New York Greeters
 

Any comments on the New York Greeters Service? We are arranging this for our visit in February. I know they are not allowed to accept tips but is it o.k. to give them a small gift? or a meal?

A close friend of mine is a greeeter. He does it just to meet people from out of town - likes to see them experience the wonders of NYC. They are not allowd to accept gifts. You may offer a meal - which will often be accepted - but the greeter will almost always insist on paying for him/herself.

The only thing unwelcome he said is attitude (but that's not how we do it at home - oh, look, isn;t that strange) - which is very rare but not competely unknown. He had to dump one couple after about 5 minutes (they were south african - and apparently thogh aparthied should still be in effect - and were in absolute - and extremely offensive - culture shock in NYC)

We had a Big Apple Greeter two summers ago, he emailed us prior to the stay and he told us he liked to collect sweatshirts from universities across the country and if we would bring him a sweatshirt he would reimburse us.

We brought him a Bellevue University sweat shirt that said something to the effect about being a "Bellevue Alumni" on it. Thought it would be fun since the famous mental institution in NY is also called Bellevue.

He did reimburse us for the sweatshirt and we did buy lunch and drinks at a local restaurant on the upper east side.

We used the greeter service in Chicago and it was great.

Sorry, this is new to me. What is a New York Greeter?

We used Big Apple Greeters in March.

Be sure to specify what you want to do. (shopping, museums, etc.)

We gave our greeter a brief description of our plans for the week and asked her to take us to a part of Manhattan she liked.

She took us to Harlem and it was great.

She also explained the subway and bus system which helped us enormously during our week long stay.

We paid for lunch and gave her a gift (our own maple syrup) which she truly appreciated.

I would recommend meeting your greeter at the beginning of your stay in case he/she mentions an interesting activity that is not already in your agenda.

Hope this helps!

Richard

Many thanks for the tips. (sorry should have said Big Apple Greeters)