durer l'entrée pour 2008

For this last entry I'm going to talk about a book which I purchased quite recently.

Twilight by Stephenie Meyer

After watching the movie version of Twilight released on 23rd November 2008, I hurriedly bought the book version from Amazon. I got less price for being a devoted customer to Amazon since I came here in Montreal. There are other books which I promised myself to buy them after seeing the movie. But that all can wait since I was satisfied with the movie . To name a few, I will someday buy Nicholas Spark's, "A Walk To Remember", Cecelia Ahern's, "P.S I Love You" and J.K. Rowling's, "Harry Potters...". Though like I said, these all can wait. I have no intention to purchase them in a short time.

However, it was a different feeling after I watched Twilight. I found there's something missing and I want more. That's why I decided to buy the book. After reading a few pages, I am right about it. The story was beautifully written and the plot was so interesting. It was so irresistible and I can hardly put it down.

I am very mad at myself now because reading Twilight forbid myself to do other important stuffs during the winter break. I have another two serious book to be attached with (the group theory and differential geometry) apart of Twilight. These two books need pencil and paper in hand...hehe.

Though I'm going to play fair here, I am now more that half of pages of Twilight and I'm going to take a break...

Come on now, I need to be disciplined. If not who else?

Note: Farewell 2008...

Snowy

Today in the early morning, when I look outside, I can see that the whole place is covered by snow again. The snow is still falling and I believed the falling has kept on going for the whole night due to the thickness of the snow outside. But this time it drops slow and the droplets are small. Its like when we were having a light rain. In my opinion, this would be a good day to go outside .

After all, today's weather show a sudden drops to -3 degree if compared to yesterday, with -14 degree. I found that it gets colder when the snow is not falling. The weather here I must say quite complicated. I mean nothing is certain, that's for sure. Not for the entire predicted week. The way I see it, the weather forecast made an excellent job for only few days. So I guess we can use the common movie dialog here "we'll never know what the future might holds"...huhu

Personally, I like it when it is just snow with no rain. Because the rain will only make the snow into icy and thus the sidewalk will be slippery and dangerous. But the best part is after the rain, trees are more beautiful that it used to be. Even without leaves. The ice that cover its branch looks like a glass or some may say crystals. However, as the beautiful they might be, bigger icy trees play a dangerous role. If the weather get worst with strong wind, they can easily break and fall which at the end may threaten houses nearby. This as my friend mentioned do happened a lot during the winter here in Montreal.

I am now trying my best to enjoy the feeling of the winter, this is crap actually... hahaha but the snow...yes!

Note: We were having a blowing snow on Monday and its pretty bad that we were actually need to go outside to see a physician for Ain's flu shot. What an experience for the three of us.

A Must Have

My first boots.

my sweet inside warming slippers. huhuhu...

my lovely maple leaves gloves

Believed it or not, I really need these things with me like a really really must have. All the time. It's also funny to watch myself wearing boots to school. hohooho...

Note: Happened to watch the Twilight. It's awesome...

Stop Thinking About

doing maths is actually dealing with numbers. This is very old thinking and ancient believes. hehehe... Mathematics is about idea and how the idea works. Solving problems mean nothing unless you know what is the gis of the idea is all about.

This I find difficult. Because in previous time when I'm taking maths courses, I can work out something easily but all involved problems with numbers. But when the generalization comes in, I'm pretty much lost. Honestly I hate to say that x, y is Real number and a, b is Complex number. They keep some memories inside your head which is virtually. But I guess our brain can have some functional for it. Right?

I discussed this with my supervisor today when we were trying to solve some problems involved groups. He asked me to speed up for the work out solution and insist on seeing him frequently if I face any problem. He mentioned that he was trying to train me into solving problem techniques and most important things is getting into the ideas. FORGET numbers but of coz not totally forget.

I feel like I'm living in a MATRIX world.

