First weekend in New York City

3:00am June 11^th – Windsor, Canada

5:00am June 11^th- Detroit, USA

7:00am June 11^th- In Spirit Airlines Plane 300

9:30am June 11^th- Myrtle Beach, Virginia

10:00am June 11^th – Back on Spirit Airlines

11:05am June 11^th- New York La Guardia Airport

11:35am June 11^th- In my Apartment, Midtown Manhattan, New York

12:00 June 11^th- Baruch College Library (lol Actually True)

At last…I have arrived in New York to begun my journey through the Baruch MFE program. The travel was fine. I was lucky enough to miss the Spirit Airlines strike by a day basically. If they went on strike a day before, I would not have made it to New York on time.

A small tip before I go any further: A great way to get from the airports to the city for cheap is to take the “Express Shuttle” ($10) from the airport into the city. It dropped me off at Grand Central Station. I then took a cab to my apartment. It cost me $4.50. A cab from the airport to the city is usually around $40-$45.

Once I got home(my apartment in mid-town), I went to the university library with my roommate (William). I got my Baruch ID immediately at the university. I spent the rest of the day utilizing the internet at the library and reading in preparation for the C++ class. the following monday. After browsing and some reading it was time to search for some house-hold items. We went shopping for beds, and some basic house-hold needs like towels, shower curtains, toilet paper, etc.  We went looking for beds at ‘Sleepy’s’. They have some great deals on mattresses. It is advisable to buy the mattress there and the bed structure from Ikea or something along those terms. To try out some great New York food, my fist meal was at New York Burger. It is a great place that makes some amazing burgers. I would recommend it. After all the shopping, we went back to the library. The comfortable couches at Baruch were truly great as I was dreading sleeping on the hardwood floor during the night. Our beds wouldn’t get their till the following morning so we had to brace for the floor. It was truly a horrible sleep.

In the morning, our amazing beds came in. We both ordered Tempurpudeic beds since we figured, 1/3^rd of our lives are spent sleeping and we will be only studying and sleeping during the next 1.5 year might as well get a good bed to always be well rested.

The next day, I went back out early in the morning to get a new cellphone so I can call my gf and my parents at ease anytime I want. There is a Best Buy near my house near Flatiron building. I went there and browsed. I bought a BoostMobile plan. It was a no-contract offer with unlimited text, call, internet, email for $60 per month. It includes international features also so I can call Canada whenever I want. They have international texting so all you guys from overseas (China, India, etc) can utilise the plan to stay in touch with your friends/family back home.

I spent the rest of the day at the library doing some preparation for my first refresher course and some work on my Statistical Arbitrage project for one of our professors at Baruch, Dr. Jim Liew. During the afternoon, myself and William met up with Amanda (our classmate ) and we went to go attend this massive event at Madison Square Park. It was the Big Apple Barbeque Block Party. It included Twenty something grillers from across the country competing to provide the best bbq meal. The lines were humongous. We decided to just goto a small burger joint nearby instead. After a delicious meal it was back to the library after for some more reading and then some good sleep to recover on my bed from the terrible hardwood floor sleep the previous night.

About my area/school:

So I live in a GREAT neighbourhood. Almost everything I can think of is close by. I am on the 10^th floor in a 600ish sqft apartment. Baruch is approximately 8-10 min walk from my apartment. I have an amazing view of the Empire State building and Chrysler tower from my apartment as can be seen in the pictures. The area is pretty great and there are lots of restaurants of all kinds to choose from. Tons of fast food restaurants are available too. It is quite clean and relatively quiet neighbourhood. I will elaborate on this more as I explore the area more.

The university buildings are ABSOLUTELY AMAZING. Baruch owns a few buildings in the area but their main building is the Vertical Campus. It is absolutely gorgeous as you can see from the pictures. I will post more pictures of the inside once I get a chance to see it more. I have just been spending most of my time last two days at the building right opposite the Main Campus where the library is housed.

All in all, I am very excited and am ready to start the program. I am ready to begin the journey. A rigorous path lies ahead, and I plan to tackle it with the utmost of my abilities.

Until next time…

Click this link for Pictures: http://www.quantnet.com/forum/album.php?albumid=31

Tags: baruch college, Baruch MFE, Joy Pathak, the Big Apple, weekend in New York City

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