What I learned this Thanksgiving

Thanksgiving is a time of reflection…especially when you are home in the suburbs of New Jersey. Most of my classes were canceled so I was able to spend almost a week at home numbly watching up on television shows I barely like, rushing around to visit friends and sitting through several family dinners. Here are a few things that I’ve learned this Thanksgiving.

1. Holidays are like being stuck on repeat: Have you ever noticed that you spend ALL of the holiday telling the SAME stories over and over while having the same political or religious debates over and over? How terrible is that? I had to talk about my miserable academic semester, 500 fellowship applications and the million other things I doing innumerable times. And at the end of the every conversation, nobody cares.
2. Small talk is painful: I ran into a lot of former classmates, coworkers and townies that I didn’t care to see. It’s not that I don’t like them. It is simply the fact that our lives have gone in different directions so we have nothing to talk about. So instead, people make small talk which is possibly the saddest experience ever. And this is how it always goes…you spend a whole 30 seconds trying to find common ground and then the next 5 trying to find an exit point in the conversation so you can escape and make awkward small talk with somebody else.
3. Everyone is a “Facebook Stalker“: I cannot even tell you how many times this week I had to talk about my study abroad experience. Since everybody knows how to Facebook stalk, it was their one piece of ammo to make small talk with me (i.e. So I heard you were abroad!? Where were you again!?). NEWSFLASH: Party people, I got back from abroad 8 months ago. Thus, it is not worth your time to pretend that you heard it through the grapevine. I know you looked at ALL my Facebook photo albums and knew that I was in London. Stop playin’ that game.
4. You never accomplish anything: You set out to do all this homework and see all these people then end up not doing anything that you planned. But, somehow, you are exhausted by the end of it. I was so tired by the time I got back to the city today. Must of been all those hours of watching Cake Boss and Law and Order reruns. Or maybe the 6 times I had to have thanksgiving dinner in order to see all my friends and relatives. Either way, I got nothing done.

The strange part is that I cannot wait to do it all over again for Christmas break. And that is the worst thing that I learned this Thanksgiving.

Recap: The Best of Halloween

So I owe you all a Halloween post. I have been doing some research on the annual Village Halloween Parade. The reason I went (other than the fact that I had to cover it for j-class) was because of the costumes. I was expecting some Gaga, Where the Wild Things Are and Yankee lovin’ this year BUT the rain kept me from seeing some of the good, bad and ugly costumes.

Obvi, I figured a good Google search could fix that. Here are the places online that I found so you can get your crazy costume fix:

• NYC’s Village Halloween Parade: This is the online homebase for everything you need to know about the parade from the people who put it together. They also have a HUGE archive of all the images from the parade. Photographers can create albums of their artwork on this website so you can spend hours on this website.
• Dennis Thornton: This photographer contributed to the Village Parade photo archive and captured some of this Halloween’s best costumes include NYU student Meb Byrne as the absinthe fairy.
• The Village Voice: This sponsor of the parade put together an excellent slide show highlighting the best of the parade, including costumes of “Max and his Wild Things, Alice and her Wonderland crew, Bob Ross and his happy trees, and every variety of skanky.”

Enjoy, lovely people!

What Community Should Feel Like…online.

I’ve been thinking about social media a lot lately. I spent a great deal of time on social networking sites, tweeting my life (and class time) away. It takes up a lot of my day. I also do some consulting (as a side gig to my normal keepin’ cool and staying classy) helping companies/nonprofits/friends set up Facebook Fan Pages and teach them how to engage in social media. In fact, I helped Imam Khalid Latif aka Bossman set up some stuff too.

While I was on twitter, I came across an op-ed-ish article for CNN written by Peter Cashmore (haha TOTS in cashing in now) the CEO of Mashable, a blog about social media. The piece pretty much talked about the idea that, basically, social media assassinated privacy.

He wrapped it up with a statement that made me think twice. “Twitter, Facebook, Flickr, Foursquare, Fitbit and the SenseCam give us a simple choice: participate or fade into a lonely obscurity.”

