"It Would Be a Shame to Miss New York in the Spring"

Tom Hanks in "You've Got Mail" knew what he was talking about.

Today was a gorgeous day. After work I decided I would take advantage of the beautiful weather, good lighting and my birthday present (a new camera, thanks Mom and Dad) and take some pictures at Central Park and Verdi Square.

Here's the proof that New York in the Spring is the best:

Mmmm's: The MoMA and Mamma Mia

Friday night, the BYU Comms intern met at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA). On Fridays from 4-8 p.m. admission is free. What an amazing museum, I got there at 6 p.m. and I barely covered 1/6th of the place. I'm going back for sure. The portion of the museum I saw was the special exhibits. The 6th floor explored the color wheel and the second section was titled "Design and the Elastic Mind." It was very cool, a lot of it was very future oriented. It was very interesting. But my favorite part of the exhibit was the"Take Your Time"exhibit, by Olafur Eliasson (he's Icelandic, more proof that awesomeness comes from Iceland). This exhibit was really fantastic. The program states the exhibit is probes "the cognitive aspects of what it means to see." Bottom-line: it was awesome and inspired me to take some photos. I've provide descriptions, with help from the program on each exhibit pictured.

The first picture, and the display in which I knew I was going to enjoy this exhibit, is in a dark room filled with fog, with the beams of the 24 spotlights are oriented to articulate one cubic meter of space.


The next four photos were from the "360 degree room for all colours," It was a panoramic room that immersed you in the color spectrum. (I loved this room!)





















This next picture is of the "Negative quasi brick wall." Stainless steel with mirrored interiors are stacked in six different positions to create a reflective and kaleidoscope wall.


The last picture is of me inside of "Room for one colour." The room was solely illuminated by monochromatic bulbs which emit light at such a narrow frequency that they affect your normal color perception, making everything in the room appear in shades of yellow or black.


Next fun thing, but first a bit of how we got there...

Last Wednesday I went on a search down 50th street to find flip flops and hangers. While on my adventure I came across the Winter Garden Theatre, which is where "Mamma Mia" is showing. I popped in to determine if they had any student discounts, a lottery, a rush or any other kind of discounts for tickets. I found out that they have unobstructed standing room tickets available for $21.50. Late Saturday afternoon, while Kaitlyn and I were on the subway heading to 34th street to get some flip-flops at Old Navy, I suggested we see if "Mamma Mia" had any standing room tickets for the night. After some shopping at Old Navy until the standing room tickets went on sale we got them!

Mamma Mia is such a fun show! I enjoy Abba music, and have heard more than the casual observer my age, partially because of Sarah's almost "12 days of Abba." The music is really great and the actors were very good. We had two stand-ins that night, for Tanya, one of Donna's (the mother) friends and Sam Carmichael, one of the potential Dads. I must say that Tanya, Lori Haley Fox, was SOOO funny. Her character is funny, but she elevated it. It was great! The actor playing Sam, Brent Black, did a good job, he wasn't bad by any stretch of the imagination, but I could see where he was a stand in. I was probably the most impressed with Carolee Carmello, the actress playing Donna. She had a great voice and did a great job of conveying her character's emotions. I was also a fan of Donna's daughter, Sophie Anderson, played by Carey Anderson. I would say although not my favorite song, the best choreographed and overall impressive song/scene was the "Money, Money, Money." I also really liked, "Knowing Me, Knowing You."

I'm Just Here for the Food

Here's a little bit on each of the places I've eaten thus far:

Wednesday at my first day of work the office went out to lunch and they treated. We went to Harry's Burrito a Cal/Mex restaurant on about 71st and Columbus Avenue. It was good, it reminded me of Julio's, the Tex-Mex restaurant I waited at last summer in Omaha. It was a fun little place, I wouldn't say it's a must go to in New York City, but it was good and seeing as it is only a couple blocks from work I could see me going there again for lunch. I would recommend getting the enchilada, instead of the burrito, despite it being Harry's Burrito.

