Old Friends Random places And DUMBOs that are not elephants

Swapna and Harshit came and left too fast. With Swapna, I visited Omonia Cafe three times in a row. We also ate at Rice and Beans at the 9th avenue, and my best recomendation for you guys is to try the fried yuca and the deserts. I also took Swapna alone to Caracas Arepa Bar, where I am planning to take, G, Sahishnu and Laxmi, Som and his wife and Sattvic... At different times, of course.

The Kid decided to just swing back in my life, although we only talk occassionally. We still talk about a lot of stuff, and I know he is seeing someone else, and still going to clubs, which he likes.

Two weeks ago, I watched Loins of Punjab, which is a hillarious movie. The theatre is at Midtown Manhattan and is called Imaginasian. I would love to see more movies in this theatre. The group of people I went to see the movie with were warm and friendly and I am in touch with one of them. There are three more people who live in Queens I should get in touch with as well. We also went to Yuva, and it is a great restaurant.

A week ago, on a sunday, I decided to embark in one of my adventures. I decided to take the E train towards Jamaica, but I got down in Van Wick which is basically the middle of nowhere. I then decided to take a bus that would run through a significan portion in Queens, and leave you just at the shore of Manhattan. You can see a sharp contrast the more you get closer to Manhattan. The houses and stores go from more humble to more residential. I just stopped at Tierra Sana to grab a bite there (in my usual saving tradition, I get only apethizers!) and then got back to the same line towards Manhattan to meet Swapna and Harshit at the Empire State.

I want to leave this weekend for writing tonight. There are interesting experiences like the MOMA and the DUMBO festivals that need to be recorded in a single entry.

A Great Colorful Week

Last week was great in many ways (Although it was ominous in others, like the death of a dear friend of the family!

Monday: Went to Bryant Park for an international chat. It was interesting being with average joes and plain janes besides the tent where they were celebrating Fashion Week! Unfortunately, I could not stay for long because I had to go to see Bottle Shock at the Quad Cinema with another group. Not only the movie was worth it (not exactly a classic, but it was worth my 10 bucks!) but then I moved on to talk about the movie with two of the guys of the group in a cozy coffee shop! My perfect night!

Tuesday: A Friendly Neighbour decided to help me out to save while buying groceries. He took me to Costco's where he is a member and adviced me what was worth buying there!

Wednesday: Sattvic and I went to watch the game of the Mets Vs the Washington Nationals live! It was the first time for both of us and the first time watching a game. It was funny because then Sattvic and I both discovered we were both afraid of heights, but were watching the game from such a height anyway.
That night, we both returned to Jackson Heights and we both talked about love. We seemed to be on the same page except that at times I seemed more bitter. He said that he has been in love, and I replied that I am not sure I was ever in love "although I did love the guys I was with, and suffered for the breakups. He would tell me that his belief was that this kind of love comes with time and with the right person. All this discussion was while eating a Mexican food.

Friday: Sattvic was bored and decided to come over to my place. We watched Harold and Kumar Escape from Guantanamo, and I showed him this blog. So in other words, he is the second person offline and the first in New York that knows about it, but we have grown to be very good friends and I am not being too revealing or personal in my blog anyway, so why not.

Saturday: I went to the art galleries of Chelsea on my own and then met G., Chaitya and Aish in a Jazz Bar in the West Village. It was yet another of those perfect nights! A jazz bar and four gals! (It felt like a Sex and the City chapter at times!) The only complaint I have is that I don't like to drink in public places and I had to pay 13 dollars for the stupid drink and had to force myself to drink a bit. G. gave me some ideas about how this could be worked out next time. I overall had fun with the gals!

Sunday: Another solo coffee shop day and then went to buy a variety of vegetables. Also caught up with Nishant (who is in India, but is moving to NJ (Woo Hoo!) and with S, after a while not chatting (Dang, when is he visiting New York anyway) I am also planning the weeknights with Swapna. I topped the week cooking an awesome pasta with vegetables, tomato paste and fake meat. Delicious!

A Pool Closes, A Pool Opens, Dollars I have to Make worth... And the Weekend's best Laid Plans.

1. Not having bought groceries last sunday, I have had to eat my breakfast outside. It has been for the most part $1 Nature Valley bars that I buy on my way to work. Except for today, when I went to Starbucks and took one small protein shake from a brand of smoothies I don't remember. It is low in calories.
2. Today, however, I ate bits here and there, perhaps because walking a lot in the middle of the heat makes you hungry and loose energy. Let alone that I had a very busy (and very accomplished) day at work. So I ate a small sandwich at Thalia, an ice cream yogurt, a cereal bar and some chocolate... I guess I am going to have to walk a little less...
   
