I decided to google for info to add my Hotmail account to my iPhone... Here is a step-by-step guide to set up your iPhone 4 for Hotmail. Some of the websites didn't show a method that work entirely on my phone, but below is the procedure that worked:
1) Settings > Add Account > Microsoft Exchange
2) Fill in the following fields:
Email: youremail@hotmail.com
Domain:
Username: youremail@hotmail.com (NOT your username)
Password: yourpassword
Description:
3) Click 'Next' on top right hand corner
4) For the field
Server: m.hotmail.com
Use SSL: On
5) I left the rest as it is.
So now I am able to check all my emails!
PS: Apparently there were 2 other methods before when Microsoft didn't allow Hotmail on iPhone4: the Izymail method and the POP3 method. You can try them if this does not work out for you.
No snow. No white christmas. Just the cold, the wind and... More wind...
Indeed, a good addition to the whole Xmas affair is a christmas tree. Somehow, though, this particular one in the middle of the Green just depicted how New Haven is now - empty. And cold. The colors of the lights are just wrong... Plus there was nobody around. The solitariness of a badly-lit tree in the dark (the American flag can be barely seen)... It's just not the way I expected... Never mind...
But my neighbors have a terrific taste for lights and deco! This, guys, is what I would call a cosy, warm Christmas-y lit-up house, which Santa Claus will grace his presence. It brings warmth, just by looking at it, doesn't it? =)
Finally managed to visit the WTC site in NYC. Construction is underway for the new memorial and the WTC transportation hub. The site is no longer bare and actually bore none of the signs that allude it to the apocalyptic grounds that it was about 9 years ago.
It looks pretty much like any other construction site, isn't it?
Except that it isn't. I think that's the purpose of memorials. Any memorials for that matter. It reminds future generations of things that ought to be remembered when traces of everything else's been changed and long gone. It is also a reminder of human resilience, as the memorials stand vigil as monuments of the past among new buildings of the present and future. How people stand tall again, despite crises and adversities; how people move on...
I didn't know that there were actually 4 planes that were hijacked that day: 2 for the WTC (1 tower each), 1 crashed into the Pentagon, and the last one, the passengers revolted against the terrorists but still crashed into somewhere in Pennsylvannia. I guess the focus was so much on the WTC because that's where the most people were killed and the most dramatic. It was a saddening affair at the preview memorial musuem...
Think the last of the people going back to their states will be heading out this Friday (M's leaving this Friday)... So I have resorted a number of activities to keep myself sanely and enrichingly occupied throughout this holiday season.
Ever since I got here, I haven't visited much of New Haven's places of interest. So I made my first trip down to the renowned Peabody Museum. It reminded me (totally) of a mesh between a nature discovery center and Singapore Science Centre, housed in a single gothic building. I think Singapore Science Center housed more science exhibits LOLX. BUT what made it stood out were the real specimens of animals, dinosaurs (T-Rex, Stegosaurus and Bronotosaurus-Apatosaurus) and minerals and current research (astronomy in particular). It took me just about 2 hours to get through the entire museum... I did learnt some trivial stuff from this tour though haha. Like Brontosaurus is actually also Apatosaurus due to naming chronology etc. etc.
And I have gotten hooked to Grey's Anatomy again. Haha. BUT, IT'S SO DAMN GOOD! The superb acting, the quote-ridden script, the themes, the human nature, the dramatic stories... Applause to the director, actors and scriptwriters! Thanks G and M for letting me use their Netflix!
It hasn't snowed yet. Frankly, I am a little disappointed... I mean, my first US white christmas, apparently is not really coming...
I am revising MATLAB, reading up on Systems Theory... See how much I can go in reading all these engineering stuff... I am picking up squash and gym again. I am resuming Guild Wars and some Dota too....
Most importantly, I am doing able to concentrate on some research. Though not going as smoothly as I expected, I do hope it leads somewhere.
Maybe I should start making New Year resolutions too... It's not habitual for me to do that but well, worth considering.
So I am filling up my life with fragments of things to do, maybe you can even call it stuffing. But I would prefer 'spicing' - it's not essential but with them, you add more color, smell and taste.
