Month: October 2017

Today I went to the Metropolitan Museum of Art for the Rodin Exhibition. It was my first time ever visiting this museum, and for the future I would like to tour the whole museum and take in everything it has to offer. The exhibition has plenty of paintings and some sculptures made out of plaster or terracotta. One particular sculpture I enjoyed was named Beside the Sea. It was a nude woman with her back hunched over. I found it to be quite peaceful since she seemed to be calm and in the middle of drifting her hand across soft sand. Another interesting sculpture was the Head of Balzac. This sculpture was a man’s head made of bronze. This head portrayed exhausted, and perhaps irritable emotions. This sculpture was very different compared to Beside the Sea because this one emphasized the man’s agitated brow, pug nose, and a mouth that looked like he just tasted something bitter. I learned that Rodin used different techniques for drawing such as the drypoint technique which is where you use a needle directly on a metal plate to draw. He also used watercolors from time to time to convey a sense of energy such as in his painting The Embrace. One painting that caught my eye was The Abandoned  where a woman lay on a bed, covered in bed sheets with a melancholy look on her face. I enjoyed having the opportunity to visit this museum, and I can’t wait to go again!

The time had come once again to write a blog post and I had no clue what to write about. I had made the mistake of waiting until the last minute to find a school activity that was eligible for a blog post and I had begun to panic. Thankfully, a friend I went to high school with (that now goes to Baruch) informed me that she was involved in a club that I could check out. I went to the club room to find that the club I was attending was “Anime Club”. It’s important to note that at this point in my life I don’t have much of an interest in Anime, but as I needed to write a blog post about this experience I figured that I shouldn’t cut it short. Despite what I originally thought was going to happen I found that I actually enjoyed the experience quite a bit. While I didn’t fully understand the things the club members were talking about, it was evident that they were incredibly passionate and that made the experience an exciting one. It’s always intriguing to see people discussing the things they care about and that was exactly what I was witnessing. While attending the club didn’t give me an interest in anime it motivated me to cultivate interests of my own in the hopes of one day experiencing the joy and passion that those club members felt.

Before going to college, I attended a Jewish school my entire life since kindergarten. After finishing high school, most students have the choice between two things: spending a year in Israel before ultimately attending college, or going straight to college. Although what seems like my entire graduating class took the former option, I obviously went with the latter.

Although I came into college alone, I still was able to enter knowing some people, and that’s because my brother who is two years older than I am has some friends who go to Baruch too. Through them, I was introduced to the club, Hillel @ Baruch, which is a Jewish organization where any Jews that go to Baruch College can visit. Hillel @ Baruch offers many Jewish services, from the availability of Tefillin (phylacteries), a set of small black leather boxes with scrolls of Jewish scripture inside them which Jews use to pray every morning, for those who did not get the chance to do before coming to school – to a daily prayer service where a group of Jews who attend the club will be able to pray together. Additionally, every Tuesday and Thursday, they hold events, such as their first “Welcome Back” event back in August to a class called “Hebrew in Harmony.” Additionally, every Wednesday they have a learning event called “Pizza and Parsha,” which, exactly as the name implies, participants sit around discussing the parsha (weekly Torah portion) of the week, and later on Wednesdays there is another class where a rabbi comes in and gives a speech about something relating to Judaism. During these events, they provide kosher food, making it the only place on campus I’m able to trust when it comes to food as I follow kosher dietary restrictions. Additionally, sometimes at these events, they hold raffles for those who like their Facebook page. I don’t think I’ve ever won anything in my life before but because of Hillel @ Baruch I have already won two things from the events (those being a portable charger and a Starbucks gift card, and I don’t even drink coffee)! I do try to attend as many of these events as I can, although there is a roadblock in the way on Tuesdays because our FRO class is held during club hours.

Hillel @ Baruch is a great club on campus and I would recommend it to any Jewish students who don’t know about it yet.

On October 2nd i visited the Hillel at Baruch, Hillel’s main mission is to get jewish students at Baruch and all over the world closer to their jewish culture and religion. Hillel clubs, nationally, are in most universities to give Jewish people on campus a sort of home type of feeling. They inspire people to engage with other jewish students here at Baruch, and help them learn to inspire others at Baruch. when i walked in it was this little cramped room that had so many people walking in and out, people learning, people teaching it looked like something i wanted to be apart of. they offer kosher food every day, which helps out the kids here at Baruch that keep kosher food and do not need to shlep lunch with them everyday. it also acts as a social meet up for all jews on Baruch campus to come hang out and it is right next door to the ping pong game game room. There are also some people that have offices there that you can make appointments with and talk with them about school, questions on religion, and even just talk to get to know another jew. There is also such a great feeling knowing that there is a place at Baruch that can care to your special needs with open arms. Hillel envisions a world where every student is inspired to make an enduring commitment to Jewish life, learning and Israel.