3. I explored some stores, including Sephora. I experimented with some makeup and I was pleased with what I got. It looked natural but I looked more fresh. I will buy this next friday with my fat check (don't get me wrong, I won't burn all the money, OK?
4. My best female friend and ex-roommate in college, who I will call Swapna (oddly enough, this is the second time I rename someone with the name of someone else I know. But this is the name that I can make a connection with) is coming to New York this coming September. I told her she could stay at my house, something I will tell Jess soon. Swapna's fiancee, "Harshit," might come too, reason for which I need to investigate an accomodation. Swapna comes both for a course of Genetics here, and to look for a job in New York. As much as I love this apartment and I am very pleased with Jess, if Swapna lands on a job and has not married Harshit at that time, I will move with her... That will be in a year though.
5. So anyway... On the job front, things have got much better. I started seeing four clients and I even saw five today. And even in complicated cases, I managed. It boosted my confidence as opposed to last week.
6. On Sunday, I went with Satvic to a Mandir (for those not Indian or familiar with Hinduism or Indian terms, Mandir is synonim of Hindu Temple). It is North Indian and Bengali for the most part, but it is near my house. I am still eager to go to the South Indian Mandir in Jamaica, the Ganesha Temple with the Jeweler, but I will have to talk to her. Or maybe I will go on my own. I am most familiar with South Indian traditions, and my trend of having a bunch of South Indian friends has not changed since I moved to New York. But I will definitely will come back to the mandir near Astoria quite often.
7. But speaking of friends in communities, tomorrow there is a Latino party in Guggenheim. There is also another one on Saturday. I want to go to the one on friday because it is more of a networking event. I was telling The Kid that I don't want to party every single friday and saturday. At 29, I have noticed that doing this in two consecutive days wears me out. Now imagine me doing this every weekend. I need more variety, you know.
8. I will work extra hours three days a week. It will be a welcome gain of extra money, extra experiences, and some other good advantages.
9. Touched base with G. We will see each other next week. I need to touch base with quite a few of my classmates!
10. Yesterday I went to the Y! Gym (I enter for free as a perk of working at the agency where I work). It was WAY BETTER than I expected.
11. I am reading Personal Velocity, by Arthur Miller's daughter (The name escapes). It is a great book!
12. An asshole from my earlier years of highschool was talking about me in Facebook saying that I was planing to get even on everyone. And I am getting even, as the best revenge is living well. I used my real name at the time, and right now I am using my nickname, so there is no way for him or the rest to tell that I am around. I knew this because the only worthy classmate I had pointed me to that forum. That confirms I have no interest in connecting with those people!
13. Ohh! Back on Sunday. I went to Jackson Heights and invested in a deal that was there. So, in that store, I was calling the lady Auntie and she asked me if I was from Afghanistan, which is something people tend to ask when I am in Muslim context, wearing a proper South Asian dress. I tend to get mistaken for a lot of nationalities, but this was the first time I was mistaken as Afghan while in jeans and a shirt (I Usually get things like "Italian" "Israeli," "Egyptian" and the sort. G pointed out the equation: "Saying Auntie + Dark hair + Tall + Fair = Afghan/ Persian." I knew in New York, which has double and triple the diversity than South Carolina, where I lived before coming here, people mistaking me for other as the Latina I am would multiply... Interestingly enough, also more Latinos identify me as one of their own without me having to speak. They speak Spanish to me immediately!
    
14. That's all I have so far... Unless I remember other things.
    

Adaptations, Studies, Economy and a Period of Learning

Once August start, I will start studying for my LMSW test. For now, my biggest concern is adapting to work. Last week, it was challenging. This week, so far, my boss seems pleased with my progress, but I need to do well at any rate.

Did I talk about the New York City Parks and Recreations gyms? Didn't I? OK. They are good, especially the ones in Chelsea and East 54. Now, do NOT expect an Equinox or other fancy stuff! They are nice enough though, with all the necessary equipment, and even though I admit I miss my university gym, this community center ones are enough for me. I plan to alternate these with the Y! gym in Manhattan, because it is free for the employers of my company. Tomorrow I am planning to go.

S. called me last thursday, because he was going to India. He called me from the airport minutes before he left. That is very sweet of him. Last sunday I spoke to him via chat also and he told me Hyderabad was more crowded and other more changes last time he went. "I feel like a tourist here, " he would say. "Streets that used to be familiar to me are completely new." Made me wonder what should I expect from Hyderabad when I go there... Something I plan to do within two or three years.

Let us go back to thursday. I hung out with CK once again and he made some confessions of his own. He is married, but there are issues in his marriage that turned him into a very cynical person. He was also telling me that he saw the same with his friends. I have met another guy with sort of the same vision than him, a guy I used to go to school with. I am basically talking about views on marriage, sexuality and the life of couples. Both of them agree on one thing: live your life as you wish but be clear with others so they don't get hurt. If they get it, enjoy. I will leave it at that.

