Heritage Music Festival - competition

25th of April, Saturday

Today, we had to wake up insanely early, breakfast was at 6 am. We got back at midnight, so no one got a good long night of sleep. Today was competition day. This is what we came for. This is what we prepared for the entire year. But I didn't feel nervous at all. I don't think I'm taking this year very seriously. I don't consider myself in jeopardy, if we loose. But we won't, because we're awesome.

The competition was held at the Riverside Church in E Manhattan. It's a huge cathedral, with lot's of space to create a beautiful echo. We unloaded the buses, all the equipment and dresses made it off
The string orchestra started the competition with a flawless performance. They got great comments from the judges too. Then came the symphonic band and jazz ensemble. All of them were great. The jazz ensemble was especially praised.

Before we knew it, it was noon already, and I had to get ready. That meant putting on makeup, hair, gown. Not all of these are easy tasks, especially for someone, who doesn't wear makeup or fancy hair often. We watched the women's choir, sitting in the church, in full preparedness. The girls sang beautifully too. After Ms. Dyer was finished with their performance, we went to the chapel to practice, and before I knew it, we were standing on the risers ourselves, ready to sing by our best skills. It felt surreal. We prepared for this moment the whole year, and now, we were ready to finish our journey. And I wasn't even scared.

Our first song was Noel, a Nigerian Christmas song. This one is the most exciting, because there is movement in it. The girls are on the floor instead of the risers, and we turn and clap, and sing. All to a wonderful rhythm and melody. I think Noel is my favorite of the three songs. And thankfully, I didn't mess up the clapping and the turning.

For the second song, the girls went back on the risers to sing Mozart's Lacrimosa. I thought it went pretty well. The third song is a morbid song called Clementine. It's about a girl, who wears the wrong shoes one morning, and she falls in a stream and drowns. But instead of being faithful to her, her lover forgets her, and settles for her sister instead. It is a very strange song, but the melody is beautiful. And really hard to sing as a choir. This is definitely the hardest one. I don't think it went as well as the others, but we did well.

The judge commenting on our performance didn't say one negative thing. Usually, the judges point out the mistakes they recognized, but not this time. She talked about how moved she was, because her family's printing company printed the copy of Lacrimosa we used, and how fun Noel looked. Ms. Dyer was very glad to hear these.

And then, we left the risers. What are we going to do now? No competition to practice for. We're done. But hey, we got over our shock and the minimum of fear we felt. We took pictures with the group outside of the church. We changed back into our regular clothes, and packed up. We had a few hours to kill until show choir's turn.

Other than the show choir kids, everybody went to Grand Central Terminal for supper. I've never been there before, but I've always wanted to. Instead of going down to the food court, I just stayed up in the lobby, and took pictures of the clock. We couldn't stay for long, we had to hurry back to the church, and the traffic was horrible.

Show choir delivered a wonderful performance. The judge however, didn't give such nice comments like to our choir, but I knew everybody was impressed.

Two hours later, we were sitting in the nave, waiting for the award ceremony. All the trophies were lined up in the front, and 1200 people were trying to fit into the wooden benches. Finally, after a long long wait, they started it. All of our groups did very well. And this could be seen from the six gold plaques we took home. This is just an individual achievement, it means we were great. Then came the big trophies, with even bigger names, that nobody remembered. All we knew, is every time Greece Athena was mentioned or called out, we started screaming and shouting, clapping our hands off while jumping up and down. The orchestra didn't win a lot of big trophies, those were taken by a rich prep-school, but we all knew how good Athena was. The choruses however! Select choir and show choir received the exact same best score, therefore we tied each other for first place! We found this quite funny, because nothing like this has ever happened.

Immediately after the award ceremony, we got on the buses, and at 8:30 pm, we headed back to Rochester. The road was long, and uneventful. Everybody tried to sleep, but the constant rumbling of the bus kept us half awake. It was 3 o'clock in the morning, when we finally arrived back to Greece. Kim was a hero, she came to pick me up in the middle of the night. It was 5 am however, when I finally fell asleep.

With Lady Dearstyne

Grand Central Station ...

... I mean Grand Central Terminal

The clock

Busy

Nave of the Riverside Church

Trophies

Sightseeing in NYC

24th of April, Friday

We got up comfortably at 7:30, and after breakfast, we took the buses to Manhattan, for our one day of touristy activities.
 We had a choice between Chinatown and Little Italy, and Chelsea Market and High Line Park, and because everyone's suggestions, I chose the latter. And what a great choice it was!

Chelsea Market is an artsy little indoor shopping place in Eastern Manhattan. Everything is cute, modern mixed with retro, and very expensive. My touring buddy was my friend Lilly, and a girl named Maria joined us too. We walked in the shops for a while, but what we really wanted, was to go on High Line Park.

