Setting up the grill

Smell good!

People enjoyed the music

Volleyball!

Join us on May 4th @ Buell apartments courtyard (Bush Campus)  for our “End of the semester barbecue.” We’ll start at 1 pm, all graduate students welcome. Bring your friends!

• We will travel to NYC using Suburban Transit bus (You can buy at ticket from the SAC for $15 return. Please buy the ticket before the trip. Buy the discounted return ticket from the SAC (http://getinvolved.rutgers.edu/centers/center-listing/7) by the 23rd December (they close for the winter break). You can still buy a return ticket after the 23rd from the store across the train station for $19.
• We will be taking the subway, to get and come back from Port Authority (where the bus stops) to the museum area will only require two trips so subway will be about $5
• We can leave in the morning around 9:30 am from the train station. We will need some help with people who have cars to pickup those who dont and park by the Grease Trucks.
• We can then visit  the Museum of Natural History http://www.amnh.org/From 11 am to 1 pm  - cost is as low as $1 to enter
• We can have a quick lunch at the Shake Shack which is behind the museum http://www.yelp.com/biz/shake-shack-new-york-5 (have money for lunch)
• The Met (Metropolitan Museum of Art)  is across central park, we can walk (http://www.metmuseum.org/), 2 – 4 pm – cost is as low $1 to enter
• The afternoon will be free and people can do as they please (shopping and seeing other things), they can return to Port Authority to catch the bus home anytime.

AMNH

Let the Games begin

Join us for food, soda, board games and some social video gaming (Wii and Microsoft Kinect) fun this Friday at the GSL. The ISAC social hours are informal events where ALL grad students and postdocs (American as well as International) are invited to come relax and unwind with others.

We had a good turnout for the last social hour and hope you will take some time to relax and let of some steam.

Event: ISAC Social Hour
Date: Friday, October 14, 2011
Time: 6:00 pm
Venue: Graduate Student Lounge, College Ave

Facebook Event: http://on.fb.me/pMplOZ

***ISAC Carpools! Volunteers needed (please email isac@gsa.rutgers.edu if you can offer a ride to others; carpools leave at approx. 9pm)***
Grocery shopping at Easton Ave (Stop-n-Shop, KMart, etc.)

ISAC Social Hour

Date: Friday, September 30th 2011
Time: 5:00pm
Venue: International Lounge, Busch Campus Center

Join us for food, soda, and board games this Friday at the International Lounge, Busch Campus Center!

Theme:

This Friday the theme will be “Getting to know the World”. We live on an interesting planet but we take much for granted about the world we live in. Come over and share a little bit about your country to others and also learn from others about their countries or continents. Even if you dont want to share, this is an excellent opportunity to learn about other countries. If you have more than just words to share you can bring any object you think will get your message across better.

The ISAC social hours are informal events where ALL grad students and postdocs (American as well as International) are invited to come relax and unwind with others. This social hour will be relaxed and have board games available.

***ISAC Carpools! Volunteers needed (please email isac@gsa.rutgers.edu if you can offer a ride to others; carpools leave at approx. 7 pm)***
Grocery shopping at Easton Ave (Stop-n-Shop, KMart, etc.)

Facebook Event: http://on.fb.me/pbeXNR

1. Getting to New York

Use the Bus

The cheapest (best) way to get to New York from New Brunswick is to take the bus. Yes the bus. Suburban Transit (Coach USA) Line 100 goes from Princeton to NYC, passing through New Brunswick. As a Rutgers student you can get discounted bus tickets from New Brunswick to NYC (Stops at Port Authority, a block away from Times Square). You can purchase tickets from the Student Activities Business Office (SABO) for $15 Roundtrip. Purchases must be made during the week, check the SABO website for business hours. SABO is located at the Student Activities Center on the College Ave campus.

Travel Cost (NB to NYC): $15 Roundtrip (To and Back)

To get around NYC you will probably want to take the NY Subway. The fare to use the subway for  a trip to a destination is $2.25 one way. Good to know: How to use the Subway.

2. The Museums

AMNH

New York is the largest city in the United States. With that New York has the best opportunities in visiting a number of museums. The ones highlighted in this post will be the American Museum of Natural History (AMNH) and The Metropolitan Museum of Art (The Met). Many museums in NYC ask for a suggested donation for admission, some museums are free, while others always charge a fee(some of these have free days or times). AMNH and The Met are suggested donation museums.  They ask you pay the suggested price but you can pay what you can. The Met for example allows you to pay a penny as a donation. AMNH also allows you to pay what you can to access the museum. This makes access to the museums affordable. This means you can access these museums for a $1. The only drawback is that you wont have access to the special exhibits. These special exhibits, are normally a small fraction of the rest of the museum. For example at AMNH you will not be able to access the IMAX or Planetarium presentation.

Cost: Pay as you can for AMNH or The Met

3. Other things to do

Central Park

As stated before NYC is large and there is a lot to do. You can make your visit more affordable by packing a picnic and enjoying a picnic lunch in Central Park. There a number of guides online on how to experience NYC for cheap. One notable is the NewYorkology Guide.

You can also take other trips to places near New Brunswick like Princeton. Vukosi has a blog post about Princeton: http://beyond.vima.co.za/2011/05/princeton-a-day-in/, you can take a bus to Princeton for less than $5 roundtrip.

We hope to have more of these posts (maybe monthly) so that we can expand the experiences students have. If you would like to share your travel experiences around the area we also would like to hear from you. If you have suggestions of places or would like to submit a post to share with others we also want to hear from you. In general we want to hear from you

Thats it for this short post. We would really like feedback on these posts so you can email us at isac@gsa.rutgers.edu or you can comment below.

