Java bound
I'm off for the next 10 days to Indonesia!! I'll try to post a few things here when I can, but I'm not planning on spending anytime in internet cafes. I'm flying to Jakarta tonight and the plan is to leave the city as fast as possible and go to Yogyakarta to see two of the largest Hindu and Buddist structures, and also one of the more active volcanes if I can. Then I don't really know where I'm off to, but hopefully somewhere good! Watch here for any updates. See you on the other side. Peace!
Posted by Evan at 11:10 PM
my new temporary home
About two weeks ago I was forced to move out of my place (PGP) and into a new residence across campus. I am now sharing a very small room with Guillaume from Versailles (France), and so far it's been quite fun. I've never really shared a room before so it was a little weird at first but now it is quite fun! Our residence is really nice too. It's right on the edge of some jungle so there are lots of trees, birds and lizards around. The place sort of has a bungalow vibe to it too! The only drawback is, since my room is open air and you can't fully close the windows, there are a lot of mosquitoes and bugs, which can really suck some nights. Here are some pictures of the place!...
This is my building, one of 5. I am on the top left.
Here is the pathway leading to my building. It's nice to walk in the mornings and at night when all the animals are out.
The door to my room and the cool tree in the courtyard. I just wish the tree was close enough to climb down.
This is where my internet comes from! It's amazing the connection is reliable. If you look closely you can see some self patch jobs someone did.
Posted by Evan at 6:58 PM
leaving on a jetplane...
I bought my ticket to Jakarta today. $258 sing after all the hidden taxes. I guess you can call it a self birthday present. Leaving this Friday and coming back August 7th. So far the plans are just to go there and take whatever trains/buses I can across Java. Should be fun!...
Posted by Evan at 11:19 PM
da lab...
In case any of you are interested I thought I would post some pictures of where I work. Here are 2 of my experiment. It is basically a mess of wires and tubes, plus a bunch of computers that I get to play with.
The main component of the setup:
This is the other side of my work area:
I'll spare you the explanation of all the junk in the pictures! What I am working on is the characterization of adsorption properties of a number of materials which can be used to make giant cooling facilities or what my boss is working on in the other lab, a super-CPU cooler for military computers! So basically I just measure stuff at different temperatures and pressures with the Thermogravimetric analysis machine. It sounds boring (and often is!) but it is actually a lot more complicated that it appears on the surface. There are a lot of modeling equations with really crazy derivations that I tend to stay away from as much as possible. And yes I use each of those 3 computers everyday! The first one is for controlling the TGA machine, the second is for a datalogger and monitoring the equiptment, and the third is for internet! Anyways, that has been my job for the past 3 months and I'll be a little relieved when it's over!
On another note lets have a look at what Samson does all day at work!
Posted by Evan at 9:16 PM
breaking his own record!
Well it looks like Lance was won yet another Tour de France. With only 3 flat stages and a time trial left before the cruise into Paris I don't think anyone can make up the lead he has. If he does win this years race I would have to say that this was quite a boring tour: so far he hasn't won a single stage nor done any really impressive attacks. Oh well, I guess he is still the best out there and could ride anyone into the ground!
Posted by Evan at 7:02 PM
Not quite "the beach", but close
Beach bums, banana pancakes, bikini girls, mellow music, white sand and sunburnt white guys....that basically sums up this past weekend. We took a quick trip up to Northern Malaysia to get a glimpse of what island life is like, and so far I like it! The Perhentian islands are said to be among the top 10 tropical islands and I can see why. They're cheap, beautiful and oh so fun. But this is not a sales pitch...
Friday night we (not the Wu-5, nor the PGP-five, but what I like to call the dysfunctional-5: me, Samson, Lisa, Misha & Raina) took the bus across the border into Malaysia and caught a night train. The first thing I noticed about the trains in Malaysia was they are nothing like even the crappier ones in Europe. The inside of our train was nice enough (actually not bad at all), but it was the train ride itself that stood below the rest. Despite leaving right on time we arrived 15 hours later at our destination - somehow during the night we managed to get a whole 4 hours behind schedule! And you think I would have noticed an extended stop given that after taking three (3!) gravols I would have been able to fall asleep at 4am, even with all the violent motions. Sacadevan told me today that the train track is in such bad shape because it was laid by Japanese controlled slaves in WW2 and has not been replaced since! A few times the train swayed so bad I smacked my head on the side of the train! But the ride wasn't that bad, it was actually kind of fun in a way in some sick and twisted way, like being on a super long roller coaster if you will.
