Weekend

This weekend, a whole bunch of archies came to town. We went to the MoMA, PS1, a Japanese place called Ippudo..uh... The current exhibition at MoMA was great - prefab. They had actual prefab houses on exhibition in a side lot which we all walked through. Olafur Eliasson had an exhibition at PS1 which pretty much consisted of a giant mirror suspended from the ceiling, slowly rotating. It was so enamoring that we went and lay on the floor staring up at it for a grand total of an HOUR.
I escaped the archies to join Marlen and her boyfriend, Mark for some tango dancing. First time tangoing ever, second time I've ever tried dancing with a partner. I think it went well - Mark gave me a quick run through of some tango moves. Then Marlen and I attended a free beginners tango class where I danced with a Parisian man named Philippe who had danced a couple times before. It was hilarious at one point when he said in his super French accent, "It is forbidden to pass." Of course, he was talking about the rules of dancing in the circle. No passing, no switching of direction. There are a whole bunch of other rules. Only a man asks a woman to dance, never vice-versa. It starts with eye contact, the woman nods and the man approaches. And the code-word for, "I no longer wish to dance with you" is "thank you." And if you agree to dance with a person, you dance for 3-4 songs, at which point they play a completely un-tango-like song to indicate a change partner moment. Argentine tango...mm...rules... An old guy named Joe kept following me around until I agreed to dance with him, and it turns out he's very good at leading and taught me a few things that Mark didn't show me. There was another guy who insisted on a "close embrace" (that's what the hold is when the two partners are closer together) and being the total beginner that I am, I wasn't able to see his feet and didn't really know how to go along with it, so he kept stepping on my toes. Lots of fun, though. I'm going to go to a free tango class tomorrow!
Also, my cousin Ling and her family were over for Friday and Saturday. I was out all Friday so I didn't see them, but I spent the earlier part of Saturday with them. Ling, the sprightly little 7-year-old that she is, watched me put on makeup with many questions and then insisted I hold hands with her when we walked to have a delicious dimsum lunch. I wondered if people looked at us and thought I was her mother... On our way out of the restaurant, my aunt whispered to me, "Hey, that white guy just checked you out." I turned around and sure enough some white guy was staring at me. I just thought it was funny that my aunt pointed it out. O, and gramma's moved back in since Jonathan came back from Germany. Let the gluttony begin!
Speaking of hitting on me, today after I got back to Flushing after spending a few hours with a friend in Brooklyn, I decided to go get some snacks. Ariel, my boss at work, has dubbed me "Snack Queen" so I'm only trying to live up to my title. Anyhoo, walking along, someone suddenly asked me a question. I smiled and nodded and kept walking. Then he kept walking with me, and kept trying to get me to talk to him. I wasn't particularly interested so I just smiled and shook my head and tried to speed away. Except that its Flushing, and you can't speed away because there are too many d*** people everywhere. So I kept going, shaking my head - he asked if I spoke English, I shook my head. Asked if I was Chinese, shook my head. Japanese? Shake my head. Korean? Malaysian? Singaporean? Thai? (Thai?!!!) He tried to give me his business card - I don't get how he'd expect a girl who didn't speak English to call him...
O, and today on the subway I saw a beautiful mixed couple. I think they were both half Chinese, half whatever else. Both gorgeous. I hope I didn't creep them out, but I kept staring...

R.I.P.

My computer died! Dead, kaput!
Good thing my uncle's getting me a nice almost new laptop this weekend.
It's like immediately replacing my old dog with a brand new puppy. I'm so bad...

Elevator Stares

This morning in the elevator, this guy who stood in front of me kept turning around and looking at me. Repeatedly. I began to wonder if I had something on my face so when I got into the office, I immediately looked into a mirror. No, nothing on my face, nor do I look particularly haggard. My only conclusion was that he just wanted to keep looking at me. Guess NY men like me more than the French men do.

