the spectacular skyline of Manhattan if you stay IN Manhattan. Williamsburg will give you sunsets over skyscrapers and bridges on the other hand!  

Apart from that, if you want to hang with the cool kids, stay in Williamsburg. It feels alive, colorful, non-touristy and young. Mix in that it also is more quiet than most parts of Manhattan and has a nice waterfront and you will notice that it's worth cringing at a couple of hipsters from time to time!

• In general you should avoid areas and neighborhoods of New York that are far away from Manhattan or not well connected to Manhattan. Why? Because most interesting things for you as a visitor will be located there.
  

• Some of those boroughs and neighborhoods that are either too far away or just not interesting for visitors are: almost all of Queens (too far); Staten Island (too far and not that interesting); the southern and eastern parts of Brooklyn (such as Crowns Height, Flatbush, Bensonhurst, Bay Ridge, etc.) and most of the Bronx (especially the northern parts).
  

• While New York nowadays is a very safe city, some neighborhoods might seem sketchy to visitors: Brownsville, East New York, Bedford-Stuyvesant, Mott Haven, Long Island City, etc.
  

• In Manhattan itself, I personally would avoid Time Square (too exhausting, fake and turbo commercial), Washington Heights (not much to do) and Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village (almost entirely residential with not much to do for visitors).