The art of concentration is always one that is hard for me to master totally. Most of the time, you thought you have obtained an expert level on it, but ultimately it still eludes you after disuse. It's not like swimming, where the skill stays encoded in muscle memory.
Sometimes, I envy my childhood days when I didn't have so many things in my head and the world revolves only around study, play and sleep. Intense focus was a skill I had. I could work hours on something and oblivious about the world around me. I would play and come up with ideas on games to play or levels to cross and complete. Sleeping is the only thing left from those days that I could do without a worry, haha.
Then, I found squash. It was this sunset sport in Singapore that I didn't really know about. Haha. Playing it again here in New Haven, is just amazing...Like a clock being rewound and setting the adrenaline on a rush again.
There was nothing else. Just me and the ball. Just focus on the single sphere. On moving that ball to where you want it to, trying to make adjustments to the grip of the racket, the flow of the swing and the exertion of the strength to make that ball move to your desired location. Perfect focus training for the mind, when the opponent is just you, yourself and nobody else.
I wonder how long I can keep up with this regime. Even more pertinently, how long I can keep up when spring semester starts. For the time being, I want to try to regain a satisfactory level of concentration...
Sometimes I go to seminars and talks for the sake of just going. I think many people do that too. Two ladies in front of me just told my current PI that they have no idea why they are here ("'cos our PI told us to come here"). My PI happens to be one of the speakers today at the Sacklers discussion. So today, I have a good reason for myself to attend this talk.
But in general, I (would like to) think the phenomenon is not something entirely new. Especially to students like myself, who is not yet well-versed in anything. I go wherever there is a talk or whoever instructed me to. Somehow, I thought I should have some form of autonomy in deciding where I should go. But autonomy must come with knowledge of where you want to go. That is my problem. Because I am such a fledgling, knowledge of that is an issue in itself. This brings us back to my endless loop of being instructed to go to seminars and talks by whoever and wherever. So to break out of that vicious cycle, I need to find something to settle on.. Which is a perpetual question in my head that I haven't been able to answer....
I feel bugged everytime I attend these seminars and talks and people seemed able to grasp some aspects of the talk and ask questions, seemingly pertinently (or not, since I couldn't understand fully what is going on anyway). I start to question if I am actually less intelligent than these people, or can such skill be developed that you could ask anything intelligible, anywhere, at anytime.
To me, it just sounds absurd to know everything in this universe, to be able to ask questions in every unrelated seminar. So my final conclusion is, they just know an aspect of the topic and dwells only in that. I tried to emulate that, but I was made to arrive at another conclusion that I did not know that topic well enough, hence the lack of knowledge. I turned to another direction: there was probably a flaw in the logic. But sometimes, it's so hard to follow a line of logic because you aren't immersed in the field long enough to know whether the thread is flawed or just contains components that is assumingly omitted because it is so well-established. Or basically, you are just too asinine to follow that logic.
So then, I concluded finally that it boils down to experience. Experience, to identify logic nicks, to know what is going on, to ask questions. It is a convenient excuse to use to not ask questions during a seminar indeed, even though I would like to believe there is an element of truth in it. Most annoyingly though, it brings us back to the fact that I am still a fledging which equates unceremoniously that I am without much experience. So I am still in the cycle. And to get out of the cycle, I have to have experience - in asking questions, which means I have to start asking questions or I can keep mum and allow experience to sediment with time. (Which is not really such a bad idea)....
This sounds like a ranting of a confused teenager. Indeed, I should be focusing on my work now. But I am just not satisfied with the status quo. Not satisfied with the state that I am in, that I am stuck in a local minimum and am unable to climb out.
... yet.... But I will. And when I do that, I am going to start asking a lot of intelligent questions, doling out insightful comments and suggestions. Watch me. *hmhph*
In the meantime though, I will still remain a petulant teenager, pouting at every injustice and sulking at every self-deprecating act...
I am tired of chasing my blog haha and keeping up with my own activities. So, to piece my life together will be a combination of Facebook photos and blog posts!