Me and Lisa on the train:
Finally we arrived in Tanah Merah (red earth) at 1pm and paid some guy with a van 40RM to drive us the hour to the coast. Pulling up to Tok Bali (near Kuala Besut) wasn't anything like your typical dock in Asia, there were so many Europeans around I felt like I was somewhere in Scandinavia. Then after an hour boat ride we arrived at the island in the pouring rain:( Then the race was on between all the backpackers to find the last remaining acommodation. We walked up and down the beach practically elbow to elbow with the other backpackers trying to find a place to stay, but every place was full up! One place sympathetically accepted us in their 'dorm' since our other option was sleeping on the beach, but they had a water shortage so gave us the condition of staying there if we didn't take a shower and used the bathrooms of the other restaurants. We tentatively accepted and went on one last search for a place to crash. It was the last place I would have thought to have looked that offered us a room - a more upscale hotel type place at the other end of the beach. We gladly took a room with 6 beds for a modest 250RM.
Our hotel, Hotel Bubu:
So after that ordeal was over we didn't do much Saturday. Went for a swim in the bathtub warm water and had some delicious food at a restaurant that played some weird ethno-techno and way too much Jack Johnson. The waiters were super laid back, almost to the point where they took a nap before bringing us our food. All of the Bob Marley posters in the place must have an impression on them.
This is the restaurant where we ate most of our meals:
Sunday can basically be summed up by: eat, swim, nap, swim, eat, boat, taxi, eat, train. Nothing too exciting here except that the water was amazing! The sand was white and super soft and the water was so crystal clear you could see forever underwater. I spent the afternoon swimming and playing with the millions of tropical fish. There were so many around you could just stick out your arm and touch a few of them. Some of them even thought my arm might be food and poked me with their mouth for a taste.
View of the beach from our hotel:
Raina, Lisa & Samson eating lunch:
Another shot of the beach:
After getting sufficiently burnt it was time to leave the island. First we had to take the small boat shown here out to the slightly larger speed boat for the fun bumpy ride to the mainland.
Misha and Raina getting in the boat:
Travelling back home was straight forward enough. Our night train to Johor Bahru was only 1 hour late this time and we arrived in Singapore at 11am Monday, just in time to move a few things before we had to meet with Javed Iqbal.
All in all a wicked weekend, although a little on the short side. Would I go there again? Definitely. Well maybe not there, but some other tropical island, perhaps one in Thailand (going to Phuket in August!). We didn't really have enough time there to get settled in or meet many people, but I think I may like the tropical island vibe. I think I would have to be there for about a week to really enjoy myself, but no time for that on this trip. Month long trip to Thailand in the future perhaps??...
And as always there are a bunch of pics in the
gallery here!
Posted by Evan at 8:53 AM
et je suis allé...
Well it looks like I have my housing situation sorted out afterall!! I got an email from the Rez people this afternoon saying I can stay in another residence across campus (talk about last minute!). It's basically like moving from Totem to Gage, and it doesn't sound too bad either. It works out to about $30 cheaper a week but it looks like I am sharing the room with some French guy?!?! Could be interesting. (Good thing I am not Kung, lest I get jailed for attempted sodomizing French nationals)
I am just leaving now to hop on a night train to the Malaysia/Thailand border and then tomorrow we are heading to the Perhentian Islands in Malaysia for a weekend of sun and sand and not much else. The islands are rated amongst the best tropical islands in the world so it should be fun! The only catch is beer is hard to come by as it is in a very Muslim state.
I am hoping to get lots of rest this weekend because Monday doesn't sound so pleasant. We get back Monday morning, hopefully before noon, then I have to clean and check out of my room, book it across campus with all of my junk (still haven't figured this one out), check in, and then go meet Dr. Iqbal for a meeting at 2:30!! But I am going to try and NOT think about this all weekend! See ya later....
