I'm baaaaaaack!

It's been a long time since I have blogged and quite a lot has happened in the past few months. Look forward to some posts over the next few days for updates on graduation, Project Mexico and lessons from the end of my undergraduate career!

Spring Break!

Here is a tale in photos of some of my spring break adventures!

Stacey and I started off arriving into LaGuardia Airport, taking entirely public transit into Times Square as to keep costs down, and took the Subway to the 9-11 Memorial. In the memorial area, they have two large fountains (one pictured above) with the names of victims throughout. A whole plaza of new buildings are being constructed and the 9-11 Museum is almost complete. It was a powerful thing to see!

After some New York Pizza, we bought tickets and took a boat to Liberty Island to see the Statue of Liberty. Thankfully, it was a really nice day out so we got to walk around the island. I even saw a kid with a GBN sweatshirt on and he happened to be in Eleni's peer group at Glenbrook North! Small world, right? 

Stacey and I posing by the skyline...but incompetent people taking photos don't understand that you want the skyline in the photo and not the bricks on the ground!

We met Maria and her friend Angie at Shake Shack for dinner, which had excellent milkshakes and hamburgers! After, Stacey and I went to Dave & Buster's happy hour in Times Square and took the Subway to Brooklyn to stay with family for the night.

Saturday morning, we woke up early and walked New York with Maria. We probably walked over four miles, heading to the SOHO area, West Village, meatpacking district and Chelsea Market to get some gelato and walk on the high end. Maria and I posed there above since it was another nice day, and then we visited Eleni's godsister Marie hostessing at the restaurant she works at!

Saturday night, Stacey and I saw Evita- one of the reasons for the trip. Ricky Martin stole the show as Che, and it was an amazing brought-back-to-Broadway production. Highly recommended!

Times Square at night! What would it be without advertisements and brands?

Maria and her Fordham friends took us out to a club in the city where we soon learned the business of club promoters.  Great music and it reminded us a lot of Argentina!

Sunday morning, we ate at a diner and headed to the Greek Independence Day Parade, as it was March 25!  I got to see Thea Stephanie and her New Jersey church, and a lot of Greeks reuniting in the street! Definitely a sight. Even Mayor Bloomberg was there! 

Walking Central Park on Sunday afternoon! Stacey and I also saw Rockafeller Center, more of Times Square and shopped a little bit.

That evening, we met up for a sushi dinner with our roommate from Argentina Elizabeth, and a few of her friends! They took us out again and we spent the night at their hotel which was close to our bus station for DC the next morning. 

Our first stop in Washington D.C. after our $15 Megabus ride was walking from Union Station to the Newseum, a journalism museum. This place is seriously heaven. I went with Kara two years ago and have looked forward to going back ever since. It brings our Communications Law and History of American Journalism classes to life, as well as talking about a lot of interesting cases in the news. It even has a piece of the antenna from the North tower of the World Trade Center!

Posing by the Capitol, Stacey and I showcased our colored pants which are a very popular trend on the East coast.

All of these cases discussing Amendment rights were also discussed in Comm Law at Mizzou! Yay for a great journalism education!

The World War II Memorial is my favorite, and Monday we did that, the Lincoln Memorial and glimpsed at the Vietnam Memorial. Instead of taking the Metro from being so worn out from walking, a rickshaw bike took us all the way from the mall back to Georgetown to stay at Kara's house for the night! He only charged us $10, and gave us a beautiful ride on the Potomac River.

It's cherry blossom time in Washington D.C., which were a gift one hundred years ago from the Japanese government! They are beautiful, and I'm sure would have been more beautiful if they all blossomed at the same time. But because of weather issues, they moved the festival a week early and not all of them were up. Kara, Stacey and I went to the FDR Memorial, JFK Memorial, Martin Luther King Memorial (that one's new!), and after lunch, hit up the Newseum again (2 day pass!) and the American History Smithsonian. Productive day! We took a bus and Metro train back to Fordham and stayed the night at Maria's dorm. 

Wednesday morning, Stacey flew out and Mom flew in to NYC! That night we met up with Thea Stephanie, Kira and Sophia in New Jersey for dinner.

Mom and I had frozen hot chocolate at Serendipity on Thursday and walked a lot of Central Park! We also spent time in the Metropolitan Museum of Art. 

Friday, Mom and I went to the New York Botanical Garden and saw the Orchid Show, which was beautiful! Thankfully, it didn't rain until Saturday so we spent a lot of time sightseeing and shopping. Saturday, Maria took us for pizza and cannoli around Arthur Avenue at Fordham and overall, it was a great break!

Where has this semester gone?

Where have I been the past month? I haven't really posted any photos since going to Colorado, making me wonder, what do I actually do in my time? Homework? Meetings? Clearly not sleeping.

