The Bahamas

We just got back from the Bahamas and what a nice, relaxing vacation! Braxton's friend was kind enough to let us stay in their vacation home. Actually, I think it was his friend's neighbors home because they switched houses.  The people on the trip were Becky, Braxton and Carrie.

We did absolutely nothing, which was great! The girls and I laid out on the deck every day and sunbathed.  We tried to go swimming at one of the beaches but the waves were huge. I got knocked under and panicked. I thought I was going to die. It was hard to get up because I lost my footing in the sand and went right back under the water again. I really need to learn how to swim and tread.

At night, we drank of course and watched movies.  We went to Atlantis one night and that was fun. It has a huge aquarium with manta rays. They were enormous! We planned on going to the club there and decided to do more shady drinking (see picture below). We brought a few bottles of alcohol with us and drank in the car beforehand.  Unfortunately, the cover to the club was EXPENSIVE! It was $50 each for girls and $100 for guys! No wonder there weren't people inside the club. I guess it's for celebrities maybe who could afford it.

Overall, the Bahamas was nice, but I prefer Hawaii over it. Maybe it's because the weather wasn't as warm as I had hoped it to be. Also, there were no good snorkeling spots at all and the beaches had a lot of rocks.  I probably would want to visit a different island next time. We were in Nassau on this trip.

Matt Damon Sighting!

In the past week, I've seen Matt Damon three times!  The first two times were all within an hour.  Aaron called me while he was on his way back from the hardware store.  He was walking right behind Matt Damon and told me to come outside quickly.  Apparently Matt Damon was going to the Crunch Fitness gym that is half a block away from my apartment on West 83rd and Amsterdam.  I saw Matt walk into the gym and I could see him from outside of the door glass. He was talking to the receptionist.  Looking back, I should've walked into Crunch and pretended to be interested in joining the gym. Then, I would've stood right next to him!

About an hour later, Aaron had to go back to the hardware store and saw Matt leave the gym.  He called me again and I came running out of my apt in flip flops and a dress. Matt Damon was already two blocks ahead of me so I had to catch up to him.  I wanted to know where he lived so I figured that I could discreetly follow him home.  I know, stalker right? Right before I caught up to him, Matt sprinted across the street on West 86th street and went into this fancy-looking apartment complex in the middle of the block. He stopped for a few minutes to talk to the doorman.  I don't think he lives there though because he supposedly bought a condo near West End Avenue and we weren't close to that street.  Maybe he's temporarily staying at this apartment while he's renovating his current place. Or maybe he just asked the doorman if he could pretend that he lives there because a crazy asian girl was chasing after him.  I think he had started to run when I was getting close behind him because the light was changing to red and he didn't want to miss the light. I don't think he knew that I was running up behind him, right?

The final sighting was earlier this week. I went running at 6:30am and when I hit Crunch Fitness, I saw him leaving the gym again. I decided to run parallel to him, but from across the street so it wasn't as obvious that I was trying to follow him. After a few blocks though, he kept looking in my direction. I guess it was awkward that my "run" was almost like a slow jog because he was walking. I gave up eventually and crossed the street towards Central Park. I didn't want to freak him out.

Hurricane Party

I've been in NYC for only two weeks so far and we've had an earthquake and a hurricane.  Both of these are rare in the city.  I wondering now that maybe I shouldn't have moved here. Haha.

Well, I was pretty worried about the hurricane. On Friday, I went to Fairway to stock up on canned goods. The supermarket was CRAZY.  Everyone was preparing for it.  People were buying bottled water and lots of food. There were long lines and a ton of customers. I grabbed a few large bottles of water and a bunch of canned goods.  I figured I would stay home on Saturday and watch movies.  The hurricane was supposed to come at night and be gone by Sunday morning.

Instead of my original plan, I went over to my friends' apartment: Braxton, Morgan, Patrick and Ed.  They were having a hurricane party! I packed an overnight bag and it was so much fun. Ed introduced us to Van Gogh Espresso shots. We played Kings Cup and watched Princess Bride. We had to drink every time we heard "inconceivable!", "as you wish" and "true love".  It was a lot of fun.

At the end of the day, the hurricane was significantly less severe than the city had anticipated, which was great news. People were complaining that it wasn't much of a hurricane, but I think that they should be thankful that it wasn't bad. I heard that a lot of bars stayed open actually during the hurricane and some CBS students were out partying.  Go figure, lol!

First Day of School!

Orientation!  Orientation started today and it was CRAZY!  I'm assigned to Cluster E and I think our theme is Extraterrestrials. We were greeted by our Peer Advisors (PAs) who were standing on the steps outside of Uris and cheering.  Some of them were also dressed up on costumes.  The most memorable one was a banana suit.  Haha.  Each cluster has a theme and some fun trinkets to go with it.  Our cluster has glow-in-the-dark glasses.  I do wish we had cooler stuff.  For example, Cluster G is "GQ" and had hats. It's been great meeting different people at school though.  It's such a diverse group from many different backgrounds.  There are people who used to be bankers, engineers, lawyers, military service men, etc.  One of my classmates was a reality TV show producer and another classmate is Owen Wilson's cousin.  


So far, I have one friend already, Becky.  My friend, Ty, had introduced me to his friend, Danny, who's a 2nd year at CBS.  Danny knows Becky from Berkeley and introduced me to her.  It's funny because we chatted online before business school and just hit it off right away.  It's nice to already have someone at school.  It takes away some of the anxiety.  Hopefully I'll make more friends while I'm here. It's really intimidating, but I have to tell myself that I can do this.

Last day in SF

Well, I'm packed up and moving tomorrow. It's so surreal. I'm going to miss everything. I love my studio at Bayside Village. It's weird to see it empty. Things have been really hectic since I first started applying for business school.  I can't believe I'm finally doing it.  I keep telling myself it's only 20 months, but I'm worried about whether I made the right decision.  I think it was hardest for me to quit my job at Google actually.  That was my number one roadblock with this decision.  But I need to do this for myself and I think I'm going to grow a lot from this experience.  I live in a bubble, but I'm glad that I have because I've had a great life so far.  But I have to learn how to be on my own now and I've only started doing that two years ago when my whole life changed and I quit Deloitte and moved out of mom's house.  So here I go...wish me luck.

My last day at Google MTV

Today was my last day at Google in Mountain View.  I'm going to wrap up a few things in the next week while I'm in New York.  So my official last day will be on Friday, August 12.  It was a pretty busy day though and I actually missed lunch with my team and it was supposed to be my farewell lunch.  However, we had our team outing which was at the nearby aquatic park.  Stephen planned it and it was a lot of fun.  We played a version of waterpolo but in kayaks on the lake.  I also did a sack race for the first time.

It was weird to say goodbye to everyone.  Philippa was really nice. She gave me all these hello kitty school supplies. I thought it was very thoughtful of her even though we didn't get a chance to chat that much during work. I still can't believe that I'm leaving Google. Most b-school applicants quit their jobs early and wanted to leave their companies. I'm trying to quit my job as close to the start of school and I want to go back. People say that it's because I'm comfortable there and don't like change.  That is true, but at the same time, I recognize that I work at an awesome company. So in this case, I don't think it's comfort and risk aversion.