I finally have both and internet connection and some spare time to give you all an update! Granted, the spare time is mostly because I'm still waking up earlier than needed, but at least I was able to sleep for most of last night.
I last left off when we were in Chicago, so I'll start from there.
The flight from Chicago to Beijing was not bad at all, it actually did not seem that long. One of the first things that we were greeted with when we got off at the airport was a group of about 30 cleaning ladies ready to clean the airplane up after us. Going through customs was not that bad, and before we knew it we were in a taxi on the way to campus.
I am extremely glad that I do not have to drive at all in Beijing. The taxi ride from the airport to the university was extremely scary. Our driver did not seem that bad, but people do the craziest things while driving. We saw cars stopping in the middle of two lanes on the highway, using the shoulder (which generally had people riding bicycles on it) to pass people, and just generally disregarding all road markings. I think we were glad to finally get to campus, where, although there is still some crazy traffic, it is generally not as bad.
Most of the rest of my first day here consisted of sleeping, which meant that I woke up at around 2 in the morning on Thursday. Tony and I got breakfast around 6, and then since no one else was up we wandered around campus for a while and saw No Name Lake and the water tower.
Thursday was our first day of class, and we got to meet our other 30 classmates from PKU. We have groups of three (one PSU student and two PKU students per group) for one of the class projects, so we got to meet our group members. I only met one of mine, and since the other one was not there, we "joined" another group to form a super group. I don't think we will be able to keep the super group, but it was nice to get to know more than just the one person in my group.
Class on the first day was interesting, and I can definitely tell that the schoolwork will not be easy. I definitely wish that I had at least some introduction to partial differential equations (I have only taken ordinary differential equations, which is the easier kind), since Professor Liu (from PKU, he is teaching the first part of the course) jumped right into the heat and wave equations, which I have never learned much about. Fortunately, it wasn't all impossible to understand, since a lot of what he was doing involved calculus, which I am more comfortable with.
After class, Professor Liu at lunch with us and the took us on a tour around campus. The campus is beautiful, especially the northern part where No Name Lake is. There are a lot of small ponds, secluded paths, and beautiful traditional buildings. I put pictures from this tour up on Facebook, and I will be putting them on my Freewebs page soon for those who don't have Facebook.
EDIT: Pictures are now up on http://picasaweb.google.com/sag5060 and will hopefully soon be joined by more
Thursday night we went with several of our PKU classmates off campus to the mall(s), where some of us got cheap local phones in order to communicate with each other while we are here. We went to several different buildings before we found what we were looking for, and each one was very different. There are some places that are more like malls you would find in the US, and then some that were like massive flea markets for electronics and other things.
While at the mall, we also went to McDonalds, which was a little odd. I have definitely never had a spicy cheeseburger before. I think I'll stick to real Chinese food, which has been very good so far.
Another post will be coming soon about our trip to the Great Wall, but right now I need to get ready for class (we wouldn't normally have class on Saturday, but we need to make up the class we missed from having our flight delayed)
Thursday, June 26, 2008
Monday, June 23, 2008
Huh? We're where?
Well, it's the end of a long day of travel, and I'm finally in our hotel in.....Chicago? What? Shouldn't I be flying over Russia right about now?
I most certainly should, and I would be except for some "aircraft maintenance" issues. They said something about an indicator light that wouldn't go out, so we waited in the plane for a while without air conditioning as they checked things out. It got so hot that they first opened the rear escape hatches (prompting Wei, one of my fellow travelers, to later tell her boyfriend that we parachuted out said escape hatches), and then they eventually let us off the airplane. We waited for another couple of hours before they moved the flight to tomorrow morning.
So, for now, the airline gave us all hotel vouchers. I may have to wear these clothes for three days instead of the expected two, but at least I get to sleep in a bed and not on an airport bench.
We should be (fingers crossed) getting to Beijing at around 11 am Wednesday, just as our first class will be ending. We are all hoping that they will at least give us the rest of the day off to get adjusted and probably catch up on sleep.
