June 24: Onrust Community Service

So today we went to do community service, yet again. This community service was much different than the last one, we were on a boat! This boat was a remake of the Onrust, a Dutch Ship from 1614. This year is the 400th anniversary of the boat. When we first arrived, the weather did not look like it was going to cooperate. It was really cloudy and rainy all morning, though when we got there, it wasn't that bad. There was a lot of work to be done on the boat and we got right to work.

Onrust

 Before I get into how the cleaning went, I would just like to mention that we have been here before, when we visited the lock in Waterford. Deja-Vu. I love the view from here which is why I took a picture :).

Bridge near Lock #2

 Now back to the cleaning. Me and Katie cleaned downstairs on the boat. They had just returned from a voyage to New Jersey. The picture below shows the after. Before we cleaned there was just a lot of stuff everywhere. We just straightened up, we didn't really know what to do with anything, so we just kind of did it. I thought this boat was soo cool. Though the original boat did not have a kitchen and bathroom, OSHA regulations make them have a bathroom and the kitchen was a nice touch. It was made out of 400 year old white oak. This white oak is the least water resistant and that is good for the boat.

Downstairs after it was cleaned

 When we were finished downstairs, we went upstairs. We helped Gretta move totes onto the boat, then Katie helped oil the deck. I wish I could have helped, but because of my knee, I couldn't. I found it very rude that someone who didn't help at all with the community service had the nerve to say to me "Are you gunna help, or are you just gunna sit there". The fact that I helped with what I could shows that I did my part. I could not kneel on my knee because of my brace and the fact that my knee hurt. Anyway, other than that itty bitty piece of negativity, we had a really good day. This was the only activity we did today, so I was home by 2 :).

Working Hard

June 23: Schodak Island

So today we went to Schodak Island. Our adventure for the day was to connect with nature. We started out our day like normal, we met in Hart 206, which we haven't done since week 3, and we read blogs. I didn't read mine though; soon I will. After the blogs were read, we ventured off. Schodak Island is a little south of Albany. Upon our arrival we ran into a lady that was already there and she told us to take a look down the path; there was a turtle there. This is the turtle in the picture below. When Toby realized that it was not a snapping turtle, he picked it up. almost immediately, the turtle retracted into its shell and peed down Toby's leg. We learned that this is a defense mechanism. The turtle was scared. The girls wanted Toby to put the turtle into the water, but he put it back where he found it. We find out later that this was a good decision.

Scared Little Turtle

 We then went back down to the river and stood on the dock. We got a brief lecture from Toby about the river. The early Native Americans called it the river that flows two ways. This is because it is a tidal estuary. during low tide, the tidal influence of the water is stronger that the current. We saw this when a stick was flowing upstream rather than down stream. When the tide starts to come back in, the water will again flow downstream. The picture below shows a cement plant near Coeyman. This plant is the largest mercury pollutant in New York state.  The cement plant burns coal which emits Mercury. Bacteria then convert the Mercury into methyl mercury. Methyl mercury gets absorbed into the plants which the fish eat. Humans then eat this fish. This process is called bio-accumulation. It is also the reason that there are warning signs about how much fish someone should eat. It can be fatal in areas where people depend on fish to survive. I find it frustrating that regulators are more worried about how much money it costs to rid of the mercury than the damage the mercury does to the ecosystem.

Cement Plant

 After we got our lecture we were able to walk around for about twenty minutes. Me, Michelle and Krista decided to go check on the turtle. We ran into it laying eggs. At the time we weren't sure what it was doing, but Toby cleared it up for us.

Same Little Turtle Laying Eggs

After our short adventure, we walked along a trail to go fishing in a creek connected to the river. Unfortunately I have no pictures for this, though because I was in the water. One by one everyone, except for two people, got into the water. When I jumped in, I sank about 8 inches into the mud. My poor sneaker probably hate me. Kassiana and Katie had the best reaction though, when they screamed bloody murder, and Kassiana jumped into my arms. It was the funniest thing I have ever seen. We are encouraged to try new things, and this was definitely new. Today was a nice relaxing, and a lot of fun. Until tomorrow...

