Blog Category Events Thursday, January 26, 2006 Saturday, January 14, 2006 This has gotta be the most unusual birthday cake that I've seen and the most extravagant birthday party that I've been to! There was plenty of food, drinks, dancing to a live band and mingling among 300 people on two floors of the historic Harold Pratt House.
Photos Saturday, December 31, 2005
For the first half of our New Year's Eve celebration James, Joanna and I went to NYUSABDA party held at Ballroom On 5th. The party had a buffet dinner so Joanna and I got there right after 8 PM, which is the starting time of the party, to make sure we get enough fresh food. The food was OK, but there were not enough tables for everyone to sit at. Many people had to just put a paper plate on their lap. I did make sure we got a table though by saving the seats while Joanna was changing. The lack of tables made up for some great space for dancing.
The party was quite heavily attended by people of all ages - from 20-something college kids to seniors. The highlight of the evening (besides the midnight champagne toast) was a performance by US amateur Standard and UK Open finalists Craig Shaw and Katya Afanaseva. The performed a Waltz, Foxtrot and Tango. Here are some photos from the party.
After the party ended at 1AM, Joanna and I were ready to head home after exhaustive dancing. But James insisted that on New Year's Eve everyone should stay out as late as possible, so we went to a house party that our friend Yan had invited us. Getting a cab at that time was impossible so we walked from 32nd street all the way down to the Village. This was the same party Yan and I went to last year. When we got to the party, it was grooving with some nice club music - a good alternative to all the ballroom stuff we were dancing to so far. My friend Natalia was there as well as Christina who I met at this party last year. We did not stay at the party for too long because Natalia had organized a move to another place - the Italian New Year's Eve Party "Made In Italy" at club Sol. The move there was again hindered by the lack of cabs on the street and trying to organize a big group of people to go there. Joanna gave up on further partying and took the subway home. James, Yan, Natalia, Christina, Jenny carried on. After giving up on the cabs we took the subway to 28th street and then were lucky enough to get the cabs to the club.
There was a relatively small line outside and I am not sure what were the rules of who is going in first... They insisted on checking the IDs and our friend Christina had to drop out since she did not have an ID with her. She went to some other party around the corner though. So James, Yan, Natalia, Jenny and I made it inside the entrance. At that point there were more bouncers telling us to pay the cover. Natalia and Jenny were able to squeeze in without paying. Yan and I paid, but James decided not to go in, so we said goodbye to him and entered the club.
The club was very cool. It was one giant room with a bar in front followed by a dancefloor with a raised stage for those who want to show off or have a better vantage point to find their friends. On the perimeter were couches with small tables to put drinks on. The club had a winter theme to it with big snow flakes hanging from the ceiling, a polar bear and the snow made out of cotton web. The crowd was very festive and nice looking. The music was very good - no hip hop, just pure house and techno - I love being at a European party. At around 4 AM there was more room and Yan and I did some nice improvised creative partner dancing utilizing the open space. We stayed at the club until almost 5 AM. Here are all photos from the club. Thursday, December 29, 2005
Today Joanna and I saw The Nutcracker performed by New York City Ballet. Several weeks ago we saw a parody called Nutcracked at Joe's Pub. After seeing that, it was great to see the original ballet to give it justice. It was amazing how many kids were part of the cast! Surprisingly there was no story mentioned in the Playbill. The story with the appropriate photos from the performance can be found here. Wednesday, December 28, 2005 Sunday, December 25, 2005
Today we had yet another spacious party at Tim's place organized by Sue. This was one of the longest parties I've been to! It was going from 4 PM until about 1:30 AM - that's more than 9 hours! It was a pot-luck dinner where everyone brought something to eat and as usual there was more than plenty of food for everybody. Instead of bringing food, I brought entertainment with my karaoke system which turned out to be quite a success. People were singing on and on starting from Christmas Carols going into regular songs. Joanna really impressed me with her singing that night. She really let her self go! And she did a great job being a DJ queuing up great songs for everybody to sing.
All Photos
Saturday, December 24, 2005
To get into Christmas spirit, Joanna and I went to the Cathedral of St. John the Divine for some Carols singing at an event they called "A Festival of Lessons and Carols". The event started at 4 PM, but we got there closer to 5. Only two thirds of the enormous cathedral was open to the public. The high alter area was closed for renovations. The clergy was positioned in front of a giant blue wall separating the area under construction.
We were handed the program with the sheet music and the words of Christmas carols as well as the words that the preacher was saying and what the people are supposed to be saying. Singing Carols was kinda weird with the huge amount of echo in the cathedral. When I tried singing I could only hear my voice since no one around me was singing (loud enough). I felt that I was doing a solo. So it's better to leave it up to the choir in front who I think had microphones next to them and sounded very nice thought the cathedral.
At the end of the ceremony was something that I have not seen in a church before. They brought out 3 giant puppets - first was an Angel, followed by the Virgin Mary carrying baby Jesus. I am not sure who the third puppet was supposed to represent. He looked like Jesus, but then how could he be following his mother carrying him as a baby? They proceeded up the center isle to the exit of the cathedral and stayed there until the end of the event. As people were leaving the kids got a chance to get blessed by the angel extending his giant arms towards them.
All Photos
We spent Christmas Eve at my place exchanging gifts under the Christmas Tree and watching the movie It's A Wonderful Life.
