Tuesday, January 19, 2010
Life
Things are going great. I am looking forward to going back to China. I have so much to decide and to plan.
Sunday, July 26, 2009
Week 7
This is going to be a short post. I continued doing research. I have been making steady progress with my reactions and I have improved some of the reaction schemes. I spend almost all my time trying to complete my reactions, so that is pretty much my week 7.
Saturday, July 18, 2009
Week 6
I traveled to Shanghai this week. I really liked Shanghai, but I did not like the hot and humid weather. I went to The Shanghai Museum which had a lot of relics from various parts of China's history. I also walked around Shanghai and I saw the Pearl Tower and the two tallest buildings in Shanghai. I met one of my friends who was in Shanghai and she showed me the traditional Shanghai. I had some amazing traditional Shanghai dishes. One dish was a noodle soup that had raw egg dumped into the water, which was instantly cooked by the very hot water. I also had rice that was cooked inside of bamboo. I also went to the Shanghai Beach. The beach was one of the best parts of my trip. The water was warm and clean and the beach was clean. I had to pay to go inside the beach, but it was definitely worth it. The Shanghai beach was much better than the Qingdao beach that I had gone to. I also ate with some of my friend's friends. I went to my friend's friends parents house to have dinner. It was really fun and the food was great. I was really happy that I was able to eat dinner with them because everyone was so nice.
I also went to Hanzhou. Hanzhou was very pretty. It has a beautiful lake called West Lake. I spent most of the day at the lake, enjoying the mountains by the lake. I walked around the lake and enjoyed the beautiful weather. After enjoying the lake, I walked around the city with people from the program. We saw a Ferrari store and we went in and talked to the people inside. The signs said no touching and no pictures of the cars but we managed to convince the people to let us take a few pictures. I really liked Hanzhou. It was very pretty and relaxing.
I also did research during the week. I am still doing a ton of reactions and purifications. I am really enjoying the experience.
I also went to Hanzhou. Hanzhou was very pretty. It has a beautiful lake called West Lake. I spent most of the day at the lake, enjoying the mountains by the lake. I walked around the lake and enjoyed the beautiful weather. After enjoying the lake, I walked around the city with people from the program. We saw a Ferrari store and we went in and talked to the people inside. The signs said no touching and no pictures of the cars but we managed to convince the people to let us take a few pictures. I really liked Hanzhou. It was very pretty and relaxing.
I also did research during the week. I am still doing a ton of reactions and purifications. I am really enjoying the experience.
Monday, July 6, 2009
Week 5
Well, I have reached the halfway point of the program. My body is finally acclimated to the Beijing weather! I spent most of my week in the lab. The highlight of the week was the group dinner with my research group. We had group meeting on the same day. This was not too exciting because it was four hours of presentations in Chinese. After the meeting, my professor drove us to the restaurant for our group dinner. Everyone from our lab was there. It was a lot of fun and the food was really good. I got to pick the food that I wanted to eat and then I grilled it on a grill in the middle of the table. Overall, I think this week was great because I felt good and I felt comfortable with the progress that I made in the lab.
Tuesday, June 30, 2009
Week 4 Second Part
This week I took a vacation to go to the coastal city of Qingdao. I was lucky that my graduate student understands that I want to do research, but I also want to explore China. He gave me an extra day off, so that I could spend more time in Qingdao. He is amazing and I am glad that he is so understanding.
We decided to take the train to Qingdao. The trip was about six hours. We had soft seats, so the trip was not too bad. When we got to Qingdao, we had to find our hostel. We asked around until we were able to locate our hostel. Some of our group arrived earlier in the week, so we spent most of the night trying to find them. We eventually found them and we talked to them about the plans for the next day. After we made our plans, we all went to bed. I had a little trouble sleeping but eventually I fell asleep.