June 18th Birthday in Brooklyn; Viewer Discretion Advised

So today is my 19th birthday. It doesn't feel much different than my 18th birthday, though now I can get into Pacha. Our adventures today consisted of going to Brooklyn and getting a walking tour from one of Andor's friends from Grad School; his name was Allan. He was a really great tour guide; he definitely knew his stuff. Our tour lasted for about an hour and a half, we walked all through Brooklyn; learned things that I didn't know. One in particular was Brooklyn used to be a city; though it merged with New York City and became one of the five burrows.

Old Brooklyn City Hall

Throughout the tour we payed close attention to the buildings. Allan told us how to tell the when the building was built just by the architecture. I found this really interesting. The picture below shows what is now apartments. If you look closely, the buildings have what looks like garage doors. At first I thought it was for a fire department, though I soon learned that these were the stables for the horses and carriages back when people rode them through the city.

An Alley Way 

 From the port, we could see Ellis Island and the Statue of Liberty. I am really excited to go to this on Friday. I have never seen the Lady Liberty up close, or even as close as this picture, so I should have a lot of fun, though I do not think that I could climb it due to my bad knees.

Statue of Liberty

 After a short lunch and a trip to the park to discuss salt marshes we ventured to the Brooklyn bridge. Now before I get into how the walk was, I would just like to point out that a classmate of ours has chosen to be unfair to the rest of the class and skip out on the walk. Now I understand that you may be afraid of the sun, or the sunburn, but that should be no reason to skip out on a whole part of class. None of us really wanted to walk the bridge, but we still did it anyway. The whole point of this class is to step out of your comfort zone and try new things. There are some people that are afraid of water, are afraid of heights, or are physically injured but the rest of us did the walk. Just because you want to be miserable during our trips doesn't mean that you should get out of activities. If you really didn't feel well, it's because you refused to drink all day and when you did drink, you drank a milkshake; not too smart when it 90 degrees out. Now that I got that out, the walk was actually better than I thought it would be. It would have been a little better if the sun wasn't beating down on us. It actually didn't take as long as I thought it would and the views were amazing.

Manhattan Skyline from Brooklyn Bridge

Freedom Tower

 My favorite part of this trip was being able to see the Freedom Tower. I really would love to visit this, but there is just no time. After a four hour break we were able to go to a Broadway show. Me and Krista went on a date (again), and went to see Matilda. I thought the play was awesome. I had two favorite characters in this play, Matilda and Mrs. Trunchbowl. I would say actresses but Mrs. Trunchbowl was played by a man. They were a riot. We laughed, and applauded and enjoyed ourselves. It turned out to be a good day with a few speed bumps. It was definitely a different way to celebrate my birthday, and now I can't wait to go home and celebrate with my family. Until next time...

June 17 Chinatown

So today we took an adventure to Chinatown. We started off at the Museum of Chinese in America, or MOCA. I really enjoyed this museum because it was very modern and very interesting. The first gallery that I walked in to was of contemporary art. It was definitely odd, but still pretty cool. They had an exhibit that I wasn't expecting to be there, an LGBTQ exhibit. It was interesting to read the stories of these Asian families that accepted their child as they were. I was somehow surprised by this though, I wasn't expecting it.

Contemporary Art

 The picture below was a part of the LGBTQ exhibit. I really liked the quote that was had written in. I'm not exactly sure who wrote it, but it was really nice. Though the quote is hard to read in the picture the caption below the picture is the quote.

"Do nothing else today, then meditate because you can do nothing if you aren't here. If you can only do 1 more thing, then do yoga because you can take no action if you're not in your body. After that, write...+live+play (guitar)+cook, but always remember you are not what you do- you are far more magical than that."

The Ellis Island on the West Coast

 I was interested in Angel Island also. I figured immigrants traveled to the West Coast, but I didn't think that they had anything like Ellis Island. Angel Island is in San Francisco, and it served the same purpose that Ellis Island did on the East Coast. This makes me wonder if it is a tourist attraction the way Ellis Island is, or is it still in use? The picture below shows a dragon costume. I really liked the design on it, and for some reason it reminded me of the Rugrats cartoon, though I'm not exactly sure why. I think there was something like it in the Rugrats go to Paris movie.

