This is how we party.

Last week, at the school here in New York, was a small fair where all of the exchange students had to present/represent their home school to attract prospective Stern Students to go on exchange. We were there.

One of our strategies was a LEGO challenge as you can see from the picture above. Below you see one of the Stern Students successfully completing the LEGO challenge, and I am a bit proud, as you can tell. Maybe she will go to Denmark on exchange?

The photographs in this entry have not been taken by me. The first one by A. Mark Rosso, the next two, Morten Boesen.

My best friend stopped by, and we had a lot of fun. Below is a picture of him in front of the car we rented (more on that in another post).

So, because I could not make it to make a Welcome entry to Morten, this is a goodbye entry. He left on Sunday. More on our adventures together later!

But school is also demanding, and I am sure you understand that I cannot update my blog everyday. Anyway, I have some time right now.

I love all of my subjects. I am taking Emerging Financial Markets, Corporate Finance, International Financial Management, Risk Management, and Business Policy and Strategy. Inasmuch as Stern (my school) is one of the best finance schools in the world, it is no wonder that I have an overweight of finance courses. Also, I have been lucky with all of my professors; the level of the professors here is simply much higher than in Denmark.

But there is much more to do here, than in Denmark. There is an ongoing evaluation of the students at all times, whereas in Denmark we are more used to the one final exam. Whichever is best is probably a function of what you grew up with. But it feels great to be challenged in the way you work, which enables you to take more than just the approaches we are used to back home.

A little note on school. More posts to come in a second!

The last day before school (read the entry if you do not remember) was not a success in terms of watching baseball (but in terms of many other things). However, on September 23, once again, we went to Yankee Stadium in the Bronx.

And boy was it fun. The fun part was of course experiencing a different sport and a different culture, because I do not think that I could get used to watching baseball as a spectator sport. But I got to taste a very very salty pretzel, a very very sour Minute Maid ice cream, but it was fun.

In the middle of the game, the entire stadium stood up and sang “God Bless America”. What a great atmosphere in the stadium, and what a great day.

As usual, I attached a few pictures. If you have any doubt (I don’t think you have), I took them myself.

What does a presidential debate has to do with a fire alarm? I’ll tell you.

So, last Thursday was the first Presidential Debate, and the topic was foreign policy. Who would ever guess that the vast majority of the debate would be about the war in Iraq? :-)

However, the day began with the Wall Street Journal, which I, as a good business school student, read every day – of course. In it was a box called “Rules of Engagement”, and rarely do I have so much fun reading a newspaper, as I had when I read this box, which contained the rules of the debate (yes, they have rules!).

1. The debate is 90 minutes
2. The winner of a coin toss can decide between getting the first question or making the first closing statement.
3. One has two minutes to answer a question; then the opponent has a 90-second respond. Hereafter, if the moderator deems necessary, he can add one minute to the debate, 30 seconds to each.
4. The families sit in the front row, in the line of sight of the respective candidate.
5. The media sits on the two rows in the back of the room.
6. The audience may neither cheer nor boo.
7. Each of the candidates is entitled minimum eight rooms backstage, and these rooms cannot be smaller than 3.5 meters by 3.5 meters.
8. The podium is 125 cm tall.
9. The candidates may not move away from their podium, and they may not stand on anything that adds height.
10. The candidates cannot ask each other questions.

So, much different than what we are used to in Denmark.

Who came out of the debate as a winner? Most newspapers agree that Kerry was stronger in the debate, and in my opinion it seemed that way (not revealing my political orientation, though, God forbid). But let us see what the polls tells us, and from what I can read in the Danish newspapers you must be pretty updated on this.

But of course……before the debate had ended, yet another fire alarm went off, and I had to evacuate for the fourth time. Get real.

When you sleep and do NOT hear the fire-alarm in a 26-story building and you are on the twentieth floor, you are, well, not extremely well off, to put it nicely.