And now, I'm going to bed despite the fact that it's only 8:30 (Chicago time). My dad would be proud
I most certainly should, and I would be except for some "aircraft maintenance" issues. They said something about an indicator light that wouldn't go out, so we waited in the plane for a while without air conditioning as they checked things out. It got so hot that they first opened the rear escape hatches (prompting Wei, one of my fellow travelers, to later tell her boyfriend that we parachuted out said escape hatches), and then they eventually let us off the airplane. We waited for another couple of hours before they moved the flight to tomorrow morning.
So, for now, the airline gave us all hotel vouchers. I may have to wear these clothes for three days instead of the expected two, but at least I get to sleep in a bed and not on an airport bench.
We should be (fingers crossed) getting to Beijing at around 11 am Wednesday, just as our first class will be ending. We are all hoping that they will at least give us the rest of the day off to get adjusted and probably catch up on sleep.
And now, I'm going to bed despite the fact that it's only 8:30 (Chicago time). My dad would be proud
Sunday, June 22, 2008
Leavin' On a Jet Plane...
Just a quick update for today. While I do enjoy distracting myself, I really should be packing right now. I think I have almost everything I will need to take, so now it's just a matter of organizing things, along with tackling some more laundry.
I'll be leaving the house tomorrow (Monday) morning at around 4:30 am, to fly out of Philly at 9. From Philadelphia, we go to Chicago, which hopefully won't be as bad as the last time I flew internationally through there (on the way back from Germany our plane to Harrisburg was delayed for 4 hours on the runway, making me get home at one in the morning on my birthday).
The flight from Chicago to Beijing will most likely be over some pretty interesting places, including a large chunk of Canada, the Arctic Ocean, and Russia (maybe even a little of Mongolia). I don't know why, but for quite a while I pictured flying due west over the Pacific Ocean, but that would be a much longer route. Apparently I turn the aerospace engineering and related subjects parts of my brain off over the summer.
In other news, my mom and I saw a baby penguin in our back yard on Friday. Alright, it wasn't actually a baby penguin, but whatever type of bird it was, it looked a lot like one. It was sort of sitting on its tail in very penguinesque fashion.
Time to go continue packing, and avoid other distractions such as the books I just got from the library (you can tell it's been too long since you've been to the library when they have to give you a bag to carry everything out).
I'll be leaving the house tomorrow (Monday) morning at around 4:30 am, to fly out of Philly at 9. From Philadelphia, we go to Chicago, which hopefully won't be as bad as the last time I flew internationally through there (on the way back from Germany our plane to Harrisburg was delayed for 4 hours on the runway, making me get home at one in the morning on my birthday).
The flight from Chicago to Beijing will most likely be over some pretty interesting places, including a large chunk of Canada, the Arctic Ocean, and Russia (maybe even a little of Mongolia). I don't know why, but for quite a while I pictured flying due west over the Pacific Ocean, but that would be a much longer route. Apparently I turn the aerospace engineering and related subjects parts of my brain off over the summer.
In other news, my mom and I saw a baby penguin in our back yard on Friday. Alright, it wasn't actually a baby penguin, but whatever type of bird it was, it looked a lot like one. It was sort of sitting on its tail in very penguinesque fashion.
Time to go continue packing, and avoid other distractions such as the books I just got from the library (you can tell it's been too long since you've been to the library when they have to give you a bag to carry everything out).
Friday, June 6, 2008
Just Around the Corner
It's hard to believe, but I leave in just over two weeks for Beijing. I remember last summer going by very quickly, and this summer, with my work at the lab split into two by this trip, will be no different. I have a couple more things to look forward to before leaving, such as visiting my brother in DC for the first time in a while, one more trip to State College to see all the folks who were in Jordan during my last visit, and trying to make at least some progress at work before leaving.
Oddly enough, at this point the main thing I'm worrying about is not the strange new culture I will be finding myself a temporary part of, it's the math I'll be doing. I have a couple of assignments from the spring portion of the class that have been sitting next to my desk at work leering at me for the past few weeks. Since high school I have always enjoyed math and felt fairly confident about my math abilities, but I am definitely feeling out of my element. Here's our "schedule," which clarifies these feelings of uncertainty a little bit more:
Until next time
Oddly enough, at this point the main thing I'm worrying about is not the strange new culture I will be finding myself a temporary part of, it's the math I'll be doing. I have a couple of assignments from the spring portion of the class that have been sitting next to my desk at work leering at me for the past few weeks. Since high school I have always enjoyed math and felt fairly confident about my math abilities, but I am definitely feeling out of my element. Here's our "schedule," which clarifies these feelings of uncertainty a little bit more:
June 24: Student Arrival
June 25: Morning: Orientation
Afternoon: Two-point boundary value problem: General solutions and Green's functions
(2.1.1, 2.1.2) By Prof. Chun Liu.