Weekend

Fun and busy weekend - I went out to see Fuerzabruta on Thursday with some coworkers where I met with one of the performers and went out drinking with him and his friends until 3 in the morning. Got home at 3:30 where my dad (mom and dad were at the apartment because they were leaving on a tour of Niagara Falls in the morning) yelled at me for being out so late on a school night. Poo to you, dad, I had fun dancing on a bar at Coyote Ugly.
Friday night I went out with Estee and her friend from Goldman Sachs. We were going to go watch Dance Brasil's free concert in Central Park, but when we got there right around start time, the line was way too long. Figuring we had no chance of seeing the show, we wandered down to Greenwich Village and had a delightful dinner at a Scandinavian Restaurant. I got to use my knowledge from Denmark to explain what nearly everything was on the menu - fun, fun! They had Smorbrod (open faced sandwiches) but I opted for the goat cheese and beet salad. What can I say, I love goat cheese. After dinner, we went down to Little West 12th to meet some of Estee's friends to go clubbing. Upon arrival, we found out that the group wanted to get a table - which is fine except that it cost $1600!!!! They seemed to think it was reasonable that we all pay $200 each. NOT. ON. MY. SALARY. So we left and went to the rooftop bar of the Peninsula Hotel which was also expensive and had no good places left to sit, so we decided to call it an evening.
Saturday I spent doing laundry and sleeping off Thursday night. I was going to go to a dance class, but when it started thundering and pouring, I decided to download a nice workout video from Netflix and follow along with that instead. Call me crazy, but I feel a little dumb doing a workout routine all alone in the apartment. Anyhoo, performer buddy from Fuerzabruta, Jon, gave me a call and we went to hang out in his neighborhood, Williamsburg. What a cool neighborhood... Marlen, can we live there? Jon and I had a long discussion about what I want to do with my life, and really, I didn't think about it until today, but I just feel frustrated. I felt pretty well established at CMU - I had my dance friends and my archie friends, I knew where I stood with everyone and had positions of responsibility. I liked being able to teach class and having that freedom to take dance classes whenever I wanted. Here, I just take orders (making copies on the copy machine, model building without any creative input...) and I don't get to impart any of my experience or knowledge. It's like I got here and just stopped. Well, hopefully things will pick back up again in a few months...
Anyway, Sunday I woke up with a finicky stomach from drinking beer on an empty stomach the night before, and hobbled my way over to a contemporary jazz class at Broadway Dance Center. It was fuuun. And today, my upper abs feel like I've been doing crunches all day, but I don't recall doing any at all. Must have been all the contractions we did in class. Mmm...dance...

Sleeeep

During a lunch meeting about an extra-curricular work thing today, I started nodding off. Apparently, during another meeting I nodded off a little too. I also started nodding off at my desk. And this is after getting a good 7.5 hours of sleep. Adding to this, I used to fall asleep in lecture like a champion - I mean, 5 minutes, pow, I'm out.
The moment I have to sit still and not do anything, I fall asleep. I used to think narcolepsy was exhibited the way the "Narcoleptic Argentinian" was in "Moulin Rouge," but after a co-worker's comment about narcolepsy, I looked it up online and realized that I just might have it. Apparently test number 1 is the Epworth Sleepiness Scale (teehee) which is a scale of 0-24. 10 and above means that you should already start seeking help. I gave it a go and got an 18. Uhhhh... And apparently, narcopleptics can fall asleep in half the time it takes a normal person. Which I think may apply...Maybe?
Sitting still and not getting to do anything...my worst nightmare...

Caffeinated

I think it's very possible that my company is killing me with kindness. Today along with my usual two cups of coffee, I was obliged to drink the free liter of soda I got at lunch and a super-iced cupcake which we got today to celebrate Big Boss Hugh's birthday. So...more caffeine than my usual intake and more sugar than my usual intake. It left me pretty much strung out for the rest of the day - I couldn't sit still and kept getting up to walk around and I pretty much sprinted out of the office just to sprint. I'm still really caffeinated and hyper.
And full...Auntie feeds me too much, too....

O, and I got discounted tickets to Fuerzabruta - and the performer who's getting them for me invited me out for drinks afterwards! I love NY!

Partying it Up!

