Sarah's Snow Show

I thought that i could handle the cold. The really very freezing cold. The cold that makes you hallucinate about hot chocolates and sitting inside and being warm and toasty and even just sitting somewhere that ISN'T SO COLD! This weekend put me to the test.

On Friday night I joined Amanda (my friend that came to Melbourne Uni as part of Penn exchange) to eat Shabbat dinner at Hillel. It was a really place to meet people, and it was especially helpful that I didn't go there by myself. Apparently I wouldn't be spoken to if I arrived by myself, as one girl put it, "Jews don't talk to eachother." Well, i spoke to lots of the faith that night, met lots of interesting people from all over the States, some of whom couldn't believe we have our Pesach in the autumn, or channukah in summertime. After dinner and chatting another girl and I went back to Amanda's apartment (she lives off-campus...ooooh). It was really nice, and the girl (Lauren) also lived in my apartment building, so I think there's some potential friendship there as well. Lauren is also the editor in cheif of First Call, a weekly magazine thats published by Penn, thats full of editorials and opinion pieces. So i'm going to get involved in that too - the first meeting is tonight, so I'll fill you in. There's going to be free pizza as well.

That's the thing. Not only me, an exchange student on a budget (as opposed to the thousands of students here whose parents pay for their meals) but most juniors and seniors tend to find ways of recieving free food. And how they work at it. I went to a meet and greet last night for new people to Harnwell House, the college high rise apartment building I'm in. And my roommates told me to bring back cookies, cookies and more cookies galore. Now we have a cookie jar thanks to last night's stash.

(Update: Tonight I went to a First Call meeting, a meeting of a club that publishes a weekly editorial magazine for and by Penn students. There was pizza, and of course I brought some back to the flat to share with the rest of the girls.Of course. Oh, and I think I'll be involved in their layout and distribution.. perhaps I'll even write. The Aussie perspective of Penn.. ha.)

So when I returned home I found a message on my phone from one of my Australian friends thats also on exchange here. Jess and the other Aussie, Amma, are from Canberra, and decided to go to new york for a couple days. They were leaving at eight in the morning. So i told Jess to call me when she woke up.

I got to sleep at four that night after hanging out with my roommates and walking one of their friends back to her place in the rain..and then had to wake up three hours later! Arghhh! It was hell, as I packed in such a hurry, and forgot to take my gloves, a scarf, any type of hat, or an umbrella.

We collapsed into the ChinaTown Bus for the two hour journey, a bus that costs only $10 and takes its passengers from China Town of one city to the China Town of another. They speed, they talk on their mobile phones, but its a quick and cheap ride nonetheless. People screaming in Chinese is always a welcoming experience, especially at eight in the morning. We were staying in a hostel in Greenwich Village, perfect location, and the rooms and bathrooms were clean. The only real problem about it was that there were no ceilings. We could hear what everyone else was saying, doing etc. At night time this proved quite, erm, interesting.. perhaps even disturbing. One guy to our left was snoring so loudly, and it sounded quite fruity as well. It was pretty gross. But not as sick as the guy to our right... Who seemed to have fun with himself at the expense of us listening - YUK! WE DON'T WANT TO HEAR THAT SHIT! NOBODY DOES! And it even woke up Jess, who was already asleep. I was trying to get to sleep, but then i hear our happy neighbour AGAIN! i think it gave me nightmares because i didnt sleep very well that night. Maybe it was also because it was freezing cold. As in freezing. Below zero i'm sure.

But before our lovely sleeping muzak, the girls and I went shopping in Soho, browsing in all these gorgeous boutiques and taking in all these beautiful presentations and displays and products that were on show. Here's a chocolatier in Saks Fifth Avenue that we visited on Sunday.

That night we went to a vegetarian restaurant which was yummy, and in a great area. Here are some pics of Jess, Amma and I at Radha, the vegan place.













After dinner, we stumbled into a bar called The Living Room, or the Lounge Room, i can't remember now, and being 21, we were allowed through the mysterious black curtains behind the front door. Its so strange how they're legal drinking age is 21. And how underage drinking at college is so 'cool'. Hrmmm, maybe they should come down to Melbourne for a while, these freshmen. Let their lecturers take them out to the pub for their last (or first) lecture. Ha.
So the music at this bar was awesome, the band were so lively, jumping around the stage and the room, where we were all sitting. There was this woman playing the trombone and the trumpet, and she was fantastic! Here's a photo of the band, but it was real dark, so it's hard to see them.

On the way home we got ourselves caught in a mini snow storm. That's right, Sarah's (not Slava's, sorry Bunny) Snow Show. The wind ripped right through us, chilled us to our very bones, and it was a long walk back to the hostel! Arghh! I was yelling in the wind, trying to get over the cold, and Jess and Amma formed a protective sheild with their umbrellas, which didnt last very long. Amma held her brolly out in front of her to fight the wind, but she couldn't see anybody, so she walked straight into the back of someone on the street! It was lucky he took it well, and laughed it off, coz it could have gone down not too nicely. The snow was pelting our faces like tiny sharp pin pricks, we thought something this painful HAD to be good for our skin. Let's hope.

The next day we went for brunch with one of Jess' friends from new york, and tried to walk down 5th avenue and central park... i say tried because it was toooooo cold. We kept taking coffee breaks just to keep warm. Here are some photos of us around central park on Sunday.
Do I have nice skin? Maybe snow storms will be showing at a beautician near you?
That's all from me for now. Hope you enjoyed my trip to New York. I'm sorry you weren't there to share it. I have to go to sleep now, I have so much reading to do before tomorrow's class. And it's one in the morning. Arghh!

Miss you all.