(no subject)
Today was a rest day. Physics only starts on mondays, ending on fridays when the institute opens. We spent the morning at a nature reserve called Eloda. Its main feature is this deep gorge. There were a pretty large bunch of kayakers paddling on the river when we were there.
After walking (they call it hiking) around for most of the morning, we headed to some pavilion where they had some chef to do some barbeque. The lunch provided was excellent. To be honest, I've never tasted sausages and chicken barbequed so well.
In the early part of the afternoon, we spent hte time playing a variety of sports on a field in the reserve.
Next, upon the request of some of the group, they dropped us at the local shopping mall for the rest of the afternoon.
Overall, the day was pretty nice. But the most significant take away for me was probably observations of human interactions. By this time, cliques have naturally formed. First, there is a split by gender. The group consists of about 40% females. The girls are generally one large bunch. The african girls, 2 of them, are quite left out of the group tho. The guys however are quite fragmented. The east europeans generally keep to themselves, not even speaking to each other. The other group is the canadians. The quality defining this group is their rowdy nature. They seem thoroughly unacademic.
Finally, the third group consists of an assortment of lamers from all over. This consists of a China born Canadian, a Brazilian, a Romanian, an American, and of course the Singaporean. The canadian guy seems particularly itneresting to me. He comes across as particularly sharp and hence intelligent, however, he claims not to have much knowledge of physics. The romanian has a nice independent, bohemian air about him. The american knows his politics well. We spent the entire time in the mall, not shopping of course as there was nothing unique and nothing cheap, but discussing random political stuff. For which, the american was taking most of the brunt of the pounding.
It seems to me that the fate of the girls who are not physically attractive has been rather uneviable. Generally, I have observed that generally, the guys do not attempt to interact with the unattractive females. The unattractive ones also seem to have a generally lack of confidence and hence do not attempt to approach anyone. However, they are taken under the wing of the lead females, due to what i suspect, is a certain sisterhood which females pride themselves on. It is itneresting to note that the girls here, to slight surprise on my part, also do lame things. They spend their time on the bus "bonding" by singing lame tunes with accompanying actions, also skipping the normal intros which the guys are still struggling to complete, they have plunged right into ascertaining each others opinion on whether the colour of the bus is nice (its just a normal schoolbus-yellow fyi), or whether angelina jolie, and related people, is attractive or not.
Generally, this group of people are imo as diverse as tehre can be. The only thing in common being that everyone speaks ratehr good english. This was surprising to me as i expected the east europeans or south americans to be unable to speak good english. Besides this, the balance of geek vs punk is good. For every reclusive geek-like person, theres his/her antithesis at the pool table laming away. However, equally interesting is the way the different groups interact with each other. They do so with a certain mutual reverence for which i cannot fully/ will not due to lack of space, describe here.
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After dinner and stuff.
Was talking with the american guy over dinner. (They got 30 pizzas for us -.-) Apparently he has taught himself partial differential equations, topology, abstract algebra, some form of non euclidean geometry (exact nature i cannot recall). In other words his math is godlike, not godlike in the olympiad way which chen speaks so much nad highly of, btu rahter in the content way, which i think is equally impressive. Buti think its safe to assume one would only go into abstract algebra after going into linear algebra. This puts him in good stead to enter GR, QM and basically all of physics. He says hes still working on Maxwell's EM equations, so maybe he only has a conceptual understanding of the stuff. Sigh, I only i had worked harder in the past 2 years, i might have been close behind.
upon closer inspection of some of the math notes they handed out, I have come to realise that Shi zhiming's elegent proof of some complex no. relation that Dr Yeo and us were examining, is simply a switch to phasor notation. Apparently it is a very common technique when dealing with complex no.s. So his proof wasnt all that imba after all. he merely knew one step beyond us.
Also, the guys have really begun to bond at the table tennis table. Some german dude is owning. But it is only at the table tennis table that the East europeans loosen up. I am eager to view their skills for myself. (not table tennis, physics/math/intellect) The girls have also begun to mix about more. It is interesting to see how just a few hours can make such a large difference to the social landscape.
