Waking up at 4am to catch a plane was not as bad as I expected, though no treat by any standard. Nevertheless, I got fly off into the sunrise and arrived 4pm Easter Time in a campus straight out of the 18th century -- though the college was founded one later, in 1841.

This weekend I got to take part in a special event over at the first university I applied (and got accepted into). With about 40-50 other students, I was wined and dined by the school and escorted all over New York City, as I mentioned previously, Friday to Sunday, 10am-12am.

The itinerary (and the city) was jammed, crowded and hot like summer; I never expected to get 3 shades darker in NYC! Apparently, the many of us from California pulled the weather over with us.

my host and her roommate had the luck of one of the most gorgeous views you can get from any dorm room!

I stayed in one of the a typical college dorm on campus, co-ed by floor and with shared bathroom. The showers were much nicer than expected and overall kept quite clean. Each room comes with the bed bases, two desks, and two closets.

A wider view of the campus green.

The Church, pictured left, apparently is one of the most desirable places to get married and is now only open for weddings of the university alumni. The waiting list is said to be 5 years long - better sign up now and just wait for the proposal, eh?

Left is what I like to call the campus version of Disney castle, I believe. Right is one of the freshmen residential colleges/dorms on campus and the one I think I would like to be in, if just for its pure prettiness and Harry Patter-esq common room lounge!

Imposing and impressive from the front, crap from the back, and - from what I've heard - cramped inside. 80% or so of the sophomore year are housed here.

Construction on 3 new dorms. They are expected to be amazing, gorgeous, and very "green," in the environmentally conscious definition of the word.

I forgot my camera in my suitcase on Friday, so I have no pictures of Grand Central Station of Gossip Girl fame or Times Square (jammed and crammed like sardines) and its perpetual lights that turn 12am to 12 noon or the Tony-winning Broadway musical we watched, In the Heights.

On Saturday, after a cafeteria brunch (the food was decent, I s’pose) we treked over to the Bronx Zoo, where we were set free to wander for two hours or so. My camera was flashing the battery sign already so I stopped my photo spree halfway. What bad luck!

Water Birds. It was sad that we could only spot one penguin, no ice.

My  brother actually visited this zoo on our last trip to New York, about 2 years ago. Instead of sticking around, I took the subway with my mom to tour NYU. Alas, stupid private university in the public service that has very private and steep tuition rates that prevent me from even considering you! Why Stern, why do you not offer any merit scholarships? $500 per semester will maybe cover my toilet paper – thanks, but no thanks.

After the zoo, we regrouped and headed off on the metro to the Manhattan waterfront where we took a very brilliantly-narrated (and perfectly snarky) Circle Line cruise/tour around the Hudson.

Amy and Sarah; sunset on the Hudson, waiting for the circle line.

Across the river there is New Jersey, with more (but newer) skyscrapers.

Josh (that's his camera and arm), Sarah, and Michael.

Sunsets are so cliche and gorgeous and also excitable!

Taken from my plane seat; this poor lonely soul was neglected for the longest time before someone noticed it. Attention: THIS IS HOW YOUR LUGGAGE GETS LOST IN TRANSITION. Which is why I didn't bother to have any check-ins.

New York from the sky. Apologies for the uneven horizon line.

So I’m probably not going to New York University, college university of my dreams slash fantasies. I decided that as awesome as Stern is and as much as I would love to go there, paying 52k a year and going deep into debt before I ever get a real job would not be ideal nor comforting. Besides, living in Manhattan requires huge amounts of money just in itself, amazing dorm room from converted apartments/hotels or not. Whaaaa.

Yeah, so boo for only 1k of merit aid (which is essentially less than the NMSQT offers, even, and the only reason why I probably got it). Round trip tickets twice a year between here and there would essentially render that toilet paper.

So what’s the lesson here? Don’t bother going to NYU without a real game plan. Loans won’t cut it, I promise.

So now it’s down to Cal (Berkeley), UCLA, and Fordham University. Because while NYU has been wiped off my list–I shed a tear in mourning, I really do–I’m still visiting New York City during spring break!

I’m actually going to take a trip to Fordham, which is sponsoring my visit to them. At the moment, they’ve offered me a full tuition scholarship. So yeah, I’m swaying towards a school that I never seriously considered attending to in the first place. In fact, before the onslaught of mail and email, I’d never even heard of it. I only paid attention because it was in New York City (well, the LC is in Manhattan but Rose Hill & the Business school is in the Bronx) and because they have one of the most aggressive (in a good way) marketing strategies I’ve seen.

For example, they offered to waive the application fee, I got a million emails and viewbooks prior to applying (and even after) early decision, and after I got in, their alumni sent mail from their companies–of which they were presidents of–encouraging me to attend. And since I want to study marketing, this is the kind of thing that really affects my decision to the positive.

Anyway, I think my final decision will come after the visit.

Now, what about Cal and UCLA you ask? My parents definitely would prefer Berkeley, being closer to home and having the more famous Haas for undergrad business, but its definitely somewhere that I’ve seen a bit too much of. Too close to home, as I pointed out earlier. Though then again, most of my friends seem to be leaning that direction. It’s a pity no one else plans to join me if I do decide to go east.

I’ll post any lessons and advice I found in my experience applying and the like this year, since I know senior year & colleges are usually major decisions.

A post without any pictures for once, can you imagine? I’m going to start a new section where I basically summarize recent events in my life/what I’ve been up to. Yep, just another narcissistic attempt to document my life.

Lately I’ve…

1. Reformatted the laptop, which caught a virus when I tried to download a math program for a dumb calculus project. At least it was worth it, since there wasn’t even much stuff to back up off the laptop (being old and hopefully an in-between until I can get the HP TouchSmart tx2z). I am much more satisfied with my newly configured (but very old) Dell XP for now, though.
2. Ordered the new 35mm f/1.8 Nikkor prime lens. It was a belated birthday present, and took an amazing amount of work to convince my dad to get it. I even got help from the kid brother on that.
3. Accepted into the 4 UCs I applied to. Now I’m waiting on the last two school, which come out next Tuesday.
4. Been driving! Today was actually only my fourth time driving–I’ve only recently gotten my permit–but I’m having fun trying not to be like all those people who do not understand how to drive smoothly after 20 years of experience! I’m looking at a couple (Asian) parents of a few friends, actually.
5. Been going to Tea Station way too much. We say we’re celebrating admittance, but it’s really just another reason to hang out and not do anything after school.