It's the old tracks, that go above the street, that were used, to make this place. It's a several mile long line of new and old architecture, trees, benches. You can see the street underneath you, and the buildings surrounding it. The park is very interesting. It's definitely a nice part of New York, that you can feel, was once a run down neighborhood. We walked about a mile in one direction, then we headed back to Chelsea Market on the street. I had my street cart hot dog as lunch, and I was very happy.

After just walking around the streets surrounding the market, our whole group gathered together. Because not a lot of us chose to peacefully roam around the city over shopping with Chinese vendors, we got to go to Battery Park, the Southest park , to take some pictures of the Statue of Liberty. There was a bomb scare, so all the people on the island were evacuated, and there were police and helicopter heading there. I snapped a very good picture, that I'm quite proud of.

We only spent 10 minutes, looking at the Statue, then we left for Times Square. We had a few hours to kill, taking pictures of the landmarks and looking at the shops. I liked the independence and freedom we got from our chaperons. Lily and I, we discovered how crowded and brutal downtown Manhattan can be. So much pushing, shoving, shouting. I grew up in a big city, but Budapest is much nicer. I loved the whole experience though. So many things to see, you don't know, where to turn your head. And everything is so expensive. I thought Rochester was pricey, but the Hershey's store on Times Square has astronomical prices. The price of one medium sized chocolate bar could feed an entire African village for a month. All I bought was 10 postcards for a dollar in a sketchy gift shop, and a few magnets.

I looked up, what kind of film shootings were happening in NYC, and I convinced Lilly and a chaperon to come see it with me. It's been my dream to see a film being shot ever since I could remember, and I was so close now, only a few blocks away. It was on the West side of 54th and 55th on 6th avenue, so we walked there. I thought we would come at a bad time, and we wouldn't see anything, and I was almost right. Until we saw filming trucks, and a crew, setting up. It's a Christmas movie, so they were putting up Christmas decorations on the building, and fake snow on the ground. We talked with the workers, turns out, the filming will start at 9 pm. Although this was not the real thing, I was happy I at least got to go, and see some of the preparations.

We had dinner at Times Square at Mama Sbarro's, an Italian place. It was pretty crowded for the whole music Department to sit down, but the food was great. From there, we left for another program we had to choose in October: The Ride. It's a tour-bus, leaving from 42nd street, and it's quite unique. It's not the usual double decker bus, that I thought we were going on. It's a bus, with the seats facing the street, in three rows like a theater, and the side and top of the bus are made of glass. The inside is full of funky lights and screen. We had two hosts, Scott and Jackie, who were hilarious. While we were driving around, they entertained us with different jokes and comments about NYC, the people on the street and even us. We saw some performances, that were involved with the Ride, like people dancing, rapping, singing, just outside of the window. We also learnt about the different sights and building in downtown Manhattan. The Ride only last 1,5 hours, but it flew by like crazy. We had so much fun. I recommend it to everybody, tourist or New Yorker.

After being in the bus, in the warm, going outside was a chilly experience. The weather was quite cold at this point. Our group (which wasn't very big, I always chose the least popular choice by accident), walked to the Rockefeller Center, to go to the Top of the Rock (which is the roof). It took us a while to get in, but finally, we were in an elevator, rocketing upwards to the 67th floor.

The view was extraordinary. It was night now, past 10 pm, and every light was on. I've never seen the city from this point of view, but I have to say, it's pretty special. It's crazy to think, that 8,5 million people surround you. I took some great pictures, but due to the cold, we couldn't stay for long. It was 11 already, when we got on the bus to go back to the hotel. My feet very aching, I was tired beyond tiredness, but I was so very happy. I got to spend an amazing day in this wonderful city. I felt kind of unsatisfied, because there is so much left to see, but this is how much I got for now. Hopefully, I'll visit again soon.

Chelsea market

Chelsea market

High Line Park

Old tracks in High Line Park

"Balancing"

Decorated High Line Park

Cab and food cart, so NYC-ish

Street art

Met a dog that looks like my Reli

Freedom tower

Bomb scare at the Statue of Liberty

Texting on the job in Battery Park

This is where the Titanic was supposed to dock

Times Square

Times Square

Hershey's store

Shoe shining

Fifth avenue

Rockefeller center

Crowd

Love statue, Philly memories

Putting down fake snow for the film shooting

Christmas decorations in April

Police

At Rockefeller Center

Creeping in Times Square

Broadway

Inside The Ride

Times Square at night

Top of the Rock - Empire State Building

NYC at night

NYC Broadway: Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder

23rd of April, Thursday

And to New York City we went!!!

Today, I took the bus to school like every morning, but with a medium sized suitcase. The whole Athena Music Department gathered in the APAC foyer with their luggage, waiting for the buses to arrive and us to board. 

