Wednesday November 29: "Petite Abeille"

Yes ladies and gentlemen, after BXL & Markt, we've found another one!

After an interesting culinary trajectory this past week (Mercer Kitchen & Café Felix in Soho), we (that's Romain, my colleague from the Paris office, and me) have discovered another Belgian restaurant, which we tried out tonight. "Petite Abeille" is actually a chain of 4 Belgian restaurants in New York City, founded already in '96. We tried out the Tribeca branch...

Although I think that the selection criteria for waiters are not based upon knowledge of Belgian beers (Hoegaarden served in a DeKoninck glass, Leffe Bruin served in a Rochefort glass,...) the food was great. We (or was it me) decided that we should come back here for the Monday special (Belgian beers at half price until the restaurant closes, which still is about double of what you would pay in Belgium but anyway...)

Friday November 24: United Nations

Today I visited the only piece of land in Manhattan that doesn't belong to the United States; the United Nations headquarters (the site has it's own post office and security is airport-like).










Since it's mandatory to take a guided tour, I queued for about 30 minutes to get in, but I must say it was definitely worth it. The tour takes you through the main rooms of the building (Security council,Trusteeship council,Economic & social council,General assembly) & shows at the same time the impressive collection of 'gifts' that the member states have donated to the UN. Although I didn't expect too much from it, this turned out to be one of the most interesting things I've visited since I arrived in NY, and I would definitely recommend it to everybody visiting the city.

Thursday November 23: Thanksgiving

I love Thanksgiving! Given that it was my first Thanksgiving ever, I didn't really know very well what to expect when Gita, one of my colleagues in the NY office, invited me to come and celebrate Thanksgiving with her boyfriend & some Australian friends.

Although at first stunned by the amount of food that appeared on the table (among which a lot of things I had never tried before such as Indian corn & sweet potatoes) I soon realised that actually most Americans consider Thanksgiving as an eating marathon: they eat some, then they eat some more, then they take a 15minute "power-nap" on the couch, then they eat some more... you see my point. In the end literally everybody is supposed to have an indigestion when returning home. All in all a fantastic experience (thanks Gita!)

Monday November 13 - November 16: MBA Recruiting travel

A travel-intensive week is the least you can say about last week.

On Monday I flew over to Boston for the first Bain recruiting presentation of the week at Harvard Business School. The venue (Charles hotel in Cambridge) was great, as were the people who attended the presentation. I met my former colleague Jens (who is now a first-year student at Harvard), who he gave me a tour of the Harvard campus, which is quite impressive; all on-campus buildings are connected through underground tunnels so that students don't have to go out when it's freezing -15°C over there.

Unfortunately I had to get up quite early in the morning to take my 8am flight to Chicago. The taxi driver who took me to the airport turned out to be a total maniac, driving at 120km/h with his windows all dampened, and when I pointed out that he could drive a little slower he pretended not to understand any English (which came in handy because he couldn't object when I didn't tip him :-)

I have been positively impressed by Chicago. Although it was very foggy during the 2 days I was there, I could just see the lake from our office [which is located in the Sears Tower, the 3rd tallest building in the world after Taipei101 (Taiwan) & Petronas (Malaysia)]. A lot of museums have been implanted at the lakeside, which makes that this side of the city is a lot less hectic. Although work (& the 2 other recruiting presentations I attended: Kellogg & Chicago GSB) prohibited me from visiting the city extensively I managed to visit the Chicago Art Institute, which is supposed to have the 3rd most representative collection of Modern Art in the world (after MoMA & Pompidou). The museum also has a lot of famous impressionist pieces.


(Picture 1: View from Sears Tower, Picture 2: Chicago Art Institute)

On Thursday I flew back to New York, arriving at LaGuardia around noon (there is a 1h time difference between Chicago & New York), which allowed me just 2 hours to go to my appartment, pack for the weekend (flying to Belgium to attend Philippe & Sarah's wedding) & get to JFK airport, a rushing end to a rushing week...

Sunday, November 12: Whitney museum of American Art

This week has been quite fun; on Wednesday we had a team diner at Alta (a tapas restaurant in the Village) -> definitely among the best tapas I have eaten my entire life (which is not really surprising given my limited tapas-knowledge).

Friday early evening was reserved for ice-skating in Bryant Park (an event that was part of the Frim's charity fund raising efforts) & Friday night was spent in Nikki Beach, celebrating the birthday of one of the girls in the office. Not surprisingly, my Saturday only started at 2pm in the afternoon...