This is the week of parties and gatherings for me. Yesterday was the office party, which was great. I had a margarita and a ton of vodka sours and loosened up enough to get into some good conversations with the boss-people. Ariel and Eli talked about the red light district in Amsterdam - I came to the conclusion that it's really like a vending machine, like those ones with the hamburgers and hotdogs, where you pay the money and the little door opens. Except you go in, instead...Then I talked to Patrick and he revealed to me that Daddy swears like a sailor at work! Daddy! I told him how I changed the Netflix queue when I saw that Ang Lee's "Lust, Caution" was at the top because it's kind of pornographic. Really, it was to protect Daddy's innocence. Patrick said, "Oooo, your dad's not so innocent..." Daddy, how could you?
I went to half of the after-party, since open bar and the lounge we were at closed at 8. We went from Park (the office party) to the Martitime Hotel and had some drinks at the bar. By then, I was quite tipsy, and everyone around me were cracking away at their private jokes. I just kept staring at Grace, who literally let her hair down after a few drinks and was working the whole flirtatious-Korean-dragon-lady-with-gloriously-long-and-wavy-hair look. I wish that I had gloriously long and wavy hair...The group decided around 10:45 to move on to Meracat or however its spelled. I, myself, could no longer keep my eyes open, not because I was smashed, but because all the horrendous air conditioning had made it so my contacts felt like sandpaper on my eyeballs. But, I heard that they didn't stay at the second place very long before dispersing - we still had work today, after all...
Tonight, housewarming party at Christina's (a best friend from the olden days). She lives near Times Square! I'll bet the place is way out of my price range. Ah well, the things I give up to be able to look at magnificent buildings I designed. And tomorrow, the NY Carnegie Mellon Alumni chapter is having a dim sum lunch here in Flushing...at the mall...Obviously this guy doesn't know Flushing, but I'll go anyway since it's just a few streets away. Maybe I can see Ken and punch him in the face. Now that's networking.

On a completely different note: On the way home, I heard the wierdest clanging noises in Lippman Plaza. On approach, I realized that it was a band of people in traditional Chinese dress. One had a drum, and another guy had some sort of trumpet thing that seriously sounded to me like bagpipes and another guy was dancing around with a funny hat that had a rope attached to the top which he kept swinging around like a helicopter. Fun times...O, and the song they were playing was "Amazing Grace." Um...

Apartment Search Horror!

Yesterday I went to go see a couple of places. One was great because it was in a diverse neighborhood with lots going on, and the lady I would be living with is very straightforward and the apartment is squeaky clean. Downside is that it's just a tad out of my price range. Well, I'm still strongly considering it, because I had really good feelings about the place.
The second place I saw was a nightmare. I figured since my gramma and aunt and cousins were all in Flushing, I could just live somewhere near them. I looked at one place that was listed as female roommates seeking another female roommate. Well, no, it was more like females plus the guy that lives in the living room and sleeps on the couch a few months out of the year. So, already, I'm thinking that it's not my thing, plus its really far away from the metro station. Then, as I'm leaving, the guy who owns the place (Mr. Couch) says that he's heading over towards Main St and would like to walk with me. Sure. Then we talk and he starts asking me all these questions. What sorts of things do you do? What do you like? I stick to talking about the bakeries on Roosevelt, I figure its neutral enough. Then as we part ways - me going to my aunt's, him going elsewhere, he says, "We should go check out some bakeries together some time." I later email him to say the place isn't for me and he replies that its ok, and repeats the bakery visit offer.
Eep...
So, today, I regale Jason at work about the tale, and then pretty much everyone in the office hears and Matt tells me I should report the guy to the rental committee/consurtium/triumverate/whatever for sexual harassment. I don't know if he's really all that bad. I doubt he asks out every girl that comes to see the place. But still, if its all female plus the guy on the couch, please, tell people that in the ad.
And really, if I was willing to sell my body for low rent and a place to live, I'd be living it up in some swanky bachelor pad in the East Village. Not Flushing...