Update(09/21/2011) : Sep 24 is National Museum Day: entry to most museums will be free. http://bit.ly/mOINvb

Another Update (09/22/2011): From Reshma Nayyar,

MoMA (Museum of Modern Art): www.moma.org

ABOUT: Founded in 1929 as an educational institution, The Museum of Modern Art is dedicated to being the foremost museum of modern art in the world. The Museum of Modern Art is a place that fuels creativity, ignites minds, and provides inspiration. With extraordinary exhibitions and the world’s finest collection of modern and contemporary art, MoMA is dedicated to the conversation between the past and the present, the established and the experimental. Our mission is helping you understand and enjoy the art of our time.

FREE/CHEAP ADMISSION DETAILS: FREE admission on Friday evenings from 4-8.30pm: Admission is free for all visitors during Target Free Friday Nights, held every Friday evening from 4:00 to 8:30 p.m. Tickets for Target Free Friday Nights are not available in advance. Your Target Free Friday Night ticket permits you to all other Museum galleries, exhibitions, and films.

LOCATION: 11 West 53 Street New York, NY 10019 (MoMA is located in midtown Manhattan, New York City, at 11 West Fifty-third Street, between Fifth and Sixth avenues.)

• Getting to MoMA from the east side of Manhattan: 6 train to 51st Street, transfer to the E or M train; one stop to 53rd Street and Fifth Avenue
• Getting to MoMA from the west side of Manhattan: E or M train to 53rd Street and Fifth Avenue, or B, D, or F train to 47-50 Street Rockefeller Center

The Frick Collection: www.frick.org

ABOUT: The Frick Collection includes some of the best-known paintings by the greatest European artists, major works of sculpture (among them one of the finest groups of small bronzes in the world), superb eighteenth-century French furniture and porcelains, Limoges enamels, Oriental rugs, and other works of remarkable quality.

FREE/CHEAP ADMISSION DETAILS: On Sundays, pay what you wish from 11:00 a.m. to 1:00 p.m. The price of admission includes Acoustiguide audio tour.

LOCATION
1 East 70th Street
New York, NY 10021
Phone: 212-288-0700

The Onassis Cultural Center: http://www.onassisusa.org/

ABOUT: The Onassis Cultural Center is the main exhibition space of the Foundation located in the Olympic Tower. The Onassis Cultural Center, opened in fall 2000, carries out the mission of the Onassis Foundation (USA) by presenting cultural and artistic activities concerning ancient, Byzantine and modern Hellenic civilization.

FREE/CHEAP ADMISSION DETAILS : FREE Admission for ALL events/exhibitions at the Onassis Cultural Center.

LOCATION

The Alexander S. Onassis Public Benefit Foundation (USA) and the Onassis Cultural Center are located in Olympic Tower in the heart of midtown Manhattan, at 645 Fifth Avenue, entrances on 51st and 52nd Streets, between Madison and Fifth Avenues.

Potluck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potluck)

ISAC is joining forces with the International Friendship Program to bring you the International Potluck (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potluck). We encourage students to bring something to share with others. We are also really interested in your countries’  unique foods that you would want to share with other international students providing a manner in which we can all share our cultures.

The event will be at CIFSS (180 College Ave) on Friday the 16th of September, starting at 5 pm.

Please provide information about what food you would be bringing by filling in our webform at http://www.bitly.com/ifpisacpotluck The earlier you fill it in the better we can plan.

First Social Hour

Join us for some food, board games and conversation this Friday at the Graduate Student Lounge. The ISAC social hours are informal events where all grad students and postdocs are invited to come relax and unwind with others.

This is the first Social Hour for the Semester. There a lot of new students so come and welcome them to Rutgers.

Event: ISAC Social Hour
Date: Friday, August 26, 2011
Time: 5:00 pm
Venue: GSL, College Ave

Facebook Announcement: https://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=239034922806867

Rutgers 101

NJTransit - Yes you can escape NB

In the fall we want to offer a new way for students to experience Rutgers and its surroundings. We understand that a large number of new graduate students have different challenges while being at the university. One of these challenges is getting around. We would like to help empower new students by offering guided trips to different places (The Malls, Sights and Sounds in New Brunswick/Highland Park/Piscataway/Princeton). These trips would not be the same as GSA trips where one pays and gets a chartered bus or van but would be a way to introduce students to using public transport and smashing that stereotype that makes students feel isolated while at Rutgers.

If you have ideas for us for places to go, things to do that are accessible (or could be accessible) for students using the public transport system please do notify us.

If you would also like to assist in setting up these trips email isac@gsa.rutgers.edu

Orientation

Our first social hour is at the end of orientation week (26th August). This social hour will have a lot of new Graduate students so we encourage you veterans of our institution to come and join us next Friday and meet the new students. There might be students from your department/country or who share the same interests as you.

Recycle Drive

Our second social hour will be on the 2nd of September. This social hour will also be our anual recycle drive. Yes Recycle drive is not really the right word but it captures the spirit. Bring in and drop off your old/unused stationery/kitchen/household/other items and we’ll offer it to others at the ISAC Social Hour.

We all know how bare our apartments were in the first few months at the University. We also know that we have collected a lot of useful things that we no longer use and we could give to others who would appreciate more. That’s what the recycle drive is all about. We will announce next week where and where you can drop off items that we will then make available on the 2nd of September.

ISAC Recycles (Fall cleaning, the other Spring cleaning)