Welcome back to City Tech, everyone! I hope your winter break was relaxing and pleasurable as  we now muster the strength to return and finish the school year. I normally share historical and/or current stories about pieces of architecture and art in New York City. But, before I delve into my more informational posts, I would like to share a few things that I did and places I explored over the winter break.

For Christmas, my family and I ventured to Lancaster, Pennsylvania to see a Nativity play at the Sight & Sound Theatre. The facility was built like a Disney Castle; I found it hard to believe that this experience was real or some type of fantasy dreaming. The arches by the entrance were exaggerated and hollow; giving the patrons a clue as to what lied forth the fantastical facade. Past the threshold was a sweet aroma of caramelized almonds; it was the type of smell that made you want to bite the air to see if you could taste it. The auditorium, itself, was a well-thought design; as if the theatre was built around the audience instead of the ordinary spectator viewing. The show was great and I enjoyed it thoroughly; it’s not typical to see horses, goats, pyrotechnics, or choreographed acrobatics inside a closed auditorium. The entire experience was very different from other plays I have seen and I found every aspect intriguing.

Sight & Sound Theatre auditorium

Ceiling motif at the Sight & Sound Theatre

For New Year’s Day, we went out to Coney Island beach like thousands of others to celebrate 2018 with the annual Polar Plunge. This would be my third year attending the winter festivity and it was one of the coldest. Reportedly, the temperature of the brackish Atlantic Ocean was 37 degrees Fahrenheit and the outside temperature was in the lower teens; this would be the coldest New Year’s Day in about 50 years. Bravely, we marched past the ice breaking at the shore and stepped into the slushy waters, dunking ourselves into winter’s freezing abyss. My body was thoroughly shocked by the water; I lost my breath and almost all the feeling in my limbs before gathering all the will I had to run out of the frigid water.

Coney Island Beach on New Year’s Day

These are just a few of the things I did over my winter break; I still spent plenty of days resting from the long and grueling fall semester. As I chart through the spring semester I will bring you more stories of my adventures and information that I learn along the way.