Comically enough, I went to Kansas City or St. Louis four out of the past five weekends, for very random reasons. Flying out of the St. Louis airport to Colorado, the Phi Mu sisterhood retreat in Kansas City, a MOJO presentation at an advertising agency in Kansas City and a musical in St. Louis. Freshman and sophomore years, I remember the spring semester being dead in Columbia on the weekends but now, it's reversed and I feel like I'm missing out on things!

Taking a moment to pause and actually think about how I've been spending my time how much opportunity there is in college. Opportunity not only to travel, but to go on adventures, see various groups of people and get involved. So take a minute to check out these photos and figure out where your dear friend has been!

This photo was taken at the St. Luke Greek Orthodox Church dinner dance. Mizzou has gone in the past few years from having three active Greek Orthodox college students to having an excellent group meeting every week. Gregg, Yianni and I felt like happy parents realizing what we have created. Our productive meetings, interesting lectures and upcoming retreat have really shown us that Orthodox Christian Fellowship can exist anywhere if we put in the time and the resources!

Before the Phi Mu sisterhood retreat, Shelley (currently living in Kansas City and student teaching during her last semester) invited our pledge family over for a bonding night! We ate a homemade dinner, caught up and shopped at the Plaza in Kansas City. What lovely sisterhood!

As my sorority's sisterhood chair, I planned our retreat at the Great Wolf Lodge in Kansas City, Kansas!
We had 25 rooms and got to cheer on the Tigers watching the Mizzou-Kansas game and playing at the water park!

We facilitated sisterhood activities at night, and here's everyone in the chapter that went.

Mizzou Basketball! Our last home game was against Iowa State, but we've continued to be the Big 12 Champions and a No. 2 seeded team in the NCAA Tournament! If we're not at games, we're watching them! MIZ!

MOJO- Team Maven. Every Thursday when we present our progress to our professors (management team), we choose a theme to dress to. Last week was groutfits- gray outfits- a popular theme in the Artemas family as well. MOJO has been a great time commitment but I'm excited to see the work we produce!

MOJO members pose in Kansas City after presenting our State of the YAYA (youth and young adult) report at an advertising agency.

Relay For Life Steering Committee members pose while canning to fundraise downtown. Relay is four days away and has already fundraised $55,000, trying to hit $100,000!

Kate and I saw American Idiot, the Green Day musical, at the Peabody Theater in St. Louis!

Jen, me, Alex and Jordin smile at Phi Mu Founders Day- 160 years!

Homecoming Steering Committee members rise early (4 am!) to surprise next year's committee!

Oh...and spending some time out with friends too. Emily, me and Alex!

I think the most exciting news of this past month was I was admitted into the graduate school program at the Missouri School of Journalism, so I'll officially be receiving a Master of Arts in Journalism-Strategic Communication next May! I'll also be the TA for MOJO instead of on a team, so yay for waived tuition and phenomenal experience planning the Strategic Communication Career Fair! In the olden days, you would have saved your acceptance letter. But it's 2012, so I'll remember important moments by screenshots on my iPhone. I first found out from a text message that acceptance emails were out, and after telling a few friends in a class, word spread quickly. Yay for nice friends and text messages!

iPhone screenshot post grad school acceptance

We'll see where the next month takes me with Relay For Life, spring break and MOJO work!

A weekend in Colorado!

In high school, I made a goal to visit all of my best friends’ at their respective schools. I wanted to see everyone where they were comfortable and enjoy time with friends in their college lives- so I planned visits to see them. After visiting University of Illinois, Iowa State, Georgetown, DePaul, Northwestern, Notre Dame and a few more universities, I spontaneously booked a flight to visit Jessie at University of Colorado-Boulder!

Boulder (CU) is about 25 miles from Denver, so I flew into Denver and Jessie and I had a packed weekend enjoying everything there is to do in Colorado! In fact, besides Denver and Boulder, we also made it to Estes Park, Lyons, Thornton, Louisville and Aurora in just two days! The cool thing about Boulder compared to other “college towns” was how much it offers to do- in terms of activities, entertainment, food and more. You have some places like DC and Chicago where you’re at the school to enjoy the city, and others like Ames, Columbia and Champaign where the school CREATES the city- physically and economically. The city of Boulder reminds me a lot of a newer version of Evanston, Ill. All the buildings are new and there is an endless variety of restaurants, unique stores and entertainment. It expanded outside the college campus and being Colorado, is very environmental as well (recycling, organic, the list goes on).

