Laura's Visit

This weekend Laura came to visit for the July 4th Weekend. It's easier for me to show you what we did instead of write an essay about it (captions to come later):

Starstruck

This past weekend, I have come to realize how accessible celebrities are to the general public here in NYC. I could only attribute that to either extreme luck or just Laura's presence, since all 3 celebrities I spotted this weekend happened during her visit. Here were the 3 sightings in chronological order:

1) As we were leaving from Avenue Q, we spotted a crowd of people on the sidewalk, everyone with camera in hand in anticipation of something I wasn't sure of at that moment. Out of the crowd sprung this tall black man with gray hair flanked by two people who looked like security guards. It wasn't until I saw his profile that I realized it was the ever-respectable Morgan Freeman. I managed to snap a few action (and therefore blurry) shots of him while he was leaving the theater. Apparently he is starring in the Broadway play called Country Girl. Perhaps I will go check that out one of these days.

This would be a profile shot.

Backside shot.

Starring Morgan Freeman.

2) Mario Lopez was on his way out next door from the musical A Chorus Line in which he stars. We were able to make out his silhouette through the tinted windows of his SUV. We figured it wasn't worth taking a picture of. What was sorta obnoxious however were the girls who were screaming at seeing even his outline through the tint - dude chill out.

3) As we were visiting the famous Magnolia Bakery in Greenwich Village, Laura noticed this woman with her family walking towards us on the sidewalk preceded by some photographers, which we quickly realized were the paparazzi. Despite her cover-up sunglasses, Laura pointed out that this woman was Heidi Klum strolling around leisurely through the streets. Her demeanor was very calm and composed, even as the paparazzi were snapping away at their cameras constantly. She did not seem to be annoyed by their presence and continued to smile as she walked by the public. Laura, Michelle, and I were 3 feet away from her!!! Though I was hesitant to bust out my camera since I felt she had enough on her already, Laura did manage to steal a picture of her almost instantaneously.

HEIDI KLUM!!!

Though we visited the same bakery the next day in hopes of standing in the presence of other celebrities; however, there was no such luck. Let me point out that these 3 sightings happened over a brief hour and a half or so. That's the most number of celebrities I have seen in such a short span of time.

Keep posted and you'll be the first to know when I run into Jessica Alba and/or Angelina Jolie on the streets.

Culturing of Self

Last Friday, I woke up at 5 AM to attend the free summer concert series at Rockefeller Center as apart of the Today Show starring Rihanna. Though the line to get in was ridiculously long, I had the chance to stand immediately behind the VIP section and see Rihanna perform live. Though I wasn't a big fan of her newly-done short hair, she did perform some of my favorite songs by her: Please Don't Stop the Music, Take a Bow, and Umbrella. Here are some pictures:



I must say I did have to make some sacrifices here - I had to wake up at 5 AM and pull in to work at 10 AM. It was then I realized I had involuntarily become a Rihanna die-hard fan.

****************************************************************************

So this week I feel like I've cultured myself a bit by finally watching a Broadway show and a Shakespeare play live on stage.

I found Rent to be a moving musical considering the circumstances of each character and the kinds of difficulties each one has to face in the play. Most songs, some of which I found are supposed to be pretty popular, accentuated the somber mood of a majority of the scenes. If you're not familiar (warning: spoiler ahead), Rent is a Broadway musical about a small group of people who are each homosexual, bisexual, or just diagnosed with HIV/AIDS. They encounter many difficult situations throughout the movie, for example, Roger (one of the main characters) finds out that he has AIDS while Angel (a drag queen) dies of AIDS breaking the heart of his homosexual lover, Tom Collins. (end of spoiler) I really liked the songs "Without You" and "No Day but Today" though they did bring me down to an emo state. Though "Seasons of Love" is supposed to be the more popular song, I didn't like it as much as the other two however it did instill the number 525,600 into my head. I enjoyed watching this musical and would recommend it to anyone who will be here before September 7th when it goes off Broadway.

On Monday, my friend Michelle asked me to sign up for an online lottery to try and see if I could get us both tickets to watch Hamlet at Central Park performed by a rather famous group of performers including Sam Waterson from Law and Order (according to Michelle) and Lauren Ambrose. Though both of us signed up for the lottery, Lady Luck decided to be on my side this time, probably because she knew how much I needed to culture myself. Somehow Michelle managed to leave work before 7 for this opportunity. This Shakespeare play had been modernized considering the modern-day military clothing worn by everyone and the fact that there were some pretty neat special effects that took place throughout. There were sequences in which puppets were creatively put to use and it was entertaining to see how they integrated them into the storyline. Throughout the play, I was recounting what had exactly happened in that play, since I had not read it since my junior year of high school. I remember Hamlet being a very tragic play in which pretty much every character dies in the end (sort of like in the Departed). However, the actor who plays Hamlet does a great job of bringing out the insecurity and cowardry that is truly his character. Though it was great to relive the Shakespeare play, I had not anticipated being there for almost four hours. This is what it's like to sit through an entire Shakespeare play, I learned.

