During the Orchard Harvest conference 2017 in New York, I did a lot of interesting activities.
Here is a non-exhaustive list of what I have done in New York:
Sunday 19th
- Took a train between Lille and Paris Charles De Gaulle airport.
- Took a plane between Paris and Newark airport (EWR).
- Took the air train between the Terminal B and Newark airport station.
- Took the NorthEast corridor between Newark(New Jersey) and Penn station in New York.
- Arrived near the Madison Square Garden.
- Walked to Arlo Nomad hotel on 31st street.
- Went to my hotel room on 28th floor with a nice view on other buildings.
- Watched the episode of The Walking Dead on AMC.
Monday 20th
- Woke up at 6:00AM because I couldn’t sleep anymore (it was 12:00 in France).
- Went to the rooftop of the hotel on the 31st floor.
- Saw the sunset rising on the East River.
- Saw a beautiful view of the Empire State Building.
- Took a selfie with the Empire State Building behind.
- Walked to subway station between 28th street and Broadway.
- Bought a 7 days ticket ride for the NYC subway on 28th Street’s station.
- Took the subway, first in the wrong direction. I went Uptown instead of Downtown.
- Waited near Whitehall station, in front of the Staten Island Ferry terminal.
- Met the Lombiq team at the WhiteHall station and took the Staten Island South Ferry.
- Went to Staten Island, saw the statue of Liberty, for the first time, through the dirty windows and directly came back to Manhattan.
- Walked to the Charging Bull where many people were taking pictures in front of it.
- Walked to Wall street and the Federal reserve where Georges Washington took the oath as the first president of the USA.
- Saw the Double Check, a bronze businessman statue sitting on a bench.
- Walked to the 9/11 memorial, the One World Trade Center.
- Saw a Trump Building but it was not the Trump tower.
- Ate a Burrito at Chipotle’s for the first time.
- Visited the Intrepid sea air & space museum.
- Visited the USS Intrepid aircraft carrier.
- Visited the Growler submarine.
- Visited the space shuttle Enterprise pavilion on the flight deck.
- Climbed to the captain’s bridge at the top of the USS Intrepid.
- Saw the British Airways Concorde and a lot of helicopters and planes like the Black Bird or the F-16.
- Ate some astronaut food: dehydrated chocolate ice cream.
- Walked on Times Square on my way back to the hotel.
- Met a lot a French people in the subway and in the streets.
- Saw the Empire State Building colored in Blue, White and Red. May be because it was President’s day
- Watched some movies on different channels like Avatar, Inception and Spartacus.
Tuesday 21st
- Went to the TKP Conference Center for the Orchard Harvest Conference.
- Arrived early and helped Bertrand and Sebastien to set the camera recorder and the video projector.
- Said hello to the attendees while welcoming them and giving them their badge and T-shirt.
- Finally met some contributors who attended the Harvest for the first time: Daniel from IDeliverable, Matteo from Lazer, Stanley Goldman from GitHub.
- Attended the day 1 sessions.
- Ate pizzas at John’s pizzeria with other attendees and +1s.
- Walked into a bar. I drank an ‘angry orchard cider’.
- Talked to another French guy living in New York.
- Watched Star Trek: The next generation. Jean Luc Picard saved the world once more, flying back through time.
Wednesday 22nd
- Ate some bagels, cup cakes and muffins for breakfast.
- Got some Github OctoCat stickers from Stanley Goldman.
- Talked to Sergio Navarro who helped to organize the previous Harvest in Alicante (Spain).
- Attended the day 2 sessions.
- Piotr showed up in the morning (11:59am is still in the morning, right?).
- Reviewed a PR from Sipke on OrchardCore about themes administration.
- Went to bar where there was a band playing music way too loud for me to be able to speak or hear myself talking.
- Explained to Laura that she should watch the YouTube channel ‘What the fuck France’ to know how to make ‘la bise’.
Thursday 23rd
- Walked on the Highline between 23rd and 14th street.
- Saw a few nice pieces of art like ‘Naked sunbathers’.
- Went to Battery Park and took ticket for the Statue cruises at Castle Clinton.
- Went to Liberty Island on the Miss New York ship.
- Saw the Manhattan skyline from the ship.
- Visited the Statue of Liberty and learned about its construction.
- Ate a Beast burger with Liberty fries.
- Went to Ellis Island on the Miss Ellis Island ship.
- Visited the Ellis Island museum and learned a lot about the history of immigration in United States.
- Took an American citizenship test (multiple choice quiz) and scored 8/10. I didn’t remember the US constitution was written in 1787.
- Talked to Benedek and tried to teach him how to speak backwards in French Verlan.
- Visited the Chrysler building, but I could only access the lobby.
- Watched a Star Trek episode in which Captain Kirk created a robot to help exploring the universe.
Friday 24th
- Visited the Rockefeller center and the Top of the Rock observation deck where there is a magnificent 360° panorama of New York.
- Saw the picture Lunch atop a Skyscraper everywhere.
- Took the subway to Upper West Side but it turned out it was an Express, not a locale so it only stopped on 125th street.
- Visited the American Natural History Museum.
- Felt like in the movie ‘A night at museum’.
- Learned many things about Animals, Environment, Human Origins, Galaxies, …
- Saw a blue whale hanged on the ceiling.
- Saw mammals for many continents.
- Saw dinosaurs skeletons.
- Touched some meteorites, one in iron, of the size of a car, weighing multiple tons.
- Watched the movie ‘Dark Universe’ commented by Neil DeGrasse Tyson.
- Walked in Central Park near 81st street in the Upper West side.
- Watched an episode of Star Trek: voyager.
Saturday 25th
- Walked to Bryant Park.
- Saw the outside ice skating ring.
- Walked to the Midtown Public Library.
- Visited the Empire State Building.
- Took the escalator to the 80th, 86th and 102th floors.
- Walked to Madison Square Park.
- Saw many kinds of transportation: Cabs, Police cars and Fire dept vehicles, school buses, NYC bikes, city tour buses, …
- Took a plane to fly back in France. Waited 2 hours because there were thunder storms on the Atlantic.