CitySavage

festival, originally uploaded by willowyangcn.

I just stole The letter from Kai:

"Having travelled for most of the weekend going places in various modes of transportation, I've finally made it back to where I started, Philly. Had a great time in NY, well, NJ to be more precise, well worth the trip. Glad to see all the new blood and the very old blood.

Thanks Zhen the Great for letting us trash your place,
Simon for getting lost so I can spend more time with him,
XX for her dumpling quality control and 晚会 commentary,
Willow for documenting the year of the dog kick off event,
Amanda for offering to help with AS/2 and cross referencing,
Vivi for the so called dumplings that look more like 韭菜包子,
And Qi for just being there.
...
Oh its going to be a great year, I can just feel it. Happy new year everyone and 祝大家旺旺旺!

-Kai"

Posted by willow at 11:52 PM | Permalink | Comments (1)

Dancing @ Casbah, originally uploaded by willowyangcn.

It is all well planed, and perfectly executed. Saturday, we fled from New York City to Marriott Villas in Absecon, NJ. Kai arrived in NJ transit at a station 2 miles from the Villas. We picked him up just in time.

It was a two bed room condo officially accommodates four, but large enough for at least eight persons. It has kitchen/bar, dining area, indoor jacuzzi, and even a fireplace! You can lit the wood by just flipping a switch. It would be a great place for a big party. I found myself a genius finding this place.

Shortly after check-in we drove to the Atlantic City, which is 15 mins away, and parked my car at the 8th floor of Tropicana. It just had a renovation recently and did a wonderful job. After an ample dinner at Cuba Libre, we walked directly to the BJ area. Simon gave me my first lesson on BJ. Well, I did download some techniques and brief introductions of BJ, including several tables that you can memorize, which would maximize the possibility of winning, BUT I merely had time to finish the introduction part. Anyway, Simon is good teacher, and I ain't no stupid either. I quickly cleared out my pocket and budget and left the table, started watching. My vergin luck didn't work. Simon's most powerful technique is yelling at the most critical point, and people seemed like it, since it usually brings luck to everybody and quite entertaining, at least I am entertained. Kai is having a good time, by asking Simon for advices but betting in the exact opposite way.

Stepped out of Tropicana, we walked the long Board Walk that connects all the hotels. We spent quite some time reaching Trump Taj Mahal. We miraculously met our new friend Fank from Tropicana, 2 miles apart from Taj Mahal. The luck here is not in favor of us. We decided to check out the club, which opens at 10:30. The club is called Casbah. It should be the best dancing club I have ever visited, okey, so it doesn't count. But Simon and Kai largely agreed with me. It has a nice crowd, very stylish, very friendly. Should be better than most of the clubs in NYC.

We took a cab all the way back to Tropicana and enjoyed our complimentary late nite chinese food. It gave a perfect ending to the AC experience.
Quentin Tarantino's sound track flowed with our car back to the hotel in a full moon night.

Posted by willow at 12:58 AM | Permalink | Comments (5)

P.S.1 (Public School No. 1) Contemporary Art Center is affiliated to Moma and "oldest and second largest non-profit arts center" in the United States. I was attracted to this place by recent Photography Exhibitions from Stephen Shore and Peter Hujar. I found that the magic place itself is a piece of art.

Peter Shore's pictures in early 70's are a large collection of his journey across the country, named "American Surfaces". It is very straight forward recording of the places and people that he came accross. This first reminds me of the book "On the Road". The power comes from the journey itself rather than sophisticated photo techniques. The curiosity and mystery is aroused by the pictures, make people wonder the feeling of the photographer and every element in the image, which becomes unfamiliar to us in the 21st century. And after finished a whole room of pictures, you do feel you have just experienced the same kind of trip, but within an surprisingly short amount of time, isn't this the kind of feeling that we look back at the places that we have taken for granted but revisited after some time?

Stepping out of the room, I became more attracted by the building itself. I was speculating the lives used to be there when it was still a public school. The voices of the children, and all kinds of other sound pass you over your shoulder like a wisper of wind.

The cafeteria is very lovely place, and the Root Beer Float makes me "feel like a child again".

Posted by willow at 12:42 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Ski Freak, originally uploaded by willowyangcn.

Posted by willow at 12:08 AM | Permalink | Comments (0)

Scientific Calculator, originally uploaded by willowyangcn.

This is just a glimpse of what my 620MHZ VGA PDA is capable to do. The major functions that I am now enjoying:
1. Excel: Bookkeeping
2. TCPDUMP: Divx quality movie
3. Mapopolis: Map with bluetooth GPS support
4. Mdict: Dictionary
5. AvantGo: Offline reading NY Times
6. TeamOne: Ebook reading
7. MediaPlayer: Listening to MP3
8. MorphGear: My gameboy
9. Putty: SSH to your linux box at home
10. Resco Audio Recorder: An excellent recorder

Posted by willow at 01:39 AM | Permalink | Comments (8)

NYE @ NYC, originally uploaded by willowyangcn.

Please click the above picture for more pictures from the party.

Posted by willow at 03:09 PM | Permalink | Comments (0)