During intermission, I confirmed my belief that I saw one of my electrical engineering TA's in the same audience by speaking with him. I found out that he was working as a quant at another financial firm and will also be in the city for most the summer. He's a really smart guy who is intending to receive a Ph.D. for possible teaching as a profession.

My First Week in the Big Apple Part 2

I shall continue where I left off from the last post. This brings us to:

Wednesday 6/4: Today I attended an all-day training session which taught us how to use and program in one of the company's home-grown computer languages. The instruction was so exciting that at multiple times throughout the day I needed to test my caffeine tolerance by drinking coffee. The instructor seemed to know the material very well, but frankly I was not enthused.

Thursday 6/5: This day is technically my first real day of work since I had been in orientation and training the 3 days before. I was set up with a desktop computer with double screen monitors. Though I had thoughts of taking advantage of this setup by perhaps running PC games on it, I was discouraged by the fact that my desk is located almost immediately in front of the offices of three very important people in my department. My monitors directly face the corner of the room where the managing director of my department sits as well as two other high-level managers. I guess this ensures that I will be as productive as possible at work.

At night, I attended an intern social event whose purpose was to allow us to network with the other interns and managers. Though I did meet a good number of people, I felt my most interesting conversation was with a student from MIT who was explaining a research project involving WiFi electricity and how its proof of concept exists. Apparently pretty soon (probably more like in several years) we won't need to carry stupid chargers for our phones or laptops but instead just need to be in range of some WiFi electricity outlet.

After the event, some Berkeley people headed over to Greenwich Village to eat dinner at a Mexican restaurant called Panchitos. The main topic of discussion revolved around a philosophical discussion about whether an original exists if something or someone is cloned even though every single atom exists in both things.


Friday 6/6: I am getting up to speed on my project and the underlying framework of the systems I will be working with.

My friend Andrew from school suggested that I shouldn't miss out on this highly acclaimed hot dog place called Gray's Papaya. Tonight Gheric, Marco, and I decided to try it out for once. To analyze, I must say I've had better hot dogs elsewhere though the price was cheap and the papaya drink I ordered was highly diluted. My conclusion is that Gray's Papaya was overrated. We were not satisfied, so we decided to hunt for another hot dog place - Papaya Dog. Here I ordered a hot dog and corn dog, but must say that I was just as unsatisfied with their goods.

We were unsure how the night would unfold, but decided to walk towards Times Square. On the way, we encountered what I believe to be some kind of cult. These people on the four corners of the street were chanting while performing a ritual of some sort. These four guys that you see below would raise their arms, yell loudly, and then bow down as if to some imaginary god in the middle of the intersection. Then four other guys on the adjacent corner would follow suit and do the same thing. This would continue around the entire intersection for 5 more minutes. I, along with other passers-by, was utterly confused and amused at this seemingly satanic ritual. For a few seconds I thought this was a flash mob, but then I was informed that crazy shit like this happens in NY all the time. Here's a pic:


Not your everyday night time activity.

Following this, we made our way to Times Square stopping to take pictures at Madison Square Garden and some television studio which you could see from the outside.


Finally the three of us arrived in Times Square after our mini-trek from West Village.

The crowd at around 11 PM.

Then we decided to check out the Marriott Marquis which towers 45 floors high. Though we didn't get to see the observation deck, we decided to crash a Puerto Rican party on the way down. Apparently this weekend marks the annual Puerto Rican Pride Parade. Though Gheric was wearing a suit still from work while Marco had some kind of semi-formal jacket on, I stood out in the crowd like a sore thumb sporting my t-shirt and jeans with my favorite track jacket. We decided it would be best to leave before the bouncers came to kick us out.

6/7-6/11 shall be covered in later posts. Stay tuned.

My First Week in the Big Apple

This past week has been composed of many different new experiences for me considering this is my first time staying in the east coast for an extended period of a summer. Since I had not taken the time to start a blog until a week into my New York experience, I will try to fill in what I have been up to for the past week as best I can. I will probably call on the help of some pictures I took to paint my explanations since they are each worth a thousand words (cliche, I know).

Saturday 5/31: I arrived at JFK airport after a 5.5 hour flight realizing that I would be taking a pause from my life in the West, where I was born and raised, for the summer. Bringing 2 full luggages, a guitar, and a laptop in my backpack, I set off into the city. I stay in the living room portion of my apartment located on Wall Street.



