Shrimp for a Sardine

It's Saturday, so there was no class today. We decided a while ago, that this would be the perfect chance to visit a few sites in Manhattan. The first stop, was New York University (NYU).

At the NYU admissions office, we attended an info session held by one of the admissions officers. He started by showing us a video about life at NYU. It was good, but it wasn't nearly as entertaining as "That's Why I Chose Yale." After the movie, he went over details of NYU, and described the school's current goal. It seems that NYU is making a major push to create an international education program. They have full time "portal" schools, in New York, Shanghai, (and soon) Abu Dhabi. They also have partnerships with schools in 11 countries. Most students spend anywhere from 1 to 5 semesters abroad.

After he answered some questions, we split up into groups, for "campus" tours. NYU doesn't have a standard campus. It's in a nice area, and surrounds a park, but it's really just a part of the city. The tour guide explained that a very major part of life at NYU is exploring and experiencing what New York has to offer.

We had to leave the tour a little bit early, to make it over to our next stop: the 9/11 memorial. We arrived a little while before our reserved time, so we stopped for pizza. There was a long procession of police cars outside, while we were eating. Ms. L. said that it was probably because someone famous, like a politician or celebrity, was visiting the site.

The memorial was stunning. The design and architecture were really impressive. I know I'm not the first person to make this connection, but it reminds me a lot of the Vietnam memorial. Rather than placing a statue, all the names are inscribed in a long section of stone. The new tower looks especially tall, up close.

At about 4:00 PM, we headed back to Columbia. Oh, I forgot to mention, it was hot today. Really, really hot.

We got back to our dorms around 5:00. I spent the next couple hours in my room. I took a shower and researched for my Con Law essay, due Monday. At 7:00, we all met in front of Carmen Hall, and went down to the Subway. We met Ms. L. for dinner at Oceana Restaurant. Tonight's guests were two Vassar alumni, Ken and Alexandria. There was supposed to be a third attendee, but he couldn't make it. The dinner conversation covered many topics, but one thing I clearly gained from it, was that internships are very important at Vassar. Hundreds of work programs are available, every year, and if I go there, I'll spend most summers interning. Another cool thing about Vassar is that they have very long vacations. Alexandria said that Vassar might have the most vacation days of any college. Sounds good, to me.

I had the Jumbo shrimp, for dinner.

Look how massive these were.

I'll probably stay on campus for most of (if not all of) the day tomorrow. I need to focus on writing my essay.