Mr. Cashmore I couldn’t agree more. AND It made me think of the role of the internet in my life. Whoa. Deep. I know.

Here’s what I figured out: I think there are a lot of groups working with social media to minimize the loneliness of our technologically advanced world. The internet is a double-edged sword. It can heighten the sense of loneliness in the world or it can help engage its users into a niche community.

The Islamic Center at NYU is a perfect example (WARNING: Complete and shameless bias approaching. Here comes the cheerleading!) for several reasons. Their slogan is “What Community Should Feel Like” and this idea is embedded into even their website and social media.

Bossman had me create a Facebook Fan Page that students could interact with in order to learn more about the resources available. The page currently has 1,500 fans. [Disregard the tab that is About.com on how to make a screen shot. I forgot the key combination and had to look it up. i <3 Google.]

Then we linked it to a Twitter account. Every time we update one with information about upcoming events, lectures and programs, both accounts are updated.

Bossman also has a his own Twitter and a really blog called “The Chaplain” that incorporates multimedia.

So, This Is It?

I decided to put some Michael Jackson songs on shuffle while writing this, hoping to connect. I skip through track after track. The process becomes mechanical. Listen to 30-second sound bytes, judge it and move on.

Half the songs I don’t recognize. The Jackson 5 songs are too Bubble Gum Pop. Sure everybody likes “Smooth Criminal’ and “Thriller” But the most popular songs have been exhausted lately on the radio ever since Michael passed away and now with the premiere of This Is It just a few days away.

But I can’t connect. I want a Michael Jackson song to call my own. I want to have a favorite.

Sure I understand his impact on the music industry, celebritism and pop culture. So as part of my Tisch Open Arts course on “the Motown Legacy” I decided to give Michael another chance and try to find a place for him in my iTunes library.

Back in September, I went to a stellar Remember Michael Jackson panel put on by the Clive Davis School of Recorded Music because my professor Harry Weinger was on it and gave us extra credit if we attended. I decided I would need the extra credit (no offense, Harry) because I knew absolutely nothing about Motown when I started the course. So I went. I also wanted to learn more about the man I didn’t like.

The first thing that struck me about the panel was that they tied down the infamously-difficult-to-work-with Spike Lee to be on the panel (more on him later, though). The second thing was the fact that everybody referred to him as “Michael” with such a sad nostalgia. I guess because they were both friends and fans.

The panelists loved him so much they nearly broke out into a fight talking about his artistic and pop culture legacy. I think that’s a type of passion for and committment to a music artist that I will never understand. Ultimately, it seemed every panelist, even Spike Lee, felt some type of guilt for not appreciating his work and presence while he was still alive.

The Verbal Cat Fight wasn’t the only fluke in the event. I think the Cantor Film Center, where the event was hosted, decided to debut their Obama Stimulus Package media technology & staff which failed terribly in making the transitions between powerpoint and video smoothly.

I wanted to find out why people loved him so much. I wanted them to convince me to love him. The panel threw around phrases like “he wasn’t an entertainer, he was an artist” and a victim of a “tragic life.” There were academics, journalists, a director and producer on this panel but by the end of it, I wasn’t convinced.

So I decided to get ballsy and try to interview Spike Lee after the event was over. When everybody was packing up, I (embarrassed to admit but) stormed-the-stage and went right up to him. Obviously I pulled out the old journalism trick: I shook his hand and held on while asking him a question. Homey couldn’t get away.

I only could get one question in, so I had to make it good. I thought of a loaded one.

“So, Spike, can you think of one word to describe Michael?”

He sighed. “No, I can’t!”

That long sigh told his story. It came from so deep inside him that it showed me how deep his appreciation for Michael Jackson. It was almost heartwarming. Some lady afterward asked me if I got what I needed.

I replied, “Yes, exactly what I wanted.”

