I finally reached another milestone in my education and in my life. I graduated with honors from New York University with a 3.813 GPA. Quite an accomplishment from someone who last graduated from Cornell University back in 2010. I was a lot of hard work and one big balancing act of time but I walked across the stage of Radio City Music Hall with the energy and enthusiasm of any undergraduate.

You can read my blog on “Grad Alley” a few days before the Graduation Ceremony:

Day Three Hundred and Seven Attending ‘Grad Alley’: My last event student event before Graduation from NYU May 14th, 2024

Myself after the ceremony outside Radio City Music Hall.

The blog on me getting accepted to NYU in 2022:

https://wordpress.com/post/mywalkinmanhattan.com/26556

I came a long way from the first meeting I had at the college back in October of 2019. I had visited Georgetown University the summer before and realized that it was not for me. When I got the email from New York University in the Summer of 2019 I thought, let me check this out. It is closer to home and I would be going to school in Manhattan and Greenwich Village to boot. It turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made.

Before the Graduation Ceremony began.

The graduates settling in for the start of Graduation.

As a returning college student (I am not going to lie, this is my fifth time to college and this is the fifth college I have graduated from), I was a little intimidated by my classmates at first. I did not know what a Google Doc or a Google Slide was the first day of class. I did not even bring my computer into the class the first (I knew better from that day on) and was still using my 3G flip phone (which got a lot of chuckles from my classmates). I also was older than everyone by over twenty years but with that comes years of work experience, travel and knowledge of the ever changing Hospitality industry that keeps evolving and will continue to in the future.

Justin before the start of the ceremony.

I got up to speed really quick with a new iPhone 13 Pro (whose picture and video taking ability has transformed this blog) and a new HP computer and watched many Google YouTube videos to keep me up to speed. By the end of the first semester, I was an old pro at all of these functions and for the first time in my life got straight “A”s in my classes. It was a long time in coming that I had to prove this to myself. And at New York University no doubt (NYU).

The theater filling up with students and parents.

It had been a long journey over the last year and a half. Running in and out of New York City for classes in between my job at Bergen Community College. Countless late nights writing papers, researching subject matter and trips to libraries on both campuses to finish projects. This on top of working on Executive Boards for the Fire Department and Men’s Association in town, volunteer work that I do and squeezing in blogging on seven sites. There were times I almost had to pull an ‘all nighter’.

The stage before we started the graduation.

The video of the organist before the ceremony started:

What I found over that year and a half was a whole new way of looking at the Hospitality industry. I had never really thought about Sustainable tourism, Dark tourism, LGBTQ tourism and Diversity in tourism. I had never categorized it in the sense it was different things to different people. My professors had their way of teaching it and I had my own and going forward I used both when creating projects and my own expectations from my students. They gave me a different perspective of looking at the way a place could market itself and I took it one step further and asked of my students how can small towns and musty historical sites be made unique and interesting by marketing them in a different way. Break the mold of what they were doing and present it in a format that they might not have thought of in that light.

The NYU Bagpipers opening the ceremony.

Video of the Bagpipers entering Radio City Music Hall:

What really opened my eyes were the three GFI (Global Field Intensification) courses that I was able to experience. On my first meeting with my faculty advisor, he told me that he was planning a trip to Prague for a week and then insisted that I must come on it. He kept going and going until I finally said “yes”. I knew nothing about Prague or really where it was located. I kept thinking it was in Russia. Two Professors decided to do back to back GFI’s, the first one going to Paris and the second to Prague. Since my brother was getting married in Sicily, it gave me an excuse to go on both. It opened my eyes to a different world that changed me.

Our Dean welcoming the graduates and their parents and guests.

Paris is a more amazing city than I could have imagined. As intense and cultural as New York City but in a totally different way. The countless independent shops, restaurants, cafes and flea markets opened my eyes to a city not overrun by chain stores and each neighborhood had its own cultural identity. Every day it was a new adventure or trying new restaurants or experiencing new foods served in a way that I had not seen in the States. Since it was a Culinary Tourism class, I had to lead a tour of gourmet shops, bakeries, chocolate and candy shops and the gourmet department of a department store. I had never been to Paris before, knew nothing about the city and had not spoken the language since the 1980’s (I had three years of high school French). Somehow I charmed enough shop owners with my broken French to welcome my class in to try their products. It was a huge success (Google “Exploring Paris Block by Block”) for the details on the trip.

My blogs on “Exploring Paris Block by Block”:

https://mywalkinmanhattan.com/category/exploring-paris-block-by-block/

The ceremony was about two hours and most of that was calling names of graduates.

Then off to Prague for another wonderful experience exploring the history, food and culturally delights in the city. We visited all the touristy spots you would normally see on the tour but our tour guide, Jana, really had us exploring the city from a different perspective from someone who lived in all these areas. Everyday we experienced something new and in the time that I got to explore the city on my own, I walked the entire city as I would in Manhattan and got to pass all the local shops and restaurants and experience things as a local would living in Prague.

