sorry!

my apologies for the recent lack of posts (although my isp is largely at fault). i will summarize the last few weeks as pretty awesome, and a continuation of the great experience i am having in new york. once again i will use bullets to list the big updates:

work! - i am a freelance database administrator in the litigation support department of a major law firm in ny. at first i was worried i wouldn't be able to handle the technical work, but it's been going well so far, and the pay is much more than i was expecting with no legal background.

nightlife - i have finally started going out (after i secured my job), after not going out once in my first two weeks in the city. it's been lots of fun, but very very expensive. mainly i've been going out with gerald and crew, and also mike owh, a good friend i met through other good friends at cal. i've learned that i don't think i can handle tow nyc nights in a row (maybe if it's a special occasion). here's a list of where i remember going:

saturday (a while ago) - ludo in east village for albert's birthday (a friend from cal), but met up with monica and friends, big j and his brother, tammy loh, along with gerald (who i went with). this was also my first time going dancing with devy! we stayed out late and closed the night with bereket falafel sandwiches (thanks j!)

saturday (another one) - back page bar in the ues for the big game where we stomped stanford! (thanks francis for saving us seats). then i met up with mike and we hit up the frying pan (club/boat), another hip hop club, and finally some fine sul long tang (oxtail soup) at gammioak in k-town.

friday (after thanksgiving) - went out once again, first lemon (bar in unon square), then i napped at gerald's, and back out to forbidden city and la caverna. james lin made a guest surprise.

cuisine - i have truly been eating well here in new york. maybe somee day i'll take the time to list all the great places i've been to so far, but it really has been excellent. two highlights for this weekend:

blt fish (the shack one) - had a great lobster roll when we went for g's bday
suripaphai (sp?) - according to zagat, the best thai in nyc. excellent, reasonable meal. however, my heart and stomach hhave to lean towards osha - crab fried rice i miss you!

sorry for all this in one post. hopefully i can resolve the internet issues at my place and start posting more regularly.

busy weekend

after confirming my start date for this upcoming monday, i had my first big weekend going out. highlights:

friday
ludo (east village) - it was the birthday party for a friend from cal, and i met up with a bunch of my friends. devy took the night off from studying, gerald and the ieors were there, monica made the trip from queens and my friend jason was visiting from seattle. the place was nice, not too crowded. good music, and the first time devy and i danced together :)

bereket - after leaving ludo at around 3, jason, jon, tammy and i made it to bereket where i scarfed down my firstt falafel sandwich before monica and friends even made it there. then i gorgred mself and got a second sandwich - this time a tasty doner

saturday
morning - woke up early with devy, as she had to head back uptown in the morning. picked up bagels on the way to the subway. btw - devy also brought over some delicious chocolate cake from kitchenette last night, mmmm!

we bought a rug - ill try to post a picture of it soon. i bought it from a lady in the eas village, and carried it back to my place on the bus. finally we can walk around in the apt without our shoes on

chinatown - met up with g and susana in chinatown. we all got chinese style chair massages. i don't think gerald found his to be very relaxing. then we bought some groceries (got the dried pork i've been feening for!) and had pho.

the big game - after pho we realized that we were running realy late for the big game, which we were watching with the cal alumni association in the ues. luckily francis fought off strangers and saved a seat for us. awesome game, good prices, and great atmosphere made for an exciting time as cal beat stanford 27-3.

frying pan - on my way home my buddy mike called to see if i wanted to go out. conveniently, my bus was headed in the perfect direction, so i decided to extend the night. after a quick nap (i've been way too lucky about waking up at just the right stop) i walked to the frying pan. this plce is literally a boat they have a little gallery area, bathrooms that were way to hard for me too find, instead i kept finding mself in the area full of little bedrooms, complete with real beds! tammy and andy (monica's friend who knows a bunch of my friends, small world) also met mike there. they were smart though and changed at home.

hip hop club in west village - after the f.p. we taxied over to the west village where tammy's roommate was having her going away party. this place was pretty nice - i was definitely out of dress for this spot. however, tammy did have free drink coupons and there was chocolate covered strawberry action going on in the back room.

gammiok - after a short stint at the club, mike, his buddies chris and paul (who was my asian am t.a. 10 years ago!) went to koreatown for some sul long tang (oxtail soup). my first time having it, it was delcios and hit the spot. perfect for late night, not to heavy and you salt to your own perfection. the kim chi was excellent as well.

