Last Post Before Starting Work!

Well this is it! It’s the last day before I start work at the WFP liaison office in New York City! Nate and I have had an incredible time getting to know the city before starting work! Last Friday was our 6-month anniversary. We celebrated by going to a prix-fixe dinner at Petrossian, which was amazing. I found it in our Zagat “best-buys” section (thanks Jenni!) – listed as one of the best dinner prix-fixes. At some restaurants the prix-fixe menu is more expensive, but at Petrossian it’s a great way to sample what the restaurant has to offer – and it’s less, not more expensive. Nate had a herring sampler for his appetizer, the steak for dinner, and a pear mousse for dessert. I had a smoked thinly-sliced salmon appetizer, the mushroom truffle pasta for dinner, and the pineapple-coconut shortcake for dessert. We also shared a bottle of French chardonnay, which was really lovely.

After dinner we went to Dizzy’s Jazz Club, which is in Columbus Circle in the Trump Building. I’ve been to Dizzy’s once before with a friend, and I knew Nate would love it! Dizzy’s hosts traveling jazz performers with a backdrop of the Jersey skyline easily visible through the wall-size windows behind the musicians. We were treated to a performance by the Cedar Walton quartet. They were really good and we had a fun time!



Another item on our to-do list was to walk the Brooklyn Bridge one afternoon from Manhattan to Brooklyn and end at our favorite pizza place, Grimaldi’s. We spent a Sunday afternoon walking the bridge and we had near perfect weather – mostly sunny, 80 degrees outside, breezy but not windy. The bridge itself is really cool, the walkway is above the cars but far enough in that you can watch them go by. The bridge itself is fun to walk across, very different from the Golden Gate Bridge in San Fran.



It was pretty fun to cross the bridge and see the “welcome to Brooklyn” sign paved into the sidewalk. I had to copy the picture our friend Katie took, even though as everyone knows we’ve been in Brooklyn two and a half months at this point! And as for Grimaldi’s, it was great as always! It was our third time there and it hasn’t gotten old!





The next day Nate started at Columbia and I enjoyed my last week before working. Nate really has a great office environment, a fun staff, and the math building is just so beautiful! Friday at the end of his first week of work I came up to meet him for lunch. We got sandwiches at Milano Market (my favorite) and ate at the picnic tables in the center of campus. Another beautiful sunny day – we’ve had the best weather!

I also had a couple friends from Italy stay with us at the end of the week – girls I interned with, Emily and Sara. We all went to dinner Thursday at a great Thai place called “Laut” – in Union Square, and I will definitely want to return, it was great! It was fun to see the girls and reminisce about the days in Italy



That’s all for now! We have more visitors and adventures planned in the weeks ahead… stay tuned!

Start of August

August is off to a great start! First, on the job front… after only six weeks of job searching, Nate was offered a job at Columbia University! He will be an assistant in the office of the Chairman of the Math Department. It is a great job and he is perfect for it! Columbia is a great University to work for, and he starts August 9th. He will also be working very close to my sister Jenni, which is really nice too! His subway stop will be the Columbia University stop, which is even highlighted in the subway stop at 116th street:



Funny enough, when Jenni gave Nate a tour of Columbia back in June, we walked by the Math Department and it was one of the few buildings I took a picture of – it is a beautiful building and it is in the center of campus, near the Low Library and the main quad.



As for me, I start work on August 17th. I’m really excited to be back working for the World Food Programme, and on these hunger initiatives that are so important to me. Every day it seems I read more about the global food crises that are occurring around the world, and WFP is working hard to be there in times of emergency and rebuilding. It is both exciting and a privilege to work for this organization!



Last weekend I had a blast as two of my girlfriends from college were in town! Representing the Breakfast Club, Me, Laura and Natalie were in full force Saturday night as we went to dinner in Soho with our boyfriends (well… Laura with her HUSBAND)! It’s still hard to believe one of us is married – and Cara is next! We had a fun night and it got me even more excited for everyone being reunited in Chicago in October.

