Accor Hotels is inviting Bloggers and Vloggers to participate in an awesome competition called A Tale of Three Cities to win an amazing prize: a trip for two people of 9 days to Paris, London and Amsterdam, with hotels and trains included, plus £1,000 to spend and a GoPro to register the to be remembered moments! Wow!

In order to participate, all we have to do is to write about our favourite city in the World! Exactly! So of course that me, being a travel addict, could not hesitate to take part in this competition, count me in!

Oh, and before I move on to the big revelation, here you can find all the information you need in case you also want to take part in the competition. Good luck!

Now, for those of you often around here on Packing my Suitcase, you might never have seen me saying which one is my favourite city in this World. Well, that is because I still haven’t said it. However, now the time has come, the perfect opportunity to reveal my dear one: the city I fell in love with over 10 years ago, to where I return to with a big smile on my face, with my eyes shining and my mind going crazy with excitement to explore this beautiful concrete jungle:

NEW YORK, NEW YORK!

After revealing my secret, I might as well now present you three reasons why I love the Big Apple…

A skyscraper island

Manhattan has always been the center of the World to me. Would that be because of the movies? The media? Might be. The truth is, I love islands, and Manhattan is one of them. Not one with a beach and the sun shining the entire year, but with stunning skyscrapers, beautiful to be looked at and to look out from. A skyscraper island where so many fell in love, spent horrendous amount of money in shopping, had a drink in one of the best bars in the World and were inspired to write remarkable stories and songs.

Where I can be myself

I have always been impressed by the fact that in the city of The Great Gatsby and Carrie Bradshaw, you can simply be yourself, because no one will really care. No matter your age, fashion taste, clothing size, how much you have in your pockets or your sexual preferences. It seems to me that New York is always with her arms open for everyone willing to love her. And how could I not love a city where I can be myself?

Part of the World

There are very few places that made me feel a part of the World, and New York was the first and main city to make me feel this way. Every time I walked on Times Square in a very normal day among thousands of other people and all the noise and lights, I felt that even tiny as I am, I am part of this enormous World. Thanks to New York to make me feel this way, it is only fair to return the favor and visit her every once in a while.