Four girls

its late already and im a little lazy; so i just picked the picture that i still had open form yesterday! the sea of flags was a photo opportunity for many.... these 4 little girls had to pose a few times before their father was satisfied with the portrait...

tim picked me up from work and said we should goto the movies. and so we did... this time it was woody allen's midnight in paris. and i liked it a lot. funny, too... just a movie you should see rather than that i tell you about it.. :)

Memorial day

today its memorial day in the us; always on the last monday of may. its a public holiday, and typically marks the beginning of the summer vacation season (well, hot it is; since a few days its over 30 degrees and very sunny; the pool at our apartment complex is open again; jeeejj!). my friend wikipedia tells me that memorial day was formerly known as decoration day, "and was first recorded to have been observed by freedmen (freed enslaved southern blacks) in Charleston, South Carolina in 1865, to remember the fallen Union soldiers of the Civil War. Over time, it was extended after world war I to honor all Americans who have died in all wars. Now known as Memorial Day, it is a day of remembering the men and women who died while serving in the United States Armed Forces."

above i photographed the approximately 20,000 flags that they placed last friday in the boston common. each flag represents a massachuttes citizen who died in wars and military conflicts during the last 100 years. everyone was taking pictures of them; but you were not allowed to walk through them...

Wall street

of course, as real tourists we also went to wall street. as always guarded by a huge amount of policemen.... just to the left of this picture many people were posing with willing policemen in front of their NYPD car. since i saw planet of the apes i cannot watch the statue of george washington anymore without thinking about that movie... that statue is just up on the steps behind... but i was more interested in this homeless man that seemed to pose for me, while standing on this vent.... it wasnt very cold that moment, however...

oh my! and i was just reading up on my wikipedia pages... and yes, also wall street is originally derived from the dutch that named this street "de Waal straat"...

Staten island

ok... back to new york... :)

this time we took the staten island ferry! its always nice to see the skyline of a city from the water, and even better if you dont have to pay for it. and... the staten island ferry is free! it goes very frequent and provides you with a 30 minute ride during which you can try every setting on your camera to get the best picture... if still not satisfied, there is still the way back to manhattan... :D

when on staten island we didnt see anything in the immediate vicinity of the terminal that could entertain us, aside from an au bon pain to get some food, so we went straight back.... the ferry is huge! and its also good to have an hour rest from all the walking through new york while just enjoying the view of manhattan, ellis island and the statue of liberty....

above you see another staten island ferry (i like that they are yellow... :) ), to the left you see new jersey, with their tallest (and my favorite) building; the hackensack building, and to the right manhattan...

Zombie march

jeeejjj! we witnessed the boston zombie march! while last year we ended up amidst the zombie walk and were wondering the rest of the day what was that all about; this year we were prepared! or... kind of... we knew it was today, and that they would probably go through prudential center, and we happened to be at prudential right on time... :)

there were sooo many! and the make up/outfits were amazing! but the clown above was the freakiest..... im planning to upload more pictures on my flickr account.... here!

Bye bye!

above my sister and i, in front of the boston skyline. this was during the first weekend she was here. i had read in some magazine about a great lunchroom/restaurant, so went there to have lunch. it was a teeny tiny place, with a lot of people working in the small kitchen; pupuseria mama blanca. the food was good and sooo cheap, and the waitress so cute! it wasnt a place i would normally goto, but i was glad we did! yum yum mexican food. after that we walked a bit through the neighborhood, and discovered this nice view of boston we hadnt seen before. after that we had a walk through the nearby marina, which was great too, as there were a lot of huge and interesting/beautiful artworks... surely i will post some pics of that sometime...

yesterday my sister left for the netherlands again. too bad i had to work most of the time, and too bad the weather wasnt that great most of the times, especially compared to holland right now (but the last days were good!), but we did goto new york... and we had dinners at a lot of restaurants... once again; we do not usually go out to dinner that often! i do need to visit the gym a bit more now....

and isnt it funny; when we were young, people sometimes asked whether we were twins, which i always hated, since i am TWO (!!) years older than her.. :) but now we dont look as if we could be twins anymore, i think....