  Then the fire alarm went off. The timing was painfully hilarious. The whole school went outside, in the snowy rain, all traffic in and out of the school territory stopped (leaving Ms. Dyer angry in a lot of traffic), and we waited for the fire department to scan the building. As we later found out, there was a fire scare, and someone pulled the alarm, but nothing serious happened. We just waited, and laughed about the events (freezing).

  Our departure wasn't delayed by too much. The bus boarding went fine, all the instruments and clothes fit, and I found some good seats near my friends too. I was told the trip from Rochester to NYC will be long, but it didn't really seem so horrible. I'm either used to long travels, or time flies when you have fun. We made a stop in Pennsylvania (a state I love very much) in a Wegman's for some lunch - which was sushi for me -, and our next stop was in New Jersey, where our hotel was, just outside of New York City. 

  We settled our luggage down, and rested for 15 minutes. I was sharing a room with the Bo sisters, Brittney and Tiffany, very nice girls. Then, we dressed up fancy, and put some makeup on, because we were going to see a Broadway show! I wore Kim's black dress, the same one I wore for Avon Casino night, and my Desigual boots. Last time I wore those, I was in the Hungarian State Opera House with my Mom, I guess they're theater boots from now on.

   And to Manhattan we went! We took a tunnel under the Hudson river, some horrible traffic, but at last, I was in the city. I've been here before, for one day, 3 years ago. I didn't see a lot from it back then, and I knew I wasn't going to see a lot of it now either. New York is a place, where one lifetime is not enough to discover it. So I took what I could with me with my experiences.

  My first though was: yaaay, tall buildings! Rochester and Greece is a very flat part of the world. No skyscrapers, the houses don't touch. I'm used to big cities, I grew up in one. And New York City is the city of cities. It was getting dark, when we arrived, but the lights were up long before. 

  We went straight to the Walter Kerr theater, to see Robert Freedman's A Gentleman's Guide to Love and Murder. In October, we had to decide what show we were going to watch on our music trip, and I chose this, because I had no idea, what it was about. Turns out, my choice was great.

  I loved the play and the story. It's about a young man, who discover's, that he's 8th in line for the title of earl, and he decides to murder the men and women before him. It was morbid but hilarious, and very well done. The songs weren't very catchy, and thankfully they weren't boringly long. The actors did a wonderful job, and I agreed with the director's interpretation of the story. Everything worked out at the end, no lines were left loose. Everybody else loved it too. There weren't many, who chose this play, but I heard no bad comments about it. No wonder it won a Tony Award in 2014 for best musical.

   It around midnight, when we got back. We took our bus back to New Jersey, and everyone fell asleep as soon as possible, this day was quite eventful, and we were sure, the next day will be event more exciting.

Pennfield and Letchworth Park

19th of April, Sunday

After I woke up from a nice dream where I crashed a royal wedding, I skyped my parents briefly. For who never saw or heard about my dog: it's a very fluffy, middlesized goof, and it's very good friends with my cat. Well, because summers are really hot in Hungary, we take the dog to the groomer twice a year. But the cat, who we adopted less than a year ago, has never seen the dog without fur. So since my Mom brought him home naked, the cat doesn't trust the "new" dog, and cries (meaows) a lot because "his buddy is lost". So that's what happening at home.

  At 10:30, Kim and I picked Alma up, and we went for a little trip. The

 weather was a little colder, but still really good. 

  Our first stop was Pittsford Plaza, where we did some shopping at Trader Joe's, an artsy, organic grocery store. I was last here with Herb and Sun. 

  Next we went to the Erie Canal, where we walked 3 miles along the water as an exercise. Afterwards, we had some Greek food for lunch there, and we drove an hour to Letchworth State Park. It's a beautiful park that surrounds a part of the Genesee River, where the water cut itself some nice waterfalls in the canyon.

  The gorge was just gorgeous! (pun intended) We walked along the path next to the river, and we went real close to the waterfalls. These are massive though, almost Niagara Falls big.

  We took some awesome pictures. At 4:30, we headed back to Greece. It took us about an hour and 15 minutes. We dropped Alma off, then we went home.

  Larry came over for dinner. Mike went to Atlanta for a few days, so we had one less person in the house. We just talked with Larry, and caught up on things that happened since we last saw each other. 

  I had an awesome day. I was outside, had some decent exercise, saw some beutiful places in New York State, and spent the time with people I love.

Card Club

18th of April, Saturday

I woke up at the Ritson's house. After watching the Prince of Egypt, an old Disney movie about Moses with an amazing soundtrack and oahead-of-its-time design, Sarah drove me back to the Masiellos.