we split up afterwards, me cabbing downtown and the guys heading eastward. i slept in for the first time in ny, waking up at 11am. overall this was a great weekend, expensive, but w a good way to kick off my time in new york.

internet works!

so my roommate calls the cable company to complain about our internet, they say nothing is wrong, and a few hours later - voila! it miraculously works! i've got my airport express set up and everything so now i can play music from itunes wirelessly (even though i can't go far in my apt anyways).

anyways these last few days have been pretty eventful. here's what happened (in random chronological order:

- i got a job! registered with an agency last week, had a phone interview on tuesday morning with the hiring manager at the firm, and got the call this morning that i was hired! not i can stop worrying about money and spend to my heart's content

- i mailed off my health insurance forms. filling them out was actually quite stressful as i don't want to be without insurance during my first east coast winter - heard too many stories about trips and falls

- i waited in line for 3.5 hours to get my copy of "feast for crows" signed by the author, george r. martin. this is one of my all time favorite book series, i highly recommend it, starting with "game of thrones"

- i had a few choice meals with devy - golden crust in harlem (my first jamaican fast food experience) and at a very reasonablly priced and decent japanese place near columbia

- i picked up a cubano sandwich from sophie's in midtown. one of the best sandwiches ever... (oh, the green sauce...)

- i met up with paul and denize for drinks. two friends and former coworkers who are both out here for b-school. it was nice to catch up. makes me excited aboubt going back to school, although i doubt law school will be the same type of environment

- watched cal get stomped by usc. we better at least beat stanford this weekend.

that's all i can remember for now. off to meet up with bt and burger, who are back from europe and have a layover in nyc

update

sorry for the lack of recent updates. internet has been down at my apartment for the last few days but i'm sending this out from the apple stre, which is fortunately just blocks from me.

btw - the classes at the apple store are actually prety cool. i've been sitting in on a few classes as i like to sit in the auditorium as i surf the web.

job update - phone interview tomorrow, wish me luck!

katz's deli

wow, i just had the best pastrami of my life. today i had lunch at katz's deli with calvin and lawrence, two brothers i have known forever from our old neighborhood of hastings ranch in pasadena, and also gerald, my ieor and college roommate. the bus near my house that runs down houston (m21) only runs twice an hour during off peak, so i walked and it only took me twenty minutes.

man, it was delicious. all you meat-loving friends, you would love this place. the matzo ball soup was excellent also, although it didn't make obsolete every soup i have had prior, as the pastrami did to hot pastrami sandwiches.

the job hunt is still on-going, as i discovered yesterday that the job agencies here don't accept walk-ins and that i have to email my resume everywhere. i remember in sf i could just walk in, meet a recruiter, and they would have a list of jobs for me right then and there.

this morning i also applied for my ny state id card. i'll be sure to post a picture once i get it. i like to smile big on my id cards, but this guy mad me smile less because he said my eyes were too squinty in the first picture i took.

fall in ny

DSCN1867
Originally uploaded by MikeUCB.

isn't this tree cool looking (btw, i just figured out how to post pics directly to my blog from flickr!)

marathon and more

the marathon was pretty awesome. i got a great spot about 400 meters from the finish, and ended up chatting with a Swedish guy and nice couple about living in NY and the marathon. the coolest thing was when one of the elite runners stopped with about 400m remaining to the finish. the crowd went wild and cheered like crazy until he started running again. it was awesome.

then after i came home i assembled my overhead lamp. i bought the pieces from a hardware store and put it all together with scissors, a screwdriver and googled instructions. little scary when i hit the switch for the first time, but it worked! now i just need to get a tall stepladder so i can nail the thing to my ceiling.

today i made my first freshdirect.com order. i temped at webvan during their startup phase, so ordering groceries online was a bit of a flashback. hopefully freshdirect will be better than webvan (although webvan did have an awesome employee cafeteria).

saturday and sunday

halfway through the weekend. my first nyc saturday was pretty eventful, as i shopped at the union square farmers market, bought kitchen stuff at chelsea market and saw a new jersey nets game with some friends i hadn't seen in a while.

the farmers market was different in a lot of ways from the ferry plaza one in sf. fewer vendors, MUCH cheaper, and not quite the people watching and tourist spectacle. still nice though. i didn't buy too much stuff, as it's every monday, wednesday, friday and saturday, so i'm sure i'll be back soon. i hate having produce go bad, so i try not to get a lot at one time. i bought a second hand industrial aluminum sheet for $6 as well as a veggie steamer for $6 so now my kitchen set is starting to really come together. it's actually quite exciting, as i've never owned anything more than a bowl and baking sheet the entire time i lived in the bay area.