After walking (they call it hiking) around for most of the morning, we headed to some pavilion where they had some chef to do some barbeque. The lunch provided was excellent. To be honest, I've never tasted sausages and chicken barbequed so well.
In the early part of the afternoon, we spent hte time playing a variety of sports on a field in the reserve.
Next, upon the request of some of the group, they dropped us at the local shopping mall for the rest of the afternoon.
Overall, the day was pretty nice. But the most significant take away for me was probably observations of human interactions. By this time, cliques have naturally formed. First, there is a split by gender. The group consists of about 40% females. The girls are generally one large bunch. The african girls, 2 of them, are quite left out of the group tho. The guys however are quite fragmented. The east europeans generally keep to themselves, not even speaking to each other. The other group is the canadians. The quality defining this group is their rowdy nature. They seem thoroughly unacademic.
Finally, the third group consists of an assortment of lamers from all over. This consists of a China born Canadian, a Brazilian, a Romanian, an American, and of course the Singaporean. The canadian guy seems particularly itneresting to me. He comes across as particularly sharp and hence intelligent, however, he claims not to have much knowledge of physics. The romanian has a nice independent, bohemian air about him. The american knows his politics well. We spent the entire time in the mall, not shopping of course as there was nothing unique and nothing cheap, but discussing random political stuff. For which, the american was taking most of the brunt of the pounding.
It seems to me that the fate of the girls who are not physically attractive has been rather uneviable. Generally, I have observed that generally, the guys do not attempt to interact with the unattractive females. The unattractive ones also seem to have a generally lack of confidence and hence do not attempt to approach anyone. However, they are taken under the wing of the lead females, due to what i suspect, is a certain sisterhood which females pride themselves on. It is itneresting to note that the girls here, to slight surprise on my part, also do lame things. They spend their time on the bus "bonding" by singing lame tunes with accompanying actions, also skipping the normal intros which the guys are still struggling to complete, they have plunged right into ascertaining each others opinion on whether the colour of the bus is nice (its just a normal schoolbus-yellow fyi), or whether angelina jolie, and related people, is attractive or not.
Generally, this group of people are imo as diverse as tehre can be. The only thing in common being that everyone speaks ratehr good english. This was surprising to me as i expected the east europeans or south americans to be unable to speak good english. Besides this, the balance of geek vs punk is good. For every reclusive geek-like person, theres his/her antithesis at the pool table laming away. However, equally interesting is the way the different groups interact with each other. They do so with a certain mutual reverence for which i cannot fully/ will not due to lack of space, describe here.
--------------------------------
After dinner and stuff.
Was talking with the american guy over dinner. (They got 30 pizzas for us -.-) Apparently he has taught himself partial differential equations, topology, abstract algebra, some form of non euclidean geometry (exact nature i cannot recall). In other words his math is godlike, not godlike in the olympiad way which chen speaks so much nad highly of, btu rahter in the content way, which i think is equally impressive. Buti think its safe to assume one would only go into abstract algebra after going into linear algebra. This puts him in good stead to enter GR, QM and basically all of physics. He says hes still working on Maxwell's EM equations, so maybe he only has a conceptual understanding of the stuff. Sigh, I only i had worked harder in the past 2 years, i might have been close behind.
upon closer inspection of some of the math notes they handed out, I have come to realise that Shi zhiming's elegent proof of some complex no. relation that Dr Yeo and us were examining, is simply a switch to phasor notation. Apparently it is a very common technique when dealing with complex no.s. So his proof wasnt all that imba after all. he merely knew one step beyond us.
Also, the guys have really begun to bond at the table tennis table. Some german dude is owning. But it is only at the table tennis table that the East europeans loosen up. I am eager to view their skills for myself. (not table tennis, physics/math/intellect) The girls have also begun to mix about more. It is interesting to see how just a few hours can make such a large difference to the social landscape.