P.S. I finally found my Michael Jackson song. They played the music video for “They Don’t Care About Us” and I was like “Wow! What a cool song!” Maybe I just like the controversy behind it but at least I found one to call my own. So, This Is It? Not so much. I don’t have the song on my iPod yet so I don’t think this is the end of that playlist, just yet.

The Office

Well, not The Office but my bossman’ s office.

I decided for my profile on Khalid, or errr Imam Latif, for my journalism class should be accompanied by my first attempt at a photo essay. I felt like an office says a lot about a person. For example, my desk is covered in photos, postcards, posters and article clippings because I like to save everything. I envision Sarah Palin’s office to be covered in oversized vegetables, snowglobes and various sized telescopes so she can see Russia. I imagine Putin would have a similar set up. I think Obama would be a minimalist and has already hid his prototype blow up of the Chicago 2016 ad campaign.

Any who, then. So here it goes. Bear (or bare?) with me.

Imam Khalid Latif in his office, located in the basement of St. Joseph's Church, home of the Islamic Center at NYU

a little perspective on the space

I really have no words for this photo. I think it pretty much explains itself.

Some of the many bookshelves. Khalid is still working on reading all these books.

an intimate moment

This stuffed animal used to have a sign that said "Thanks for not eating me!" or something to that extent

I Want You to Want Me

If anyone from the Met Opera is reading this, let a sista-friend know you want her to be a patron.

Over the last few years, Peter Gelb the general manager has been to trying to reach new audiences but I don’t really understand who he’s looking for or what he is doing. After working on a piece or Journalistic Inquiry about the Met Opera and how much it has changed since its 100th season, I realized a couple things.

They have it all wrong. And here’s why…

World Wide What?: The Met Opera obviously was schooled in the New York Times College of Click-Throughs. It is an incredibly deep website with tons of video clips, audio clips and interactive history tools but NOBODY KNOWS IT IS THERE. Maybe if they got a Facebook Fan Page and tweeted about their new rush ticket policy, somebody would actually surf their website.

College Students Feel Unloved: How about this. All I ask for is a student listserve. Oren Margolis, a Steinhardt communcations student summed it up pretty well. “They haven’t done a great job in reaching out to me. They think they have but they haven’t.” Broadway gives discounts. Lincoln Center has a student rush policy. I got spit on by Philip Seamor Hoffman for $14. But if I want to see the opera, I have to have to fork up to get good seats. Even the Brits do it better. The London Philharmonic gives people under the age 26 a ticket and a Henekin for 8 quid (about 12 USD). They have sponsors ’cause they are hurting bad, why don’t you, Met Opera? Their “Noise” marketing team even visits college campuses.

Top Heavy Technology: Sure, they broadcast in HD and on Sirius/XM radio. That’s cute. But what does that mean to me? They have their tech tools in all the wrong places. What’s wrong with a iPod app or a podcast? London Philharmonic got the one up on that too. Too slow.

In this round of Battle of the Arts, I think it is a knock out. London 1 New York 0

Eid: the End of Ramadan

Lately I’ve had a lot of explaining to do. Back in August, around the start of Ramadan, the Islamic Center at NYU decided to keep me on board for the fall. The last couple weeks I have been trying to fit my internship into my fall academic hours.

There are a few problems though that make my week a bit complicado:

• Jummah (kind of like the Sabbath or Sunday Mass) services are held on Fridays so my boss, Khalid holds prayer since he is the Chaplain for the university. So that means Fridays are out.
• Mornings are easier but sometimes Bossman will have meetings at Bobst Library or with the other university chaplains.
• Other times he’s traveling, like this week he will be speaking at UPenn.
• Not to mention my boss prays several times a day and has been fasting everyday for the last 30 days.

Bossman and I will meet for a hour here or there and other times, I work from home. We play phone tag. I am always leaving voicemails and it took me forever to figure out the greeting on his phone “as’salaamu alaykum (peace be upon you) this is khalid latif…”

When people ask why I have such a crazy internship schedule, I simply tell them, “My boss runs on a lunar calendar and I don’t.”

