Category Archives: Blog Post #1

freshmanseminarblog191616

My schedule this year at Baruch gave me a lot of free time during the day and I didn’t know what I do with myself. I have a three hour break three times a week and I was bored out of my mind. I spoke to a couple of kids that graduated the same high school as me and told me that a Rabbi comes and speaks twice a week during the breaks. I was ecstatic when I heard the news I went to the Rabbi’s class and I learned a lot about Jewish laws. Now I started going to this class during my break twice a week and I made a lot of new friends and to top it all off when you go to the rabbis class we get a free meal.

Today, Christine and I went to the American Museum of Natural history. It was extremely interesting to learn about humans, including the mind, and evolution. Also it was cool to observe different species. This includes species that exist today, and some that are extinct.

One of my favorite parts had to be the Space show which displayed a 360° effect of space. Lights were off, and stars appeared. It felt so real, but it was all visual effects. I really enjoyed this, and also the IMAX movie that they played about national park adventures. The screen was huge, and the scenery in the movie was so beautiful that it made me want to visit the parks they showed.

My least favorite part was the butterfly conservatory. Since it was hot outside, the humid environment that the butterflies needed was not enjoyable at all. Also, I don’t even like butterflies. They kept landing on you and it was gross. It was additionally very crowded.

The museum was very fun and I’m glad we went. My favorite parts outweigh my non-favorites so thats good. I hope to come to this museum again, and explore the national parks I saw in the IMAX movie. In addition, I would like to visit other museums.

About a week ago, I attended Hack4Baruch’s first programming workshop. The goal of this workshop was to let everyone, experienced or not, get a feel of what it feels like to code. The languages that they chose that day were HTML, CSS, and Javascript. Now, it all sounds like too much on one plate, but these three languages are the meat and potatoes of a modern website these days. Two of them aren’t even real programming languages!

Peter Zheng, our instructor put a website in the following analogy:

A website is like a building. HTML is the brick and mortar of the building, while CSS is the paint and decorations, and Javascript are the elevators, the electricity, the running water.

Unfortunately, I wasn’t able to attend the full workshop, because of a work meeting. Yet, the workshop sparked my interest into web development and made me look for other resources I could use to teach myself at my own time. It’s a great skill to carry, and could score you some money when times get tough!

On Friday September 16 I visited the MET with Ruana and Ahmed. Unfortunately we got there pretty late, so there was not a lot of time before the museum would close for us to look around and see everything. We got to visit the Egyptian, Greek and Asian exhibitions.

It was really interesting to learn about different cultures, there were a lot of  interesting art work to see. It was my first time visiting that museum and I would love to go back and see other exhibits and see the beautiful view from the rooftop. Definetly visit the MET, especially at night when it’s not crowded, you basically have the entire museum to yourself, there is a lot to see and it’s a fun place to go with friends.

Tuesday the 20nd I visited the FIT Museum (Fashion Institute of Technology). As expected it was a fashion based museum which featured unique pieces that was inspired by different aspects of life. This exhibit features different clothing designs and styles that were inspired by common life events. Fashion designers are not only inspired by pop culture, but by sports, fast food logos, and the military.

The football jersey evening dress by Geoffrey Beene caught my eye because this was a piece from 1967. And to think about it, I can still see this being worn today by a fashion Idol like singer Rihanna. It merely shows how fashion has evolved over the decades but at at the same time, stayed still. Also, it shows that today’s style will always be connected to trends that were already established years ago.

Jeremy Scott uses the branding technique of McDonald’s for his 2014 collection for Moschino. Instead of writing McDonald’s under he uses his brand name “Moschino”. Although Mcdonald’s is already a well known food chain, the idea of using this brand technique in his high end line was very clever to me because not most people would think of walking around with a McDonald’s  logo as a fashion statement.

The difference between camouflage worn in the military and in high fashion is, “In high fashion, camouflage is about standing out rather than blending in. I thought that this Michael Kors camouflage pants suit was very dope. With the glasses and the piece in general, it looks very futuristic and it definitely stands out!

Overall, I enjoyed my visit at the FIT museum Although I wish it was a whole building full of fashion finds. Although it was just one section, I still learned a lot and it opened my eyes a lot to the thoughts and ideas that goes through designing clothes.

I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art this past Tuesday with my friends Gaby and Josh. It was really last minute and I’m glad they were able to show up since last time I planned on it, a series of events happened that prevented me from going.