My blogs on “Exploring Prague Block by Block”:

https://mywalkinmanhattan.com/category/exploring-prague-block-by-block/

The Faculty applauding us when we all graduated.

Then it was off to Abu Dhabi and Dubai during their Winter tourism season and that was a true eye opener. It was like going home as I discovered my Arabic roots (though they are about 400 years old and through my mother’s Sicilian heritage). All the men looked like me and that made me feel more at home. Though we had a pretty tight schedule again seeing all the sites that are popular with tourists, I had to stay an extra day because of the flights and got to explore Abu Dhabi on my own.

When the ceremony was over we were all applauded.

Me crossing the stage to finally graduate from Graduate School:

I walked the entire part of my neighborhood around the hotel and discovered the more localized view of the city through the eyes of the Omens, Saudis, Indians and other ethnic groups that made up the majority of the population that make this city run. I walked through their neighborhoods and visited their shops, restaurants, bakeries and stores and saw the city through their eyes. This was the city that I wanted to experience. That and a flat tire coming back from Al Ain left us eating at a local ‘hole in the wall’ restaurant where the site for thirty American students shocked the restaurant owner who could not believe that he had a full restaurant on a quiet Tuesday night. These were the experiences that I got in classes at NYU.

My blogs on “Exploring Abu Dhabi and Dubai Block by Block”:

https://mywalkinmanhattan.com/category/exploring-abu-dhabi-block-by-block/

We finally graduated from NYU!

As we all prepared for the excitement of graduating, I thought back to my first day of class and arriving on the NYU campus right before Labor Day weekend and having no clue what to expect. I have a clearer idea now how the world ticks and how much I had been exposed to in such a short period of time. My Professor who had taken us to Paris was now leading a class over the summer to Barcelona and I really wanted to stay to experience that as well.

The end of the ceremony at 6:00pm.

When all of the students and parents took their seats, the ceremony started on time at 4:00pm. We were greeted by the Radio City Music Hall organ player who made his appearance and then disappeared behind a wall. Then came the NYU Bagpipers who opened the ceremony for us. This was followed by a speech by our Assistant Provost and then by our Dean of our College for the School of Professional Studies.

In the hallway of Radio City Music Hall after graduation.

Then we had to endure the one thing I hate, the student speech. I have sat through countless junior high, high school and now five colleges of students saying things like “life long friendships” and “what we learned from the past will carry us into the future” and ” the people who influence us”. I have heard this same speech over and over again that I could have memorized it and bet on what she was going to talk about. I bet by the time the ceremony was over, everyone was going to part ways and many of my classmates would be traveling back to the countries they originally came from and run their tourism boards. I did not know too many of my classmates who were going to stay in New York City.

Me after graduation was over and Radio City orchestra seating had emptied out.

Then we walked on stage row by row and they called our names over the loud speaker so that family and friends could see us walk on stage. I was so thrilled to hear my name and that a got a nice applause. I was not sure that anyone noticed me as I crossed the stage. This made me feel like a million dollars. I could not believe that I had graduated from such an exclusive college like NYU and with honors. That was quite the achievement for me.

Maricel and I in Radio City Music Hall before the usher kicked us out.

As the rows and rows of classmates made their way to the stage and walked on and off, I looked behind me to see people leaving the theater before the ceremony was over. I thought it was wrong for people to not wait until all the graduates to finish but I will be honest. The second the last classmate crossed the stage, the music started, the confetti and streamers came down and then they wanted us out of there. There was a show that night and they needed to clean up. I wasn’t even out of the orchestra seating before the usher was asking us to leave so they could clean up.

One last shot when the usher turned her back for a second.

Me talking to my friend, Reema, after the ceremony.

We were able to snap some pictures before we left when the usher’s back was turned and then we had to leave. They closed the doors behind us and then the ushers kept everyone off the stairs and everyone had to leave the hallway so there was quite the crowd just outside the door. I bet the show in the evening went off without a hitch.

The end of the ceremony.

While we were outside, Maricel and I took lots of pictures around Radio City Music Hall and then finally had to go across the street because the crowds outside got to be too big as more people had to leave the entrance to the theater and make their way out to the street. It was packed with graduates and their families either taking pictures or trying to cross the street. There was grid lock for about a half hour.

Leaving Radio City Music Hall after graduation.

Outside Radio City Music Hall.

All the graduates and their family and friends had taken over Sixth Avenue and we were all over the place taking pictures. Funny enough with all the time I had been spending in the Times Square/Theater District for my blog on the Streets of Times Square, I got to know all the buildings quite well and we made our way over to 1251 Sixth Avenue to take pictures before heading back over to the hotel.

Me in front of 1251 Sixth Avenue. No one paying that much attention to us. We decided to have some fun with it.

Me as the worldly graduate.

Having some fun by the fountain.

Having some fun at graduation.

Maricel wanted to take more pictures so we went to Times Square with the other tourists but we took one more picture in front of Radio City Music Hall before we left.

My best friend, Maricel and I outside Radio City Music Hall after graduation.