Last week was a week of fire alarms. The first one was, I think the weekend before the beginning of last week. I was sleeping heavily (it was 2pm), and I heard a strange bell. I disregarded in my sleep until, I think, 5 minutes later when another alarm (POWER ALARM) went off (I want an alarm clock like that), which woke me up instantly. I realized it was the fire alarm and I quickly got dressed. I admit, I stood for 30 seconds with my clothes on, wondering whether I should bring my newly purchased computer with me (with all my photographs on) and my camera (also with photographs in it), but no, I went down twenty stories by stairs.

6 fire trucks came, and they found, after some time, a guy had been cocking and that the heavy smoke development had set off the fire alarm. Now we know that it works.

Two other fire alarms went off, but they were drills (we did not know beforehand), but could quickly enter the buildings again (not as above…. all the firemen had to check the building). One was at school, another one here at the dorm.

(And, yes, I know that I promised you stuff on Monday, but I am very very very very very busy… I have to hand in two problem sets tomorrow, so you’ll have to wait a little more for crisp pictures from museums, the Yankees – you name it – cause that’s what comin’ at ya.

My parents arrived yesterday on September 11 to visit me here in New York.

And here we are, the three of us (well guess who’s behind the camera; it’s my Frappucione in the lower right corner – UHM) drinking a GrandeJavachipFrappucinoWhippedCream (to be said very fast!). After one of those you’ve really had a drink! But it fits well with the warm, nice weather we have right now in NYC. Jealous, anyone?

Hi mom and dad!

PS>
Actually, my dad took a picture of me at the same place – you can see the Starbucks cup in the bottom of the picture. Of course, this has been through my PS CS.

I was trying to find a more attractive title to this entry – but I don’t think I would able to capture all the emotions, the atmosphere, the despair (and at the same time) resolve, which characterize this day, and, subsequent to 9/11 01, Americans.

September 11 started with 4 minutes of silence at Ground Zero, the place where the Twin Towers collapsed – at the time of the two impacts and at the time of the two collapses. Family to the victims and many other people gathered during the day, and the names of the thousands of victims were read out loud. The relatives of the victims were allowed to enter Ground Zero (which is fenced off for the public), and lay flowers in the footprints of the Towers.As the evening came closer, A Tribute In Light started (as the other years), which is two projected light beams (consisting of several smaller beams) vertical into the sky, symbolizing the Twin Towers.

All over Manhattan, flags were half pulled, and there were different kinds of memoralia in stores such as pictures, cards etc – everyone telling their own story. All New Yorkers, it seems, has a story to tell about 9/11.

It is hard to believe that two of the world’s largest buildings stood just where I was taking these pictures. New York is moving on as smoothly as haven’t they been there at all, but they will never forget. Rising from the tragedy, next year the construction of the two Freedom Towers will begin at the WTC site. They will be 1776 feet tall, symbolizing the year the United States gained their independence.

Thanks to the subway system of New York it is relatively easy to get across town (with emphasis on relatively) – which is one of the good things to say about the NYC metro. On the flipside is the overall attractiveness of the metro; something is obviously left for improvement.

However, the subway makes way for some excellent motives – and I couldn’t help myself when I saw the above, and I shot a series of photos. This one turned out OK and with a little editing it’s not bad at all.

We came from the subway. It’s great. It takes you were you want to go – cheaply. But it’s very hot on the stops (not in the trains – great air conditioning), no info on when the next train comes – and it doesn’t smell too good. That aside, people are friendly, you easily fall into conversation with people in the subway, which is a characteristic we do not see in Denmark that often – in that sense I guess New Yorkers are rather friendly.

Below, you’ll find another edit of the subway phone. Let me hear whichever you like best. Ciao.

I guess all of you know this, and so do I, but let’s just recap for a second. Digital Images knock 35mm film off the field.

I have for several years loved to edit images of every kind (both photographs and other graphics) – but it’s a little more fun with a good digital camera. The above photo is taken with my Digital Single Lens Reflex (SLR) on Hudson River, while I was taking a boat tour around the entire of Manhattan.

The bridge you see in the picture is the George Washington bridge and is a main route of traffic between New Jersey and Manhattan – I don’t know how many lanes of traffic that is on that bridge; MANY. Anyhow, I think it is a nice picture, but I could not help myself from playing a little with my software. The result is below.