A Year Lived Fully: A Condensed Story of 2016 in Images

So I am rushing a last 2016 post before 2016 actually goes, quite inspired from a post the great cogdog Alan Levine just did… ‘Twas an unbelievable year, 2016. The good thing, great! The bad ones, terrible, including a bad flu that grabbed breadth from Hilda and me just during Christmas week. The students this year were great, and they produced the best blogs ever, to be shown in a next post. If I weren’t that lazy, I’d have done it a month ago. Three groups of students also won prizes for videos on the Internet for the Internet Society.

I did 35 posts in 2016, that is one every two weeks. Too little, now that we ought to reclaim and defend the Web. Yes, I fell into apathy with Twitter and other networks, but I participated a lot with my classes and students. That was a lot of fun.

So, 2016 began in Rincón, under the tropical sun with the four of us.

Rincón, Puerto Rico

Then came Alan for a month-long stay at Sagrado, where we had a wonderful time sharing the Inf115 course and his genius “Una foto cada día” activity, cloned from the famed ds106 assignment bank. I cannot thank Alan enough for the great inspiration and time together. I have suspicion he had some good time himself!

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The two big events of 2016 were our daughters’ graduations, of course. Chiara graduated from Syracuse University with a hard-earned BS in Biology and we went to upstate NY to share a little with her, her friends and environment. We saw her house, her neighborhood, her workplace at one cafeteria, where she was loved and commended by fellow workers.

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On our way back to NYC we stayed at the famous “quirky, art-focused” Carlton Arms Hotel, a place close to Madison Square Park, where everything is made and decorated by the artists who have been living there. Great place, if spartan–and cheap.

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In NYC, we had the luck to savor a wonderful meal at one of my favorite restaurants, the Hundred Acres, down in the Village. Spring menu, fantastic!

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At B&N of course, I bought a copy of this book, just to have with me. It would serve me well during the rest of the year!

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We also spent one night in Pennsylvania on the route from Syracuse: that was when we learned that we’d actually cross this state in mid NY. It was a nice stay, and of course we were so happy and proud for Chiara.

Younger daughter Flavia (on the right here, with friend Gaby) graduated from High School later, and she felt so adult, having just marked her 18th year!

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So, mission accomplished, in one sense, but still a long road to go.

During the summer nobody made a move: Chiara was studying, Flavia partying and I kept sort of going to my office to begin working on the STEMmED project’s end that was closing in fast.

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Flavia continued to do her dance and theater pieces, better and better. I kept on with my culinary passion (here a home-made roman Tomato Stuffed with rice, one of the delicacies of Rome’s ubiquitous rosticcerie).

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And now, since autumn, the STEMmED project is over, and we’ll soon complete its final report. As the last hours of this year come and go, I am enjoying a tranquil time with the family, here in San Juan, and recovering from the flu. Just want to thank friends and foes who helped make this a very non-conforming one!

[All photos taken and shared by moi meme. Please use according to CC-license BY-SA-NC]

[Featured photo–also by me– is of baby turtles being rescued by specialized personnel from a beach in eastern Puerto Rico. We were amazed and speechless witnessing the experience.]

Baby turtles being rescued on the beach.

Baby turtles being rescued on the beach.

About Antonio Vantaggiato

Professor, web2.0 enthusiast, and didactic chef.
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