Dragon Costume

Harold Lee Reconstruction

We got to learn about different families throughout the exhibits. I saw a little bit about the Lee family, though I don't exactly remember what I saw, I think the heat is getting to my head. I should really learn to take better notes. At 11:30, we went on a walking tour around Chinatown. I wasn't really interested in this though, it was so hot and humid. I couldn't really focus on our tour guide, and the action of the streets caught my attention more than the tour guide. We went to lunch at the Golden Unicorn Restaurant; it was a Dim Sum chinese restaurant. This experience was definitely unusual. I had never been to a place like this. In the afternoon, we went to the Tenement Museum. This too was really hot and humid and I was not a fan of how the tour was set up. It was almost like we had to initiate the conversation. I may have started daydreaming. My favorite part of the day was dinner. Me, Krista, Michelle, and their friend Shar went to Bubba Gump's Shrimp Co. It was amazing. I had only been there once and it was in Chicago. The food was absolutely delicious, and we even got to play trivia. Though it was a really hot day, we still had some fun at the end of the day. Until tomorrow...

June 14 Phillipe's Manor. June 15 Architecture Rally. June 16 The Met and Alumnae Dinner

So recap! The reason that I have waited so long to post this blog is because upon arriving to the city we were told that we only had to do three blogs while we were here. This was like music to my ears. I was so ecstatic. So on Saturday we Visited the Phillipe's Manor. This house tour was different than any I had taken. First of all, all of the people were dressed up. I found it humerous. Second of all, the tour guides that we had didn't paint the Mr Phillipe to be a saint. He talked about the business he was in, slave trading, and bardering. They knew the names of the slaves, which I though was pretty cool, and each job the slaves had. We found out how they knew all of this. Mr Phillipe did not leave a will behind when he died, therefore an inventory of all of his stuff was taken. This inventory is what helped the researchers find out how each room was set up and each and every slave, worker, and tenant farmer on the property I though that was pretty amazing.

Phillipe's Manor

So Sunday, which was yesterday, was father's day. It was pretty rough for me not to be able to see my dad on father's day, but I talked to him so that made it a little better. We did what is called an architecture rally throughout the city. What is this you may ask? Well pretty much it is a giant scavenger hunt. It was pretty fun, though my legs and feet still hurt because I wore the wrong shoes, I definitely learned my lesson. I will forever wear sneakers when I go out like this. We walked a total of twelve point four miles, and I did it all in flip-flops. Any way, it was still fun. Me and Kassianna were partners and all of the pictures were taken on her tablet so I didn't really have much to choose from out of the pictures that I took. So I just picked a picture with me in it. 

Me in front of St. Patrick's Cathedral

Finally today was the day that we went to the Met. This place was huge. I couldn't believe how much was here, and their gift shop was more like a department store. Anyway we were given an assignment to go to the American Wing, we also had to find some stuff that Mrs. Sage donated. Let me tell you, there was a lot. Just on the third floor of the American Wing, there were something like 10 pieces of furniture that Mrs. Sage donated. I thought that was crazy. 

The Metropolitan Museum of Art

 The picture below shows Michelle posing as the Native American in the statue. I just liked the picture so I put it in :).

Can't tell the difference

 The Met was incredible, I have never seen anything like it. There was just so much to do, we couldn't fit it all in. So after we left the Met, we went to lunch down at Battery Park. This park was really close to our next destination, the Museum of American Indians. The exhibits were really small, which kind of upset me because I find Native Americans really interesting. It literally took us 20 to 30 minutes to walk through all of the exhibits.

Small Museum about Native Americans

Infinity of Nations

"Land of the People" 

After we left the second museum, we headed back to Barnard to get ready for the Alumnae dinner. It was really nice, the Alumnae that we talked to were so interesting, and interested to hear what we had to say. The restaurant was on 20th street, so we only had about 20 minutes to get ready before we again had to leave the dorms. Ronnye was there again. She is one of the nicest people I have ever met. We all kind of split up so we could talk to the Alumnae, but we ended up talking to Andor for a lot of the night. He was giving us all advice and making fun of us as per usual. Today was a really great day, and tomorrow should be as well. By the way, only two more days until my birthday, which I can't wait for.

