End of first half at Cold Spring...

I hope you all enjoyed reading my previous post on my family visiting the city. My previous post gave you also the chance to virtually meet my lovely family. Time is rushing by hear as I am already nearing the half of my internship. It has been great so far, and the prospects for the second half are looking really exciting as we are working on a new client, as I made Belgian friends in the city, as the weather is getting better and better everyday. This also means more awesome stories for you to read! 

Monday, 09/04/2012

Easter Monday in USA, but it is business as usual here in Cold Spring. Even though no meetings were scheduled for that day, I still had plenty of work to do. While I was doing research on the competitors for K-bear, Marshall was making phone calls back and forth to California; for him a busy day as well.

While I was in the city, Marshall finally switched from Blackberry to iPhone 4S. He’s never been happier with his new cell-phone. In the beginning he wasn’t really happy about it as he worked with Blackberry for a long time. But once I showed him what cool stuff could be done with this, he began to use it non-stop. We also joked around his new girl friend called ‘Siri’ by asking her question like: ‘will you marry me’, ‘what is the meaning of life’, where can I dump a body’ and many other cool questions. The answers were just hilarious.

In the evening we ate some delicious sliders in the ‘Whistling Willies’ on Main Street and went almost straight to bed afterwards.

Tuesday, 10/04/2012

On Tuesday we had our every week meeting with B&B Pools and Spa in the afternoon. The weather that day wasn’t that good that day: rainy and cloudy weather. Ever since the moment I arrived in the USA up until now the weather has been really great; not many rainy or stormy days, with relatively high temperatures. From what my parents told me time to time, the weather in Belgium hasn’t been that great.

Last year the relative temperature was down with 7°C compared to the relative temperature we are experiencing now. So far I have had nothing to complain about.

On our way back home we stopped in a new in Garrison called Garrison Café. They have an excellent bakery there with some allegedly – am not a coffee drinker – delicious coffee. I had a Chocolate croissant, which was just delicious. I’ll definitely come back there for breakfast.

Wednesday, 11/04/2012

Just like any other Wednesday morning we had to record two radio shows with Doc Rick. This also meant that I had to get up earlier as usual as it took on hour to drive all the way up to Poughkeepsie. The first radio show was a phone call with a Hypnotherapist based in California. She came to talk about the benefits of hypnotherapy and how people can use this to resolve spiritual and emotional issues. The second radio show was a conversation about Hormone Imbalances.

We spent the whole afternoon working in the office reading through legal documents, business plans and powerpoint presentations. Not only the afternoon was spent in the office, also the whole evening. It was around midnight we closed the office doors, after which we had some late night diner at the Red Line Diner in Fishkill. I always wanted to try and compare the American ‘Belgian waffles’ with the actual ‘Belgian Waffles, so I tried it but it wasn’t that good. I still prefer the typical Belgian waffles. Luckily for me I wasn’t sick after eating that waffle.

Thursday, 11/04/2012

Every month Marshall flies out to California to attend meeting with new and existing clients. That Thursday I had to drive Marshall all the way up to JFK Int’l airport. With the last time fresh in my mind I was really hoping for less traffic and a smooth ride to the airport. Luckily for us it took us about 1h40 to get there. We dropped him off at the airport and drove back to Cold Spring. Marshall also told me that I had to pick him up alone as Mark had other business to attend to. Looking already forward to that trip.

Friday, 12/04/2012

Normally we had a meeting scheduled with K-bear that day but due to some practical issues this meeting was cancelled thus rescheduled to another date. Even though the meeting was cancelled, we did worked on preparing the next meeting with them.

We went through some strategies on how to create the WOTS-UP analysis and how to approach the market. But before doing the actual approach to the market I had to find out what was already out there i.e. potential competitors, existing eucalyptus products…

In the evening I also went for a run to blow of some steam after a hard working week. Afterwards I had diner in the restaurant and planned ahead my weekend.

Saturday, 13/04/2012

Last week I met some new people from Belgium, also doing an internship in New York. As I didn’t really know somebody of my age in the city, I decided to give them a call and see what they were up to that evening. In the evening there was a party planned hosted by the company in which Alexandra was working in. Alexandra lived with her roommate Alexandre in Harlem, just above central park and I was scheduled to meet them in the evening.

During the day I continued exploring the neighborhoods of New York. That day I was planned to visit Lower East Side with sightseeing spots of China Town, Little Italy and Canal Street.

I wasn’t in a rush that day so I woke up around noon, washed and dressed myself and took the train around 2pm. As I haven’t had diner yet, I decided to take the subway all the way downtown to get some Belgian Fries in ‘Pommes Frites’. According to their website, they really made the authentic Belgian Fries. But I was rather disappointed when I started eating e.g the fries were way too thick and the potato peel was still visible; Luckily the taste of the fries was good. However I do prefer the fries they serve back on ‘Rumbeke Platse’ in my hometown.

Afterwards I started walking around in Lower East Side. On my way I passed ‘people playing Basketball in Sara D. Roosevelt Park’, the crowdedness of Canal Street, the small little shops, restaurants and bars on Orchard Street, the huge Roman-looking gate marking the beginning of the Manhattan-bridge. It was nice walk alongside all those small streets, pubs, restaurants and shops. Once again this is prove on the huge diversity there is in New York City.

The second part of my walk was China-town and Little-Italy. Bowery Street is also the street that lies just in between the actual lower east side and China town. Walking in China town was a really cool experience as I’m a very tall guy compared to all the Asians walking around there. Which was also very convenient to me as I could see where I was going much easier.

Amongst all the restaurants, shops, Pokemon and Yu-Gi-Oh! Shops, there was one particular place that intrigued me a lot: the Bloody angle. That place is located in the middle of China town and is very infamous for numerous gang-street battles and murders in the early thirties. This angle, part of ‘Doye Street’ is the only curved shaped street in Manhattan. Definitely worth checking out when you are in the neighborhood. Here are some impressions:

The Bloody Angle

 Adjacent the small streets of China Town is also Little Italy. Little Italy used to be a very big neighborhood as there were many immigrated Italians, but now it has only the size of one or two blocks. The sidewalks of Little Italy are filled with small and cozy Italian - what else - restaurants, all of which I took some pictures. 

By the time I was done visiting Lower East Side, Chinatown and Little Italy it was already nearing 7pm: time for me to get some good MacDonald's in the neighborhood. After which I met with Alexandre and Alexandra at their place to drink some beers before heading downtown. The apartment they are living in is really nice. It's a shared apartment where they only pay 400 & 600 dollars a month, which is a really nice offer to live in New York. 


The party was held in a night club called 'Pranna', located on the junction of Madison Avenue and 23th street. We had a really good time as we didn't have to pay for drinks or entrance. So it was a cheap night out, which was just awesome. Here are some pictures from that night. 

The party ended at 4am in the morning but that didn't stop us from going some place else. To my astonishment we went to the office of Alexandra as her boss with us. There we listened to some music, ate the birthday cake depicted here above and watched the 'city that never sleeps' wake up. The office also had an immaculate view on the Empire state building and the Chrysler building.

Once back at their apartment around 7am, I slept on a small yoga mat, which was rather uncomfortable but the good thing is that I made it through the night. The next morning we woke up around 1pm, got washed and dressed and went for a breakfast in Le Pain Quotidien.

After breakfast we both went our ways: Alexandra & Alexandre were heading back to their apartment to sleep and I headed back to Cold Spring to sleep as well.

This was also the end a hell of weekend and a crazy week. More stories to come next week!

Stay tuned!