Note: he was saying that lets us finish these in 4 years...(ow! this sounds helpful)

My First Presentation

Wow...I just finished my first presentation today. And that will be the end of the touchè of the last course of my fall term. There are five of us and the speaker was selected in an alphabetical order. The rest were using their family name instead of their own name but I choose to use mine. And so I was the third person to give the talk.

My topic was quite a straight forward. It is the representation theorem and distributional function. I have to cover two topics which consists of six unequal theorem. The whole idea of the topic was to used the general theorem of converges in order to proof the representation theorem. This is actually a theoretical rather than practical subject. There's nothing more to add up to the theorem. I think I am lucky to have choose this topic. Because in my opinion anyone can do the same if they are given the opportunity. Nothing much to argue.

As usual, like I'm used to give a simple talk during my day at Physics Dept. (for the quantum group discussion..) my aim for the presentation was to make sure that the audience is with me and I'm not carried away with my own thoughts and so on.

First Thing for Everything

Yesterday it was less cold. Even though the snow is started to fall and streets were full of it. Believed it or not, it was my first heavy snow ever. I went to Concordia early (9 a.m.-it was darker and gloomy) as I need to submit my take home final exam for my PDE. I think I've done the best for this final and I just hope that my grade will turn out good. I really hope so. Despite that I've been carelessly lose quite a mark on my 1st and 2nd assignments. But the teacher told me that she'll be OK with it as long as I showed and proved some understanding of the subject.

I also think that I am finally find the right moved and mood to handle things surround me. For the first time I feel that it is a scary thing to have a discussion with the rest of the student. Sharing thoughts and stuff like that. But that happened just because of I was lack of information and at the same time having this feeling of "these people" knows better than me and these "mat saleh" usually perfect in everything. At the end, all I need is do more homework and work real hard.

Yesterday also, I got my first (influenza) flu vaccine shot. Not that I need it, it is just that prevention can make a lot of different. I got a free shot since I've met one of the criteria (living with a 0-23 months child). Else I need to pay 20 dollar for one shot. The vaccine is meant to prevent ourselves from influenza virus. Not that it can prevent us from being cold because of the winter. hehehe...this wording is stated in the module. We need to read it before getting the shots. After the shot was given, we need to stay for approximately 20 minutes to make sure that we don't have sudden (bad) side effects. If that happened then the nurse will take a counter action. But according to survey there's only 3%-7% of people who have the immediate bad side effect. Lucky me, there's no major side effect occured.

Note: Salam Aidiladha

Pe'el Jiran Tetangga

Setelah dipikir-pikir dan dipeteng-peteng, akhirnya dapat cik salma buat kesimpulan tentang pe'el jiran tetangga. Teramatlah baik hati. Hari ini, sedang kami sekeluarga berehat-rehat menikmati sarapan pagi merangkap makan tengahari, tiba-tiba loceng rumah berbunyi. En. salam kata oh, ini mungkin our landlord, Nana Chen. Mesti macam nak tengok-tengok keadaan rumah yang didiami. Tapi bila dibuka pintu rumah, tiada siapa pun yang menunggu diluar. Kami hanya dapati ade sebiji almari (wardrobe) ditinggalkan. Kerana tidak diketahui siapa yang memberi, en. salam hanya menjerit, 'we thank you' to the open air. Dengan harapan org yang memberi mendengarnya.

Ini bukan kali pertama perkara semacam ini berlaku. Sebelum ni ada disedekahkan meja, barang mainan, kerusi dan segala macam. Kini dirumah cik salma boleh dikatakan cukup sempurna. hehehe...

ada seorang jiran ni, siap menamakan anak cik salma 'my little princess'. Segala macam mainan (yang ain memang tak main pun) diberikan. Termasuk juga pakaian. Ain juga dapat candy pertamanya sempena Holloween Day tempohari. Dia siap berjanji the coming new year eve akan ada lagi barang nak diberi.

