My July 4th Weekend

My weekend holiday was great.  I went to see Wall-E with my girlfriend who later treated me to a surprise dinner at a traditional Japanese tea house near St Mark’s Place. to celebrate my promotion at work.

Wall-E was a cute movie that had a very serious message.  I really enjoyed the short before the movie as well.  The robot, Wall-E, does remind me of a cute Johnny 5 from “Short Circuit” while EVE looks like something Apple designed if they had the spare time and money.

Saturday was a night out at the East Village at a hookah lounge called “Sultana”

Sultana Cafe
128 E 4th St
New York, NY 10003
(212) 228-7678‎

http://maps.google.com/maps?hl=en&ie=UTF8&q=Sultana+cafe&near=New+York,+NY&fb=1&cid=14778458480028245273&li=lmd&z=14&iwloc=A

The Cafe has a very cozy atmosphere with freshly prepared Middle Eastern food along with a variety of flavoured tobacco for the hookah. We got there a bit early before it became crowded when it was around 9:00 PM.

We got a bit carried away smoking about 2-3 hours of hookah but it was fun. The owner was very courteous and he knows how to make his customers have a memorable experience.

Sunday was a day out to see “WANTED” starring Brad Pitt’s “Life Partner” and the White guy from the Idi Amin movie.  Parts of the movie where the main character was working at the office really reminded me of my final 6 months at Arbinet before I switched careers. After the movies, it was a random walk down Times Square before heading out.

Glad my first week implementing email campaigns for my client is coming to a close…

NYC Charity Event - Rebuilding The Bridge for the China Earthquake relief efforts

For those of you in the NY area, I would like to invite you to “Rebuilding The Bridge”, a charity fundraising event to benefit the China Earthquake relief efforts.

The event will take place on Saturday, July 12, and will feature a ground breaking coalition of Asian American performers and not-for-profit organizations as we raise awareness and dollars to help rebuild China’s Sichuan region after one the most devastating natural disasters in recent memory.

Feature performers include:
RYAN LESLIE
BEAU SIA
ANDREW CHOI
…with more performers to be announced soon.

The event will be hosted by MISS INFO of HOT 97FM.

For more details (with frequent updates), please see the event’s website:

http://www.rebuildingthebridge.com

Saturday July 12th 7:30PM
Pace University
Michael Schimmel Center of the Arts
3 Spruce Street
New York, NY 10038
RSVP 212-619-4785 ext 106

Funds raised by this event will be donated to the China Earthquake Fund at Mercy Corps:
http://www.mercycorps.org/chinaearthquake/

Hope you can come for a great evening of entertainment and support the cause. And please spread the word!

I am promoted.

I am now in the process of transitioning to my new position working at the LC24 Tower at East Island City in Dukes, Liberty City.

This is a change from my previous job working in an office building nearby the Triangle Building in Algonquin

Liberty City has been good to me…

Now I need to find an apartment nearby Alderney City.

LC24 Tower vs Citigroup Building

This is going to be interesting…

Earthquake Relief Party at Club Element

StageNightLife Presents

Earthquake Relief Party at Club Element

Party all night without the guilt

Join us at Club Element for a charity benefit to help provide aid to the thousands affected by the Sichuan, China earthquake.

guestlist pricing
*ladies free until 11pm
*everybody $15 until 12am
*discounts for Birthday Parties and Bottle Reservations with Vip line treatment and Complimentary Admissions

All door proceeds will be donated to the American Red Cross

Element
255 E. Houston Street
(corner of Ave A and Essex Street)
New York, NY
10pm-4am

*21+ over
*Dress to impress
*Come as early as you can for guest list pricing

Come join and mingle with everyone else from the group. Send additional names to guestlist@stagenightlife.com

Japan Day in New York City

Japan Day was held today at Central Park near the entrance at 98th Street and 5th Avenue.  This year’s events consisted of some traditional concerts and pop culture concerts, a robot exhibit, some free food and free canned tea.

I met up with the rest of my friends around the afternoon no thanks to delays in PATH but we all got there in time.  After we all got together, we went to find a picnic area around the Japan Day section of the park and went about having our picnic.  Some of the friends prepared rice balls, some fruit salad, and some crackers.  The food was good and it was a nice sunny day to relax after a hectic week at work.

The free tea they were giving away was great.  The flavours they offered were white tea, green tea, and darjeeling tea.  I preferred the darjeeling and the green teas over the white flavoured ones.  Instead of watching the various performances and concerts we spent most of our time just chilling in the picnic area and enjoying the scenery.  Later, two of my friends joined us before we went around the exhibits.

The performances were very lively and the crowd was excited by them.  However, there were a few Japanophiles who were just acting like rude punks while some people were performing.  Most of them were wearing Naruto, or some weird Japanese costume and jumping around like idiots while some random people watch in amusement or took pictures of it.  Other than that it was fun.