June 26: Smoothness and Maximum principle
(2.1.3, 6.1) By Prof. Chun Liu
June 27: Culture activity
June 30: Two-dimensional elliptic equation: general solutions in a rectangular domain
(7.1, 7.2.1) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 1: Maximum principle
(6.4) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 2: One-dimensional parabolic equation: general solutions
(3.2,3,3) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 3: Finite difference method for elliptic equations
(2.2) By Xiantao Li
July 4: Maximum principle and convergence of the finite difference methods
(2.3) By Xiantao Li
July 7: Finite difference method for two-dimensional elliptic equations
(7.5) By Xiantao Li
July 8: Error estimate of the finite difference method
(7.6) By Xiantao Li
July 9: Finite difference method for parabolic equations
(4.1) By Xiantao Li
July 10: Stability analysis of the finite difference methods
(4.3, 4.5) By Xiantao Li
July 11: Implicit methods
(4.4) By Xiantao Li
July 14: Truncation error
(10.3) By Prof. Zhiping Li
July 15: Convergence analysis
(10.3) By Prof. Zhiping Li
July 16: Numerical method for 2D parabolic equations
(5.1)
July 17: Culture activities
July 18: Students departure
Somewhere in there we also have a final.
Doubts aside, I am definitely beginning to get excited. The class will be PKU students as well as PSU, so I will hopefully have a good opportunity to improve my Chinese as well as meet plenty of new people. I have also been working on my German in case I have to fall back on my "pretend I speak only German and Chinese to get people to talk to me in Chinese" plan. I have a fair amount of things left to do, such as getting an outlet converter and some software I will need, as well as making a t-shirt that says " 你认识他吗? " (Do you know him?) accompanied by a picture of Brian. I probably won't get around to that last one, but I still think it would be fun to test Brian's theory that everyone in China knows and loves him.
June 25: Morning: Orientation
Afternoon: Two-point boundary value problem: General solutions and Green's functions
(2.1.1, 2.1.2) By Prof. Chun Liu.
June 26: Smoothness and Maximum principle
(2.1.3, 6.1) By Prof. Chun Liu
June 27: Culture activity
June 30: Two-dimensional elliptic equation: general solutions in a rectangular domain
(7.1, 7.2.1) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 1: Maximum principle
(6.4) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 2: One-dimensional parabolic equation: general solutions
(3.2,3,3) By Prof. Chun Liu
July 3: Finite difference method for elliptic equations
(2.2) By Xiantao Li
July 4: Maximum principle and convergence of the finite difference methods
(2.3) By Xiantao Li
July 7: Finite difference method for two-dimensional elliptic equations
(7.5) By Xiantao Li
July 8: Error estimate of the finite difference method
(7.6) By Xiantao Li
July 9: Finite difference method for parabolic equations
(4.1) By Xiantao Li
July 10: Stability analysis of the finite difference methods
(4.3, 4.5) By Xiantao Li
July 11: Implicit methods
(4.4) By Xiantao Li
July 14: Truncation error
(10.3) By Prof. Zhiping Li
July 15: Convergence analysis
(10.3) By Prof. Zhiping Li
July 16: Numerical method for 2D parabolic equations
(5.1)
July 17: Culture activities
July 18: Students departure
Somewhere in there we also have a final.
Doubts aside, I am definitely beginning to get excited. The class will be PKU students as well as PSU, so I will hopefully have a good opportunity to improve my Chinese as well as meet plenty of new people. I have also been working on my German in case I have to fall back on my "pretend I speak only German and Chinese to get people to talk to me in Chinese" plan. I have a fair amount of things left to do, such as getting an outlet converter and some software I will need, as well as making a t-shirt that says " 你认识他吗? " (Do you know him?) accompanied by a picture of Brian. I probably won't get around to that last one, but I still think it would be fun to test Brian's theory that everyone in China knows and loves him.
Until next time
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