Kesimpulannya, penduduk disini ramah tamah dan baik hati dan mulut kami dah naik letih menjawab soalan wajib setiap org "how do you do" bila bertegur sapa. Kami pun dah terikut-ikut dgn soalan wajib ini.

Note: Cumanya bilik cik salma dah nak penuh dengan barang ain yang tak guna. Macam mana la nak dismantle nih...

Language Does Matter

I went to another series of ISM Graduate Seminar yesterday at UDEM (University of Montreal). I have missed twice seminar for this venue as it was a French University. This time, the speaker was my friend, Valerie. Her talked was on how to compute the coherent state for a Poincare (2+1) group which is related to my future research (I believe). I asked Valerie earlier wherether she would prepare her presentation in English or French. She said that she not sure yet, not that if I insist. She kind of preparing a bilingua for the presentation.

At the first place I just want to cancel my present to the seminar. Because I don't want to put her in an awkward way. To just speak in English just because of me alone. But again, there's nothing wrong to have the English version as English is our FIRST language ever. So I decided to go and just see what happened. I sit at the very front of the seminar room. The speaker made an earlier announcement in French that she will present in English since there's one student here who don't understand French. Funny that I actually understand her, since she point me to the rest of the room and I can here she pronounced Anglais (English). That obvious huh...

The presentation went on slow. And question and answer keep on popping up in French, until the end of the session. I asked one of my friend from Greek who speak well French. She told me that it's difficult for a French student here to actually understand the English especially the scientific terminology and others. It takes time for them. This remind me of the same situation happened to us to understand the terms in English when we're learning in our mother tongue Malay.

The way that I saw it, the rest of the student who learn science in French has the same 'level' as if one learn in English. Not even far by an inch. In fact some even better.

Bahasa Jiwa Bangsa

Satu perkara yg cik salma rasa seronok ialah bila secara realitinya dapat mendengar ragam ramai bangsa lain dengan bahasa ibunda masing-masing. Mungkin sebelum ini cik salma terbiasa dengan cerita-cerita korea, jepun dan china kantonis tak lupa juga venezula di tv3, ape tuh..ya telenovela. Sekarang di dalam metro boleh dengar sok-sek beberapa bangsa mexico berborak. Tidak cukup dengan itu, ramai lagi bangsa lain di Montreal ni. Korean, Sepanyol, Mexican, Hungary, Chinese (mandarin), Greece, German, dll. Hari ni di lab cik salma, satu lagi bahasa yang cik salma tak pernah dengar. Bukan French atau Italian, Mungkin Poland agaknya. Mereka bercakap, tapi mulut seakan tertutup. cik salma curi-curi dengar tapi tak dapat sahkan bahasa apa. Rakan lab yang sorang ni selalu sibuk, tak pernah duduk di meja nya lebey dari 15 minit. She's always on the move. Kami biasa tegur gitu-gitu jek berbalas senyuman atau angkat kening masing-masing. To me she's look like a Polish.

Semacam seronok mendengar bangsa lain bertutur. Pada cik salma. mungkin mereka-mereka juga rasa terkesima bila dengar cik salma dan keluarga berbahasa Melayu. keh keh...

Note: Rupanya Julia dari Ukraine, she's going to finish this coming Spring for her PhD...

Math Physics Seminar

We had our very first of Math Physics Seminar of this fall term. The seminar was given by a visitor from Palermo University. His talk was on SUSY, intertwining operators and related vector coherent states. It was a nice feeling that the group who also attend this seminar is quite a number of people. Some were from other universities as well (the group of physics and mathematics).

For the first part of the seminar, I can actually follow the speaker and his content. His talked very clear and slow (I think this is why I found that one of the audience fell asleep) . He touched on the operator of the hamiltonian and stuff like that in quantum mechanics. The idea of susy QM came from when you can find other hamiltonian like H_{2}, H_{3} and so on when you already have your H_{1}. This is what he called the partner of hamiltonian operator. He later relate the idea with the coherent states which is closely related to what my supervisor is working on. And at this point I lost count. hehe...

