Tania R.
Yelp
If you are a person who frequents Steinway Street, you will know that there are a vast amount of hookah places to choose from, your choice often varying based on the prices, whether they check underage kids, or the decor.
After 8 Hookah seemed like a pretty nice place from the outside, very dark and cozy, had an attractive bar area, and played decent music. A group of us decided this would be the spot for us one night...regretted it shortly after.
There are many hookah places that don't card people who are obviously under 18. I did not mind when that applied to me when I was younger of course, but as of now, I saw how irritating it could be when gaggles of high schoolers would be in the same hookah venue as me-it took away from the sultriness that these hookah environments would often provide. Fortunately, the people here were all apparently of age and minding their own business-After 8 cards you as soon as you enter. However, I did not like that they immediately told us we had to order drinks to fulfill their drink minimum. I don't like places that that, they usually end up being a bad time. We ordered three hookahs among the six of us-we only wanted two seeing as some of us weren't as inclined to smoke, but for some reason were not allowed.
This is the part where I have to explain the three stars. At first, the hookah appeared to be enjoyable-I pulled several times and it was fine. But after some time, I began to feel sick/nauseated. This is common of course when smoking hookah, but I knew the difference between the feeling one gets when she takes too many pulls, and funky hookah places. Ordinarily I wouldn't have thought anything of it, but several others in my party got the same feeling. I don't know what in the hookah made us feel this way, but it was enough to never want to come back here again. Good thing Steinway has another five thousand or so hookah bars to make up for this one.