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December 14, 2005
Winter hiatus
In a sea of younglings stood the wise sage donned in red, and while he delineated the traditional games so fondly embraced by his people, his apprentices listened attentively and responded ebulliently to his riddles and sagas. (This description is highly fictional. The wise sage is merely a volunteer describing games his countryfolk play to a bunch of kids in Burnett Creeks Elementary School.)
This will be my last post before going off to London for a well-earned rest.
Erm.. how shall i conclude my first semester in Purdue? It's a pot-pourri of mixed feelings, inter-mingling and sometimes too pungent like a good D24 durian. It started with the intimidating yet exciting flight from KLIA to Indianapolis Airport, in which, for the first time, I experienced more than 36 hours of airborne traveling. For a person who seldom had the privilege to travel by plane, let alone wandering overseas, the experience felt like a storm after a mighty long draught; the rush of adrenalin came incessantly, the urge to look around without missing a single detail, the joy of leaving old sweet home to venture out into the unknown - everything that I knew and were used to were no longer around. Sometimes I wonder if I would survive if I come alone to this foreign land.
Things got better as I accustomed myself with the environment in West Lafayette. Talking to people was extremely difficult intitially (as always), but time provided opportunities to expand my circle of friends. I took a longer warm up time than usual as accustoming to the culture here required efforts more than ever. What helps a lot was the availability of helpful seniors from hometown, both private students and scholars alike. Mingling with them proved to be fun and harmful sometimes, but I learned to keep my integrity straight.
Highlights of this semester? The traveling trips I made together with Peter, of course! Our first venture was driving a wreck for darn 7 hours to Ann-Arbor, officially becoming the first persons in ATU11 to make diplomatic contact with other university (lol). Michigan University, alma mater for chee yong and the gang in 4 years' time, was truly a greay university in terms of architecture and design, the vastness of buildings and equipment, the nice lecture theatres as well as dining halls (shout out to chee yong: East Quad rocks!), even nicer dorms! Umich aside, the duo P traversed numerous places also like Columbus, Chicago (2 times!) and Evanston. More traveling to come in the next semester :)
Contribution wise, I became a volunteer for the International Students and Scholars office to organize and help out in events like presentation in schools and such. The prospect of becoming a guinea pig didn't hold much approval from family and friends, but I went ahead anyway. Currently I'm done with the first part of the research, and the second part commences in the next semester. Last but not least, my precious undergraduate research program!!!! It was not easy to get the lab assistant position in Dr. Fekete's lab; hence I was truly grateful for the opportunity to work with the Harvard-graduated professor and earn credit hours from it. Most importantly, however, is the things that i can learn from the research itself (ear morphogenesis and development in chick embryos, underlying the purpose of discovering the genes responsible for development of auditory cells and vestibular cells in ear, thus in a long run help cure deaf patients and such, but that's really a long way ahead)
One more final exam to go! and that marks the end of Fall Semester 2005.
Lastly,
May good fortune rule over you.
May the stars shine upon you.
And may peace live in your heart.
Posted by peixin at December 14, 2005 01:00 PM
Comments
interesting...all da way!
Posted by: lsk at December 15, 2005 11:45 PM
4 months in West Lafayette sure hold lots of sweet memories.
More to come in the future for you to enjoy and cherish!
Posted by: sigmatau at December 17, 2005 11:35 AM