You are currently browsing the daily archive for September 19, 2011.
I won’t write about the exams or studying for the exams… because that is boring.
On Friday after our histology exam, a bunch of us went into the city for lunch. Indian buffet for the win! It was the Brick Lane Curry House in East Village. Tried mango fish curry and other stuff for the first time.
After that, I tagged along w/ a friend to check out the city. Our afternoon was my edumacation of the city.
We walked south down Broadway and checked out SoHo, Little Italy, and Chinatown. Fun facts I learned that most people probably already know:
- SoHo means “south of Houston”. Houston (pronounced HOW sten) is a street that runs sideways, perpendicular to Broadway. Therefore, SoHo is the neighborhood south of Houston. Tada! It’s got a bunch of shops mostly.
- NoLita means “north of Little Italy”. Also another neighborhood/area.
- Little Italy’s in the middle of a 2-week (or so?) celebration called the Feast of San Gennaro. The main street down Little Italy’s closed to traffic and all the stores set up booths and outdoor seating areas. Walking through, I smelled and saw a bunch of pizza, sausages, cheeses, etc.
- Chinatown, which is mainly on Canal St is creeping into Little Italy.
- Manhattan’s Chinatown’s more Cantonese, whereas Flushing/Queens’ Chinatown’s more Mandarin.
- Apparently, Manhattan’s Little Italy isn’t as great as tourists would expect. Friends have told me it’s kind of a tourist trap? If you want better Italian food, come to Arthur Ave in the Bronx which is another Little Italy.
The whole time, my friend and I had an awesome conversation. Unfortunately, my attention was all over the place as were my eyes because of all the new things I was seeing.
Stuffed from the Indian buffet lunch and a Nuts4Nuts cart, I couldn’t sample any Little Italy food. Instead I bought half a roasted duck in Chinatown and got it to go. :) very oily, though 
MOVIE NIGHT
One of my classmates is this really cool guy who grew up in Ghana. A bunch of us ECF people went over to his apartment Friday night to watch a movie called Facing the Giants.
My friend, his wife, and his 2 year old daughter hosted us until midnight and we talked and talked. His childhood in Ghana, his experience w/ men’s accountability groups in the past, their experience delivering their first baby, their thoughts on home births, how they met. All while eating homemade brownies and homemade frozen yogurt. Twas awesome!
HALF MARATHON – 4 WEEKS AWAY
I’m running the Baltimore half marathon instead of the full as I’d originally planned. I just had to downgrade – my training was nonexistent.
I’m still really lazy about running! Part of me kind of wants to just wing it, just out of curiosity and laziness. Another part of me knows I’d probably waddle for a week afterwards if I did.
I just found out that each borough of NYC has a half marathon sponsored by the NYRR (New York Road Runners). So that’s 5 total: Manhattan, Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn, Staten Island.
What’s cool is that NYRR is the group that organizes the NYC Half Marathon (March) and the …. *drumroll* ….. ING NYC Marathon (November). For anyone who doesn’t know, a lot of people call the ING NYC Marathon the most exciting marathon. Crazy crowds (2 million spectators), live music, the course runs through all 5 boroughs, finish line in Central Park, I hear it’s awesome. If I can, I’m going to check it out this November.
The NYRR has this goofy guaranteed entry program where if you run 4 of the 5 halves, you bypass the lottery to get a spot in the NYC Half, and there’s another guaranteed entry program for the full marathon (9 NYRR sponsored races in a calendar year + 1 day of race volunteering).
Before I found out about this, I thought there were only two ways to get into the NYC Marathon:
- Be fast enough to qualify (I think)
- Get a lottery spot
I have no shot of getting into the NYC Marathon before clerkships begin my 3rd year, buttttttt I can still do this guaranteed program thing for the NYC Half Marathon before I hit the wards!
A picture from the Half (which also goes through Manhattan!) taken from nyrr.org
So yeah. I want to run the NYC Half 