The next day we went to the beach. There are multiple beaches in Qingdao, so we started at the furthest one and walked all the way down to the first beach. We climbed a lot of rocky islands on our trip to the first beach. Climbing the islands was a lot of fun. The scenes were also very pretty. We saw a lot of couples taking wedding pictures by the sea. It was pretty funny because apparently they were carting around all of these people that were getting married in a bus and then dropping them off on the beach to take pictures for their wedding.
We stopped at one of the beaches. We went swimming for a while. I thought the water was going to be really cold, but once we got into the water, it was not too bad. After we were done swimming, we hung out at the beach for a while and then we continued to walk towards beach one. We thought we were taking the correct path to get to beach one, but we accidentally kept taking paths that led us into peninsulas. So we would have to back track to the original path. It was really fun because we did it more than once, and we never realized it until we would get to a point where we could not go any further. We saw some of our friends at another beach and we stayed and talked to them for a while. I did not seem them initially, and I thought that the person who saw them was mistaken, but then I looked and in the middle of the beach was another group that had come to Qingdao separately. After we talked to them, it was getting late so we went to dinner. We went to a very good seafood place that was located on beer street. It is called beer street because it is located on the same street as the brewery. After dinner, we were pretty tired from spending the day at the beach, so we went home and slept.
The next day we went to the Qingdao beer factory. It was fun but I thought maybe at the end we would get to try all of the different types of beer, but that did not happen. We did get to see the old brewery and the brewery that they currently use to make beer. After we saw the brewery, we went to the beach and some of the group went on boats that had bikes in the middle that paddled the boat through the water. We hung out at the beach for a while and then we went to an open market where some of the group bought kites. We spent the rest of the afternoon trying to fly the kites. We got all of the kites to fly except one, but that one required some skill because it had two strings instead of one that controlled the steering.
Eventually we went back to the hostel and got our stuff. We went to the train station and headed back home. We had hard seats on the way back home. We knew this may be uncomfortable, but it was fairly cheap so we got them. Unfortunately they were really uncomfortable and my entire body was sore after riding on the train for nine hours because we decided to take a slower train. I probably will not do that again. It was a fun experience and I had fun in Qingdao. That pretty much wraps up my vacation in Qingdao.
We decided to take the train to Qingdao. The trip was about six hours. We had soft seats, so the trip was not too bad. When we got to Qingdao, we had to find our hostel. We asked around until we were able to locate our hostel. Some of our group arrived earlier in the week, so we spent most of the night trying to find them. We eventually found them and we talked to them about the plans for the next day. After we made our plans, we all went to bed. I had a little trouble sleeping but eventually I fell asleep.
The next day we went to the beach. There are multiple beaches in Qingdao, so we started at the furthest one and walked all the way down to the first beach. We climbed a lot of rocky islands on our trip to the first beach. Climbing the islands was a lot of fun. The scenes were also very pretty. We saw a lot of couples taking wedding pictures by the sea. It was pretty funny because apparently they were carting around all of these people that were getting married in a bus and then dropping them off on the beach to take pictures for their wedding.
We stopped at one of the beaches. We went swimming for a while. I thought the water was going to be really cold, but once we got into the water, it was not too bad. After we were done swimming, we hung out at the beach for a while and then we continued to walk towards beach one. We thought we were taking the correct path to get to beach one, but we accidentally kept taking paths that led us into peninsulas. So we would have to back track to the original path. It was really fun because we did it more than once, and we never realized it until we would get to a point where we could not go any further. We saw some of our friends at another beach and we stayed and talked to them for a while. I did not seem them initially, and I thought that the person who saw them was mistaken, but then I looked and in the middle of the beach was another group that had come to Qingdao separately. After we talked to them, it was getting late so we went to dinner. We went to a very good seafood place that was located on beer street. It is called beer street because it is located on the same street as the brewery. After dinner, we were pretty tired from spending the day at the beach, so we went home and slept.