At the end in the QnA session, the professor who actually fell asleep during the seminar was being the first one to ask. Oh oo...

ISM Graduate Seminar

Hi,

This week, the ISM Graduate Seminar was held at the Concordia. The presenter was from Universite de Montreal. I can assumed that it will be in French (since it was a French university) but looking at the announcement and the abstract, it was written in English. I also thought that it was a female presenter, so it would be nice for the first time to have a presenter from a lady. Then I found out that I was mistakenly took Alexandre as Alexandra. Hehehe...

The topic was interesting about Grounding the Meaning of Words in Dictionaries. No high complicated mathematics needed as he mentioned it, since he was a student of mathematics and linguistic. He used graph theory a lot in his research. Before he started, he was asking if the audience would prefer to listen he's talking in French on English. Without hesitate, I just say I prefer if you can present it in English. (From my last experience, I sit for the whole one hour seminar listening to a french speaker. Owh how that possible if that kind of situation happened again). Everyone was looking at me making a face...and thanks to Valerie when she mentioned that "well, it's not wrong to just expressed yourself". And yet the speaker did present it in English though he apologized that his English is not very good. Personally I think it was more than good. Thanks.

Note-This is not a boring seminar. I kind of love it. I really do. Using dictionaries to work on with. Where you generate and find the roots of the words (meaning the keywords using graph theory and other related algorithms).

Satu Jam Ke Belakang

Kalau ada movie masa di Malaysia dulu bertajuk Jangan Pandang Belakang, well semalam semua penduduk Canada terpaksa pandang 1 jam ke belakang. Orang biasa panggil DST (Daylight Time Saving). Malam tadi sebelum cik salma masuk tidur dalam pukul 4 pagi, cik salam dah siap-siap awalkan jam tangan ke pukul 3 pagi. Difikir-fikirkan semula rasa kelakar la pulak. hehehe... Ini kira pertama kali cik salma buat benda pelik macam ni. Almaklum, profesor cik salma kata nk jimatkan masa utk waktu siang. Sebab masa malam lama sangat, so terpaksa pilih cara nih. Nanti bulan April nak masuk Spring kita anjak semula 1 jam dari masa sebenar ke hadapan sebab waktu siang nanti lama la pulak. Oh yeah...

Satu perkara penting yang cik salma harus perhatikan ialah waktu tidur si kecik Ain nih. Kalau dulu pukul 9 atau 10 p.m. dia sudah menunjukkan tanda-tanda mengantuk. Yelah waktu gelap pun waktu kat Malaysia dulu tak berubah. Lebih kurang sama jek. If ada pun beza dalam 15-30 minit sahaja. Ikut waktu sekarang pukul 6 sudah pun gelap. Dan si Ain if nampak gelap mula nk masuk tidur. Bayangkan kalau dia tidur dlm pukul 7 atau 8 mlm. So nanti pukul 5 atau 6 pagi dia sudah bangun. Walhal, pukul 7 and 8 pagi masih lagi gelap. Hahaha... Kami terpaksa memerah idea supaya dapat melekakan si kecil Ain selama 2-3 jam sebelum dia dibenarkan tidur. Cabaran...cabaran.

Sebenarnya cik salma pun tak berapa gemar, waktu malam panjang sangat. Agak payah untuk memfokus kepada study dan kerja biasa. Gelap kat sini pun semacam jek bagi cik salma. Dengan hanya lampu yg kekuningan, mata begitu rasa perit, ditambah pula dengan rasa sejuk, mulalah rasa nk masuk dlm selimut. Walhal kerja-kerja yang perlu diberi perhatian begitu banyak. Progres seminggu sekali tajuk-tajuk research begitu lambat cik salma nak hadamkan. Ini belum ditambah dengan assignment yang bukan seminit dua untuk disiapkan.