Dancing in NY

So far, I've only been able to take dance class once a week because of house hunting and visitors, etc. I hope that in a few weeks, I'll be able to start going regularly. The one that I've been really keen on getting to every week is a Limon class at Peridance. Limon is very different - I've only had a teeny tiny bit of exposure to Graham and Horton technique. The big thing I can see in this style is that it's all about falling, not throwing or contractions. And there's a lot about breathing - everyone's breathing very rythmically the whole time, sort of like pilates. It's a beautiful style - I went to Peridance looking for ballet classes and ended up sitting and watching the last half hour of a Limon class because I absolutely loved the way everyone was moving.
I realized after a few dance classes that taking an open class here has a very different conotation from taking an open class in Pittsburgh. A lot of the people that danced in Pittsburgh's open classes were professional dancers, but a whole lot of them were just regular people who liked to continue dancing as a hobby. I figured that's the way it would be in NY. Not the case. I was chatting happily with a girl after my first ballet class and right before we parted ways she said, "It's so wonderful that you came to NY to pursue a career in dance!" to which I replied, "eh hahaha! Nooooooo... I'm hear for architecture..." And I realized in the Limon class I'm in, everyone!, even the older looking people that seem like working people there for fun, was a professional dancer...So wierd...
So, in the fall, when most normal teaching class schedules resume, I'm going to sign up for the wonderfully discounted gym membership my company provides. With it, I will get to learn to pole dance. Yah, you heard it. Pole dance. Like a stripper. :P

Survived!

Here I sit in the back room of H3 at the end of the second week. Yes, I've survived! So far no one's yelled at me, and it looks like I'm not going to get fired, so I'm just going to breathe a sigh of relief. It's strange being in the working world where the 8:30 start time is more of a guideline than a rule and you don't necessarily have to worry about showing your commitment by sticking around the studio into the wee hours of the night (in fact, my supervisor is often the first one out the door). In fact, whenever I stay a little later, usually because I'm waiting for a dance class to start, people that are still there say things like, "Don't form bad habits! Go home!" :D
So far, I've always been in the back room model building. The area is generally still under construction. They're moving more people back here eventually and installing a 42" flat screen TV and a Wii. For now, I get to rule my own 500sf and blast the speakers with whatever music I see fit.
O and the people are very friendly. Merton, procurer of all the modeling supplies I could ever dream of, says that because of my personality, it seems like they've known me for much longer than a couple weeks. That's a good thing, I think.
O, and half days on Fridays. I'm leaving at 12:30 to go to a Limon contemporary class and then I'm going to a pricy Japanese hair salon to get my hair cut. Long or short? Who knows...
And Morten's going to be here tomorrow!!!

Yesterday, being the first day of work, was horrifyingly slow. This morning, much to my chagrine, I found myself cleaning and organizing the model building space and some of the materials library. "This can't be what I'm doing with the rest of my life," I thought. Fortunately, after lunch, my real work started and I was model building for the rest of the day. Even had enough work to do that I left work half an hour late and have a tad bit more to finish up in the morning.
As for the company, I'm finding it perkier than I could have ever imagined. Everyone seems really nice, I have a great supervisor. They're really easy going - the key thing is to finish what you have to do for the day, but you can really surf the internet all you like, just don't put it on your billable hours. Also, there's company-paid outings - we're having some sort of big summer outing on the 24th. It's top secret at the moment, but in the past, it's been parties on a yacht or double decker tours led by Hugh Hardy (the big cheese). Also, days before holidays, work gets out at 3pm, and if I work after hours and have approval, I can get a free cab ride home. Jolly!
O yes, and today, we all got free delicious pizza for lunch. It was prompted by my supervisor, Ariel, who had me and all the interns doing hard labor all morning. He called the office manager and requested pizza for us, and then she decided to order a little extra for the office. Ironically, since we were all in the back cleaning, our little group was the last to know the pizza was here. Fortunately for me, people hate pizza with green pepper and onions, so I got to have a BIG slice of it. Yum!

Twiddle

I've been twiddling my thumbs since 8:30 this morning. First day of work always seems to be like that. I'm in a temporary station that is apparently occupied by a very fastidious person who likes everything in its place. I've been told not to take it personally when he disinfects everything when he returns. So...yeah. They're doing some renovations in the back room and when its done, people will be rearranged, and there are some interns on the way out. I guess when all that happens, I'll get moved into a permanent spot. A week too early, oops.
I found out a little bit ago that I'll be working for a guy named Ariel on a nifty black box theatre at a very prominent NY landmark. Should be fun. I am sworn into secrecy. And I'm hungry...Darnit, I even ate breakfast. At least there's free coffee. But yes, I have nothing to do, and until then, I'm just going to be sitting here twiddling.
O, and in a week, they're considering sending me out for some training in Revit. Michael, the guy who hired me, is going to go over the Revit curriculum to see if it's worth it. Must do Kristen Kurland proud...
Technically no IMing allowed here, but I keep looking at this girl behind me and she's been online shopping and emailing all morning. Surely an occasional IM is okay if online shopping is okay.
Real estate search is going well. Marlen and I discovered that the 180s in Washington Heights is absolutely perfect. I've fallen in love. All the other places we saw before were nice, but nothing got me quite like the apartment we saw yesterday. I turned to her and said, "Marlen, this is where I want to live." It had TREES outside and all the windows are inward facing so it's quiet. Perfection for $1425/m. We talked about it and decided that we can only afford it if the owner covers the broker fee. If he does, we'll actually save $300 in the long run. Otherwise, though, we're going to keep looking.

