Scuola

School Exchange – NYC February 2017

Benedetta Di Cesare |

From 4th to 24th February, I and other third-year high school students (Marta Nizzo, Benedetta Coccia and Giorgia Candreva) went on exchange to the Convent of the Sacred Heart of New York. Sacred Heart in New York is a single-sex school (just for girls) attended by students since kindergarten. It is really close to the Guggenheim Museum. 

New York

New York is one of the most famous cities in the United States. Located at the southern tip of the state of New York, the city is the center of the New York metropolitan aera, one of the most populous urban agglomerations in the world. A global power city, it is also called  Big Apple. Moreover, New York City is the most densely populated major city in the United States: it is the cultural and financial capital of the world. New York is divided into 5 areas: Manhattan, Bronx, Queens, Brooklyn e Staten Island. One of the most important symbols of the city is the Statue of Liberty. The statue, a gift from the people of France to the people of the United States, was designed by French sculptor Frédéric Auguste Bartholdi and built by Gustave Eiffel. The statue was dedicated on October 28, 1886. The Statue of Liberty is a robed female figure representing Libertas, the Roman goddess. She holds a torch above her head, and in her left arm she carries a tabula ansata inscribed “July 4, 1776”, the date of the American Declaration of Independence. A broken chain lies at her feet. The statue became an icon of freedom and of the United States and was a welcoming sight to immigrants arriving from abroad. It is close to the river Hudson and it’s 93 meters tall. The seven spikes on the crown represent the seven seas and the seven continents in the world, indicating the universal idea of freedom. However, the Statue is not the only monument in the city! Other places of interest in New York are the Empire State Building, the famous art-deco building, Central Park, the big park in Manhattan, Times Square or Madison Square Garden.

Snow Storm

On February 10, 2017, a snow storm hit the eastern side of the States, reaching New York, Boston and Philadelphia. The snow storm has arrived after a day of hot weather of more or less 17 degrees. It began during the night. Almost 3000 flights were canceled, and the majority of schools and public offices were closed. The snow storm brought almost 30 centimeters of snow. To rescue the population, almost 2.400 people were working, with 690 gritters. During this snow storm, one man died: his name was Miguel Gonzales, he was 59 years old. He was a doorkeeper of the Upper East Side district of Manhattan. He died while he was shoveling the snow. Because of the slippery ground, he fell against a glass window and he died for the injuries on the neck and on his face.