  The plan was to go see The Little Mermaid, the musical that Greece Arcadia did this year at 2 pm. Turns out, the show was at 7, so we just bought tickets for the only other time we could watch it: next Sunday.

  So instead of enjoying some high school theatre, we enjoyed the sunshine of a beautiful and hot day. We're very thankful for this kind of weather. 

  We went in to Wegmans for milk, and the only thing we forgot to buy was milk. I have to say though, that happens to me in Hungary way more than I want it to.

  At 7, Kim and Mike had their cards club, and I asked them to let me join as a spectator. The party was held at their friend Rita's house. Ten couples came, some I knew, some I met there. Wonderfully nice people!

  Everybody brought an appetizer or a dessert, and we socialized for a while. Then the grownups were randomly put into pairs, and everybody sat down to play euchre. Euchre is an American difficult card game. Kim tried to teach me how to play it the afternoon, I kind of get it, but I'm not confident enough to play it. Basicly, two couples have five cards each, and the goal is to win the most rounds of cards by having the highest cards in the round. We play a similar game with my parents and friends called "Rikiki", but euchre is more complicated.

  So in this party, everybody counted their individual scores. If the couple lost, they stayed at the same table, if they won, they moved to a different table. This way, they never played with the same person twice.

  Between each round, the players would get up, eat some more, talk, have fun. I just walked around, checking out each table. I made quite a few friends.

  After the final round, everybody counted their final score, and the person with the highest and lowest  score won. The person with the highest was our host, while the person with the lowest was Mike.

  It was 11 pm when we got home. I was tired, but happy, that I got to know a lot of my hostfamily's friends.

Youth Group

17th of April, Friday

Today was the end of the third quarter in school. I can't believe that the year is almost over. I doubt that my average will be as good as in the previous two quarters, but I don't mind. I missed a lot of school, but for the r ight reasons: to discover America and New York.

  Friday was a skinny day again, so I saw all my teachers. The last block was choir, and after we sang Clementine a couple of times (fortunately many of those were successful), Ms. Dyer went through the itinerary for the NYC trip. I'm so excited to go!! I'm the only exchange student in the area, who hasn't seen the Big Apple yet. I've been there for one day in 2012, but there's so much more to do, to see! We're going to have a day of competition, and two days of sightseeing and practicing. It's going to be very awesome!

  A few hours after I got home, Sarah picked me up at 6. We had dinner at Wimpy's, and then we went to a youth group meeting to church. We just sat on comfy chairs and played some games, then Claudia, the leader, talked about a passage in the Bible, that we performed in little groups. At the end, we played this really funny game called "grug", where 3  pieces of flashlights are hidden in the whole building (including the sanctuary, the gym and the nursery), and people have to find the pieces and put them together, in order to defeat the "grugs", two people, who chase the others, and  "freeze" them when they catch them. It's a fun game with a lot of running, so I definitely had my exercise for this day. We played two rounds, in the second one, Sarah and I were the grugs, but our game was shorter, because everybody was tired now.

  Before we realized, it was past 10. We went home, and I slept over at Sarah's house.

Broadway Anything Goes

16th of April, Thursday

Today at 9:15, all the seniors had to sign up for one of the buses going to NYC. Luckily I got a spot on Ms. Dyer's bus, and my friend Chelsea is my busbuddy.

   In creative writing, Ms. Domm tortured us with the ending of that Stephen King story, but thankfully, we finished all the horror stories. Next class, we'll start writing them too.

  Ms. Dyer was able to get some cheaper tickets to the visiting Broadway show of Anything Goes. Mrs. Passamonte gave me a ride to the theatre. A bunch of people from the cast came. 

  It was very interesting, to watch a show, because I knew all the lines and songs. All in all, it was a good show, but the whole time, I was thinking how much better ours was. Sure, we had to kisses, and these professional actors articulated their words more, but there was way too much wasted time in this version. 

  In the interval and afterwards, everybody agreed that Greece Athena is better than Broadway.

Ms. Dyer should start charging more for tickets next year.

First warm day of the year

13th of April, Monday

Here came yet another day of school, another Monday. This one was different though. The weather was finally how it was supposed to be. It was warm, sunny and there was a warm breeze in the air. The wind hit us from the South this time, bringing the warmth with him.

  Soon after school, Kim came home too, and we decided, that we can not possibly spend this day inside. We went to the pier, and we walked all the way to the end. Lake Ontario is dirty.

   Then we went walking in a park next to the lake. It was very nice. 81 degrees, probably the warmest it has ever been since I've been here. Just to think, that the coldest it has been this winter was more than a 100 degrees less than it was today. Brrr.

  So yes, being in a T-shirt, without a coat or a jacket is definitely a positive thing to experience. In Hungary, the weather started getting better in February. Here, it's April.