This was my first time visiting the Museum of Modern Art and it was quite an experience. The museum itself is incredible, 6 floors, and an outdoor lobby. My original plan was to start from the 6th floor and make my way down to the first floor. I did, in fact, start at the 6th floor, and it was the most interesting one to me. The museum had just opened up a new exhibit a few days before, Is Fashion Modern? I started out excited and loved seeing the different pieces through the ages. It was interesting to see how many trends of the past have come back into popularity. As I made my way to the 5th floor, I didn’t exactly know what to expect. I saw many famous pieces I’ve heard of before, and it was pretty cool to see in person, versus a google search image. I sometimes felt like I wasn’t doing it right though. I would simply walk through the museum, and look at the pieces, but I noticed just about everyone else was spending at least a full 60 seconds observing each work of art. I was about halfway through the 3rd floor when the security guards began ushering everyone out of the museum because it was closing.  On my way out I discovered a window that overlooked the outdoor lobby, and I must say, at 5:20 the lighting was impeccable for taking photos. In all, it was a great experience, especially because it was free, and I would love to do it again with some friends.

    

For my second blog post I decided to visit the Lower East Side Tenement Museum. My mother has always loved this museum because of the way it is designed and laid out. It is structured for the most part the same way it has been for the last 150 years. Of course, many key parts have been restored in order to continue allowing the building to house a museum with constant people inside. While walking around I really felt like I was getting as good of a glimpse of the past as possible. Just staring into each living space and trying to imagine how supposedly 7,000 people were in one building was just a horrifying thought to me. It was then I realized why my mother is such a big advocate of the museum. Aside from the visualization aspect of it, there is also an educational component. I learned about the harsh living conditions of immigrants in the late 1800’s- early 1900’s. These immigrants all had different backgrounds and came from different parts of the globe and came here for one common goal, freedom. I think this is a very special museum and anybody who has a chance should definitely check out the Tenement Museum.

For my second blog, I decided to pay a visit to the American Museum of natural history. I visited several exhibits including the Heilbrunn Cosmic Pathway. there I learned more about the earth and solar system. Then I proceeded to visit the North American forest exhibit where it showed us the different types of forests and talked about deforestation. right next to this exhibit was the Milstein Family Hall of Ocean Life. Where you’re immediately greeted by a giant whale.

It had all kinds of animals such as otters, dolphins, and even a model of a sperm whale eating a giant squid. The next exhibit was the Bernard family hall of North American mammals. where it had a wide range of animals including grizzly bears, moose, bison, and dears, lots of dears. I also went to the new exhibit the opened in June. it’s called Inside You. the exhibit was about the bacteria the lives inside the body, and how they affect it. in there I learned about a new theory that gut bacteria might be a cause of autism and that changing it in a certain way may treat it. Unfortunately, I did not have time to go and visit the special exhibits. So I just visited a random exhibit and snapped this as photo proof.

For my second blog post, I decided to choose the category that had the option of joining a club. I chose this category because I recently joined a club here at Baruch. I did not spend much time surveying the different groups I could have been a part of during the given club hours. I was actually referred by a sophomore at Baruch who I met during my first weeks as a student here. He told me I had to join Tamid at Baruch, and followed to explain all the benefits it had to offer. I heeded this guy’s advice and recently was accepted to Tamid at Baruch which I am very excited about. Tamid is a “student-led, apolitical business organization that develops professional skills through hands-on interaction with the Israeli economy,” as per the Tamid at Baruch website. This was incredibly enticing to me, as I spent an entire gap year, this past year, living in Israel and exploring the land while also engaged in theological studies and deep critical thinking. I decided I would apply to the club in order to put more of my free time toward productivity and further education. After completing my application and a phone interview with the club’s President,

 I enthusiastically accepted the offer to join the club, once notified of my acceptance. I look forward to learning about both consulting and investing, as well as participating in any networking opportunities that may come forth from Tamid at Baruch.