Aloooone

I moved into Gramma's place in Flushing today. Now I'm all alone. Living alone sucks... Marlen, get that job quick so we can find a place!
Otherwise, nice things. No more naggy mom, which is nice. And public transportation and dance classes abound. I can't wait to take my first dance class since May...
O yes, and of course, the mandatory countdown. 13 days!

Never Never

Tonight, my parents invited my uncle and his family over. Overall a nice evening with my second-cousins which I haven't seen in a while. Now that Angie is older, she's more interesting to talk to, and it was nice to chat with Yogi, who, for the most part, is elusive. We had a barbecue and then watched "I Am Legend" and "V for Vendetta."
My granduncle was also present. He's 83 and in the past couple years, he's gone from a somewhat grumpy, very sharp minded big man to a spare, very jolly and absentminded one. Apparently, he's in the early stages of Alzheimers. I saw him once before going to Europe so I was prepared for the fact that he wouldn't remember me, and, in fact, would need reminding every half hour. After a whole evening, we got into a little routine.
"Who's this lovely young lady?"
"O, I'm Ruby's daughter, the second one."
"O, that's lovely. Did you know you're the spitting image of your grandmother? Your mother's mother?"
"Um, actually, I look a lot like my dad, see?" [stands next to dad who smiles as I gesture from face to face]
"O, no, you look just like your grandmother. She was beautiful, do you know what she looks like?"
"No, we don't have any photos."
"O, all right"
At which point he switches to Taiwanese, I get wide-eyed, and walk about when Mom answers him. Then, the next time he sees me, he goes, "O, who is this lovely young lady?" Rinse and repeat.
One time he managed to retain the memory of me long enough to ask if there were hordes of boys chasing after me, to which I replied, "No, I'm too mean." And then another time he said I should be careful out in the big world because I'm so pretty.
Dad and I decided that he had a huge crush on his sister-in-law. Tee-hee!

Au Revoir, Paris!

It was a whole week that just flew by, I can't believe how quickly. About 5 days ago, I got a bit of food poisoning while eating some unwashed strawberries. Stupid me. Either way, the people at the pharmacy gave me something that I was very dubious about, but it ended up working in just one dose. I'm on the road to recovery, but my tummy is still quite tender. I can't seem to eat more than just a tiny bit at a time. Ah, well, at least I'm going to come home a little lighter rather than heavier.
I met a whole bunch of great people along the way at the hostel, and we all traded ideas about where would be good to go. I ended up going to the Louvre, the Musee d'Orsay, l'Orangerie, le Musee Picasso, Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, er....Galerie Lafayette, etc. I can't remember what else I went to, because I did a lot of walking (though far less after I ate those darned strawberries). Best meal I had there was the one on my second day in Montmartre at La Vrai Paris. Second best was the self -serve cafe in Galerie Lafayette. That's some fancy food there, and I would calculate that I had it all at about half the price it would be at a cafe because it was self-serve. But yes, Paris is lovely, I'm going to have to come back one day and make sure I wash all the fruit before I eat it.
On to Copenhagen and Morten!

Bonjour from Paris!