last nights game was the nets vs. the bulls. attending were myself, lawrence, calvin, and calvin's wife gladys. our families have known each other since before i was born, so it was good to see them. calvin moved out here a few years back, and lawrence is currently in st. louis with plans to head back to southern ca. none of us had anything vested in the game, other than tyson chandler is one of my fantasy players (1 pt, 8 rebs! come on tyson, that's disappointing!) and gladys is from chicago so she was rooting for her home team. it was actually quite exciting, as you can read here.

anyways, today i'm gonna try to find a good spot in central park to catch the end of the marathon, maybe work out and also start researching the legal temp agencies that i'll be hitting up next week.

errands but still so much...

today was fairly productive.

things I did:
- exchanged my cell phone (turned in my Samsung 950 for the Motorola E815)
- Went to Apple store to try and fix my Airport Express. it's driving me nuts!
- bought a cookware set: http://www.tramontina-usa.com/cookware.asp
- cooked dinner at Danielle's house with Gerald
- explored J & R (huge electronic/appliance/computer/music store in downtown)
- bought stuff to make an overhead light from scratch
- ate at Blimpies for the first time

now that i have my nice set of pots and pans, i need to get abunch of other stuff to start cooking:
- groceries. i think i'm gonna give freshdirect.com a try next week.
- splatter screen. i like to cook fatty foods like chicken, salmon and sausages
- mixing bowls. i really took my last set for granted. they are quite useful.
- cutting board(s)
- pepper grinder and something to hold my salt
- tupperware. i miss my old tupperware

I have spent so much money so far, but i guess this is just how much it costs to move...

pictures

see some pictures at my flickr page

new york!

i still can't believe i'm here! it hasn't sunk in yet that i live here permanently, but i'm sure once i start working or the weather changes, i'll know i'm in nyc.

i'm new to blogging, but hopefully this will be an easy way for me to share my experiences with everyone!

unofficial bio

Pizza is my favorite food. Hot dogs are a close second. After that, I enjoy pretty much everything. I've been fortunate to live in the greatest food cities in America, moving from Pasadena to Berkeley to San Francisco to New York and finally to Chicago.

When not eating or thinking about eating, I enjoy being a student, exercising, reading and watching movies.

Thanks for reading!

about mike

hi, i'm mike. i'm not very good at typing, which is why my blog is in lower case. just getting the letters right is difficult enough. i'm 27 (sadly in my late 20s), and recently moved out east to the big city of new york... city.

why did i move and how did i decide on new york? i was born and raised in california, spending my first 18 years in southern caifornia (pasadena), and the next nine years in the bay area (berkeley and san francisco). i had an opportunity to move, so i quit my job, packed my bags, and showed up in nyc. i've always wanted to live in the east coast, but never thought i would have a chance. luckily, i found an nice apartment in an awesome neighborhood right before my arrival, and was able to secure a pretty good job after only two weeks in the city.

this year is my big vacation before i start law school in the fall. which law school? your guess is as good as mine. i did the shotgun approach, aiming high, low, far, wide, over, under, in the middle and in between, applying to a grand total of 21 schools. if you read through my blog, you'll see that i've gotten in to at least one school already, which means i'll definitely be a student come august. now you ask, why law school? i liked it better than all of the other grad schools. at build i worked with some awesome attorneys and law students. i will learn how to actually make a difference and someday be able to help grow some cool socially entrepreneurial companies. and hey, why not? i miss being a student.

so what kinds of stuff do i like to do? i love to spend time with the people i care about. in my opinion, without family and i friends you've got nothing. of course, i do enjoy my alone time, reading books, magazines and watching movies. spending time outside is one of my favorite pasttimes, usually just walking around and taking in everything the world has to offer. my belief is that our time on earth is limited, and it's up to us to make it count. how you make it count differs for everyone, but for me i want to make the world a happier, better, more fair and friendly place. life's too short to waste time on the negative - i gravitate towards positive thoughts, actions, attitude, people.

me in a nutshell? the zen expression: "eat when hungry, sleep when tired."

thanks for reading and i hope you find my blog enjoyable!

- Mike

drop me a line: mikwu@[removethis]yahoo.com
check out my pictures: http://www.flickr.com/photos/mikwu/