Anderkoo » Cambridge

WBUR supports Fair Trade

Gene Koo — Wed, 11 Feb 2009 13:44:43 +0000

This year’s WBUR annual Valentine’s Day fundraiser features Fair Trade flowers from Winston Flowers! This means that both workers and the planet are treated right.

Find out more about the Flower Label and Transfair Fair Trade Certified flowers.

Winston Flowers

Donate now to WBUR and support local news.

January thaw… again

Gene Koo — Tue, 08 Jan 2008 19:22:34 +0000

For three years running now, we’ve had a crazy January thaw here in New England. I’m looking out the window, and it’s 67 degrees outside. It was funny the first time (two years ago), but this is downright freaky. I’ve been in Boston since 1993, and this is not normal weather for this area. Maybe it’s El Niño… or maybe it’s the end of the world.

Smaht Cahs in Hahvahd Squaih

Gene Koo — Thu, 05 Jul 2007 00:48:50 +0000

smart cars are coming to the USA in 2008, and we got a preview last weekend in Harvard Square. These are the perfect vehicles for urbanites and, if their egos can deal with it, suburbanites too. For families with kids, the fortwo would make a good second car, since there’s only two front seats.

Photo album (Facebook)

Test drive video blip.tv)

HLS Block Partay

Gene Koo — Sun, 24 Jun 2007 19:35:45 +0000

This past weekend, Harvard Law School hauled three houses out of the way for new campus construction. My colleagues at Berkman took particular interest in the move, as Berkman occupied Baker House for a few years.

HLS houses move (Phil Malone)
HLS houses move (Erica George)

I like how as the day progressed, more people showed up to watch the spectacle. Sadly, I was out of town when all of this happened… looked like beautiful weather for a block party!

at Play

Gene Koo — Fri, 13 Oct 2006 23:09:39 +0000

Walking home tonight I passed the usual traffic knot on Western Ave, just south of Central Square. The motorists there were working themselves up to the usual froth of honking, frustration venting as sound like steam in a kettle. But something happened as I listened — at some point the honking stopped and was replaced by a tap-tap on the horn. Another horn answered, tap-tap-tap. And back and forth it went, a rhythmic song played, not shouted.

Moonrise / Sunset

Gene Koo — Sat, 07 Oct 2006 00:36:45 +0000

I haven’t even gotten around to uploading our vacation pics from Aug-Sep, but here’s some I snapped tonight while biking home from Newton. The first is taken from the Lars-Anderson Bridge over the Charles River: Moonrise over Leverett House, with crane:

The second is taken from the Western Ave Bridge, looking towards Allston:

Here comes Frosty (the other one)!

Gene Koo — Sat, 21 Jan 2006 20:32:08 +0000

As a typical immigrant trying zealously to fit in with the natives, I have embraced Boston’s love of ice cream in all seasons; in fact, I love the idea of walking around with a cone on days when the air is colder than the ice cream itself. This, however, is the first time I’ve ever seen an ice cream truck rolling around in the middle of January in Boston, and I confess that I ran out the door shoelaces untied when I heard the tinkle of “The Entertainer” at about 4pm this afternoon. And like the other neighborhood kids, got me some ice cream.

Then the Frosty drove away, thumpety thump thump.

House: Demolished

Gene Koo — Tue, 25 Oct 2005 04:24:59 +0000

Well, the house is gone with only the basement left to mark its passing. That, and some poor laborer’s partially severed leg…

Apparently, on Friday morning, one of the laborers taking apart the
house cut his leg badly with a saw (this, I admit, is hearsay from the
neighbors). This picture taken on Thursday morning (you can still see
the first floor in the background) shows one of the men hard at work,
perhaps with that very same saw. Although I had only worked briefly on
a crew in NY, this still doesn’t look like the right way to take apart
boarding, although it does look like a good way to lose a limb. Another picture of this guy seems to have him smoking, dust mask out of the way.

At the time, my boss in NY didn’t spring for OSHA-certified dust
masks, though to be fair, few or none of the laborers seemed to want
them (or any masks, unless there was heavy demolition going on) because
they made it hard to breathe. This series of pictures showed that a lot
of these laborers don’t care for the masks either, except perhaps as an
anti-fashion statement.

Tearing Down the House

Gene Koo — Thu, 20 Oct 2005 15:24:42 +0000

Right before our vacation we received a letter in an envelope with
the words “Demolition Notice” on it that appeared mildly threatening.
Upon inspection it turned out to be a legitimate notice that the house
behind us would be demolished in the upcoming week. I was somewhat
disappointed to be missing this demolition, as I had visions in my head
a giant, cartoon wrecking-ball taking down the building.

The weeks came and went, with no demolition, until yesterday morning,
when a small crew of laborers starting having at it. By 9am they had
stripped away the second story, and when I got home there was only the basic frame of the first story left.

This
morning I think the crew will finish demolishing the first floor, and
by the time I get home I suspect there will only be the bare bones of
the building’s basement. Too bad I can’t make a video of the process
and speed it up to make it look like ants swarming over a carcass.

The bad news (?) is that I can longer eat breakfast in my underwear,
as the folks from the street behind us will be able to look straight
into our kitchen!

Alice Wolf serves ice cream to Riverside

Gene Koo — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 00:27:09 +0000

Our state rep, Alice Wolf,
came by the Putnam Gardens Community Center across the street from our
apartment yesterday to chat it up with her constituents and serve up
some mean ice cream (donated by Toscanini’s). She was accompanied by her interns and staff (who are fortunately much better with their digital cameras than I!).

It was a great chance to meet a lot of our neighbors and local activists, including candidate for city council Lawrence Adkins
(at left in picture). Rachel and I kicked around, hung out with our
next-door-neighbor Susan, and met some of our other neigbors for the
first time (sadly, since we’ve been there for almost 3 years!). The
neighborhood needs more of these events to bring everyone together.