Samomatic

Snowboarding at Waterville Valley with Ryan, Steve, Chris, and Thomas. (Below is Steve catching some air!)

The weather was perfect hovering around zero degrees and not a cloud in the sky.
A view of the mountain ranges from the chairlift.
Our group tried out some beginner jumps (I didn’t attempt any because I want all my limps by the end of the day and it is only my 4th time snowboarding).
Our group shot at the summit, about 4,004ft above sealevel and 2020ft above the bottom of the hill. The longest run is 3 miles and it sure takes quite a bit of time to get down.
Breathtaking view along the way down.
It was a really good day. However at the end of the day I couldn’t find my wallet and realized that I had forgotten to zip it up after buying lunch. It is probably buried somewhere in the hills. Oh well stuff happens…be more careful next time. I tried to notify Bank of America about my bankcard but they kept redirecting me to different services. In the end I had to wait till the morning and go cancel it in person.

This past long weekend I went to NYC and met up with Elvin, Kathy, and Elton. I hopped on the LuckyStar bus at 3pm but didn’t get to New York until 8:40pm. I was ready to chew on the armrest… Well once I arrived in NYC Chinatown I had a hard time finding the subway station so I had to run to Union Square with all my luggage to meet Elvin by 9pm.
We went to his place, dropped off my stuff and then walked north of Time Square to get some Chicken & Rice – Elvin nearly froze to death. We went to HA! Comedy Club and the show was harlious.

Saturday I told Elvin to be prepared to walk all day (he is too nice to tell his touristy friend he doesn’t like walking or the cold), fortunately, we had blue sky and near zero temperatures.

There are lots of unique things happening all the time in New York. One of my favorite moment that weekend was when 2 people got onto the subway and start started singing acappella, many of the passengers were already numb to these street performers. But soon their joy spread throughout the monotonous subway car, some tapped their foot, some sang along softly and looked looked around and smiled at others.We got home around 7pm and I got an email from AJung: “Have loads of fun and be safe ok? And don’t exhaust those guys with 23 hours of walking!!!”
We both burst out laughing, I guess the damage has been done already..haha




Kathy and I wanted to cook, we went grocery shopping and whipped out some chicken parm, mashed potatoes, and veggie. I am quite proud that I am learning to cook a thing or two living in Boston.
We had lunch at Little Italy. Elvin ordered so much food it could barely fit on our table! The pizzas were fantastic with lots of flavor and very little grease.
I hopped on the 2pm bus, the ticket lady would not start the bus because she was missing ONE ticket stub and had to check everyone on board. Arrived in Boston at 7:30pm, it is so peaceful, different but nice too.

So a few post back I mentioned Macaroni & Cheese and it brought back some memories related to this food item.

The time was April of 2005 and I was just finished my first co-op term. Throughout the term I was planning a hiking trip with Ian, Ludwik, John Fong, Tim Moon, and Eric Tang and often drove around town after work to pick up supplies or scout out equipment.
We arrived at Algonquin Park and the park attendent informed us that the river has flooded the entrance and we would have to decide whether to go ahead or not. Ludwik was our first scout (left picture) and we tried to use garbage bags to keep his feet dry but the branches soon ripped them to pieces. We asked the intoxicated Moon and he just said “I’ll do it” so we all put on our packs and brave the freezing water. The left image is Ludwik manning the stove, I recall we were cold and tired from the first day trek and was looking forward to a warm filling dinner. I had bought Easy-Mac by accident so in the end we each got about 2 spoonful of food and had to go to bed hungary. Due to the rainy conditions and soggy ground we often have to toast our shoes, socks, shirts at night.Wet logs, icy, and wet ground meant that we sometimes lose out footings. Here John Fong totally wiped out and Eric with his daily fall into some sort of rivine that completely soaks him. The best part is Moon’s reactions!Tim Moon was King of Ghetto with his Acura seatbelt, cut off Khakis, and never working fishing rods. The picture on the right shows the various techniques we tried to keep our feet dry…
To this day we are sill amazed that Ian managed to fall asleep on top of that tree root, it must have deformed his lungs permanently. In the evening, after everything is setup and settled it is so peaceful to just sit by the fire, chat, and enjoy the beautiful scenery.This is a picture right after we finished the trail!THE bear stalking Tim, that was a close call.The Skyline Lookout Point where we ate our trail mix, threw sticks off the cliff….
Tim ‘owned’ a tree so we had a big bonfire and also nice benches to sit on.Fog moving in over the lake Sushi!! As you can see we were famished and started harrassing the restaurant before it opened. Our whole table had this not-so-fresh and smoke smell but we didn’t care what others think. It was a very satisfying meal.

Mike decided to drop by Boston for the weekend and we walked all over town for the 2 days he was here.

We walked around the Harvard and MIT campus, below is a lecture hall inside the Stata Center.
It was impressive that there was no echoes bouncing around in this room *ahem* => RCH Rm.104

Mike and Ryan reading atop the Prudential Center while snow is falling somewhere far away.

At night we went Ryles Jazz Bar in Inman Square for some live music. The food and the music were fantastic and I loved how they decorated the place.

We visited the USS Constitution and joined the tour, surprisingly it was very interesting and gave us a glimpse of how the 500 sailors lived together.

We toured another docked destroyer and it was such a stark contrast against the old wooden ship with all its weapons and equipment.