The smell

Remeber the Queijo da Serra in the picture of the previous post?

Well, I just opened it the other day and have been keeping it outside the fridge, and its beautiful and active smell has started perfuming the house.
I hope my Turkish roomate doesn't mind some nice Portuguese smell straight from Serra da Estrela.

Newark visit

Newark is a small city in the state of New Jersey, about 30 minutes away from New York City.
Newark has a big Portuguese immigrant community, so it is quite natural to see Portuguese restaurants, supermarkets and all types of services with banners written in Portuguese.

My brother had to go to Ikea, which is in Newark, last Saturday and we couldn't go there without doing some Portuguese food shopping.
Here is a picture of what I bought.


From left to right:
- atum Bom Petisco
- queijo da Serra
- Nestum
- Chocapic ( I like the fact that the box says - Atencao: mais chocolate)
- bacalhau
- chourico

Missing in the picture:
- 12 pasteis de nata, that disappeared in 2 days :D

New York Rats

One of the most unique things about NY is the amount of rats that live in the city.

I have done some research online to try to find estimates on the amount of rats that NY has, and I have found that there is no consensus about this number. That is not surprising, as it is quite hard to find an accurate method to count them.
I found estimates saying that there should be around 6 to 7 rats for each inhabitant of the city (this means more than 44 millions rats only in NY). Other estimates go as far as 12 rats per inhabitant. One thing that I have found is that everyone agrees that there is at least one rat per person, which is already a lot.

Controlling this pest is not easy (although I don't think there is any real effort being done in that direction). Female rats can reproduce up to 285 new rats per year that, in a matter of weeks, are ready to run in the streets. Furthermore, an Israeli professor has recently done some research and found out that the geometric layout of New York is easier for rats to spread out, than the irregular layout of a city like New Orleans (more similar to European cities). It seems that rats learn how to move better and quicker in a grid city layout like NY.

The place where I usually see more rats is definitely in the subway. I stop a lot on the 96th street station, which is a very dirty station that is currently under construction, and I don't think I have ever stopped there without seeing any rat. Other stations are also crowded with these little creatures. I will leave you some pictures taken yesterday on the Penn Station subway.

Orientation Week

After coming back from Canada, I made part of the team that introduced the new January MBA students to Columbia.
It was a great week of fun and meeting people. It is actually very different doing the orientation as a student (like I did in August) or as an Advisor (like I did now). I initially thought it was all about going out, meeting people and cheering, but after being and Advisor I understood that there is a great component there of helping people out and make sure the integrate in the Columbia community as smoothly as possible.





The newest import from Portugal, my friend Tiago Sousa, showing everyone how we do it:

Canada

Hey guys,

sorry for the lack of postings!

Christmas was great, I had a wonderful time in Canada with my family. It was basically a week just for relaxing, eating and spending time with family.
It was also the first time in 5 months that I had bacalhau, so that is also a reason to celebrate.

As you can see by the pictures, the amount of snow there was huge!

Columbia University during winter

Birthday Party (mine and my sister's)

In the middle of the chaos of the last month between group assignments, exams and friends visiting I managed to celebrate my 24th birthday. Everybody here tells me I am still a kid, however I feel that I am approaching the 30s faster than I thought I would.






My sister was in NY on the following week, and it was her birthday so we also celebrated it together.

Cai neve em Nova Iorque ... faz sol no meu pais.

I am sorry for not updating the blog for more than a month, but the last month has been really chaotic. It was the end of classes, the exams, friends and family visiting, so I had basically no time.

Today when I woke up (at 1pm) this was the sight I had from my window. I just wanted to share it.


I am leaving tomorrow for Canada. I will be there for Christmas. I promise to upload more pictures and more stories.

In the meanwhile, Merry Xmas for everyone!!

We've got a new President

The election night, last Tuesday, was followed with high expectations by all the Americans.
It would be an historic day no matter what (either the first African-American president, or the first female vice-president).

Everyone gathered around a TV, either at bars, at home or out in the streets. And the anxiety levels were at their peak minutes before the polls closed on the west coast.
We gathered some friends at Gal's place, and followed the counting very closely. Anne Eidelman was perhaps they happiest person in NY when the results were finalized, she jumped, screamed and called everyone in her address book.

Obama was elected new president. Let's hope this means a brighter future for the country and for the way it deals with the rest of the world.

When I got home (122nd street) there were crowds of people coming from 125th street (the center of Harlem), celebrating and shouting. The excitement was quite similar to when Benfica wins the championships (humm...ok, a little bit less).

Breakneck Ridge Hike

Last Sunday the Outdoor Club of CBS decided to organize a hike outside of Manhattan (Breakneck Ridge, New York state) to watch the impressive and beautiful colors of the American Fall Season.

Besides telling you that we walked in the mountains for 5 hours, I don't think there is much more to say as the pictures speak for themselves.