Come on cik salma, sini bukan ruangnya untuk mengomel. Buat dulu sampai lebam (bak kata en. salam)...InsyaAllah

Totally Paranoid

OK...I am totally paranoid because of nothing!

It turns out that I'm not doing so so bad at all for my midterm. I am so relieved. It was more than half of the total. Which is OK for me. All my furious and other bad feelings have gone now. Nothing to regret for being left out from the 'discussion' during the running of the exam. I have actually tried to answer everything towards the end and believed it that it is lucky that some of them is actually correct.

However I learn it here that when you are trying to answer a mathematical problem. Please please make sure everything is written up. Don't left any tiny single idea that you had in mind. NEVER. Justified everything...

My level of courage is up now.
Thanks

Paranoid

OK, lets face it. Am I being paranoid or what. Is it just my feeling or it's nothing to do with anything. It's happened that exams over here is nothing the same like with exams we had in our country.

1. We can bring in formula (in only one piece front and back of a paper). So I wrote exactly the formula needed. But towards the day of the exams. I found out everyone wrote not only formula but also notes. Of coz in a very tiny little handwriting just to fit in both sided of the paper.

2. While exam is running, we usually don't discuss any of the question. Thus we don't even talked loud. Yeah maybe we can asked if the question really really confuses us. However in my midterm, everyone keep questioning the lecturer until they get to the answer.

But what really pissed me off is, the lecturer actually go one by one asking if they have came to point of question 2 for an answer. AND AND she didn't even asked me. Nope...she didn't stop at my place. You will never imagine that the class was actually were having a discussion instead of an exam. And it worst that I've just been left out. Totally left out.

There were just 9 of us in the class and to me its pretty small. I can hear a student and the lecturer was discussing the question in a very loud sound. For e.g.
Dialogue 1:
the lect - "Have you solved question 2 part 2?
student-"Not yet I've just finished part 1 (and she showed the lecturer her answer sheet)"
the lect-"Owh you actually has already the answer. Just write it in the form of Psi(s) and Phi(s). Now for part 2 you need to...bla..bla"
I can't help to hear again since time is running and I have another 2 parts of the question to answer. The the lecturer just went around the table asking everyone if they have come to answer question 2 part 2.

I was so confused and at the same time feel terrible about it (that shed didn't asked me) but I still want to make an effort and I just raised my hand and asked. And guess what, the lecturer just told me that "you need to make a change of variables" then she left. The discussion just continued. the lecturer even used the board to show everyone the idea. And I was so 'like terkapai-kapai', running towards time and in the same time stretching my brain to get an idea for solving the two parts. I again raised a hand to ask the lecturer, again the lecturer was just pointed very tiny ideas which don't really helps. Or maybe I asked in a wrong way. I'm not sure. But the lecturer never border to see how am I doing like the way she did it to the other student.

I just give up and wait for a stop sign to hand the paper in. I don't even bother to ask again. I am lost. So lost and mad.

So, am I being paranoid?

Lacking or Don't Care

As usual, I was meeting with 'my' professor today. The theme that I can come up with is the easiest part of the group (a book by Brian C. Hall). I can only cover 4 parts together with their many many subtopics to be discussed to. I just only prepared the materials through the night before the meeting. I note down few questions coz I know he might want to ask me later on which part will be rigoroused to understand. To have a no question at all will be not a good way to start with.

So it is fine at the end with the topic matters. Then for no reason, he asking me few types of question on MALAYSIA. heehhee...the language, the population, the religion, malaysian politics. When Islam first arrived to Malaysia, the centuries and so on. Arrgghh sudah...this is not what I was preparing for. I better start to wiki about Malaysia from time to time. I just admit to him that my historical knowledge is very bad. The truth is I was not border to take our country history in a serious way. Bad of me. It was long time ago. I can just remember Islam was brought my the Arab site. It took us one hour just to talk about these stuffs. It went pretty well and Oh my gosh he reads a lot.

