Home, Sweet Home

We made it home, finally, in the wee hours of Saturday morning. After NYC friday night traffic, a missing pilot, and thunder and lightening storm delays, we arrived safely at PDX around 1:30 am. It was a happy reunion for everyone, with a personal welcoming crew for each of the interns. Welcome back to Oregon!

The last night!

It's hard to believe that tonight is our last night in NYC! We certainly made the most of our time here, doing everything imaginable. After touring Myriah's family around the museum and showing them the highlights today, we all headed to Coney Island! Today was the best weather we've had since day one, so it was a perfect time to be at the beach. We rode the Cyclone, a wooden roller coaster that was built in 1926-twice! It was a scary, rattling, blast! We're happy we made it there, as apparently a developer purchased the land, and this is the last summer it will be in operation. Off to pack our bags, which is a greater feat than it sounds after all of the great shopping here...

Broadway Show

Yesterday after we got off work we headed back to the room to get ready for a night out! First we met Myriah's family for dinner and then headed to a Broadway show. We watched "In The Heights." It was absolutely amazing, the singing, dancing, and the acting. We really liked how they put a modern twist on the musical such as the costumes and the rapping.

Behind the Scenes!

Yesterday, instead of working the carts at the museum like we usually do we were able to see what goes on behind closed doors. We were given a private tour of the museum's collections that are kept in climate controlled units. It was extremely intersting to see how they pereserve and care for the fragile objects. It was also amazing to see how they catalog all of the objects and enter them into an online database, that way anyone who wants to can see what is not on display at the museum.

D.C. Day 2

Day 2: We all woke up early so we could try and gwet to everything we wanted. It was just the right temperature outside during the whole day. Hot but not too hot and sunny! First we walked to the White House! The White House was really cool and big. Then we walked to the Lincoln Memorial. There were so many people out. We saw the Washington Monument from afar. Then we went to the American History Musuem for a little bit. There wasn't a lot of time to look around but we saw what we could in the short amount of time. We saved the best for last and went to the Holocaust Museum. The secuirty was tight as you could expect from the shooting that had happened. It was free because of what had happened. It was sad, but gave us great knowledge and we learned a lot from the museum. There were many people there to show their support of the musuem. When we got on the bus and were back in New York it went from sunny to rainy. The weather is so different here. Overall this trip was amazing and fun! : )

Day 2

Washington D.C.: Day 1

Saturday morning we got up and went to the bus station. It was a couldy day in New York. On the 5 hour bus ride it was pouring and then we got to Washington D.C. and it was hot with humidity in the air. The first thing we did was check into the hotel and it was so nice. There was even a starbucks in the lobby!! Once we got all set in we walked around and went to an art museum. Around 3 we had a tour of the National Museum of the American Indian. That was very interesting to see. It had tons of other different Native American Tribes. We all very much enjoyed seeing and getting new information. Atfer that was done we met up with Lindy's friend and went to Chinatown. We had some pretty amazing food, and then got some cupcakes. The last event we did was going shopping in Macy's at night and just walked around town. That was enough for one day. We were getting up early the next day.

Washington D.C.: Day one (Saturday) Picturres

DC weekend blog...coming soon!

We just returned from a museum and monument-filled weekend trip to Washington DC! More to come tomorrow...

Spa day and the presentation!

To welcome Lindy to New York we took her to Big Nicks which has some of the best burgers in town, and it was also the first place we had eatin in the big apple. For those of you that don't know Lindy is the chaperon taking Molly's place. The next day we then decided we were in the need for a little bit of pampering and we went the whole nine yards. All of us girls got our hair cut and done up and then we all went and got mani, pedis :) It was very relaxing. Go big or go home right? Then today we had our big presentation to the entire museum staff. The presentation couldn't have gone better. The staff asked great questions and were all very interested which is all that we could have asked for!

Life at the Museum

I thought I would write a little bit about what the girls are doing each day at the museum, so people don't think it is a no work all play type of a trip. Each morning the girls give a 30 minute presentation to museum staff and volunteers about Grand Ronde history, termination/restoration, and modern life. They have been doing a fantastic job of presenting and audience has been asking wonderful questions. Before the students left they researched and interviewed elders and tribal employees to prepare themselves, and I am sure they are glad that they did. People are fansinated by the information and are eager to hear about what life is like in Grand Ronde.

After the presentation, they are assigned to a station in one of the museum halls where they work with museum patrons by helping them to learn more about the details of their hall. They have each learned a tremendous about about the various exhibits and relay all of their stories to me in the afternoons. For a few hours in the afternoons they work in a place called the discovery room where children can come to get a "behind the scenes" look at the museum. On tuesday afternoons they are taking a class that prepares them to work with sight impaired people. All three are absorbing so much information. I am really proud of them. Most of the time they are the youngest in the group, and are speaking to a crowd of older, very educated professionals. They have risen to the challenge and are representing Grand Ronde in a great way.