June 12 FDR,Vanderbilt Mansion, and Val-kill

Today is the day we all have been waiting for. It's the day we get to leave Newburgh and go home, whether to Troy or Saugerties, we were all relieved. There was a catch though, we had to make a pit stop on the way there. This pit stop consisted of the Roosevelt home (old money), the Vanderbilt Mansion (new money), and Val-Kill, which was a nice comfy cottage. So lets start the day at the Roosevelt home. There was yet another scheduling issue, apparently we were supposed to go to Vanderbilt Mansion first, but we went to the Roosevelt home. I don't call it FDR's home though because he is the not only one that lived there. It kind of annoys me that it is called FDR's home; what about his mother, his wife, his kids, his father. I do understand that he was an important part of history but there were people behind him and there to support him through every decision that he made. For instance, his mother; though she was over bearing, she is one of the reasons he turned out the way he did. I was surprised to find out that FDR was home-schooled until he was fourteen and then sent off to a boarding school. When he was younger, he also learned how to read and write; he learned other languages; and he learned proper manners. Anyway continuing on with the day. While we were in Newburgh, we watched a video about Eleanor Roosevelt. It is her that I really should be focusing on. But again I'm Fast forwarding; let's talk about the Vanderbilts.

View from the Roosevelt Home

The Roosevelt Home

Roosevelts'  Graves

Visitor Center at Vanderbilt Mansion

 When I first walked in to the visitor center, my eyes were drawn to the trophies on the wall. no not like an award trophy, like a hunting trophy. I could not imagine what I would do if I ever got a trophy like these. The racks on the deer are huge, and just about perfect, and I have never gone bison hunting, which is what the trophy is on the bottom I'm pretty sure. This makes me think, did Vanderbilt actually get those himself, or did he buy them from a taxidermist? Anyway, the Vanderbilt mansion, was HUGE!!!!! There were only two people that owned the house, Mr. and Mrs. Vanderbilt. Why on Earth would two people need 54 rooms in their house. That is just crazy. The house was more for show than necessity though. There were servants that lived with them in their house, but there were 6 or 7 guest rooms just on the second floor. I honestly don't think I am friends with enough people to fill every room in the house. Another thing that blows my mind is, it wasn't their home year round. They only went to the house during the Fall and Spring. I couldn't believe that it was also the smallest of the Vanderbilt mansions. The Vanderbilt family liked to show off their wealth and they sure did that with the mansions that they built. After Vanderbilt Mansion, we went to lunch. Everyone else went back to the visitor center at the Roosevelt house, though I did not want to pay those prices, so me, Krista and Michelle went to McDonalds. It was just as tasty. At one o'clock, we ventured on down the road to Val-Kill.

Vanderbilt Mansion

 Val-Kill was the get away home for Eleanor Roosevelt. Continuing from before, Eleanor was a woman of influence. She was the most powerful woman in the world for quite a few years. This woman had been through so much heartache and betrayl so early in life that it is amazing she became the woman that she did. FDR built Val-Kill for Eleanor because she didn't feel comfortable in his mother's home. This was also built after Eleanor found out that FDr was had an affair with Lucy Mercer. Eleanor was heartbroken when she found this out because she loved FDR, but after this incident, which was early on in their marriage, she was not the same person. Val-Kill was a cozy little cottage. Apparently Eleanor liked it this way. I could definitely tell that this place was used for recreation for the family, it seemed a lot more like home than the other Roosevelt house. Eleanor still had important people over to her house, but she insisted on treating everyone the same, whether you were the King of England, or a mine worker, you were seated at the same table. Also scattered around this dinner table were Eleanor's grandchildren. I thought this was pretty cool; I never got to sit at the adult table, and sometimes I still don't. Eleanor was someone that was looked up to, and she conquered everything that she could imagine. I can imagine that she died a very happy lady because she really did it all.

Val-Kill

After Val-Kill, we were on our way. We have to meet up on Saturday at 8 a.m. yay :(. At least we get one day off.