Posted by Evan at 2:58 AM
And the countdown begins...
Edit: I think I may have a place to stay afterall, but not 100% sure. I should be getting an email today from another residence across campus. We'll have to wait and see....Number of days until I am officially homeless in Singapore:
3
Posted by Evan at 11:00 PM
Billy with red hair?
In case you haven't heard, Billy is thinking of dying his hair red, FIRE-ENGINE-RED!! Now if you know me you'd know that I did in fact try this once upon a time, and to queer results. I ended up with flaming pink hair for all of two days before I dyed it burgundy. But that's just me.
I think Billy, on the other hand, would look just smashing with bright red hair! But the scary thing is Billy would turn into some sort of chameleon, after half a beer he would look like a giant pilon!
Here's what I think Billy would look like with red hair....Thoughts??
Posted by Evan at 8:40 AM
Rain, rain go away...
Oh how it rains here somedays. It's been raining for almost a week with thunderously loud thunder storms and spine-tingling lightening everyday. And when the rain comes down it's not kidding around. I got COMPLETELY soaked just running across a street from cover to cover the other day.
It's not a problem though as you can basically walk around the city without getting wet. There are covered walkways almost everywhere. For example, I can walk from my dorm, to the bus stop, take the metro, and then walk around downtown all day, all under the cover of at least a tin roof! And when you are downtown you don't even have to go outside other than the odd occasion where there is only a (covered) walkway to cross the street to yet another maze of a mall.
I also stumbled across a new invention in the world of malls: slanted floors, eliminating the need to ever take the stairs or elevator again! The whole mall basically spiraled up from the ground floor.
Posted by Evan at 6:18 AM
Where I Live(d)
Today I had to go in to work and meet my boss as he flew in from Japan so there is not much going on today. I tried going for a run but almost died in the 41 degree apparent heat! So I just walked around taking some pictures of where I currently live, just in case all 4 of you people reading this page are interesting in seeing it! I am living in the massive Prince George Park Residences here, which has about 3000 rooms in towers all over the place. It is actually quite nice but sure isolates the students. Every cluster of 15 rooms is doubly locked behind steel doors so you can't even go and visit your friends randomly if you want to. Let me take you on a quick tour of the place...
This is part of the front of the complex. It's just too big and curvy to fit the whole thing in. A few towers are still behind me and even more are to the right. Then there are a ton in behind, anyways....
These are the main steps leading down from the bus stop. Everyone walks up and down these everyday.
After the steps you can either head left or right. This is to the right, and just basically leads to more dorms. The main food court/caf where we eat everyday is behind the plants on the right.
Continuing this exciting tour, you can also take a left and go to the store! My room is at the very bottom left of the picture. I am on the inside of the building with my window facing a lovely courtyard that amplifies absolutely every minute sound.
On the other side of the towers in the last pic is the other food court and a lovely pond filled with giant goldfish.
Behind the residence there are basketball courts and an exercise area. And behind that there is a forest/jungle no one dares to enter!
Now for what you have all been waiting for, my room itself! Sorry but I didn't bother to clean it up for the pic, sweaty clothes are hanging everywhere because of my run (and yes those are my boxers hanging over the courtyard!)
If you are still with me and are possibly wondering why I titled this post with a live(d) well you'll have to wait. I am basically getting kicked out of here in only one week because of some administrative error that they "appologized" for. I'll write more on that later once I get things sorted out, hopefully soon!
Posted by Evan at 2:34 AM
mmm chili Crab
Tonight Samson, Lisa and I met with some people from Taiwan Lisa sort of knows (long story:p) and headed over to the east coast seafood centre for some delicious eats as part of the Singapore Food Festival. We had some chilly Crab, Sea Cucumber, and a heaping plate of baby squid!! It was quite good albeit quite expensive.
Some of the restaurants at the seafood centre:
The beach and tons of ships just hanging off shore. The little bits of land you can (can't?) see are Indonesia! (ok sorry, bad pic at this size. If you blow it up you can see land and ships)
The group: Danny, Samson, Shanice, Lisa und ich.
