I'm finally back from NYC! I fell so much in love with the city that I most definitely want to go to school there or Berkeley. It's gonna be a tough choice. Pictures will be on Flickr shortly. Some highlights about Manhattan:

- I love how I can shop until 10pm in Uptown or SoHo, and 1am if I'm shopping around Times Square (even on Sundays!). There's tons of selection at low prices and not a single Forever 21 in sight!
- So like the movies, I thought me and Jon should go Ice skating at Rockefeller center. I was hoping NBC Dateline would show clips of us as they transitioned to commercial breaks.
- Only on the East Coast can I bundle up in ultimate winter gear: long coat, scarf, beanie, and gloves.
- I liked using the subways everywhere and all the strange things that go on there. B-boy battles were at all the main stations. After me and Jon finished watching Letters from Iwo Jima at Times Square, we headed for the Uptown subway at 3am. Then a HUGE mob of gay Puerto Rican teenage males chased me down screaming, "OMIGOD its Lucy Lui!!! (she's from Queens, NY btw)" or "Papi, I can't believe its herrrr!!!" and various other random statements. They surrounded me at the station and started dancing, two guys kept twirling me around and screaming "OMIGOD, hurry take a picture of me and Lucy Lui!!!" while they posed like they were in Charlie's Angels. So random!
- Finally, I watched my first Broadway show, Alter Boys, which was about a Christian boy band that had a Jewish, Catholic/gay, alcoholic, Enrique Iglesius wannabe, and a normal singer. It was pretty funny, my favorite was the Enrique Iglesius wannabe who looked like the Foo Fighter's Dave Grohl. We were so close that their spit flew on us (yea, gross I know). And all Broadways tickets are 50% if you buy 1-3 hours before the show, so we only paid $40 for 2nd row seats.
- Jon and I pretty much ate out, shopped, and did "normal" activities in NY. But somehow, bowling at ESPN Zone seemed more interesting in NYC than anywhere else. Maybe its because I had unusually great game or it could've been the crowd of business men cheering me.
- Surrounding our hotel, we had massive selection of delicious restaurants at cheap, competitive prices. I had the hands down BEST sashimi and mochi in my life. Oh I can't wait to go back...
- Throughout the whole trip, I kept protecting my purse, thinking it'll get snatched, but the New Yorkers were really polite. Sure, they had thick accents and they'd talk very straightforward, but at least they'd end interactions on a polite note. Like, "Hurry up, why won't ya!" followed with "Thank ya, yoo have nice day." Or "I said pull INTO the subway, I don't have all day!" followed by "Sir, would ya like this seat?" There's few "please" or "Can I take your order" and many "What do ya want?". I kinda like how the culture is very straightforward with few fluffy words.
- Last time I went to NYC, I stayed in Brooklyn. This time was totally different. The population looked a lot like SF in Manhattan and Queens. We weren't even in Chinatown and Asians seemed to be everywhere, Uptown, Westside, SoHo, Queens. Tourists kept asking me and Jon for directions and a lot of New Yorkers assumed we were locals, talking about local issues and places that we had no idea about. I bargained down the price of a hat and beanie with a Vietnamese vendor and that just made my day.
- I wanted to go to the The American Museum of Natural History 2 blocks from our hotel, featured in Ben Stiller's "Night at the Museum" but it closed right after our Broadway ended. So Jon went there during my interview and he couldn't stop talking about how awesome it is. For my next trip, I now have to hit the Natural History museum and the Guggenheim Museum.
- My interview at SUNY-NYC went well. One of my interviewers looked like SNL's Tina Fey with a thick accent and a mean stare. I met all the other candidates and we joked around a lot between sessions. One girl was from Canada, one guy from Queens, NY, and another guy from Oakland, CA. I actually have the same interview day as the Oakland guy for Berkeley and Southern California. In the end, I got accepted!

NYC was so fun, I wouldn't mind living there for a few years. 4 more days until my Berkeley interview. Yea, its definitely gonna be a tough choice.