Lucky for me, Natalie stayed a week and today we had a lovely lunch date in Soho followed by shoe shopping and mini cupcakes – I had smores, cookie dough, and red velvet. Heaven!

Last update for August – Monday Nate and I went to the top of the Empire State Building at night. It was breathtaking! It was so clear, you could see out to all the boroughs and Jersey, all the bridges were lit up and the buildings in the city – so many lights! Again, my little digital camera hardly does it justice, but it was really beautiful and a fun night. Nate had done it before, but I had not surprisingly enough! It was windy but not too cool yet, I highly recommend it to anyone who visits NYC!



Coming up next… Friday is me & Nate’s 6 month anniversary! We are celebrating by having a night on the town, classic New York – a nice dinner followed by drinks at a jazz bar. More to come on that soon!

Catching Up on July

It’s been a while! Sorry for the delayed posting – I’ve been enjoying the carefree New York lifestyle and not working a little too much I think! So, last I left off my parents had just visited. We spent the month of July doing a LOT of exploring. We have walked around Prospect Park near our house and it is beautiful – there are tons of trails, lakes, and trees.

We also spent some time in Battery Park one day. We walked the Esplanade which runs from the park along the water to midtown on the west side of the island. Of course you can see the statue of liberty, but once you start on the path there are tons of trees and pretty views of the Manhattan skyline. All in all it is a wonderful way to spend a breezy sunny day in NYC!



We are also now annual members of the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the MET) and so we spent an afternoon in the impressionist wing of the museum. We went to the roof of the Met which has a great view of Central Park and the skyline. There's kind of a crazy bamboo sculpture up there right now. The great thing about being members is that we can go frequently and see new exhibits!



Also, anyone who knows me knows that the first love of my life is and always will be Claude Monet. One of his paintings came to the Harn Museum in Gainesville when I was 8, we went and saw it, and I’ve been obsessed with him ever since! (I had a waterlillies bedspread, and a poster of the painting that I saw, which I still have and is in our guest room!). I could have looked at the Monet paintings all day:



We also enjoyed a very special fourth of July in NYC! Nate and I packed a picnic and headed to the lower west side for a view of the fireworks over the Hudson river. We had pasta, sandwiches, and of course some vino! Macy’s has an impressive fireworks display and we had a great view from where we were sitting. The fireworks were fabulous, and while I took tons of pictures they really don’t do them justice:



We also finished decorating – I’m compulsive about art and having everything put together, and the last piece was getting artwork for the bedroom. A lot of our art comes from countries I have lived and visited, so we decided that the new art should be places we have been, or are going to go together. Nate picked out some beautiful black and white photographs which really complement the master bedroom nicely. They are of Paris, San Francisco, and the New York City skyline. Very classy and the finishing touch on all the decorating!

We spent a Saturday in July with some of Nate’s best friends from college – Katie, Josh & Melissa – touring the Brooklyn Brewery. It was a lot of fun, although not so much a tour – it seems that the Brewery is under construction, but we did learn a bit about the beer and brewing process. And of course, we took some samples (just to verify ;)



We also spent a Sunday at a concert in Prospect Park. One of the great things about summer in the city is all the free things there are to do! We sat out on the grass and got to hear quite a bit of African music which I loved! This is a pretty silly picture from the day:



We also took in a Yankees Game – Nate’s first Yankees game! At first he was a bit skeptical, but it didn’t take long for him to crossover (me, I’ve been a fan my whole life because my dad is from NYC - I am a true blue fan!). Well now Nate is too, and we are becoming true New Yorkers! The game was great – A-Rod hit #599 and Jeter hit an in-the-park home run for a solid 10-4 win over Kansas City. I couldn’t have been happier – we were in the bleachers doing lots of cheers and snacking – Yankee Stadium has every cuisine you can think of! We started with burgers, and ended with guacamole, yum!

I’ll post soon about what we’ve been up to in August! There is more exciting news around the corner… stay tuned. Below is a picture of the New York skyline, courtesy of my friend Jeremy. It’s a beautiful photo and I wanted to share it!