The shortest week

I love it when the weekends are longer than the weeks. Monday was Columbus Day, which provided for four wonderful days in... take a wild guess... New York!
Is this getting old? Maybe. But if you ask me, one could spend many more weekends there.

I took off around noon on Thursday, thanks to my brilliant class schedule. This time the long trip (an hour from campus to the station, an hour's wait and 4.5 hours in the bus) was drastically improved by Ee-Ling (Australia) and Kris (California) who happened to travel to the Big Apple on the same bus, and some dubious Chicken McNuggets and Mustard Sauce at the mini-stopover in Connecticut. It is strange that while McDonalds is still quite a big deal in Europe, it really is pretty disgusting here. You're talking to an expert - we are served burgers, chicken nuggets and the like on a daily basis at Babson.

Thursday night was spent with Sascha on the roof of his Noho apartment house. We snuck past the landlady's door with a bottle of sparkling wine, two glasses and a camera and enjoyed the view of the lower Manhattan skyline. A glass and a half made us feel adventurous, so we climbed across a couple of ledges to the neighbor's roof garden. The comfortable lounge chairs looked like a grand idea until we were caught red-handed by the owner, who screamed at us and then called her boyfriend to stand guard while we guiltily retreated.

Looking out on the Big apple from Sascha's roof

On Friday I met up with my cousin Sophie, who is currently painting murals at some ridiculously luxurious mansion in the Hamptons. We did some shopping (well, she did, and I watched), checked out some design, contemporary art and photography the MoMa, had a hot dog and a coffee and just generally enjoyed each other's company.
I then joined Bill Grace and his sister Mara for dinner in Greenwich Village, where I was treated to some fine food in order to, as Bill put it, cure my cafeteria-induced scurvy.

On Saturday I met Colin at Grand Central Station in the early morning and we caught a train up to Tarrytown for some hiking (actually, strolling) with Scott in the Rockefeller State Park.

Can you tell we had been up early...?
Some Canada geese and a hawk on the pole that sat motionless in this exact same position for 20 minutes

Scott in the greenhouse

After coming back on Sunday afternoon, I went for an evening stroll through the beautiful neighborhood of Chelsea with Sascha, who was trying to find a house that had once been inhabited by his favorite designer Robert Brownjohn. We peeked through windows at classy livingrooms and stylish kitchens and felt very New York.

On Monday I walked a dozen blocks south to visit the Ground Zero site for the first time since 2002. I felt strange, like an intruder, as I aimlessly wandered around between thoughtful tourists and Chinese souvenir salesmen, looking at larger-than-life photos of terrified businessmen and devastated firefighters.
The afternoon was spent in Central Park, reading and napping, before I took off to Yonkers to meet up with Jo who, after serving me a fantastic beef chili, gave me a ride back to Boston and spent the night on an air mattress in my dorm room.

Next week is midterm, and the semester is halfway over. I am enjoying all my little adventures and trying to make each day special, but somehow I don't entirely feel at home here. For someone who has never been prone to homesickness, I think about my family surprisingly often and miss many things that made life so comfortable in Vienna. Luckily, it's only a week and a few days now before I return to New York to see my father, who will be there for some UN business.

Can't wait!!