June 11 Washington's Headquarters and Storm King Mountain Art Center

So today we went to Washington's Headquarters and Storm King Mountain. It was an interesting day to say the least. We actually got to Washington's Headquarters two minutes early, because we had to wait for the gate to open. I'm not exactly sure why they couldn't open the gate two minutes early, but waiting wasn't that bad.  Our tour guide for Washington's Headquarters was an interesting person to look at. Her make-up was atrocious, and she had this bow in her hair that looked like it was made out of hair. At a closer look, I noticed that it was made out of plastic string. Anyway, though she was funny looking, she definitely knew what she was talking about. Every time someone asked her a question she was eager to answer. It was a very good tour, I thought. We learned that the house was not actually owned by the Washington's. The Livingston's actually owned the house, George Washington was renting the house during the revolution. It was a convenient location because West Point was not far down the river. West Point was a spot in the river that was crucial for the war. If the British were to capture West Point, they would have been able to control the entire Hudson River. Our tour guide made sure we knew this.

Front Gate of Washington Headquarters

We could not take pictures inside the house, which kinda stinks, but we were allowed to take as many as we wanted outside of the house and museum. I learned that the Livingston's built the house in 1750, then put the addition on in 1770. In 1782, Washington moved in, along with his wife Marsha, secretaries, and guards. The house was built on a 200 acre farm, that was actively running during the revolution. In the house there was a Dutch jamless fireplace. I thought it was kind of funny because the first time that I saw one of these was at the Mabee Farm, and now I seem to be seeing them a lot more.

Washington's Headquarters

There was a museum built on the property. The house became a historic sit e in 1850, and it was the first historical site. It is also the site of one of the Minute men. This minute man is on the seal of New York State. Our tour guide was very proud of this. Also on the property was a Washington Monument. We were not even allowed to go inside this building, because of the unstable roof/ceiling, but there was an opening on each side with locked gates that allowed us to look into the monument.

The Minuteman

One this that I really remember from the headquarters, is the badge of Merit, better known today s the purple heart. This award goes to enlisted men, who were killed in action or wounded on the battle field. I personally knew someone who recieved this award. His name was Doug Cordo, and he was only 20 when he was killed in Afghanistan. His mother received the award for him at his funeral services. It is amazing to think that I stood in the room that Washington created this award for the Enlisted men of the service. Up until this time, only the higher-ups would receive awards for merit. It's nice to know that someone was thinking about the little people.

Washington's Monument

After Washington's Headquarters, we ventured off to Storm King Mountain Art Center. This was actually a lot different than I thought it would be. We had an assignment here, to compare and contrast this art center to the Hudson Valley School of Painting. So what did I think about? The Hudson Valley School of Painting was the painting of the landscapes and mountains. This art center used the landscapes to enhance the statue art. The picture below shows the grumpy Krista standing in front of a Tree like statue. Upon closer look at this statue, though it was made out of wood, it was not carved out of a tree trunk like I thought it was.

Krista standing in front of the Tree looking statue

Krista sitting in the Half Dollar Chair

What I like to call the Lightening Rod

Michelle being Studius

We also took a tram ride around the art center which was very large. We looked at many statues and pieced that I did not know where statues until someone said something. My favorite statue was the Lightening Rod showed above. This thing was huge and I could only imagine what would happen if it got struck by lightening. After our tram ride we got to go back up to the Visitor Center, where there was a small museum. We walked around here for a while, watched a few movies at the museum, and saw miniature statues just like the ones out on the lawn. Upon returning to campus, we finished watching the move about Eleanor Roosevelt. We finished pretty early with this, and decided to go out to dinner. Michelle, Krista, Kaity, Kassiana, and Me went to Applebees, but not before we got ourselves and the professors lost, when Michelle's GPS stopped working and brought us to an imaginary Applebees. Michael, Toby, Andor, Pamela, and Andra decided not to join us at Applebees, but we still had a delicious dinner. Tommorow is the day that we get to go home, and I can't tell you how excited I am for it. 