Ellis island

yet another picture from our NY trip.... hope you dont mind... :)

here we were on the jersey side, from where you have a beautiful view of manhattan... unless, as in our case, its very foggy!! this is in liberty state park, an enormous park that is by far not as crowded as manhattan. from there, you can take the ferry to the statue of liberty. you can also take ferry from battery park, in NYC, but i think its quite a bit less crowded taking it from this side...

above you see ellis island, in front of the manhattan skyscrapers. 12 million immigrants entered the US through the "golden door of ellis island" (i found that on this website; im just wondering whether there literally was a golden door? i can imagine it; some official standing there; "welcome to the united states of america! god bless america! welcome to the land of endless opportunities!!"). today, half of the american population are descendants of those 12 million immigrants....

this is another interesting website; you can enter names and find out whether they passed through ellis island (i typed in my last name, and found 22 people! i am just wondering if they mean with "residence" where they originally came from, or where they live now?)
thinking about it, i guess perhaps this golden gate was the golden M from mc donalds....?

In Harlem

we also walked around in harlem; another part of new york named after a dutch city (click here to see the dutch haarlem). the neighborhoods in NY are all soooo different. it was fun to walk through a big street in harlem; at that moment the weather was nice and everyone was on the streets; only a little later it suddenly started raining quite a lot once again. 

we passed by the 2 guys above, and they asked where we were from, and where we would publish the pictures we were taking.... they then posed for me and said they hoped it would make them famous! :D

One more...

... picture of the view from rockefeller center! the sky was just sooo beautiful! to me it looked like a painting.. :) to the right you see a black building with kind of a white frame around it; thats from the bank of america. here you cant see it, but this building is not entirely flat; towards the ground this building is shaped like a bell. or, as i prefer; this skyscraper is like a giant chute! behind you see central park. it is sooo huge! i still have not been to the far end of it, maybe next time... its amazing to imagine that manhattan once was entirely like central park.....

and i do agree with biebkriebels; the view from rockefeller is probably nicer than from the empire state building, and the line indeed was less long. or as someone else said; its better because you get to see the empire state building, rather than standing on top of it... :D

Rockefeller center

for 22 dollars you can climb rockefeller center. or rather, get into the elevator to the 67th (i think) floor to view manhattan from the observation deck. just like at the empire state building, this is a very streamlined process. you wait in line for tickets, you are led through security, you walk a little more, wait in line, get pushed forward, and at some point end up in an elevator that you cannot operate yourselves. then you are rushed out of the elevator and stumble upon many other tourists that are already blocking the view... when you are lucky, you get a small spot and can take some pictures... :) or pose, or will be asked to take someone else's picture. when you have taken pictures from every side, its time to go down again.... and then at home you realize you should have taken some more time to take better pictures. and wait, did i ever enjoy the view without looking through my lens? :)
right in front you see the empire state building, and to the left you see a small part of the chrysler, but its mostly obscured by the metlife building. the rockefeller center itself stems from 1933, and i never knew, but this famous picture was taken during its construction.

Brooklyn bridge

yup, we had quite some rain while in new york. just like in boston; the weather has not been that good yet, this year... :( here we were at the brooklyn bridge, and taking pictures with a big fancy camera and an umbrella turned out to be challenging! just like the couple above.... :)

this bridge is just so beautiful! we walked to brooklyn, which is named after the dutch city breukelen (just pronounced american). just read on wikipedia that brooklyn has the following motto "Een Draght Mackt Maght", which is old dutch for "in unity there is strength". haha, whats also interesting is how the name breukelen evolved into brooklyn: from Breuckelen, to Brockland, to Brocklin, to Brookline, to Brookland and eventually, to Brooklyn....

and thats it for today! good night! :)

Flatiron building

picturing skyscrapers is not the easiest thing to do.... :)

we're back from NY! it was soooo cooooll! and i am behind on my photos here... no internet connection after day 1, but surely i will catch up in the coming days...

here a pic from yesterday, when it was sunny (we had a lot of rain too, unfortunately). the flatiron building on 23rd street. i very well remember, and probably have told the story already a million times, the first time i went to see the flatiron building. that was in 2004. i went to the exact location, but.... where was the building?! i looked left and right, but eehmmm, no! i couldnt find it. then i walked a little, and yes, ofcourse, there it was.... since i had been standing exactly underneath it, i couldnt find it....

