Concerts and old friends

Managed to fit in two awesome concerts (and other events!) this weekend, despite all the work. Therefore, lots of photos (and hopefully some videos!) coming up =D

First part of the musical weekend was the inaugural concert of the Yale Classical Music Society, which aims to give more of Yale's many excellent musicians a chance to perform as soloists and in small groups without the pressure of having to take formal lessons here and have their own hourlong recitals. Some highlights:

Anne (co-founder of the YCMS) playing two Chopin etudes

left to right: Terrence + Ed + Chris + Nathan = Temple Street Quartet playing Dvorak's "American" string quartet

The other musical part was tonight's Living Water winter concert, which was a lot of fun with the crazy skit and audience participation in the Christmas songs =) It was especially nice to see Lee-Shing's parents since they're like another set of parents to me - they've apparently come up for all of his concerts to hear him sing, and now, to direct the rest of the group as well.

Half of LW - Yale's Christian a capella group

The other half of LW

I also recorded most of 'The Lord Bless You and Keep You," which is their traditional closing song. There's a link HERE because I'm getting strange error messages whenever I try to embed it in the entry, but I'll figure that out eventually.

Finally, the third cool thing was seeing my old friend Dhruva at the Yale Ballroom Dance Invitational. I went to preschool with this kid, found him again at Governor's School 10 years after he moved to another town, then a few days ago he messaged me to say he would be here with the NYU ballroom dance team. I also got to surprise Rose, a high school friend who's now a freshman at Harvard - she was competing in the swing dance events but those were later in the afternoon so I couldn't stay to watch.

Dhruva with his partner in the bronze-level waltz (wearing the lavender gown)

My friend Kirk with his partner in the newcomer-level waltz (he's wearing #271)

A glimpse of the bronze-level quickstep competition

This week is going to be pretty crazy with exams Thursday/Friday plus the Perspectives on Science symposium Friday afternoon, for which I have to make and present a poster about my summer research in the Comparative Cognition Lab. After finishing this semester, I feel like I can take on anything, though I will definitely think twice before taking six credits again =P