This was my second time to a museum in NYC, however it was my first time at the MET and I didn’t know what to expect upon entering. Josh led the way and he showed us a couple of very interesting paintings. Throughout the day you could say he served as our free tour guide!

We entered multiple areas in the museum, we saw paintings, statues and artifacts from many places in the world. Your going to have to forgive me for not remembering all the areas that we were in but I do remember being able to access the roof! We also entered this room dedicated to the man Benjamin Franklin, as well as an area that just had a bunch of statues made during the Renaissance.

Anyways the roof was beautiful, it gave a nice view of the city and park and it was the first time I had ever gotten to see a view like that. The roof had a good amount of people and this really old big red house was also just there, monitored by the security guards. I wish I took a picture of the house but you could see how keeping it outside and letting nature run its course left its mark on it.

On the way back down, we started to visit a couple more random areas here and there, again I don’t remember the name of where I took this picture. I think it was probably down with the paintings from the Medieval Times? Anyways we ran into this bust and I just found it funny of it was missing its nose so I had to take a picture of it (You can see me in the reflection of the glass case! Look closely! Promise I’ll have a better picture next time!)

My favorite part of the trip was actually towards the end because we went to this Arabic/Middle Eastern area of the museum and like it was very interesting seeing all sorts of artifacts. My favorite one happened to be this armor that was showcased near the entrance, the design on it really stood out to me and reminded me of the stories and toys that I used to listen to and have when I was a kid. Overall this was area was my favorite as all the artifacts had very unique designs, yet the designs had a sense of uniformity that they still managed to look like they belonged to a single culture. Most of that can be said for every area of the museum we explored and this was a nice experience I wouldn’t mind sharing with other people.

I had the awesome opportunity to go to the Met museum with my fellow classmates, Halina and Ahmed, last Friday on September 16. By the time we got there, it was almost closing time (the sky was dark outside) and the entire museum was incredibly empty.

It was such a strange experience to say the least… I felt incredibly out of place, especially with the security guards spread out everywhere. Apparently, they’ve had their own fair share of thieves at the museum and a few had to remind us to wear our backpacks in front of our bodies (which made me feel like a criminal)… But I thoroughly enjoyed waddling through the exhibits for the hour we were there.

But I digress, all that’s important was that there were very little people in the museum at the time. We got to visit the Egyptian exhibit (see pictures below), the Greek exhibit, the Asian exhibit, and we kind of walked through the “American” Exhibit/hallway because there really was nothing there to see apart from some paintings.

There was something almost ethereal about going to the museum late at night when no one is there (apart from the security guards). The exhibits were lit with artificial lighting and we were able to admire the excessively detailed feet of the Greek statues without tourist shoving us to the side to get a better look. We got to race up a large set of stairs (which I’m sure is against some form of rule, but no one/nothing got hurt except for my pride). And also, there were absolutely no crying or screaming children.

So my lesson to my lovely readers is to go to the MET late at night, get in by donation (seriously, you could get in by donating a penny although I didn’t do that because I have a conscience…I donated a dollar), go with friends, and then chill out at Central Park afterwards because NYC is beautiful.

On Wednesday I visited the Metropolitan Museum of Art with a few friends.  We spent most of our time ruminating on the works of European painters.  Since I am familiar with many of the artworks and the characteristics Renaissance art, I was able to explain the significance of the works and symbols within the works to my friends.  Although I do enjoy looking at art and spending time at the Metropolitan, I was able to see the artworks in a new light this time because I had to answer questions my friends had.  In addition, I also interrupted different artworks verbally to reveal aspects many people miss when looking at paintings without knowing the historical backgrounds.After this experience, I definitely will be visiting art museums with friends more often.

On Friday September 16 i had the amazing experience of visiting the MET for the first time. I went with my friends Ruana and Halina. During my time there I was greatly reminded of my time in Egypt. Walking through the Ancient Egyptian Art area I saw a lot of the statues and monuments that looked like the ones in Egypt. When I entered Gallery room 131 it was like a blast from the past. The room was dimly lit and it seemed as though I was walking in one of the caves located in the Valley of the Kings. It was truly amazing being able to see the art from my ancestors. What their beliefs and culture was and how it differs to mine now.

Visiting the MET reminded me of how interesting and intricate my history is and how there is so much that I can learn form the past. Going to the met has all in all been an experience that was very impact-full on me. It Brought back a passion that I had for digging deep and learning about history, a passion that I had let die down long ago.