Posted by Evan at 9:01 AM
Everyone knows that Americans generally don't have the greatest reputation around the world, mostly due to actions of their government and "red" states. This has driven some of our Southern friends to resort to measures extreme as dressing up like a Canadian whilst abroad just to prevent any sort of political hassle. I know very few Americans do this, but I think I saw one in Cologne last year! You may have seen this last year, when some company started offering "
Going Canadian kits"! Now I don't hate Americans at all, but if I saw one wearing this I would be pretty pissed off. There is just something wrong about faking your Nationality at the expense of another's. Well now there is another product out there so Americans can dissolve political ties with their motherland, the "
American Traveler International Apology Shirt."
Posted by Evan at 2:38 AM
Go NUS Go!
Today was the Singapore Dragon Boat festival, a national and international event bringing people from all over to compete and cheer for their teams. But the big race of the day was between the two rival universities here in Singapore: NUS and NTU.
I signed up for the NUS cheer squad, along with a whopping 1000 others, but only about 500 showed up. We spent they day learning the school song and cheers, and just getting warmed up for the days events.
Lernin' the school song:
TeamNUS Canadian contingent:
Then everyone piled into about a dozen buses for the ride to the marina. To make a long day sound short we basically spent 4 hours cheering at the side of the water as the boats raced by.
There was also a running race and cheerleading competitions all day long.
Other than the national teams there were a few other countries racing. Australia took the win, followed by Germany and then CANADA(!!!!!) in third. I think Hong Kong got 4th but can't remember the rest. All I can say is that the Australian racers were sure huge guys! Also, due to an IOC convention next weekend there were a bunch of IOC members in attendance!
The most anticipated race of the day was the Prime Minister's Challenge Trophy, in which the defending champion NUS went on to cream the inferior NTU yet again!! (I guess the rivalry is much like UBC and SFU, but more heated) But due to "friendly sportsmanship rules" we weren't allowed to boo or heckle the NTU team or supporters:(
TeamNUS taking the win!
The cheers they made us learn were something else. Some of them didn't sound right if you didn't say them with a Singlish accent or like an old Chinese lady. And about every second one had "NUS is the best" in it, so it got old after a while! To top it off the school song was just impossible to sing, it sounded like a church song because it required you to sing way too high. Here's a sample of the stuff they got us to chant.
NUS is here
Let's make it clear
Step aside for the best
'Coz this is our year
and,
North! South! East! West! Who's the best?
NUS will beat the rest!
NUS!
But all in all it was such a wicked day. And afterwards we headed into town to go to a food festival event: food from the '60s!
Check out more of the photos in the gallery
here!
Posted by Evan at 7:44 AM
arrrr, Malaysia, the land of pirates
Today Samson, Lisa and myself went across the causeway into Johor Bahru for the day to go shopping! We walked around the city for a while before hitting the malls. JB is quite a contrast from sterile Singapore. It is a lot dirtier and more chaos like, what a true asian city should feel like, and I like it!
It seems like everything there is pirated, and they are not afraid to admit it. There are still many legit name brand chains where you can buy the real deal for about the same inflated price as back home. But the more interesting ones are the regular clothing stores that carry "name brands". They sure fooled me a few times into thinking I was getting a screaming deal but when I asked them if it was a fake they just replied with "yes, it imitation" and a friendly smile! This is definitely not like in Italy, where Pisa's 'affrican traders' assure you that the 10 Euro Rolexes they are selling are indeed authentic. So I ended up buying a bunch of shirts and some shoes. I picked up some decent looking DCs for about $25cdn!! The first ones I tried on I actually broke when I pulled on the lace, but there was no way in hell I was going to pay for them! I also got some pirated DVDs for about $2 each! It's amazing the lengths they go to make the DVDs look real. I got a War of the Worlds DVD and it's still in theatres. The case and menu look real, and it is complete with subtitles and sound options, but the thing still looks like a cam! They also had a movie that I guess wasn't released in North America...."American Pie 4", which looked like a cheesy porno.
Posted by Evan at 7:14 AM
A Bunch Of Rejects
Tomorrow we are going to go into Malaysia for the day and try to find some cheap clothes! This is our favorite store in Johor Bahru, you can get stuff for 10-20% of what you pay in Canada!!
Posted by Evan at 4:15 AM