June 10 Beacon Institute/ Walkway over the Hudson

So this morning started out pretty good. I got to sleep in a little so I was happy. We had a sleepover last night, Michelle brought her mattress into our room. I felt bad for them because I had three alarms set, I got out of bed at the second alarm, and forgot to turn my third alarm off. OOPS! :).  I was even happier that I got to have two cups of coffee this morning. It was great. Though we were not on campus, we still have a meeting room where we read our blogs. Only today instead of going straight to our destination we stopped to get breakfast. I ate in the room, so I only got a coffee at Dunkin Donuts. Our first stop today was Beacon Institute and Denning's point. We got to walk along trails to get to the river. It made me kind of homesick, I miss being able to just walk through the trails, or ride my four wheeler. The views were stunning though; and the woods were as peaceful as I remember them. On the trail, we stopped at a bridge, where we saw the train tracks in the picture below. It turns out that this is one of the major North South railways for Amtrak, Metro-North, and freight trains. I though this was pretty interesting. We continued on our adventure.

Main railroad 

 We learned that the building of the railway had a huge impact on ecosystems. Construction workers had to build dykes, to support the rails and the trains. These dykes built a dam in the water creating marsh lands and wet lands all along the Hudson. This wasn't necessarily a bad thing though. Toby hates this saying, though it fits perfectly for the situation. Marsh lands and wet lands are the kidneys of the landscape. These lands are used to filter the water the same way the kidneys filter the blood. I really liked how he used this analogy;I understood it better because I know a lot about how the body works.

Denning's Point sign

 We continued our walk through the trails. We even came upon the devil spawn again. What is the Devil Spawn you ask? Well, it's the seed to the water chestnut plant. I also know them as cowheads. We came across these a few times before, and every time I see them, I continue to hate them even more.

The Devil  Spawn

 As we walked deeper into the woods, I was wondering where it was going to lead us. We trekked down a steep incline trail. The incline was so steep that Toby had to help us all down so we wouldn't fall. This led us right to the water. Unfortunately it was high tide so we couldn't walk all the way to Denning's point, though we got as close as we could. We also came across what looked to be a fishing camp. It was sad to look at though because the people that were there left all of their garbage and even some clothes there. It was horrible looking. Whenever I go fishing along the Hudson, I make sure that there is a garbage bag that is easily accessible, and before I leave I make it look like that no one was there.

Woods, I miss this...

 While we were standing by the water we saw this boat. To me it looks like a regular sail boat, but this particle sail boat has some history behind it. A man named Pete Seeger took this boat out on the river to protest the dumping in the river that the major industries were doing. A big example of this was GE and the pcb's that were dumped in the river. Seeger was loved by many yet also hated by many, it depended on your stand in the situations he was fighting for. I thought it was very interesting that he only died last year at the age of 94; that is pretty impressive.

Clearwater Boat

 Before lunch we took a pit stop; shocker I know. WE went to this old factory on the fishkill creek. If you look close enough at the picture below, you can see pipes that are coming out of the building. These pipes were used to dump the waste products into the river. During the time that this factory was running, that was the norm. No one thought anything of dumping anything in the river.

Back of the Factory

Our new Discovery Degree Computer

 The picture above shows an old computer desk top screen in the Fishkill creek. Andor made the joke that we can fish it out and that could be our new Discovery Degree Computer. I thought it was funny enough to make it into the blog. We went to lunch in the town of Beacon. We ended up going to a pizza place. Some of us even had left overs that we ate for dinner. After lunch we took a ride to Poughkeepsie where we went to the Walkway Over the Hudson. It was really nice, especially since my boyfriend, John, and my cousin, Corey, came to walk with us. This trip is the longest that I have been away from John in well over a year, so it is definitely hard for us, but it was really nice seeing him today. Come to find out, when we got back to the dorms my dad called me and told me that a body had been found in the river right near the Walkway today. That was kind of creepy but i think it was earlier in the day because we didn't see any emergency vehicles. Anyway, the picture below shows a sand bar made from sediment coming into the river from a small stream. When I first took this picture I wasn't sure what it was, I just thought it was pretty cool looking, but when I learned what it actually was, I thought it was even more interesting.

Sediment sand bar from the stream

 Halfway through the walk across, we stopped and asked John to take a picture for us on the bridge. Of course Michelle had to be different and lay on the ground, and Krista wasn't looking at the camera; but I still think it is a nice picture. It definitely shows our personalities and how we are all not perfect. We have become so close in this program, I really hope our friendship continues throughout our college careers and then some.