The next day we went to the Qingdao beer factory. It was fun but I thought maybe at the end we would get to try all of the different types of beer, but that did not happen. We did get to see the old brewery and the brewery that they currently use to make beer. After we saw the brewery, we went to the beach and some of the group went on boats that had bikes in the middle that paddled the boat through the water. We hung out at the beach for a while and then we went to an open market where some of the group bought kites. We spent the rest of the afternoon trying to fly the kites. We got all of the kites to fly except one, but that one required some skill because it had two strings instead of one that controlled the steering.
Eventually we went back to the hostel and got our stuff. We went to the train station and headed back home. We had hard seats on the way back home. We knew this may be uncomfortable, but it was fairly cheap so we got them. Unfortunately they were really uncomfortable and my entire body was sore after riding on the train for nine hours because we decided to take a slower train. I probably will not do that again. It was a fun experience and I had fun in Qingdao. That pretty much wraps up my vacation in Qingdao.
Week 4
This week was a little more eventful than last week. I continued doing reactions in my lab. My reactions have worked so far, which is good and bad. It is nice that I am getting the expected product but this also means more work. Since I am getting the correct products, I get the opportunity to scale my reaction up. This means that I will get a lot more product, which means I have to spend more time on the reaction and purifying the product. So now my reactions take a lot longer.
I decided to go with some people from the program to Qingdao which is a coastal city known for its famous beer. The night before I left, I got a very unpleasant surprise. I was doing my reactions, when my graduate student came in and told me that he had spilled a chemical on his hand and he had to go to the hospital. Well I was expecting him to leave, but then he started explaining to me the things that I needed to do. I told him I knew what I had to do, but he seriously needed to get to the hospital. It was funny that he was going to take the time to explain things to me, while he has this chemical on his hand. I knew what I needed to do and I was just worried about him getting to the hospital. So he left and I was by myself again, which is not too troubling because nearly done for the day and I normally have some sort of autonomy while I work.
After I was done cleaning, I went to go to the student room to grab my stuff. It was locked, which is not so good. I had my things in the student room, but I do not have a key for it. So now I am pretty sure that I am alone without anybody that has a key. I go back to the lab and contemplate my options. I really did not want to leave without my stuff and I also did not want to leave the lab because it would be unlocked. While I was pondering, another student that I had seen before came into the lab. He asked me where was my graduate student. I told him what happened and then I asked if he had a key. But he did not. Well back to square one I guess, but then he said he could call one of the graduate students. I thought they all went home, but lucky one was downstairs doing analysis of compounds. She came and I told her what happened and she came and unlocked the door to the student room and I was able to get my stuff. This is a long post so I will stop here and the next update will have the details on my trip to Qingdao.
I decided to go with some people from the program to Qingdao which is a coastal city known for its famous beer. The night before I left, I got a very unpleasant surprise. I was doing my reactions, when my graduate student came in and told me that he had spilled a chemical on his hand and he had to go to the hospital. Well I was expecting him to leave, but then he started explaining to me the things that I needed to do. I told him I knew what I had to do, but he seriously needed to get to the hospital. It was funny that he was going to take the time to explain things to me, while he has this chemical on his hand. I knew what I needed to do and I was just worried about him getting to the hospital. So he left and I was by myself again, which is not too troubling because nearly done for the day and I normally have some sort of autonomy while I work.
After I was done cleaning, I went to go to the student room to grab my stuff. It was locked, which is not so good. I had my things in the student room, but I do not have a key for it. So now I am pretty sure that I am alone without anybody that has a key. I go back to the lab and contemplate my options. I really did not want to leave without my stuff and I also did not want to leave the lab because it would be unlocked. While I was pondering, another student that I had seen before came into the lab. He asked me where was my graduate student. I told him what happened and then I asked if he had a key. But he did not. Well back to square one I guess, but then he said he could call one of the graduate students. I thought they all went home, but lucky one was downstairs doing analysis of compounds. She came and I told her what happened and she came and unlocked the door to the student room and I was able to get my stuff. This is a long post so I will stop here and the next update will have the details on my trip to Qingdao.
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