I have mass-uploaded photos onto Facebook. Very up-to-date and I will caption them to interweave my thoughts with the pictures.
It actually might not be apparent from all my complaints, and talking about how busy life is now, but I really am feeling (unexpectedly) exhilarated about even the uncertainties of the future. Maybe, but despite the routine classes, I manage to find something that puts me into certain perspective and something that keeps me going. I wouldn't want to deny the fact that it gets difficult sometimes, but somehow, I begin to appreciate some small things around me, amidst rushing =)
The little bear that I wish good night every single night =)
Anyway, complaining actually lets off some steam, to keep balance LOLX. Self-justification ehz haha.
This is probably really way overdue. But we held on an impromptu birthday dinner for G, at this bar-restaurant down at East Rock, Archie Moore's. D, V, and a new friend De, were there to chill out after weeks of slogging, an evening of relaxation and mundane chatters. Hopefully we will have more chances for such chillouts in future, because I have come to understand the term "affinity" a little better now. So illogical, but so human...
人与人之间微妙的“关系”。。就像《翼》：“...（要改变命运）就要付出同等的代价。黑刚的宝剑，法尹的魔法。。接下来，我要的是你和她之间的关系。。。即使她醒过来，联系你们之间的关系已消失， 难道这样也无所谓吗？” 关系虽已不存在，但情感还在吧。关系不是因为情感的羁绊而存在吗？无所谓，能够看到她的笑容，才是最重要的。
Some people probably wouldn't believe if I said I actually find the "Twilight" trilogy an enjoyable read =)
Wow, ok I am way behind my blog and I don't think I am doing a good job catching up. Oh well, I think the thing is to just keep writing. I reminded of classes where I am definitely way behind...
We did an interesting experiment for our Biological Physics class assignment, where we had to measure the relationship between the radius of a container and the time it takes to come to a complete stop when you stir the water in it. So Raph got 3 cylinders of high aspect ratio of the Physics building, some coffee powder and a screwdriver. We then proceeded to do that and found that the relationship is somewhat quadratic! Then the assignment proceeded to show us that this might be caused by the diffusion of the "zero" velocity from the outer rim of the cylinder in, using the diffusion equation... And we are looking at this only in 2D. And I think the idea of using a high aspect ratio seemed to be that the spinning can be perpetuated by the vortex generated, as compared to using a cup and the spinning will probably stop faster and we can't measure much. Then if we imagine a whirlpool or tornado, I guess that explains why things just keep spinning even after the forces or currents that are feeding the vortex stops, even after a considerable amount of time. Ok, that's just what I think... This sounds so undergrad suddenly haha...
Anyway, this entry is also about retreats (if you can catch the weak link between "way behind" and "retreating"; ok lame nvm) symposiums. So far I have gone to:
1) CBB retreat
2) MCDB retreat
3) MB&B retreat
4) Yale Systems Biology Institute Symposium
and there is a fifth one, Sackler's Institute Retreat coming up soon. There were always the great free food, great posters, good company, superb lineup of talks and some activities. After attending so many of them, I have come to a conclusion that I couldn't definitely be interested in so many of them and I possibly couldn't understand fully all of them, BUT, to be able to generate logic and form interesting questions by asking lots of basic "hows" and "whys" actually help in the thought process of doing research. And perhaps, that is what I should be learning out of these smorgasbord of presentations and posters: not entirely the context of the research, but the way these ideas were conceived and carried out. By talking to people, you generally are trying to tap into these mental wells. I think that is how and why communication is important in science.
Of course, another objective would be to know where I want to be heading. Haha. I am still wavering, though. But I do realize some things (seriously after so much exposure, you wonder if you are desensitized to all these already sometimes) and I am working on them, so hopefully I will come to a conclusion and I will be getting what I want; or the former can also work if the latter fails to fruit...