Now, I guess this is the time I can learn about every view in the continuum. The Kid also told me he does not believe in love either, but he believes in Romance. So, what exactly is love for people? Is it that life in New York turns people into cynics. Is this one of the points in Sex and the City (especially Candance Bushnell's book as opposed to the TV series, although the series had much of it!) Is this a view exclusive of New York? Or is it all over the place? At any rate, sometimes I think, if this is true, I feel I have confirmed being happily single.

So anyway, I guess I already talked about the parties I went last weekend in my last entry. On friday, at the birthday party of Eric Vega, I met Ganesh (I know a Ganesh in real life, and it is not him. Remember that I am changing the names of the people in this blog). It happens that we just clicked. It is like my friend the Jeweler was saying: "In New York, you either click with people or you don't." Ganesh also told me something along these lines when I met him. We went to a place to eat sweets at the Lower East Side (I wish I knew the name! It has a really good Tres Leches, a desert so good that many countries in Latin America claim it their own, although I am humble enough to say that it came from either the Dominican Republic, Puerto Rico or Nicaragua) and then we stayed talking at the Union Square for a while. I spent a good time with Ganesh! He called me on Sunday to check on me and see that we could possibly get together in the weekend.

On Saturday I finally met the lady I will call The Jeweler. She has a beautiful jewel store at the Upper East side of Manhattan. She was telling me that the economic situation of the US of A is being felt in businesses like her own. I then met a Turkish friend of hers who was in more or less the same situation... That made me follow both things with interest: the economic situation (although I thread with caution, because these days is hard to tell realistic concerns from naive optimistm or scandalous pesimism) and how the presidential candidates are willing to solve this mess. So yes, I am also following the elections with more interest than before.

At night I learned another lesson; part of the reason I am a bit tired of clubbing (or at least not into it as I was in my early and mid 20's) is about how hard it is to meet people. I honestly prefer networking events, retreats and gettogethers. The last bunch of people I met in Tonic, a bar restaurant in Times Square was right before the Indian-themed party in the second floor, for which they were coming. It is funny that I got the attention of one of them because he saw me writing.

I am also looking forward to meet VJ sometime this week. He lives in Connecticut, but close enough to New York.

Wait for part 2 of this series of entries. I need to finish the pool so the cummulative effects do not come anymore.

Summarizing the last two days. (Two days away from my return to New York)

Okay, after studying yesterday, I went to Damen. This is an avenue here in Chicago that is famous for its artistic scene and its cafes. When I entered to Reckless Records, which is a record shop famous for having a wide selection of Chicago's local underground bands, and other underground music... It downed on me that I might be one of the few, if not the only Hispanic in the shop. I made a deconstruction of the experience in my other blog.

After that, O. T. paged m. OT is a lawyer and a third generation Mexican American whom I met in Livejournal, where we both blog.. This would be the second time this guy and I would hang out together. He lives in Chicago, but it is in my third visit here that we had the chance to meet personally. We ate at Earwax Cafe (which, despite the potentially repeling name, it serves excellent Vegetarian sandwiches), and then, he decided to show me a bit of the city.

We both walked to a bar in Milwakee, which name escapes me. The owner was very friendly and intelligent and we three talked about politics. We were discussing the possibilities of McCain winning, and he came with the theory that McCain might pick Condolezza as his running mate. That would be the ultimate irony, but I think this election has been about ironies and about being a bit more frank about issues that in America are pretty much taboo (institutionalized racism and sexism still alive). I think I will go about this in my other blog.

Back to the bar: different concerts, and as far as bars go, this one looked really nice, albeit too dark for my taste (but maybe lights were not on because it was still daylight). Then, O.T. walked me much of the way through Damen and we stopped in a second bar. At the beginning, I was reluctant and I wanted to go to the lounge besides it, but I felt I was too informally dressed (it was all in the shoes), so we ended up in the bar.

Aside of the fact that smoking is forbidden in the bars (this law has NOT been passed in South Carolina as I write), the bars here in Chicago have ambience. While I still prefer lounges, I have hope in finding bars with it.

Right after that, OT walked me to the station and we talked a lot about many things. He is an awesome guy and I would definitely love to hang out with him again.

Then, I spoke with SJ, one of my long distance buddies I met rather randomly. We have talked for a year and have built quite a good friendship. He placed new pictures in his profile and I went through them... That after he buzzed me to say hi. Tired to type to him, I decided to call and we talked for a while. Sometimes it is much better to hear a friend's voice. It feels more human.

Today was rather boring. I was disappointed because I wanted to get out for the second to last time before going to New York. But at least I could concrete some appointments of people who will show me apartments (mostly in Astoria, a zone in Queens that I love). In addition, I have various hang out propositions. Let's see how it all pans out.