So he prays several times a day but what is that really like? What does it mean to be Muslim? I have done a lot of reading and Wikipedia-ing on it so that when I have meetings with bossman I know what he’s talking about. I listen to the Islamic Center podcasts and read Khalid’s blog hoping to better understand. I decided to write about the ICNYU Fast-a-thon for my journalism class assignment on Eid ul-Fitr (or Eid for short) the Muslim holiday that marks the end of Ramadan. But I didn’t really understand Ramadan and other Muslim traditions until I started interviewing people for my article.

Ramadan is different for everyone. It’s very individualistic (kind of like Lent for all you guilty Catholics reading). When I fast for Lent, I give up sweets. No candy, desserts, ice cream etc. It is pretty hard at first but then you get use to it. For the 30 days of Ramadan, you are suppose to abstene from food or water from sun up to sundown. After working at the Islamic Center all throughout Ramadan, I still don’t know how they do it. Depending on how much you commit, everyone walks away with something different in the end.

“This year has been a lot different for me learning about my religion. At this point [in the month of Ramadan] a lot of people notice they have changed from Ramadan to Ramadan. I don’t recognize the person I was last year,” Arshiya, one member of the Islamic Center, told me during an interview.

For Khalid, it seems to be something different. When I asked him about the significance of Ramadan to him, he talked a lot about how the holiday’s purpose is twofold. You are learning how to be a better person but you are always finding a way to be a positive part of your community. So Ramadan is both a holiday for personal reflection and brotherhood.

Now that Ramadan is over, I’ve learned a few things from Bossman and the members of the IC. The main thing is that religion is not only about God. It is about community, support and finding your place in the world. Ya know, finding a definition. Ramadan is 30 days of time to think and reflect. It sounds simple but I’ve gotten to see the baggage that comes with it.

And Everything Under the Sun…minus the sun

Did anybody notice it was San Gennaro this weekend? I almost forgot. If my mother didn’t call me to remind me, I wouldn’t have noticed. I had a hundred things to do this weekend. Admissions had a two day open house. I had my first assignment for Journalistic Inquiry (P.S. I now will be adding occasional posts for the class on this blog). For some ungodly reason, a professor even assigned a 4-5 page paper. Hello!? I just met you! Not to mention, the Prof only had half the syllabus for us! FAIL.

There were also some big headliners that overshadowed the start of the feast of San Gennaro. Here’s just a few to wet your appetite.

Global Warming: So it rained for the most of this weekend. Occasionally it seemed to be monsoon-ing. There were winds of 30MPH. I started to become depressed from the what seemed like never-ending gloominess. I thought I was in London again. Global warming has been kicking my ass lately. On Friday, I think I changed my clothes twice and my shoes at least 3x. Plus nobody likes a cold soggy pizza. Right? The first day of sun was Sunday. Ironic but true. But sadly, that was already day 4 of San Gennaro. [Cue sad trombone wahh wahh]

400th Anniversary of Henry Hudson’s Voyage from Amsterdam to New York: Nerdy but cool. San Gennaro happens every year but how often do you get to celebrate the discovery of the Hudson River by swapping jobs for a week with somebody in Amsterdam?! Or get to see a fleet of flat bottom Dutch boats?!

Susan B. Komen Race for the Cure: Walk for Breast Cancer in Central Park. San Gennaro vs. Saving Second Base. Enough said. Plus Motts was handing out apple sauce. Dove brought chocolate. Cindy Lauper. Easy win. Missed this one? Look out for the Avon Walk for Breast Cancer in New York, October 10-11.

9/11 Anniversary & Day of Service: Continuing in the theme of community service we have Obama’s day of service which had a lot of hype leading up to the anniversary. 9/11 took precedent on most media outlets. I’d say the feast didn’t stand a chance on this one.