Anyway, enough of ramblings, here are some pics from CBB retreat. Since I am from CBB, L said she will be expecting us to come up with something good for the entertainment segment in next year's CBB retreat AND every year has been good. Well, thanks for the pressure haha. Maybe this coming one would be an exception haha. But anyway, this year D and C made (yes handmade!) a pop-up book of the "Chronicles of the Burgeoning Bullfrog" (C.B.B.) LOLX and E was made the protagonist (i.e. bullfrog) and tell the story to everyone. It's an obvious choice, really (he is so vivacious!) =) That was nice. Cosy and warm, reminded me of the time when I was in lower primary and the teachers would read these big books in front of the class. Those were the carefree days...
Oh, and there's the Dean's Fall reception for graduate students at HGS. I always liked the courtyard at HGS, it's so lovely in fall. Anyway, just to let you guys have sense of how hungry but well-fed the grad students are:
Sorry people, kind of hectic down here. So, I am writing this in the middle of cooking dinner haha. But rest assured, though I am all over the place, I am still surviving (barely).
This is kind of way overdue but well, some related stuff are sitting on (and clogging up) my desktop, so I might as well, just write it here anyway. The Yale-NUS college saga is still kind of ongoing, though the climax has probably blown over. So there was this period of time, where Yale admin asked some of the Singaporeans here at Yale (apparently we made up the 8th largest of the country demographics here) to give our opinions on the Yale-NUS college issue. Well, most that turned up were mostly undergrads, a couple of graduates, a law assistant prof and some "friends" of Singapore who had studied in Singapore before. It was a pretty informal meeting, unlike what I expected. But nonetheless, there was quite a rigorous discussion perpetuated mostly by the undergrads who were here for quite some time already; it wasn't probably surprising to find they were all from either Raffles and Hwa Chong.
I am pretty impressed with the extent and depth of research the Yale administrators did on Singapore: from its history right to the future directions, schooling systems, current status of the education system etc. I am totally intrigued to listen to how Singapore is viewed from an outsider point of view and the fact that the undergrads (probably more attached here than the rest) have to grapple with taking a stand for both their college and home country.
Probably one of the main things Yale administrators wouldn't know (first-hand) is the culture and mentality of the local Singaporeans. Skeptical and pragmatic as we are, Singaporeans are still mostly conservative and most (especially the parents) have a somewhat ingrained mindset that college is meant for professional training, career preparation and subsequently income generation. A liberal arts college somehow might not fit into that description very much. Here are some of the issues discussed:
1) what is the proportion of international students and local students that the college would want; what kind of variety are we talking about? Knowing the system in Singapore, if cream of the crop were to be picked, then wouldn't most of the students be from Raffles or Hwa Chong or the top schools?
2) is the quota fixed? such that the quality would be compromised?
3) is Yale going for the long haul? since Singapore is the only side forking out the cash... IMO, it seems like an experiment that Yale is doing to try to create some utopian educational institution from scratch. Although Yale is not totally free of the woes of contributing resources (in terms of expertise), this is something I feel, Singapore is giving them a 'blank check'. Yale's side backed up with some insider which I thought sounded sincere enough, and made me realize this could very much be actually be a win-win situation: that Yale has an extremely strong tradition of shaping schools of higher education in the US especially liberal arts system. And they recognize the inevitable shift of the world's focus from the west to the east, so to them, this is the golden opportunity to have a stake in the East's cultivation of their future leaders - Yale becomes relevant moving forward.
4) brand dilution in borrowing the brand (this is for Yale naturally)
5) curriculum - how to make it such that it's truly a 'east meets west'? definitely, a carbon copy of Yale in Singapore is not feasible and in any case, not desirable. The school should be a stand-alone college of prestige and distinction.
6) is the 'Yale' name essential in the naming of the college? yes - because the name would provide a reputation for a new school for employers. everybody would be looking at the first batch of graduates; no - brand dilution, "2nd yale", shadow of yale, no graduates would want that.
7) Singapore stands to gain, because they do realize that Singapore has one of the best secondary school systems in the world such that there are a lot of students are extremely sufficiently equipped for college - but have nowhere to go! This new college would set up a new avenue for these students (or just more competition in my opinion)...
Well having said all these, the discussion was done in this cool-looking room, totally what I imagined in a Victorian typical New England style; you will never find this in Singapore LOLX.