The beautiful Boulder apartments

I arrived on Friday morning after leaving Columbia at 2:45 a.m. and taking a 6 a.m. flight out of St. Louis. Why I thought this was a good plan, I have no idea, but the combination of my car, 5-hour energy and Jessie’s willingness to pick me up at 7:30 a.m. in Denver made it work. I was immediately astonished at the beautiful sight of mountains from the highway. We stopped off of Pearl Street (one of the main strip’s in Boulder) to eat at a breakfast restaurant called Snooze- where we had the most amazing pancakes in the world. Their flavors, I kid you not, were pineapple upside down cake, sweet potato and oreos and cream. After a brief nap and Jessie signing her lease for next year (yay having somewhere to live!), Jessie gave me a tour of campus. I always love to see how other campuses differ from my own at Mizzou, and was happy to see how similar everything was! Like Mizzou, all the buildings have the same architecture and brick on the outside, and there was always construction. Everything from the library to the student center was similar, but I have to say that CU has an amazing football stadium. Can you imagine being at a football game surrounded by mountains?

Taking a tour of campus

Being in a mountain town of Colorado, I felt like we were taking a vacation to a log cabin. Between the snow and the layout of Jessie’s apartment (see below), it was very home-y and comforting. Jessie even gave me bottles of water constantly to stay hydrated with the change in elevation, something I hadn’t even thought about. After our campus tour, we went to T.G.I. Friday’s in Thornton to meet up with some MOJO alumni from Mizzou who work at Integer, an advertising agency in Denver! They all had great insight about the current MOJO project and it was nice to see how Mizzou alumni who I was close with from The Maneater and Relay are adjusting so well to their new jobs.

The next morning, after some car trouble and random lights turning on, we drove to Estes Park, Colorado to hit up Rocky Mountain National Park and go sledding. The park was beautiful and much to my surprise (actually), the mountains had an interesting variety of rocks, and elk. We did the park our own style by having a picnic in the snow with our brown-bag lunches and roaming various areas. It was nice to observe how beautiful nature can be and how silent it was as well!

Self-timer pictures are the best!

Playing in the snow!

Lion King pose!

We stopped in the small town of Estes Park for some fudge (caramel pecan marshmallow fudge!) and drove back to Boulder. While at the park, we saw many families with young kids teaching their kids how to sled, at very young ages. Jessie pointed out that when living in Colorado, it’s normal to do that because you have to eliminate the fear of mountains early. The state itself puts a huge emphasis on mountains, nature and FAMILY fun; we passed a family fun amusement park, go-kart area or mini-golf station pretty much every 20 minutes we drove anywhere. It’s nice to know how the businesses of an entire state can rub off on its citizens’ values so strongly.

Later that evening, we had dinner at a typical Boulder sandwich place and saw the movie The Vow, ironically set in Chicago! I highly recommend it. We ended the trip by going to the Denver Art Museum and stopping by the Capitol Building to officially walk the stairs that put us “one mile above sea level” in the mile-high city. It was a wonderful weekend getaway and I’m so thankful Jessie was such a great host and had so much in store for us! 

Denver Art Museum

Seeing an acrylic painting of Estes Park, where we were
sitting the day before! How cool!

The Capitol Building

Sitting at the stair "One Mile Above Sea Level"

An eventful week

The more I think about it, 2010 & 2011 have been two of the most eventful years of my life. I've traveled a ton, studied abroad, done service work in Mexico & Joplin, served on committees and worked on teams that I will never forget. I'm always on the go and always happy that way, so I keep doing it. This past week was a great way to kick off the year because we did just that, adding to that list of memories & seeing how much you can do in a short period of time!

Starting a week ago, I hosted some friends for a pre-celebration of my 21st birthday. Since not everyone lived in Chicago, we planned a lot of outings, hit up a lot of restaurants, and stayed at the Hilton Chicago downtown for a cocktail party!

Sherman, Kathryn, me, Shaina & Andrew
(all of our "roommates" for next year except Laura who is in Spain!)

I'll never understand how this happened, but in my two bedroom suite reservation, we got a beautiful suite on the 18th floor with three rooms- a main room with a king bed, living room & bar, a king bedroom & a twins bedroom- with four bathrooms. It was lake view too- and we were able to see all the way from Navy Pier to Soldier Field! We had 29 people come throughout the night and 18 sleep over!

The night view on the Navy Pier side, you can see the Ferris Wheel in the distance!

The sunrise view- Adler Planetarium/Field Museum side!

Even Maria & Eleni made it!

Sisters

The hotel itself is beautiful, and is where GBN had prom. The Torch alumni took a photo by the huge Christmas tree downstairs! 

Alyssa, Michelle, me, Kara & Meredith

 The next day, we roamed Michigan Avenue and stopped at the Grand Lux Cafe!

Mizzou group

If those 24 hours weren't packed enough, we ate and walked Wrigleyville that night, and did the suburbs the next day ending in Whirlyball! Whirlyball is a fun game with bumper cars and scoreboards where you on teams, try to score with a scoop. Eight of us went!

This trip was one of the things I was looking most forward to this year and it went incredibly well! After a crazy week being around a lot of friends, I took a small trip to Ohio for the end of break to visit family & friends! I'm glad to make the most out of this time before one day, it's all spent working! Thanks to everyone who came to things!