~Molly

Yankees vs. Nationals

Last night we watched the Yankees defeat the Nationals. It was really cool to see the new stadium and listen to the fans go wild. We sat in the bleacher section so we got to experience "The Bleacher Creatures" first hand (they harass the opposing team's outfielders throughout the entire game). It was an extremely fun experience for all of us.

All around Greenwich

New York University

The arc

All three of us in front of a fountain at the Washington Square Park

The mac and cheese we ate : )

This is where we ate after our weather journey...

Another Day in Paradise!

On the recommendation of one of my best friend, who lived in NYC for 5 years, the girls and I headed out to S'MAC a gourmet Mac n Cheese place in the East Village. When we walked home from the Museum at 3:30 there were clear skies and even a sun break or two. At 5:30 when we were on a random side street marching 10 blocks through the village to find the restaurant the skies opened up and poured down on us.

Myriah- "I didn't think it could rain any harder...and then it did!"

This video is from before it rained harder. We were about 3 blocks away when it really started to pour. Now, New Yorkers a.) carry umbrellas b.) wear rain boots and c.)take these opportunities to duck into a store and shop. As you can see we opted to laugh until we cried and ran! Sorry about the camera work, but it was all I could do to keep from completely busting into laughter...which happened later, when the four of us were using two umbrellas, one of which was broken(that the girls "remembered" they had after we were already soaking wet) running down the street in sandals. It was definitely a highlight. They kept asking me where this experience was on the brochure, I assured them that it was a little gem hidden on the back pages. XOXO, Molly

The Brooklyn Bridge and Wall Street

We started off on Wall Street. The buildings were huge and you could feel the attitude of hard work as you walked around. There were a lot of cool things to look at like another one of the Trump bildings. After walking wall street we walked past ground zero which was sad but it is all coming back up in the building to be known as the freedom tower. We then walked across the Brooklyn Bridge which was an amazing walk. Everything looked so beautiful from up there. It was a long walk but it was way worth it. To top of the day we ate at Brooklyns own Gramaldis under the bridge. They are famous for thier pizza. We waited in line for an hour to get a table and after eating the pizza we understood why we had to wait. The pizza was Awesome!!

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum of Modern Art is one of the biggest museums in New York. There was a lot of ineresting things to look at. From paintings by Picasso to greek statues. There was also a really cool exhibit on models from the 1920's all the way up until now. They showed famous models and the new styles. The whole museum had exciting stuff in each room. If you are ever in New York put that on your list of things to do!

Comedy Club!

Last night after we were finished working at the museum we headed back to Time Square and watched a live, impromptu comedy show. It was so funny we had a great time. After the show was over we shopped a little and then headed back to our hotel. (Where we got to sleep in!!!) Sorry this is our first blog in a couple days other than going out last night we were just resting. On Thursday we decided to just hang out in our room and watch movies together which was still super fun!
(The pictures are from the comedy club and a couple of the buildings in Time Square at night)

5th Avenue

Today was a very tiring day. We got up and worked at the museum where Hannah worked in the African Peoples exhibit, Justine worked at the Extinct Animals Exhibit and Myriah worked in the North American Mammals and African Mammals exhibits. After lunch we went to the Discovery Room for the first time. The Discovery Room is where families can go with their kids and learn about stuff in a hands on way. There are many different cool things that kids older and really young can do. Then we went to 5th Avenue. We went into stores there and just did a little window shopping. 5th avenue is where the most expensive stuff is. The Trump Tower, Rockefeller Center, and high fashion expensive shops were among the list of things we saw. The blocks were extremely long!!! Longer than usual atleast. All of our feet started to hurt so we went to the Metro Cafe and had some yummy Oreo Cheesecake! It was really good and just filled you up a lot. That was pretty much our very exciting and fun day! Check back tomorrow for more! : )

The first day at work!

We had our first day of work. All three of us worked in a different hall. Justine was in the hall of origins, Myriah was in the hall of North West Indians, and Hannah was in the hall of dinosaurs. We all got to work with our own teaching volunteers and we got to ask them questions about the halls and about New York. It was a lot of fun for the first day. After lunch was over we had a class that taught us about working with blind and seeing impaired. It was really interesting and gave us a lot to think about. We are really excited to continue working there. =)

Today we went to time square. It was the most busy place we have been! There was tons of people. We visited M&M, the Loft, the ESPN store, the Hershey store and tons of other places. There was a lot to see and the lights on the buildings were beautiful. The choice of dinner was T.G.I. Fridays. It filled us all up fast. It was the biggest culture shock we have had so far!!