Most of the exhibits were closing shop around 3:00 PM while the final acts were performing on stage.  The funny thing was two other friends showed up just as things were wrapping up.  They had made the fatal error of trying to drive to New York from Bergen county when today was also the day for the Israel’s 60th Anniversary festivities, Japan Day, some NYPD event, and random tourists coming to Manhattan on the weekend.  As a a result it took them about 3 hours to get here and all they could do was just enjoy the leftover picnic food.

After the Japan Day festival ended, we headed out to the East Village for some fast Japanese food, some gourmet pudding desert, and some shopping at the Sunrise mart before calling it a night.    The weather actually got hotter as the night went on instead of cooling down.  Today was a fun day, and it looks like this is the start of the summer season.

On a sad note, I really am disappointed with Puerto Rico for voting for Hillary.  Do these people really want McCain to win in 2008 or are they just brainwashed like the rest of the Hillary supporters?

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/7429996.stm

Hillary Clinton has said her fight for the Democratic presidential nomination will go on after winning a largely symbolic victory in Puerto Rico.

With only two state contests left to fight, she is trailing Barack Obama by 1,915 delegate votes to 2,070, according to AP’s rolling count.

Daddy Yankee - Gasolina

(Who’s this?)
(Da-Ddy!)
(Yan-Kee!)

unito mambapa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Zumbale mambo pa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Zumbale mambo pa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Que se preparen que lo que viene es pa’ que le den…
(Duro!) Mami, ya yo se que tu no te me vas a quitar…
(Duro!) Lo que me gusta es que tu te dejas llevar…
(Duro!) Todos los weekend’es ella sale a vacilar..
(Duro!) Mi gata no para de janguear, porque…

A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)

Ella prende las turbinas
No discrimina
No se pierde ni un party de marquesina
Se asicala hasta pa’ la esquina
Luce tan bien que hasta la sombra le combina
Asesina, me domina
Janguea en carros, motoras y limosinas
Llena su tanque de adrenalina
Cuando escucha reggaeton en las bocinas

A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)

Aqui nosotros somos los mejores, no te me ajores
En la pista nos llaman “Los Matadores”
Tu haces que cualquiera se enamore
Cuando bailas al ritmo de los tambores
Esto va pa’ las gatas de to’s colores
Pa’ las mayores, pa’ las menores
Pa’ las que son mas zorras que los cazadores
Pa’ las mujeres que no apagan sus motores
Tenemos tu y yo algo pendiente
Tu me debes algo y lo sabes
Conmigo ella se pierde
No le rinde cuentas a nadie
Tenemos tu y yo algo pendiente
Tu me debes algo y lo sabes
Conmigo ella se pierde
No le rinde cuentas a nadie

Zumbale mambo pa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Zumbale mambo pa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Zumbale mambo pa’ que mis gatas prendan los motores…
Que se preparen que lo que viene es pa’ que le den…
(Duro!) Mami, ya yo se que tu no te me vas a quitar…
(Duro!) Lo que me gusta es que tu te dejas llevar…
(Duro!) Todos los weekend’es ella sale a vacilar..
(Duro!) Mi gata no para de janguear, porque…

A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
A ella le gusta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)
Como le encanta la gasolina
(Da me mas gasolina!)

Help the Sichuan, China Earthquake Victims / 帮助四川地震灾民

—- DONATION WEBSITES —-

——————–
INTERNATIONAL
——————–

To donate directly to a Chinese Non-profit, a good choice is Jet Li’s One Foundation. Jet Li is an ambassador for the Red Cross Society of China. His fund, as of 4/15/2008, has raised RMB 10,677,267 ($6,590/RMB 46,130 from Paypal donations)

http://www.one-foundation.com/html/cn/beneficence_01.htm
Click on the “paypal” button

The site is in Chinese only, but I have read it. One key point to know about your donation there:
1. The FULL amount of your donation will be transferred to the Red Cross Society of China.

The website provides full transparency on how its funds are distributed.

http://www.one-foundation.com/html/02/n-102.html

I Googled the foundation and found quite a bit of press coverage, so I felt comfortable posting it as a donation destination.

——
U.S.
——

FINALLY! You can now donate directly to the American Red Cross China Relief fund. The link is provided below, before you donate, please read the paragraphs regarding fund use:

https://american.redcross.org/site/Donation2?idb=252516977&df_id=3198&3198.donation=form1

Additional information regarding relief efforts by the American Red Cross is provided here
http://www.redcross.org/news/in/profiles/Intl_profile_ChinaEarthquake.html

A recent post in this group mentions the possibility that donations to the American Red Cross does not fully transfer over to the Red Cross Society of China. I am attempting to reach the local director of the Red Cross in my area for a clarification on the exact use of fund for everyone, but probably won’t get an answer until tomorrow afternoon.

If anyone has any clarification on the matter please let everyone know ASAP.

All this being said, ARC does have a four star rating from Charity Navigator for its effective use of donations. http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm/bay/content.view/catid/2/cpid/43.htm
And your donation will be used specifically for the Chinese Relief effort.