Then when I came home, do some rechecked with my that so knowledgable guy and he remind me that we do learn that there are 3 theories of the arrival of Islam in Malaysia. huhu...I'm suppose to know that but well ...

Sejuk yang EXTREME

Memang cik salma tak boleh tahan. Kesejukan tahap luar biasa ni boleh menjadikan cik salma tak boleh nk buat kerja secara normal. Apatah lagi untuk memfokus kepada perkara2 penting sebelum exam midterm minggu depan. Bukan setakat tak boleh memfokus kerja penting tetapi juga kepada perkara rutin seperti waktu tidor, nak masak dll. Kulit cik salma pulak dah mula menunjukkan tanda2 kekeringan. Arghh serba tidak kena...

Tempat yg cik salma paling rasa selesa setakat ini ialah bilamana berada di universiti (agaknye sistem heater diorg) and so far di tandas rumah kediaman. Rembesan air hangat mmg rasa selesa. Tapi awas, bil elektrik bakal naik mendadak jika dibiarkan berlarutan. hehe... Pandai sistem di Kanada ni, penduduk tidak perlu bayar bil air. Hanya perlu sediakan duit utk bil elektrik. Diorg dah agak, kita akan pakai bnyk air panas. So? sape untung tuh...

Apapun cik salma kena cuba jugak teruskan perjuangan ni. Apetah lagi akhir Oktober akan dtgnya winter. Masa tuh kelas akan berjalan mcm biasa. Memang cik salma tak boleh nk jangka dan mengagak apa yg best dan tak best nye winter. Banyak org kata masa winter kadang2 boleh mendatangkan rasa depression. Entah la.

Kita tunggu dan lihat

note: eid mubarak...eid mubarak

Pizza Seminar

Last Friday Mathematicals and Statistics Department of Concordia has organized a pizza seminar. It was organized weekly where the speaker is among of the lecturers from the department and the topic is a general one. The audiences is among the graduate students and also academic staffs of the department. The talk of the day is Why Should We Care About The Philosophy in Mathematics by Professor Byers (I'm referring his book on mathematical thinking).

Its been a month now that I'm here. The regular tradition that I can observed would be how they love pizza very much...Almost in any activities, there will be a pizza serving at the end of it.
Everyone just enjoy them very much.

Graduate Student Seminar- UQAM

Never walk along with these people. Is it because of they do have longer legs than I am?

It was my first time to join the Graduate Student Seminar organized by ISM (Institut des sciences mathématiques) an institute with the member of 8 Quebec's university. This week it was running at UQAM (Universite de Quebec). There were three of us from Concordia (myself, valerie and alexhandra). I thought we're going to take a metro to UQAM. But they choose to walk since the weather is so nice, not so windy and no rain. And again I thought it was very nearby.

I just can't believed that I just passes three other metro stations just to get to UQAM. Goshh..it took us 20 minutes to reach at the seminar place. I might say that it will be from our faculty of science to the fact of engineering. However, our route was just straight way fo the east from Concordia through all the tall buildings. To tell the truth, I'm not complaining that we walked. The thing is these two girls walk very fast. Well they were really really fast. Two steps of mine will be consecutively to equal to their one step, I think. I felt like I'm running and it was so exhausted. My leg feel so tired and the next morning it hurts. hahaha... you know the feeling of when you're been running for the first time.

Next week the seminar would be at UDM (Université de Montréal) and after that at our place. I wonder if we're gonna walk again. But, alamak next week is hari raya on the oct 1st. Can I make it to the seminar? Let see

notes: I manage to find the Muslim prayer room at concordia. It's nice place but quite further to my lab.

