Yale 2.0: Pizza Tour NYC 2007
Text
1/ Food connects people. Back in 2007, Vladimir Coho, YC’99, brought together a group of strangers to eat at all the finest pizza places in New York. This documents what happened at the last stop — Franny’s.
2/ Once upon a time, before Facebook’s public debut, a few schools, including Yale, were chosen to test the platform. Yalies had a dedicated digital hub at yale.facebook.com, where Vladimir Coho once held an event, now lost to the digital ether.
Event
- Name: Pizza Tour NYC
- Tagline: for friends and family
- Host: Vladimir Coho
- Type: Other - Carnival
- Date: Wednesday, November 21, 2007
- Time: 10:00am - 10:00pm
- Location: NYC
- City/Town: New York, NY
- Purpose: Tour some of the best Pizza in NYC. Now that I’m on the West Coast, this is a very important “keeping it real” event for me. I mustn’t forget what real pizza tastes like. Seattle’s pie sucks, for the most part.
Pizza Restaurants
- Rose & Joe's Bakery (31st St near Ditmars Blvd, Astoria)
- Rosario's (31st St near Ditmars Blvd, Astoria)
- Joe’s (7 Carmine Street, West Village)
- Grandaisy Bakery (73 Sullivan St., SoHo)
- Lombardi’s (32 Spring St., SoHo)
- Luzzo's (1st Ave. & 12th St.)
- Fornino (187 Bedford Ave., Brooklyn)
- Franny’s (295 Flatbush Ave., Prospect Heights, Brooklyn)
3/ Photographing meals has become a staple in the era of social media, a trend that persists unwaveringly. Sometimes, I wonder whether chefs intentionally serve dishes piping hot, ensuring they retain their warmth even after the ritual of snapping pictures is complete.
4/ Dr Sam + SML (aka me)
5/ Venessa, who served us at Franny’s, handled our antics with grace and a smile!
6/ The chef at Franny’s — I have long held the idea that people who are passionate about their work always look exceptionally attractive. Here’s a living example.
7/ My favorite photo of the night. This would be perfect as a spread in a magazine.
8/ I prefer photos of the waiter taking our order instead of the receipt, as it feels more personal and humanizes the experience.
9/ Whenever I dine out, I make a point to photograph the menu. Remembering the options available can offer insight into our decision-making for the dishes we selected.
14/ Studying of the menu. Hyper focus mode.
End notes
I always carry my camera everywhere I go. I don’t remember things very well, so I like to keep a visual record of things that happened. In some ways, it might not be a coincidence that I spent 4 years working as the Photo Editor at The Yale Herald. After college, I continued to do photojournalism on my own — documenting things that I find interesting. Some of them will occasionally get picked up by major news media outlets, mainly because I publish many of my photographs via Creative Commons.
I believe that important ideas often lack the necessary coverage, but they need to be seen by people. So I photograph and post them everywhere on social media, with the goal to give a voice to those who are marginalized often due to bigotry and prejudice.
- Canon EOS 10D
- Canon EF 17-40 f/4L
This set of photographs are “All rights reserved” because of the people in them. I learned the difficult lesson that because of how Creative Commons work, sometimes even the best intention can result in the worst possible situation, so I no longer license any photographs featuring people under CCBY.
Copyright 2007 See-ming Lee / SML Photography / SML Universe Limited