Sunday 6/1: It didn't occur to me the prime location of this building until I encountered a crowd of tourists snapping pictures at what turns out to be the New York Stock Exchange right around the corner from my apartment. Today, Chris took me around different parts of Manhattan, first making a stop at this shop in SoHo which sold the best fries known only to locals. We then explored Chinatown and its assortment of butcher shops, hair salons, trinket shops, and my favorite - bakeries which sold dan ta (egg custard). As we approached Little Italy, we saw that all the streets were blocked off for what I learned was the feast of St. Anthony. The booths on the street there were filled with sweets of all sorts while one table's colorful display caught my eye:

It is actually an assortment of objects made with magnets attached to their backs. There were many booths beside it which displayed various sweets like this:



As our stomachs caught up with our eyes, we quickly chose a restaurant to spend our lunch time. Chris concocted his own plate of some sort of butter-sauce pasta over filled shells, whereas I went with a safer anchovy and tomato sauce over spaghetti:



It was afterwards that we decided to check out a bakery / butchery / restaurant among other stores in Chinatown. What caught my eye was this sign which displayed all sizes and shapes of my favorite dessert, egg custard (aka dan-ta in chinese):



I did not know such types of dan-ta existed and look forward to devouring a good number of these heavenly items of dessert soon.

As the day continued, Chris and I continued our tour of the city as we explored a bit of the NYU campus. I wasn't too impressed with the overall campus, though some buildings exhibited crafty architecture. The inside of the NYU library, for example, looked pretty cool:

I couldn't help but to think of Laura at the sight of this building. I imagine she would have found this place just as cozy as Moffitt Library. Following this, we encountered a "Haas" of the East Coast also known as the Stern School of Management:


Perhaps I will be considering attending this school later in my life.

After the NYU excursion, we visited Chris's friend from work who lives in this apartment community called Stuyvesant Town. This is not your typical city apartment complex - it contains a water fountain surrounded by the rare New York City presence of natural grass and trees. I suppose this fact merits a picture of my visit there:



Monday 6/2: Today was the first day of work, aka orientation. We were notified that there were 545 interns present and that this summer would be no vacation but rather a high-speed learning experience for everyone of us. The day was composed of our filling out paperwork and learning about company policies about every possible controversial workplace topic. This was topped off with our posing for mug shots and being fingerprinted so that we were comprehensively documented in their employee database. On my way out, I took some snaps of the Manhattan skyline and the corporate building in Jersey City:































At night, I met up with some Berkeley interns (Ravi, Michelle, Jimmy, Jerry, Keaton, and Tony) and Kiran at the Taste of Times Square food festival. At this festival, which happens once a year, different restaurants and eateries in Times Square showcase their best items of food to the public. I had the opportunity to try what was called "buffalo alligator". Most people were confused as to whether this referred to buffalo meat or alligator meat. In fact, it is alligator meat cooked in the same style as buffalo wings.


The crowd at the festival


Buffalo alligator


Bread pudding: I confused this with french toast - wouldn't you?

Complementary to the unique types of food on the streets were the different types of street music. Some guy was generating some high-pitched noise which Kiran referred to as sounding like a "cat dying". It wasn't until we traced the sound that we realized a guy was playing music on the back edge of a saw with a violin bow. It wasn't just any music - he was playing the tune of the Star Spangled Banner!!! Awed? I think that's an understatement.

Wtf mate?

This night definitely marked an exciting start to the week.



Tuesday 6/3: Orientation day 2. I got a VIP view of the Manhattan skyline through Chris who works on the 39th floor of the building.



At the orientation, we got to learn more about my division of the company since all the departmental chairs came to speak about each subdivision.



This is what it looks like to have 545 interns sitting at orientation. This room isn't exactly made to hold this many people at once.

At night, I attended the Guggenheim Museum and the Hewitt Cooper Museum with Kiran and Michelle for what is known as the Museum Mile Festival in which every museum along a mile stretch next to Central Park gives admission free of charge. I felt that the exhibits at the Guggenheim were a bit overrated; however, their main attraction I must acknowledge is pretty amazing:


They should hang this in the middle of Doe Library.

Here are photos of some of the other exhibits:



After this, we headed to midtown in search of dinner. Along the way, we decided to take a detour through Rockefeller Center.




This is what an alien abduction of Rockefeller Center might look like.



This is what you call being at the wrong place at the wrong time.




5-second exposure


5-second exposure


This is the product of the color swapping feature on my camera. I chose to swap black with grey and so you can tell that both Michelle and Kiran's hair seem to be invisible. What is even more entertaining is the fact that Kiran became pantless. That's hot, no?

6/4-6/10 will be continued in the following post. Stay tuned.