Breakfasting - Malaysian student

Yesterday, we're welcoming three malaysian students to have a breakfasting together. Another reason for this special invitation would be to say thanks to one of the student who have been very generous in helping us the house we live in today. Plus other favour that he had done for us as a preparation to coming to Montreal.

The thing is, I'm almost freak-out since this will be my first time to ever cook for a group of people. Well just tell the truth I am not (really totally a way out) to be a best and respective cooker. But don't get me wrong coz I love to cook actually. If I have a chance to meet a good cook, then I might as well be as terror as he/she did. hehe... As a regular practice I've just happened to serve my family, brothers and also my sweet hubby. They don't have a high taste and such demanding for a five star serving food hotel like. So it puts me under a safe zone feeling.

However yesterday its just the time for me to have some test and out of safe zone. Let just get done with it. With few discussion, we decided to have my special sambal ayam, kurma daging and some vegetables. It would be like a kampung style served. It went out well and it reminds that that cook is where the taste is if not perfect (should be almost) in terms of sweet, sour and the food itself must be cooked.

ade petua lagi ker?

Welcome To Real Stuffs

Today I had a meeting with my supervisor at around 10.30 am. He was asking of how I'm doing so far in Montreal and how's my classes which. I just tell him the truth regarding my approximation theory class which I found most difficult to absorb if compared to my PDE class. Though I can follow during classes, however when it comes to proof a theorem I am totally stuck. I told P. Ali regarding my lack of mathematical proving stuffs and he gave me a notes call mathematical thinking. It is a very straight forward notes which meant to be for the undergraduate level (college to be exact) as a preparation for them to take mathematics in university level. I got a chance to view a bit of the notes while I'm sitting in the metro on my way back to Verdun and I found out that there's a lot of stuff especially techniques to learn when you're dealing with maths. It tells you how exactly all the questions of why, what is maths doing.

OK...just forget about that coz I'm going to be stuck myself to that notes for the rest of my next week. So during my meeting with P. Ali also, we've decided that we will have a weekly meeting together every Friday morning and that will be the time for me to ask, reporting and what ever it is that I found appropriate to say to him. Its like it will be the time for us to get along with. Meaning also that, I need to be all set before getting into his room on that particular Friday.

Another thing is that I finally or officially get my core subject to focus on as part of a mathematical physics acquire. For instance I need to have some expertise on group theory, differential geometry, functional analyses and hilbert space. Together with this the quantum theory stuff will also be included. Or its more to quantum mechanics.

The mystery of my overall core research area is finally announced. I hope that I am capable to learn the above topics and lets the hard time begin...

Welcoming Pizza Party

Today the graduate student association of math and stat department organized a welcoming pizza party for the new and continue student. I am the first to introduce myself. And I also find out the the new student in a PhD program was just me alone. But of coz I'm lucky to be sitted in a graduate lab together with my senior in the same program and field.

I've made new friends today, from Greece, US, German, Lebanon and also Iran. 4 of them is as the same class as mine. Its a good thing to have meet new faces...

Finally #1

We are officially here in Montreal. And it has been two weeks now. Today is the 14th day of Ramadhan.

We've been settle down in city call Verdun, Quebec, 15 minutes by metro (subway train) to my university (at downtown-Montreal). It is kind of OK.

We have been traveled approximately 21 hours from KLIA to Montreal. Having us stayed overnight at Toronto where our next connecting flight is in the early morning. Before that we've been transited to Heathrow London Airport for 3 hours. the security check is highly strict, shoes need to be scanned, any gel, liquid and cream need to be showed off. Chances of bigger bottles of cream or gel will be eliminated. Even my thermos and warm water for Ain need to be emptied.

but funny is, when we first arrived in Toronto, the custom checking is not really strict. We kind of afraid that all our foods will be ceased, but fortunate that the immigration officer don't even give a damn. not one of our luggage is opened and we just walk away like that. Only verbal declaration was needed. After that we took a taxi to our booked hotel which cost us of CAD 25.00. We don't know that there are free shuttle bus was provided.

another funny things happened while we've checked in to the hotel. As usual we have our card to open the room. We we trying to search for the card reader inside the room to turn the lights and everything in the room ON. But we can't seem to locate any inserted spot. towards then end, we've been told that the card given was just to open the room. For switches and other it was manually open. hehehe...seems like any Malaysian hotel got a more sophisticated method and so.