Selfie on the Walkway

June 9 Oakwood Cemetery

So today we started our big adventure. We started off the day like normal, reading blogs, explaining what we are doing for the day, explaining our new project; you know the norm. We left campus to go to the Oakwood Cemetery and the Earl memorial crematorium. We ran into a scheduling delay, yet again. It just so happens that the time we were going to visit the crematorium, a Hindu Cremation ceremony was going on. Because of the religion, the remains have to be taken care of within twenty four hours. So what did we do? we rode around in the van for an hour and a half. I regret to say that the entire van ride I was nauseous and car sick. I don't think it was Michael's driving, I think it was just the car ride in general. This usually happens to me when I don't drive. Anyway, on our drive we stopped and looked at a few graves. One of them was Uncle Sam's grave. It was nothing too special;  I thought it would be much more interesting, maybe a little bigger and stand out more. The only thing that really stood out was the size of the stone and even that wasn't that impressive. We learned that Andor doesn't like Uncle Sam and Sharon doesn't like the Daughters of the American Revolution. I understand where they are coming from, the whole idea is kind of over played, but it's okay I guess.

Uncle Sam's Grave

A Mausoleum

 Our assignment for the day was to look for a certain symbol and look up the meaning. I chose to look up the Celtic Cross, as shown in the picture below. The Celtic Cross is an ancient Irish tradition. The cross in the picture below is a high christian cross with a Celtic design. The cross as a grave marker came back from the medieval times, where it was used more as a public monument. It is believed that the cross was introduced by Saint Patrick or possibly Saint Declan during their time trying to convert the pagan Irish. It was claimed that Patrick combined the symbol of Christianity with the sun cross, to give it the idea of the importance of the cross and the life giving properties of the sun. Some other interpretations claim that placing the cross on top of the circle represents Christ's supremacy over the pagan sun. I really like the idea of the Celtic Cross because I come from an Irish background (yes i have a little bit of everything in me), though I do take my heritage pretty seriously.

Celtic Cross

Russell Sage's Mausoleum 

Earl Memorial Crematorium

When the funeral finished, we got to take a little tour through the crematorium. I have been to this place before, but it never ceases to amaze me. The inside of the building is stunning, it has Tiffany stained glass windows, a ton of marble, and gorgeous carvings throughout the building. Something new that we got to experience on this trip, was going upstairs where the family would typically wait for the guests to arrive, before descending the steps and joining their guests for the service. Another thing that we got to look at was one of the ovens was open. I have never seen the inside of one of these, so that was pretty cool, even if it is a little weird. I don't mind admitting that I'm weird. One thing that I do find weird though, is the thought of having a wedding here. Yes it has been done before, though I'm not sure why anyone would want to get married in a crematorium. I would think that it was bad luck or something. Anyway, when we got back to Sage, we ate our boxed lunches. After lunch we went back to the Rensselear County Historical Society to do some research for our projects. We got to take pictures of our artifacts and do the research that we need to make the labels. That didn't take as long as expected, so when we were done me and Krista took a ride to Walmart because smart me didn't bring my sleeping bag or a sheet. I bought a five dollar sheet which was pretty cool because now I have a sheet for the next time we stay somewhere. I drove down to Newburgh. The brave souls that they are, Michelle and Krista rode with me. Shocker, I know. We had a lot of fun on the way down. We listened to music, sang, and joked. We even raced Michael a little in the van. In the end I let him get in front of me. We did slower than I usually do on the thruway, but that's okay. We still made it here alive. Once we arrived at Mt. St. Mary's college in Newburgh, we got our room assignments, and unpacked. We then ventured off to Alexis Diner where we ate dinner. After dinner we stopped at Price Chopper so we could buy snacks and such for the rooms, though tonight I'm pretty sure that we were all full from dinner there will be no snacking. We got back to the dorms, and me and Krista immediately got a visiter. That's right Michelle came in our room to hang out with us and do our blogs. All in all it was a great day. I'm exhausted, but I think I will make it through. Until Tomorrow....

Bench in the Crematorium


http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celtic_cross