All Photos Friday, December 23, 2005 Monday, December 19, 2005
Today James, Joanna, Julia (wow 3 J's) and I went to see Trans-Siberian Orchestra in concert held at the Madison Square Garden. I've been to it once before, but that was in the Theatre, which seats around 5000 people. This was my first time going to an event held at the arena which is an enormous space capable of seating 18200 people!
The concert lasted for about 3 hours and it was awesome. The band consisted of several guitar players, keyboard players, obviously a drummer, and believing or not... a string section. I have to say though that I could hardly hear any violins which were overpowered by the roaring guitars, but I guess it did a good justification to the band's name. The were several vocalists with voices ranging from hoarse hard rock grunge, to Broadway musical, to opera. The music was very diverse. The program featured many rock renditions of classical pieces by Beethoven, Tchaikovsky and other classical composers as well as arrangements of several Christmas carols. Of course there were also original compositions too. Joan Jett (two more J's!) made a surprise guest appearance singing her hit I Love Rock And Roll.
What made the concert really stand out were the awesome light effects produced by spot lights, strobe lights, lasers and fireworks - all synchronized to the music. This was the first concert at which the audience was asked to turn on their cell phones at one point. This was to make us participate in the light effects show by having thousands of cell phones glow in the dark. It was a very cool effect and it made me see how many people have cell phones these days - a lot!
The video is the best way to describe the concert:
I recorded the video with my Casio Z750 and edited with Ulead Video Studio 9.
Concert Photos
Sunday, December 18, 2005 Saturday, December 17, 2005
Margaret's and Zia's Birthday Party at Raga featured numerous cupcakes. I was ready to turn it into a karaoke party by plugging my laptop to the sound system in the privately reserved room downstairs, but unfortunately I got a call from my job to resolve an issue with the upcoming release of our software and had to head back home. What a bummer. Anyway, Happy Birthday, lovelies. Will sing later... Wednesday, December 14, 2005
If you want to practice your French, you should come to the Jeunes Francophiles coctail gatherings held at Maxime Lounge in Hotel Stanford. The gatherings are held quaterly usually on a Wednesday. The event is free and the atmosphere is very friendly. Most people who come to the meetings are either French or know how to speak French. The conversations are mostly in French, but when people like me come to the event, the conversation in my group has to be in English since I don't know French. After the coctails, people usually go to a nearby Korean restaurant for dinner. Tuesday, December 13, 2005
It's a Quadrille Ball tradition to have a special Christmas after-rehearsal party every year. This time it was held at the Hungarian House. The rehearsal
also took place there. After the reherasal we had
hot buffet followed by
Santa reading the traditional funny poem featuring some of the upcoming ball dancers and Junior Committee members. Santa this year was impersonated by Alan F. This was his first time doing this and I think he did not know how to handle the huge beard. It totally covered his mouth and ended up muffing the sound. It was quite tough to hear what he was saying. After the poem the traditional award presentation to the upcoming ball dancers took place. This year the guys of the Junior Committee were
serenading to Jill who has gotten engaged and therefore "lost that loving feeling" for the Quadrille and is leaving the Junior Committee. Here is the video:
The remainder of the night I spent dancing with Agnieszka and Natalie to the sounds of a live band.
Monday, December 12, 2005 Thursday, December 8, 2005 It's that time of the year for the company holiday party. We rented a restaurant for a private party during which we received our Christmas Gift. Wednesday, December 7, 2005 Today I had a pleasure of meeting Miss Universe 2005 at the reception for the upcoming Viennese Opera Ball. The reception was held at the Austrian Consulate in New York. Miss Universe turned out to be a native of Russia and I had a quick chat with her in Russian. Her name is Natalie (a.k.a. Natasha) Glebova. She is very tall and obviously very beautiful. She came to the event accompanied by one of the "wellness providers" who happend to be also Russian and a person working for Miss Universe Organization. I resent the fact that I did not get a chance to take a photo with her :( But here is what she looked liked on that day.
At the ball last year, Miss Universe 2004 Jennifer Hawkins appeared in her fancy leather gown. Checkout top-to-bottom photo in Daily News article.
Related Links:
Friday, December 2, 2005
Chi and I went to visit our friend Meg in Sea Bright, New Jersey for her Birthday Bash. The party was held at The Quay restaurant. As soon as I walked in to the huge building of the restaurant, I heard Meg's voice singing so I knew were I should head. She was singing under an accompaniment of a James Lafferty on Keyboard and a guitar player. With the wireless mic she walked around many of her friends singing just for them.
We finished the night with some karaoke to the sounds of my laptop that I brought with me.
What was amazing is that I met 5 people there who had the same phone as I - Treo 650! I had no idea it was so popular in New Jersey!
All Photos
Meg's Website Thursday, December 1, 2005
What's in common between bowling and DDR? Not much, with exception that you can do both at Port Authority Bus Terminal, which the huge multi-story bus station in New York City. Since two of my Brazilian co-workers who were visiting us for two months were going back tomorrow, today my team at work went out for some social bonding at the bowling alley. I was not as much excited about bowling than about showing DDR to my co-workers afterwords. After bowling the loosing team ended up paying for me and one of the Brazilian co-workers Herval to play it at the arcade as the rest of my co-workers were watching. Here is the video:
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