Autumn in New York
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created 12/24/2001, written in November 2000

Now I call myself a New Yorker.

It's been exactly 2 months after I started this new position at State University of New York's (SUNY) Downstate Medical Center. From the name, you might not know it is in fact inside New York City. It is not as famous or in glamorous locations like New York University and Columbia U. but the institute is smaller and thus more intimate. It is also not as competitive and workaholic like in Johns Hopkins U. or Harvard. I also registered as post-doc back in JHU, so I still have to travel back to my well-hated Baltimore every now and then.

I moved to New York at the beginning of autumn, so I barely escaped the horrifying heat of summer. Unfortunately, due to the extremely high rental cost in New York, I still don't really have my own place at this moment. I slept at my friend's sofa coach for three weeks before I settled in the attic of a Chinese guest house in Flushing (a district full of Asian immigrants in the borough of Queen's, it's half an hour's subway ride from Manhattan). The owners are from Mainland China. Residents on other floors change on daily basis but there are always so many people in this house. I think I will move very soon. Since buying an apartment of my own may be cheaper than renting one, I am shopping for my first real estate property these days.

My job hasn't got too stressful yet. I have read a lot of background information and papers in HIV/AIDS prevention and epidemiology. The focus of our department is especially on minority women. However, I do have some problems to start my own research project. Indeed, this is not exactly the same field as in my PhD research (which is depression and suicide epidemiology). Long commuting from Flushing to Brooklyn (70 to 100 minutes) also wears me out often. I do have a lot of chance to enjoy the ever-changing scenes of New York. The very talked about "World/Subway Baseball Series" (both teams in the final are from NYC) was over almost one month ago, but I still remember how people in this city were crazy about it. I also went to the Halloween Parade on the last night of October, watching a lot skeletal puppets wandering on the 6th Avenue. There were also some small film festivals I went to. All the festivals had opening receptions, which served a lot of free cocktails.... Unfortunately, I wasn't able to get in the really glamorous ones.

A movie really impressed me is Taiwanese director, Edward Yang's (Yang De-Chung) "Yi-Yi". I couldn't believe that it cannot find a releaser back home in Taiwan (but got one in New York). It is a really great movie. The family in the film lives just a few blocks from my parents' apartment and the kid in the movie even goes to Long-Ann Elementary School (the same as I), so I feel extremely intimate about it. It is very long (3 hours) but really warm your hearts. In fact, I think it is better than the Oscar winning "American Beauty". Too bad that Taiwanese moviegoers cannot see this movie anytime soon.

After a Thanksgiving break in New Orleans (11/23), I'm back to work again. Though it is officially still autumn now, I feel it is really winter. The Christmas is approaching, so I will see a shopping frenzy in this city. The huge Christmas tree will be lit up at Rockefeller Center and Christmas carols will be sung everywhere. For the first time, I will celebrate Christmas in my favorite city in the world.

After a long and harsh year, this should be a good way to conclude a millennium.