However, your donation maybe be put to best use by directly wiring money to the Red Cross Society of China (listed in the CHINA section) or through Jet Li’s One Foundation (listed in the INTERNATIONAL section) rather than the American Red Cross.

More updates to come.

——–
CHINA
——–
Directly wiring your donation to Chinese banks is possible:

Account name: Red Cross Society of China
开户单位：中国红十字会总会

RMB Donations:
Industrial and Commercial Bank of China:
人民币开户行: 中国工商银行 北京分行东四南支行
人民币账号: 0200001009014413252

Foreign Current Donations:
CITIC Bank branch:
外币开户行：中信银行酒仙桥支行
外币账号: 7112111482600000209

Hotline: (8610) 65139999
Online donations:
Red Cross Society of China website: www.redcross.org.cn

中国红十字基金会同时也接受社会各界捐赠：
http://www.crcf.org.cn/donationol/donation.asp
Thank you Clare Gu for the notification!

—————
HONG KONG
—————
Online donation for Hong Kong Credit Card Holders
Hong Kong Red Cross:
Thank you Fan Zhang!

https://www.redcross.org.hk/donation/user_donation.asp?langId=2

http://www.worldvision.org.hk/eng/appeal/Sichuan/emer_frame_e.html

———–
CANADA
———–

Allows online donors to direct their funds to the China Earthquake Relief effort
https://www.paypaq.com/redcross/new/index.php

—–
U.K.
—–

Direct donations to the Chinese Earthquake Effort via Online Payment has been posted.
Thank you Anna Judson for the notice!

http://www.redcross.org.uk/donatesection.asp?id=81125

—- RELIEF EFFORTS —-
Newest update:

NYC chapter:

Prayer and Donation Event:

Event: Prayer and Donation for Victims in SiChuan

Time: this Sat May 17th. 7:00pm to 8:30pm

Location: Manhattan Chinese Baptist Church @ 236 W 72nd St

Please join us and pray for the Earth Quake victims.

Contact: Vincent Zou. cell. 626-825-2266

Spared Disappointment

It’s always good to know that one is on good terms with others be it for personal or professional contacts. Not too long ago, someone I knew in a professional environment was spewing crap about people I knew both within and outside of the office. Many of these comments really upset me and was most likely meant to drive a wedge in my working relationship with those people (he failed). There were other things but I even made the choice to leave after I became a casualty of office politics where that same idiot who was spewing crap benefited himself at my expense.

Fortunately, I was able to maintain good relations with my colleagues, which I visited earlier when I changed careers. They were still as friendly as before and things seem to be going well for them. After having some small talk I brought up some reasons why I ultimately left that company and the person responsible for my unpleasant tenure there. As the conversation went deeper I went on to state some things the guy said that ticked me off and some of it directly concerned them.  They had a right to know what was being said behind their backs.

Most of the stuff was later confirmed to be true and there was just general disgust at the fact that these things were mentioned in the first place.

The fact that there was some truth to it all wasn’t a surprise. There were things that had happened in the past that compelled me to avoid disappointment. Although the truth left me with an awkward feeling, I was still glad to have visited. As I got home, the thought kept festering and it was just unpleasant and awkward even though it should not concern me at all.

I slept on the train ride home, I played Wii Boxing for an hour, did a hundred push-ups and even tried reading. None of these things worked and not when I had a brief talk with a close friend over this and some other things. Yes, I did save myself from disappointment today.

Another weekend

It was a fun weekend out on in New York City again.  On Friday, I finally met up with Sinan after not seeing each other for over 2 years now in the city.  We met up briefly in the New York Auto Show before heading out for dinner at Max Brenner near Union Square with him and his friends.  Although its been two years, it was definitely great seeing him again and learning that he is working on making things happen for him.  I don’t mind going out of my way to hang out since we both have busy schedules and there is a strong possibility that he may relocate in search of new opportunities.  He is very approachable, level-headed, and can read people.

At Max Brenners, we waited for about an hour while trying out free samples of Mexican Hot Chocolate and caramel chocolates while waiting.  After we were seated, it was generally agreed that we would just run with getting the sweets as dinner instead of a real meal since we are in Max Brenner anyway.  Sinan decided to order a full chocolate pizza pie, which was a cookie dough pie with chocolate for tomato sauce, marshmallows for cheese, and hazelnut bits for the toppings while I ordered a munchies waffle which was waffles mixed with chocolate ice creams, chocolate sauce and chocolate bits.  I think it was safe to say that almost everyone at the table was completely full from eating the sweets despite their seemingly small portions.

I think that although the get together seemed brief, the fact that we were able to pick up where we left off and the fact that both of us were willing to go out of our way to make the gathering happen shows how strong the overall friendship is regardless of other complications.  Its things like this that make friendships real.

Saturday was a day at the NY Auto Show with Bill and later for a night of karaoke with Hiromi, who joined us later.  The auto show was fun while I lost my voice from 2 hours of Karaoke.