For Wouter, this weekend was his last weekend in NY (Yannick is already back in Belgium since Tuesday). After a short sushi-stop, we decided to go and see Borat yesterday night, which was unfortunately sold out, so we picked Babel instead...

Getting up early was easier today than yesterday, and I met Wouter at the Whitney Museum of American Art in Upper East Side at 1pm. The Whitney museum is fully dedicated to American modern & contemporary art. A large part of their permanent collection is taken by American painter Edward Hopper (-> Liesbeth: this is the painter that painted 'Gas' [see left] which you liked som much at MoMA -> you should have visited Whitney instead of MoMA :-) ) . Currently they have two amazing expositions running; one which explains how Picasso has influenced many American artists like Lichtenstein, Pollock & Johns, the other one which gives an overview of 2 Bauhaus masters: Albers & Moholy-Nagy.



Trivial fact of the day: on our way back downtown, we stopped at the Wall Street McDonalds, which is an upgraded version of a regular McDonalds, featuring non-plastic chairs & a live Jazz pianist (see picture)...

Sunday November 5: NY marathon, Columbia & the rooftop (again :-)

37.000 participants... presuming 90% of participants finished the NY marathon, the total distance run should be around 1.4 million kilometers :-)

The NY marathon is definitely an impressive event. Given that we didn't know exactly when the bulk of the people started the marathon, Bart & I decided to take the subway to 103rd street around noon. We arrived just in time at Central Park to see (presumably) the first runners entering the Park. We crossed the Park along the Reservoir (see picture) and went to Columbia university. The autumn colours of the park are magnificent...

Yesterday evening, we met with Wouter & Yannick at the Flatiron building (see picture, taken on Saturday with Bart & Liesbeth) to go to our favourite rooftop bar (actually it's the only one I know) on Fifth Avenue. The view was maginificent (the terrace was open), the price of the drinks definitely includes a skyline premium...

Saturday November 4: 5th avenue & the New York Knicks:

Fifth Avenue is mentioned everywhere as the 'ultimate shopping experience'. Although this is probably very true for fashion addicts I wouldn't bet my money on the fact that the largest part of the non-female worldwide population thinks this is correct...

Anyway, since yesterday was Anouck's birtday (and given that I had only bought half of her present last week), I spent the afternoon getting from 18th street to 57nd looking for that what I had in mind (obviously I can't tell what it is because Anouck doesn't know it yet) . Liesbeth had upfront 'designed' her trajectory: first Saks 5th avenue, then the NBA store, then Lindt chocolate ('strange why people want to buy Swiss chocolate in NY to transport it back to Europe ) and finally the Disney store (see picture).

Saturday evening we (that's Dirk,who happened to be in NY also this weekend, Bart & I) went to a Knicks game at Madison Square Garden. Despite the fact that we had bought the cheapest tickets (still 52$ though), the view was great. The New Yorkers didn't manage to outperform the Indiana Pacers at any moment during the game, but the 'ambience' was good. We decided to finish the day in a Spanish Tapas bar, called El Faro...

Thursday November 2: Meatpacking district

With Bart & Liesbeth in town, New York almost seemed like Antwerp this weekend -> thanks for coming over guys :-)

On Thursday night, we went for drinks in the Meatpacking district. For the first time since my arrival in NY, I discovered a part of the city that looked like a European city. Meatpacking district is actually part of Greenwich Village and there are still a ton of references to it's Dutch origins (e.g. Bethune Street, Gansevoort Hotel,...).

The first stop was Lotus bar, one of the oldest bars in Meatpacking. Zagat (the 'Michelin guide' of NY) rates it as 'vanished glory without the staff realising it'. Second stop was NY's most popular Belgian restaurant/bar called 'Markt'. Markt doesn't have the cosiness of the BXL, but it certainly has the look-and-feel of a typical Brussels 'brasserie'. I will definitely return here to try to food later...

Tuesday, October 31: Halloween-parade

For most Americans, Halloween is the best excuse to go totally crazy. On Tuesday night I went to the 6th avenue parade. My Halloween experience started when, getting into the elevator in my building, I encountered Darth Vader, a non-muscular version of King Kong & a female devil/nurse. Since this is apparently very normal behaviour THEY looked at ME in a strange way like as if I was dressed abnormal...

Anyway, the subway was crowded with festive/drunk/... people and when I got to 14th street it almost seemed like the entire city was out on the street partying and drinking. I didn't see a lot of the actual parade because there were tons of people trying to get to 6th avenue and police was blocking the way.

On my way back I discovered a nice little art gallery that was having an exposition with a jazz band playing in the background. A nice way to end the evening...