Planet SoC

personal
20:35 -0400

We got back from our travels on Thursday. New York was
crowded, busy, noisy,… While we were there, we (in semi-random order):

• saw Mamma-Mia! on Broadway. It was a lot of
  fun, especially if you like ABBA. I was told that the movie version is good
  too.
• saw the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Big, lots
  of stuff. We saw less than half of it, and a bunch of it was being renovated.
  We also went to the cloisters, which is
  part of the museum, but located at the northern tip of Manhattan Island. It’s
  probably one of the quieter parts of the island.
• saw the Statue of Liberty from afar (from Battery Park). You aren’t allowed
  to go up to the top of the statue any more, so there’s not much point in taking
  the ferry to Liberty Island. You’d only be able to go into the museum at the
  base, after going through a security search.
• saw the Brooklyn Bridge.
• walked through Central Park.
• ate New York cheesecake, bagels, hotdogs from a street vendor, and deli
  sandwiches, the food.
• visited the Chelsea Market. It wasn’t quite the type of market that we
  expected.
• walked the
  labyrinth in Battery Park.
  Nobody seems to know about the labyrinth, and it is completely unmarked. It is
  right next to Castle Clinton and the Korean War monument, and the street. In
  fact, if we didn’t read about it in the magazine on the Amtrak train, we would
  never have known about it.
• saw Grand Central Terminal.

If you’re ever in New York, don’t even think of driving. The drivers there are
crazy. A MetroCard may be well worth it,
depending on how many days you’re there. We were there for four days, and we
made good use of the card.

Accommodations in New York are expensive. The
bed & breakfast that we stayed at was $150 per
night (private apartment, discounted price because of a cancellation). Hotel
rooms can easily run over $300 per night.

In terms of my interviews, I’ll find out whether or not they like me enough to
hire me in a couple of weeks or so.