Bonjour! J'aime la vie a Paris! Well, mostly it's been a lot of walking, some glorious old buildings and delicious food. Uh...well, when I can afford it. People weren't kidding when they said that France was expensive, and more so now that the dollar is so weak. So far I've been mostly just assembling tasty little picnics of baguette, strawberries, salami and milk, or a Pizza and whatever tasty morsels I find along the way. I must say, egg on the pizza, quite tasty. So far I've only had one real meal - a goat cheese salad and a limonade. Tres delicieux!
[this spot is for the picture of the meal, when I get to a computer with a working USB drive...]
So far I've been all over Montmartre, the Sacre Coeur, Notre Dame, the Louvre, the Grand Palais, the Deportation Memorial...more places...I'm going to the Orangerie with Sarah, one of the girls I met at the hostel, today at noon. Should be good. I like the hostel, everyone staying there seems to be really interested in travel and are very willing to make new friends. Still, I'm looking forward to Copenhagen and Berlin where I can just leave my stuff out instead of having to take all my stuff to the showers in a bag and live out of a suitcase. Really tiring after a while...

Bon Voyage!

I leave for Paris in less than a day! The long awaited trip, and no stupid airplanes flying into skyscrapers to screw it up this time around. Wish me luck!

Unexpected Guests

Today we weren't expecting anyone over. All of a sudden, mom's best friend pulled up. A couple hours later, some old friends that we hadn't seen in a very, very long time pulled up, too. Just dropping by, they said. The guy I remembered being a baby is now 6 feet tall, but the girls were just as great as they used to be. I just wish they told us they were coming so I wouldn't have greeted them in my pajamas. So embarrassing...I didn't even comb my hair this morning.
O, and I stepped on a shard of glass today. I don't know how it ended up on the kitchen floor, since mom said that we didn't break anything glass-like recently. Strange...

Ken's a F*** and he ruined my graduation

So today was nice, I had graduation. It was long, Al Gore was funny, I took lots of photos. Then, for the third day in the row, mom and dad helped me clean and pack.

And now, a letter:

Dear Ken,
Perhaps instead of yelling at me and thinking only about yourself, you should consider that instead of spending my own last days seeing friends, I was busy "doing my part" for the apartment. I got rid of all the furniture, cleaned the kitchen (and no, I don't blame Chang for all the mess, but I cleaned it once already not even a week ago so there wasn't much more than a light bit of wiping to do), cleaned the bathroom, and cleared out the hall closet as well as the kitchen cabinets of all of my things. I left those things in the kitchen for Brian and you to see if you wanted any of it because I couldn't take them and they were useful. I can see now that you only think that people are out to make more work for you.
Perhaps if you didn't want your mother to do be stuck cleaning up the place, you should have stuck around and helped instead of going out to play and leaving it all to her, seeing as I asked you to help, not her.
Don't you dare say I didn't do anything to help get the apartment cleaned. And don't you dare say that none of those plates or furniture were yours to deal with. I didn't buy them, they came with the apartment. If you had anything against them, you shouldn't have used them, and you used the furniture and tableware plenty. You didn't find people to take the apartment, you didn't find people to take the furniture, you weren't here when Brian and I spent three hours moving furniture because you were busy playing at the zoo. You weren't there the second day either when the second group of people came for furniture and I was the only when helping with the furniture. You never had to try to get Beth not to evict us because of YOU, you didn't have to worry about remembering to pay any of the bills, you never cleaned the bathtub or the sink, and before yesterday, you never cleaned the kitchen counters before. And don't say you cleaned the microwave, you liar, I scrubbed out the inside three times before I left.
If you had a problem with my lack of help, then why didn't you say something in the first place instead of calling me when I'd been gone for over an hour?
And don't think I'm an idiot, your half-assed email is not an apology. I'm not so stupid I can't see you still think I'm a lazy person who left your mother all the work. Stop being a selfish bastard and see what people have already done instead of expecting them to do more. And lastly? Go fuck yourself.

5th Year Exhibition

After months of looming on the horizon, the 5th year show finally happened. Wednesday night was a tremendous success. Around 200 people showed up, people enjoyed the lectures and from Zach, I heard that guests really enjoyed the food I picked out. Today was family day which was a little desperate for me because the caterer showed up half an hour early. Fortunately, the person with the key was just down the street and was able to run over and let me in just a few minutes. I think the families really enjoyed the food and there was more than enough left over so we took it all and gave it to the design firm that was on the first floor. I do hope they enjoy it as much as we did. So, other than getting the card and key returned to the rightful owners tomorrow, my responsibilities are done and I'm home free! Wheeee!