Quick update

taken while we drove through New York yesterday! not perfect and crooked, but soooo NY, I think!!

NY family

pictured this pretty family while we were in New York, last september! they were all sooo well dressed... waiting for the staten island ferry...

i thought it is an appropriate pic, since we goto NY for a few days tomorrow! jeeejjj!!

Citgo sign

the citgo sign, close to fenway stadium, is a part of the boston skyline since 1940! not pretty; i think its comparable to the ugly colgate clock, which you can see from manhattan, while looking out over the hudson river towards new jersey. but its such a famous landmark that, upon seeing, immediately reminds you of boston... i guess.

im currently a bit lazy concerning my blog and/or checking other blogs... :( or rather; too busy!

so... if you want to read more about the citgo sign, you can click here!

Be unstoppable

saw this advertisement underneath the harvard stadium. but.. ehmmm.. doesnt it kind of defeat the purpose? unstoppable wouldnt be good in this case!

anyhow... the crappy weather and rain seems unstoppable too. its cold, grey, windy and this week's forecast; rain, every day. beeeuughhh! i want summer!

Real fan

i guess this lady is a real fan of the boston red sox. as seen at the fenway stadium, right after a game... but what about the girls in the stroller? :)

im still one post behind... but as always, too much to do, and too little time... :(

American dream

my sister is visiting us! she has never been in the us of a, so i assume it is quite an experience... i really do think this is an entire different world than back home, the netherlands. for example, our apartment  complex looks like a hotel to her (from the outside, i assume... :D).

on thursday she and tim were at the museum (that one has free entrance on thursday evenings; the mfa on wednesdays...), and then took the ferry to charlestown, it was just before sunset, so they had a beautiful view on boston. all the while i was working.... :( they were also lucky to witness and photograph the above, while.. i was working.... :( so you will have to do it yet again with a tim picture, because... i was working.. :( ah yes, so is the american dream, no?

just wondering whether tim had a similar face as the guy with the pink camera.. while i was working... :( also wondering whether those colorful cameras belong to those guys?!

Ugly picture

annoyed because blogger was unavailable yesterday and i couldnt upload my picture! now today i am indecisive and therefore choose an ugly picture.. this is somewhere in malden, the city next to ours, melrose. while melrose is like a small, pretty town like in the movies, malden is the bigger, ugly and kind of dangerous version(at least it looks like that)... :) but basically, we never goto either city and only drive through one or the other, depending on where we are going.

the advertisement above is very american, i think. "for our nation. for us all". it reminds me of starship troopers, by now an ancient movie we recently watched again... perhaps i should consider a master's in leadership indeed.... :D

hmm, today's pic i will choose tomorrow, im tired now..

Harvard bridge

on sunday we went to the "MIT lightshow". if i remember correctly, it was because MIT exists 150 years, and they celebrated it with some inventive MIT inventions.. :)

for example, they had put lights all along the harvard bridge above, colors were changing every now and then, and sometimes the lights would follow the movement of people walking on the bridge, as they had placed sensors everywhere as well!

it was cool to see and for me impossible to photograph. above a picture tim took...

more info and photos here!