And during the height of these, a couple of articles on Singlish (!!!) came up on Yale Daily News. I am also putting up some other interesting articles here. If you guys are interested, you guys are google Yale Daily News and these articles =) Enjoy.
Another perspective on Singlish In his Sept. 10 column, “The Queen’s Singlish,” Sam Lasman ’12 comments on Singapore’s “Speak Good English Movement” that has been intensified this year.
As co-president of the Yale University Malaysian and Singaporean Association, and in light of the recent announcement about a Yale-affiliated university in Singapore, I wish to provide additional commentary on the social context behind the Movement and offer another perspective on this topic. For much of its history, Singapore has relied on its strategic position as a major trading post to fuel economic expansion. The practical concerns of business made it important (even necessary) for the multi-racial populace to learn English not only in order to communicate with the international community, but also to become mutually intelligible among themselves. English is, for the most part, the language of instruction across the education system. Likewise, English has also been the predominant language in mainstream media and arts. The central issue has always been — and remains — how a country of less than five million, with few natural resources, could flourish in the global marketplace. Language skills rank among the most crucial for the accumulation and deployment of human capital.
With this in mind, it is not hard to understand why the government of Singapore actively promotes the use of correct, idiomatic English in its citizens. The concern, then, is what defines “correct”? Lasman rightly points out that the concept of correctness in language is perhaps too vague in itself, since “there isn’t actually anyone with complete authority to say what is, or isn’t, grammatical.” I agree with this statement — English does, after all, evolve with time, and that which conforms to the commonly-defined standard in one period may not in another. But the purpose of Singapore’s “Speak Good English Movement” is less about having people speak like antiquated robots than it is about encouraging them to speak in a way such that someone of similar English proficiency from New York, Paris or Tokyo would easily understand the conversation. It’s about phrasing what one has to say in an elegant and cosmopolitan way, so that even any English-speaking listener can grasp the varied nuances of that particular exchange without having prior knowledge of Chinese, Malay, or Tamil (the other ethnic languages of Singapore).
I appreciate Lasman’s decision to explore the quirky intricacies of Singlish in his column — not many people are aware of this fairly obscure version of Southeast Asian creole, and fewer follow Singapore’s domestic policy towards it. I take pleasure in knowing that a fellow Yalie is well-traveled — and erudite — enough to be able discuss the dialect and allude to common instances of its usage verbatim. Janice Chen Sept. 13 The writer is the co-president of MASA and a junior in Branford College.
It's been more than a month. Studying at Yale has gotten more or less in into a routine of some sort.
Everyday, I will pass by some streets. This is nearing end of summer, where the trees are green and lush. Now it's redder, and the ground littered with dead leaves. But if weather and time permits, you can get your spirits up really by just walking down these picturesque streets...
Physics undergraduate lounge is one of my favorite haunts now. Physics, the bane of my life, is what I mean partly studying now - what an irony huh. Well the lounge when I first saw it, makes me wonder how come I wasn't really attracted to those lounges in NUS... LOLX... They weren't that bad la, but this was different. You have a lounge that overlooks the city, coffeemaker (not free), blackboard and armchairs for relaxing and intellectual discussions on homework and assignments (many people use them really), FREE textbooks to browse through (they probably won't survive the onslaught of NUS students)
Then there's the physics graduate lounge. I kindda like the idea of having blackboards for discussions.
This is one of the chemistry buildings with interesting plaques, with the elements such as Ag, Hg, Au etc engraved on them.
My lunch carts. I couldn't survive without them! Great source of food.
One of my favorite haunts: the medical library. Though it's pretty far off, it's one of the most splendid places to study in. It's like studying in a museum, exhilarating feeling at first, but wears off after you found out you still can't solve that bloody assignment problem. They even have exhibits on display... On retrospect, it kindda looks like the library I saw in Prague.
