My informational session and subsequent tour at Columbia were nice, mostly uneventful, but definitely informative. The School of Social Work (CUSSW), building where all my classes would be, is only 5 years old, so it is all spruced up, as you would expect from a top-5 school…WiFi everywhere, gorgeous library and computer labs, techno-awesome classrooms…the usual. I did not get a chance to talk to any professors because of the timing, so that’s a bummer, but I did speak with a former student. The program sounds perfect for me.
We had planned to do lunch with some family friends in Midtown after the tour, but timing simply didn’t work out, so we took the subway down to 4th St to get some food before my appointment at NYU. For my first New York sandwich experience, I chowed down on a killer pastrami sandwich from Village Clubhouse Deli Inc on Bleeker just east of Sullivan. Packed with moist, thin-cut pastrami, spicy deli mustard, Swiss cheese, sautéed onions, and bright red jalapeños on a thick roll. We walked over to Washington Square, found ourselves a nice bench near the doggie park, and people-watched to the tune of gorgeous, sunny 75-degree weather. Ah, the simple pleasures.
In all honesty, my actual experience at NYU was far superior to my visit to CUSSW. First I met with the admissions director, who showed me around and displayed an almost-tangible interest in wanting me to choose NYU. She even got in contact with a professor for me, whose class I ended up sitting in on. The class itself was a Policy class – ie, terribly boring (not aided by my sleepiness) – but I immediately developed this great rapport with the professor based on the fact that we’re both from LA. Then it turns out that we’ve both had experience working in palliative care, and her interest in me immediately transcends the “come to our school” level and moves into the “we should most definitely keep in contact, regardless of which school you choose” echelon. She says: who knows, maybe I’ll have a giant grant next summer and will need someone to help me collect data? And there are so few people in the world with passion for palliative care that you’ve really got to hold on to those people who share that interest. Yaaay potential job next summer in NYC.
Then, as if the visit couldn’t get any better, as class (the penultimate lecture of the year) was ending, this professor then says, hey, let’s all go out for a beer…there’s this stellar beer garden down on 4th. My treat. UM YES. So I talked 3 blocks south to Vol De Nuit Belgian Beer Bar to shoot the shit with a few students and the professor. Please tell me that grad school is always like this.