MTV’s Video Music Award: All I have to say is…Kanye West. He not only managed to steal the show and Taylor Swift’s acceptance speech, he took the first sunny day away from San Gennaro! How rude.

A Rabbi, a Priest and an Imam walk into a…

I decided I am going to flex some blogging muscles and get some ideas down that have been floating around in the back of my head the last couple weeks. Lately, I’ve been packing and a result, reflecting. Making the big move again back to the city. In the last year, I’ve trekked all over God’s green Earth and never felt more confused about my own religion. Out of all things. I am starting to question my own faith. Great.

Back in January, I started 2009 at a wedding for one of my closest friends from growing up. Jillian and I have known each other since the baby pool days in the suburbs of New Jersey. Over the years, we have fallen in and out of each other lives. She decided to go to university in Israel and I headed nearby to New York City. She wanted to be a lawyer and I, a journalist. I remember chatting about our life plans over lunch one day.

Me: “Well hopefully one day I can become a journalist.”

Jillian: “And I will find my husband at law school.”

She never wanted a career. She just wanted to have a family. I knew she would make a great mother some day. So when I saw on Facebook that Jillian (who now goes by Yael, her Hebrew name) was going to get married at the age of 20, I wasn’t surprised at all. Many of our friends didn’t understand or want to understand why she’s wanted to “throw her life away” but I supported her decision anyways. So 3 days before I left for London, my cousin and I headed to Jillian’s traditional Jewish wedding in the most Jewish place I know…Crown Heights, Brooklyn. And me, trying to hard as usual, tried to dress as conservatively, appropriately and politically correct as possible. I asked every Jewish person I knew for advice. What do I wear? What should I buy her as a wedding gift? I combed through the cocktail dresses at Bloomingdale until I found a dress that covered my knees, my elbows and my chest.

“Why does Jilly go through this much trouble to get dressed every day?! I don’t know how she does it!” I remember shouting (aka jersey whisper) to my mother through the dressing room walls.

But it was worth it. And Jilly looked so beautiful. I was so happy I could be part of her wedding day. Very shortly after that day, I hopped across the pond and my Jilly headed down under with her husband, Yossi to relocate to Melbourne, Australia. Now he studying to become a Rabbi and she is expecting her first child shortly.

I spent my spring semester in a quite Anglican country. I thought it would add to the challenge of keeping up with my faith. I tried to attend mass on Sundays and failed. I never was quite good at that part of being Catholic. I mean, I rep everything that there is to be Catholic. I wear my St. Sebastian (the patron saint of bravery and the town where my family is from in Sicily) medal every day. I carry a prayer card in my wallet. My grandmother even gave me a key chain that reads…

“If found, I’m Catholic. Call a priest!”

You know, just in case I die and need my last rights to be read to me. So that makes me Catholic, right? Well, I did succeed in making to some holy days of obligation including Ash Wednesday. Now let me tell you. There is nothing more awkward than walking around with ashes on your head in an Anglican country. I couldn’t have gotten more awkward stares that day. Then I decided to try and make myself Holier Than Thou by spending Easter weekend in Rome. Genius idea. The place couldn’t have been more crowded. But I got to see Vatican City like my grandfather always told me I should do. I said waddup Pope, sent some postcards and sat through Easter Sunday mass in Campo Di Fiori. Mind you, the mass was in Latin so I hadn’t the foggiest idea was what going on. But I did it. And I was happy I made my own pilgrimage to my mecca. It wasn’t much of a big deal but at least for me, I felt like I was a little closer to my God.

The biggest learning experience though that I’ve had thus far has been my summer internship. A few months ago, I started working at the Islamic Center at NYU. I applied to their internship position in PR hoping I could try something different from my corporate PR stint last summer and maybe I would learn a little something too.

Oh boy. Did I learn a lot.