This is my housemate, M. A nurse-in-training at Yale's nursing school. There's also C, an architect, who is so busy I can't get him to take a photo. But we often have fervent discussions, from pharmocology, clinical talks, genomics, biology to architecture and American politics or just about food LOLX. The picture on the right, is my neighbor's cat. She has these piercing eyes, that follow you wherever you go, clearing the rubbish, walking or stoning or also staring at her. It looked like she is going to scratch you to bits anytime...
Today's biological physics class is extremely exhilarating, despite the fact that I was probably lost half the time, but I could stilll follow some of the equations and treatments that Prof D went. He was extremely fast, so was J, our TA, when he mentioned something and he rattled on like water.
Basically, class today was talking about the contention between entropy and (internal) energy of a system, in order to achieve minimal free energy of a system.
Entropy is loosely defined as the quantification of consistency of certain (micro)states with its meso/macrostates; so by the law of thermodynamics, it increases, OR simply, a measure of the system that you did not know about (ignorance). I shan't go into the treatment of entropy. But here, let me tease apart the energy components that we are defining here. So, free energy here, typically refers to Gibbs' free energy - remember the enzyme energy curve that we always draw in JC, where we are always trying to achieve as negative a delta G as possible, in order for the forward reaction to be driven forward. Loosely put, the resultant products are of lower (internal) energy = more stability than the reactants. In nature generally, things aim to minimize free energy to achieve equilibrium state. In order to do that, we have to apply energy to the system, for the system to do work, in this case, to minimise free energy. You can also see free energy as the amount of energy available to do work (by the system). But free energy is also dependent on entropy as well. To keep things short,
free energy = (internal) energy - temperature * entropy of the system,
where temperature is kept constant
So, contextualising the above physics in a familiar biological scenario: osmotic pressure. Typically, in biology, we name that phenomenon based on the fact that there is a pressure exerted (on a semipermeable membrane) by the solutes in a solution against the inward flow of water/solvent, due to osmosis. Imagine we have our standard osmotic pressure experiment, where we have a box, divided into 2 sections by a semi-permeable membrane. In one section of V volume, you place N molecules in it. To keep this concentration of solutes in place, work has to be done by the system to keep the solutes from moving out too and this corresponds to the amount of free energy available to do work. And using the free energy equation above, if we assume all the solutes to be ideal solutes (which is like ideal gas assumption, where each particle is pointlike, totally random and non-interacting), the "internal energy" of the system as a whole can be ignored. Work done is also defined by the pressure * volume, so to counteract the water moving in, work done by the solute = the osmotic pressure * volume occupied by each solute. If you can imagine, then the amount of work done which is dependent on your free energy (to do work) per unit volume would correspond to your osmotic potential, which after a semi-long mathematical treatment, would give you:
osmotic potential = n * K (Boltzmann constant) * T
I do not know about you, but when I saw that, the IMMEDIATE thing that came to mind, was the equation of the ideal gas, pV = nRT (and I am surprised myself how fast that came, considering the last time I used that was, like 10 years ago!!)! And it turns out, it IS the ideal gas equation, since n in the ideal gas refers to number in moles!
SO, long story short, the conclusion was that osmotic pressure AND ideal gas pressure are really forces that a system exerts in its attempt to increase its entropy (2nd law of thermodynamics). Contrast these mechanical systems (where no energy assumed due to idealized particles) with a simple mechanical system, of a spring, where no entropy is involved, only aim was to reduce the free energy, you end up with a entropy-energy spectrum representing all situations, where in real-life situations, systems are really in the intermediates, a competition between minimizing energy and maximising entropy to obtain an optimal minimum free energy state.
Prof D ended the class with an analogy from amoeba being placed in pure water. In high-school biology, we often viewed that as a proof of osmosis in hypotonic solution, where the amoeba eventually burgeons (and explodes if left too long) when the cell semipermeable membrane cannot withstand the rapid increase in volume. But if you look at it in the physical point of view, the law of thermodynamics in entropy is STILL a universal governing law! In fact, the solutes is trying to get out of the amoeba, IN ADDITION TO, the water getting into the amoeba!
I couldn't find a good "bursting" experiment video, this is the best I could find on YouTube for RBC: not that great IMO LOLX