We went to the TKT Booth Stairs where everyone in Times Square was hanging out and complete strangers were wishing me congratulations and well wishing me in my future. That felt really good and I appreciated it.

Me having some fun in Times Square and the ladies below were cheering me on and wishing me well in my graduation from college.

After all the picture taking (trust me there are dozens more shots of me all over Times Square), we headed back to the Marriott Marquis. I had made plans so that we would be having dinner at the Broadway Lounge, their signature restaurant, for graduation night. The views and the food are always amazing. This is where Maricel and I eat when each of us has a very special occasion in our lives.

The Marriott Marquis at 1535 Broadway

https://www.marriott.com/en-us/hotels/nycmq-new-york-marriott-marquis/overview/

My review on TripAdvisor:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Hotel_Review-g60763-d93507-Reviews-New_York_Marriott_Marquis-New_York_City_New_York.html?m=19905

What a wonderful dinner. The food and the views at the restaurant are just spectacular and the service is always very nice. We had to practically barge our way to a window table when the host gave our first table away. I had to calm a manager down when we took the second table. I had to explain that it was my graduation dinner and my friend wanted to be sure I had a window table. After that, he was fine with it.

The Broadway Lounge Graduation night.

https://www.broadwaylounge.nyc/

My review on TripAdvisor:

https://www.tripadvisor.com/Restaurant_Review-g60763-d1465849-Reviews-Broadway_Lounge-New_York_City_New_York.html?m=19905

While we were ordering we were taking pictures of the restaurant and then each other. Now that graduation was behind me, we could have a little fun and be silly. It was such a great meal.

Then we had dinner. The Broadway Lounge on the Eighth floor of the Marriott Marquis has always been a favorite place of mine to go for dinner for a special occasion. The views are amazing and the food wonderful.

The view from the Broadway Lounge window.

We had the most amazing Graduation meal once we were seated. We started with their fiery Chicken Tenders which was a pretty generous portion for an appetizer. These lightly breaded chicken breast tenders were rolled in a hot pepper and spicy sauce and served with creamy Italian dressing.

Ryan’s Spicy Chicken: The fiery Chicken Tender with a ranch sauce

I was in the mood for a burger and Marriott does such a nice job with these. Both the regular burger and the Smashburger are excellent, and I decided on the Smashburger while Maricel had the short ribs and mashed potatoes.

The Short Ribs and Mashed Potatoes

The Broadway Smash Hit burger with French Fries

For dessert we shared the ultimate dessert treat, the Strawberry Tower, which is layers of pound cake, fresh strawberries and vanilla ice cream and strawberry sauce topped with fresh whipped cream, cheesecake bites, wafer cookies and a giant lollypop which tasted like bubblegum. With a $32.00, it was a little pricy but since it was my graduation night it was the perfect way to end the meal and it was delicious.

The Marquis Strawberry Tower at the Broadway Lounge for my Graduation dessert.

Me getting a photo op with that delicious dessert.

When I got back to the room was the ultimate surprise for me. Maricel decorated the room for my graduation. I was shocked and touched that she got this done in between the time we had arrived to check in and the time I left to get to Radio City for the 3:00pm check in for graduation. I was so touched. No one had done something like this to me before.

Maricel surprised me by decorating the room for my graduation.

The room at the hotel decorated for my graduation.

Me on my graduation night at the hotel in the room decorated for me by my best friend.

The video of Maricel surprising me:

Earlier this year I had watched Cliff Richards duetting with a ghostly Olivia Newton-John after her passing for a Christmas video singing “Suddenly” from the movie Xanadu. In part of the video, I watched Olivia Newton-John wheel a cake out for his 75th birthday and totally surprising him in an earlier video. I said to myself “that is something only a real true friend does” and wished someone would do that for me in my lifetime. Maricel did this that night. When a real friend knows what you are going through and has the opportunity to react, it makes all the difference in the world to someone. Tonight, it was me!

With the beautiful views from the room of Times Square and having the ultimate view of where the ball drops directly in front of us, I could not have asked for a more perfect graduation night. I had had different experiences on the nights of my high school, Michigan State University and Culinary Institute of America graduations but this is the one I will always remember. When a friend shows you the ‘top of the world’, you could not ask for more.

The view of Times Square from our room and the famous ‘ball’.

The view of the ‘ball’ from Times Square.

The view of the room at night.

The view of Times Square from our room where the ball drops.

The next morning the Breakfast buffet was absolutely the best way to end the evening. The food was excellent and the selection was wonderful. We were able to eat Club M, the private members room that was nice. It was the perfect breakfast.

The amazing breakfast buffet the next morning.

The amazing breakfast the next morning.

The breakfast buffet was very extensive.

It was an amazing graduation and now on to new experiences to see and new ideas to embark on. It has been quite the journey.

Justin Watrel, Graduate Class of 2024 School of Professional Studies New York University with Honors.

What a true friend does:

Cliff Richards and the late Olivia Newton-John “Suddenly”.

Watch as she rolls out the 75th birthday cake for him for his ’75th Year Concert’. A real friend can only pull this off!