And a great deal of that learning came from two things: 1) Making mistakes and 2) listening. My 1st mistake was trying to shake my interviewer’s hand. My interviewer just happened to be Imam Khalid Latif, the Muslim Chaplain for both NYU and the NYPD (If You want to check our his blog, click here) and slowly I remembered, Muslim men don’t shake hands with women. Oops. Big mistake. I hoped he wasn’t offended and I certainly wasn’t offended (since I don’t make much of a contribution to the feminist movement). But he ended up hiring me and I think we’ve learned a lot from each other. Every day, I am learning more and more about day to day life for Muslim Americans and I’ve come to appreciate their religion.

Islam, like Judaism and Christianity is from the Abrahami tradition. I learned that in a Middle Eastern class but it makes a lot more sense now. While helping to clean out the Islamic Center at NYU (strangely located in the basement of St. Joesph Church, on 6th Ave), I was a bit clumsy and swore out loud “Oh Christ!”

I apologized quickly. “Oops, sorry. My people.”

and Khalid replied, “Don’t worry. He’s our people too.”

To wrap up my summer, I sadly had to attend a funeral for a friend from high school. At the age of 20, Danielle passed away suddenly from Menegitis and I found it very hard to come to terms with the fact that she is no longer with us. I hadn’t seen her since graduation but I felt like I needed to pay my respects so a friend and I attended her memorial service. The funeral home was filled with so many of her friends and family members, there was hardly room to stand. A reverend got up, did some readings and family members spoke. One part that stuck out in my mind was one person who mentioned how we all need to remember that now more than ever, we need God in our life as the shepard guiding us and giving us a strength to go on.

I’ve realized this year, that no matter how you take your religion (light, dark, with sugar, with Splenda), God is God. And so what if I don’t get it right all the time. At least I got someone guiding me.

R.I.P. Danielle. God Bless.

The King of Pop has died but will his legacy live on?

The King of Pop has died but will his legacy live on? Not in the news.

Sorry kids, long time no see but the recent passing of Michael Jackson strangely has confirmed my inkling of a feeling that I don’t think it is a good idea to be working in journalism right now…

So introducing the View from the Balcony’s (short) list of Reasons not to Work in Journalism:

1. Breaking News? What’s breaking about the news anymore? I heard about Michael Jackson’s death via a text message and Twitter well before any news outlet could get the story up on TV. Hello and smell the coffee, Mr. (Hypothetical) Journalist! Just when you think you are a good journalist, someone on Twitter beat you to it and “tweeted” it all over the internet. And their friend has the whole thing on video on their cellphone. AND has already sent it to your broadcast company like a good citizen-journalist. The best part was your employer got the goods for free. Too slow,  Mr. Journalist. Ownage.

2. Guess Who’s Boss Now? I was watching CNN’s coverage of Michael Jackson’s death and Larry King was interviewed in order to provide some anecdotal information about Mr. Jackson’s health and career at the time of his death. Mr. King mentioned that he hadn’t seen Mr. Jackson in TWO YEARS. How does Mr. King have any authority to be quoted on anything to do with Michael Jackson? Did he really need to be interviewed? He certainly couldn’t add any value to CNN’s coverage. Meanwhile in Twitter -world I’m sure that Perez Hilton, Hollywood’s favorite blog gossip, is having a tweet fight with Pete Wentz about whether or not we should honor Michael Jackson’s life and death. Shame on you all. Mr. King I expect more from you. Mr. Hilton I would like to hear less from you. Frightening. Absolutely, frightening.

3. And guess what? I’m already bored. This story in a matter of three hours has reached its peak and is starting to ebb in coverage. And those who are continuing their coverage are all saying the same thing. The speed of journalism is so fast now thanks to the internet, iphone and all the like guilty parties that a story in the news dies as quickly as it broke. So what does this mean for the coverage of Mr. Jackson’s death? Will he receive the same coverage as other celebrities’ deaths like Ray Charles or Princess Di? Who knows. But I can tell you that story about Farrah Fawcett’s death lasted all 5 minutes. This story didn’t even get its 15 minutes of fame. Tragic.