Thursday Ahmad took me out to lunch at one of his favorite local Chinese restaurants, Ollie's on about 68th and Broadway. I'm a tough critic when it comes to egg drop soup and they passed the test with flying colors. It was extremely good. When I went to PF Chang's, for the Divine Comedy banquet, I got a beef entree, but tried a friend's sweet and sour pork and it was delicious. With that in mind, I ordered the sweet and sour pork. It was still good, but PF Chang's actually has Ollie's beat on that front. Ahmad offered me some of his Beef and Broccoli, which I almost ordered, and it was extremely good. That is what I will be ordering next time, for sure.

Thursday after returning from work, a fellow BYU Intern and I went to go eat dinner. We decided to go to Cafe Lalo on 83rd and Amsterdam Avenue. It's the cafe featured in "You've Got Mail" with Meg Ryan and Tom Hanks. I really loved the place. It's so charming and cozy. I ordered an Italian soda with a shot of almond (per the server's suggestion), lentil soup and a slice of midnight chocolate cake. Mhhhmm, so good. I was pleased with the Italian soda and the lentil soup had a lot of flavor and the cake was good, though after having a slice of my friend's desert, I deduced hers was better. It was a cake with various fruits, with almonds lining the side. Very pretty, very good.



Yesterday, Friday the BYU group met at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), which I'll talk about in another post. Afterwards, Kaitlyn and I went to the World Famous Carnegie Deli on 55th and Seventh Avenue. My friends it is world famous for a reason. Everything is fantastic and it's done in a unique way. First you are graced with a plate of pickles. I'm not a huge fan of pickles but was told I must have them. I really liked the really green ones, which weren't in pickle juice very long. They were like sweet cucumbers. I'm a fan. Not long after diving into the pickles, we received our sandwiches. They are HUGE! And very tasty. I got the #9 which features roast beef, lettuce, tomato and onions. I almost ate half of the sandwich. But you can't go to Carnegie Deli and not get a slice of cheesecake. IT IS DIVINE! PURE UNADULTERATED BLISS! I got the fresh strawberry cheesecake. Oh my goodness. So good. A must go to for anyone visiting New York.

Work, work, work

Wednesday was my first day of work at my job, in case I haven't mentioned it enough I'm at the Public and International office for the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints.

On my first day I got the traditional tour of place. The cool thing is my office is in the Manhattan temple building but it is an non-temple portion of the building, which is the southern part of the building, Public Affairs is on the 2nd floor. There is a "meetinghouse" on the 3rd which is currently under construction and a distribution center somewhere, that wasn't a part of the tour.

The big project I will be working on for almost the entirety of my stay in New York City is on what my boss Ahmad Corbitt said is "the biggest event of the year" LDS Public Affairs is hosting. The BYU Philharmonic Orchestra is going to be playing in Carnegie Hall on June 4. We have two tasks: getting dignitaries from the UN and Consulate Generals to fill the box seats and to fill the remaining 2,600 seats.

Things have been good at work, we've had some major computer difficulties but as I was leaving on Friday it looked like everything was figured out. We'll see if that is really true on Monday.

Also related to computers, I finally got to the bottom of my power cord issue for my laptop, and it should be here in the next few days. It only took them about a month. (Shakes fist in general direction of Office Depot warranty people.)

LDS Newsroom

I've known about the LDS newsroom on The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints Web site for a while, but with my internship at LDS Public Affairs I am to keep up on things and read it everyday. Here's a quick little bit from the article "Mormon Youth Put Careers and Education on Hold to Serve as Missionaries," I thought was cool.

"Three years ago, Guillermo Franco interrupted his professional soccer career in Argentina so he could be a missionary for the Church. Now that he has returned, he is once again making his mark on the soccer field.

Franco told Argentine newspaper Diario Uno that he has been blessed in his life and that he was truly happy. “I am coming back in football and in 2007 I married my wife Lorena!'”

I too know that I will be making sacrifices financially and perhaps in my career as well to serve. But I know that The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints is the one true church on this earth and I look forward to sharing it with others.

I will blog more about New York tonight, hopefully, last night the Internet was down at the I house.