O'Neal-Freemans in NYC: Chinatown, NYC: Photo class, taking a dose of Asia to lighten my culture shock to the U.S.

I took a photo class, with the fun women's group "Mice at Play" in Chinatown. We started off at Nom Wah Tea Parlor below, which they say has great dim sum. It's tucked away on a lesser traveled alleyway in the very overcrowded streets of Chinatown. This free-wheeling class was great at helping me continue my SLR photography, which the blog and Asia inspired me to finally start, and to be more brave with turning off the automatic settings, and use some trial and error with the manual settings. These are some of the products below of my class. This class was a necessary mental respite for me from what I found to be a very stressful unpacking and move back into our Brooklyn home.

Only in NYC. This zoot-suited man drove his vintage car, which had been parked right in front of a hidden speakeasy, like in the good ole NYC prohibition days.

The speakeasy entrance, hidden right next to Nom Wah Tea Parlor

The speakeasy bar

Us cougars lingered our cameras over our speakeasy bartender prey, perhaps a bit too long

Chinatown funghi

I loved peeling these egg shell-like rinds off these Asian fruit all over Southeast Asia

Chinese kids, expected to hang out while their parents work. True all over Asia. No over-scheduled after school activity-filled days for these kids. Maybe math tutoring, though.

Oh, what memories for me! These are the Chinese New Year Moon cakes, here at a Chinatown bakery in anticipation of Chinese New Year. Most Chinese sit down with their friends all over the world and share a cake or two. I would sit down and eat an entire cake myself. My Chinese-Malaysian friend gave me my first moon cakes in Malaysia, saying she didn't buy me the moon cakes with egg inside since she thought my Western palate couldn't handle it. Well, I showed her by ordered the egg cake right away in Chinatown!