Americans posing

to me, these students look very american! the dresses, the shoes, the hair... :) they were posing for whatever reason on the steps of an MIT building, last sunday.

just frustrated my pic is not very sharp.... :(

Boston firefighter

last week, or perhaps the week before already, we suddenly were surrounded by fire engines. a small street in the center of boston, and 6 or 7 trucks. the ladder out. a lot of spectators. but no fire.... actually not much happened. they were just standing around..... i think it was an overheated eeehhmm... dont remember. but something got overheated... luckily it didnt seem too dramatic or dangerous...

im wondering whether this firefighter can run at all! ;)

In line

we went to the MFA today, since it was the first weekend of the month, we had free entrance with our bank of america debit card. the line at the front entrance was sooo long, so we thought we were clever and went to the back entrance; but as long a line as the front entrance. it was mother's day, so mothers were apparently dragged to the museum en masse...

ah, and there was a new exhibit, chihuly, the reason we went there; glass art. however, if you wanted to see that, it meant waiting in line for 2 hours, and by that time the museum was about to close. so went to see a photo exhibition instead. the only glass art was this green icicle tower, of which you see only a little bit, i was more fascinated by the girl's fascination...

Mother's day

its always easy to let the church speak! we drove by today, but there wasnt much traffic (at that point), so i had to quickly take a picture...

tomorrow its mother's day.. i guess that inspired them. 

a mom's words shape the future of a child... is that true? hmmm..... let me think a little more about that.

what do you think?

Girl jumping

boston is very green, currently. so pretty!
girls are flying around.. what else would you want... ? :D
this was at the boston common, last sunday....

Zoomed in

a blossom! with the new lens... i think that lens is magic!

good night, or morning, or afternoon... :)

Street photographers

on sunday i finally saw "the guys with cameras hanging around downtown crossing". i came to know about them here, after watching the short news item. apparently, they are around downtown crossing very often, taking pictures of strangers. some people claim they do this in a very annoying way, following people, and taking pictures of "body parts". here is another article, that generated a lot of responses. i dont know... when i saw those 2 (but there are supposed to be more men..), they were just talking, and not taking pictures. ha, i took a picture of them! 3 pictures, even...

i dont know... taking pictures like this should be fine, no? im doing the same! actually, they have an exhibition coming up, starting tomorrow, as you can read here. 

ah, and look at the advertisement behind them! about the british prince and his wife... :)

Bostons original

is that a bostons original? or mister nut? :) at the boston common.

on sunday we were suddenly amidst the "walk for hunger", right at the finish; we found out when people were saying to us; "thank you! well done! great job! thanks for walking! some water?" eeehhmmm?

not much more to write today. at work i received emails to warn real americans for the potential threat when traveling, after yesterday's happenings with ob/sama. ah well.. im not american and not traveling, but security is up; more policemen at subway stations, more security checks to be expected... etc etc. if really curious, here is the link for the travel alert regarding anti-american violence.

He lives!

 

this pic is a little crooked; i took it quickly while driving by yesterday morning...

i didnt know which picture to choose for today, until i came across this one again, and thought it kind of appropriate. when walking to the subway station this morning, we saw the headlines of the newspapers that are for sale at the station. DEAD was the prevailing word. only then we knew, as we dont have a tv. but during the day it was hard to miss; it was all over the news, everywhere, osama this, obama that.. etc etc. apparently, many students were out on the streets of boston, last night, to celebrate. isnt that a little weird, in a way?

this i think is a weird/scary video about how boston might be affected by this "significant death". and here a short video of "the celebrations".

New lens

this is what me and my new lens saw today at the boston common! isnt that cute?

it was kind of nice weather. very sunny, but quite windy at times as well, so i was glad i took my jacket and scarf...
ah, and i am very frustrated; often blogger seems to reduce the quality of my pics! only when you click on it, the quality is better. i have been googling about it, but so far have not found a solution. does anyone know how to fix that?

Blossoms, finally!

this is what i was waiting for.... and now i finally got a picture! isnt it pretty? tim showed me last night some pictures he took of those trees with his phone, and i could only answer; "so, you were just watching this without taking me there?! i want to see it toooo!!!" especially since before you know it, all flowers are gone again and only green trees are left. we went there today; its just opposite the building where he works....

we also drove through somerville, where we lived the first three months exactly a year ago, as there are a lot of blossom trees as well. just, so pretty!!

ah, and tim got a new lens for the big fancy camera, surely you will see some pics through that lens the coming days...
(click on the pic to see it entirely; i just wanted the flowers as big as possible)