Departure and Ramadhan

We have finally received our visa. But unfortunately the flight on the 25th August is not there. At the end we've confirmed to depart on the 1st of September morning and reach Montreal on the same day at around 1700 hrs. Its a bit scary for myself since I've got a class on the 2nd of September. Being first time to ever put my leg to a very new and unknown place is actually make me freaking out. Should I be?

Yess...of cause.

I just can't imagine how the h**l I'm going to cater everything which is very unfamiliar instantly and at the same time trying to find mood in my first day of class. I just pray that Allah give me enough strength to go through this huge challenge.

Another thing is, 1st September is the very first day of Ramadhan. Wow..the fasting season is just around the corner. Hopefully with the blessing of the month of Ramadhan we can make the best of it.

till the day coming...

Medical Examination

I've been called by the Canada Visa Office (CVO) to collect the medical forms to undergo a medical examination as part of the issuance of our Visa. Thus, the three of us go to the Tan & Tan Tower (KL CVO located) to pick up the form. We were a bit of not so lucky yesterday as the visitor basement parking was already full. The building were located at the busiest main road, and we just parked our car illegally in front of the Tabung Haji Tower and decided to just walked from the parking car to the CVO.

After collected the form we decided to undergo the medical check-up right away since Ain was also with us. Only three selected private practitioners that was authorized by Canada to do the medical reports in KL. The rest was in Penang, Kuantan, KT, Sarawak and other top Malaysia town state. As we were not familiar with KL-Jln Ampang area, we decided to take a taxi and ask the driver to take us to the Clinic. This is the fastest way we can get to the place mentioned in the list. Again, it didn't went out smoothly, since the clinic that we choosed (located at the Standard Charterd Chambers, Jln. Ampang), was closed as they were moved to another place. Again we take another taxi to another clinic located at the City Square Complex , Jln Tun. Razak). As we moved along we were kind of noticed the route.

We were finally made it to the Klinik Segara, 4th floor at the City Square Complex building (at first I thought it was Klinik Segera...huhu). But the x-ray examination need to be done at a different place located at Ampang Park building. We were still confuse of how to go there, so we decided to take the x-ray check-up the next day. We were finally get everything done, and going home. As we waited for the taxi to take us back to our parking car, we found out that we were at the main road of Jln Tun Razak, very near to the big 4 junction within Jln. Ampang. We called a cap and asked the driver to Tabung Haji Tower. The driver seems confuse and keep asking us are you sure you want to go the Tabung Haji Tower?...

Funny is that places we went along which also include also our parking car was near to each other. We can actually walked if we want to. The driver think that we were trying to make fun of him. He showed us that the Ampang Park is just in front of the City Square Complex connected by cross junction. Tabung Haji Tower is to the north of Ampang Park with a cross road. It cost us MYR 10 to the taxi service just to take us touring through a near place. But I don't feel terrible about it, because the day was really hot and bring Ain along is not a perfect day to have an adventurous travel at town.

Personal income - kwoning KL better.

Hanging in the Air

This is the second week of the month of August. Right now we're waiting for the processing of the CAQ and VISA application. Since we were heading and plan to stay in the province of Quebec, the CAQ (certificate of quebec) is compulsory to apply so that the VISA application can also be processed. I am worried if there's isn't ample time to make all the application processes. Not to tell our ticket to Montreal which is depending on the OK of the VISA.

Pray that everything went well. Else we might be lucky to have the time to fasting here in Malaysia if I'm going to delay my departure to Montreal. We'll see...

Hectic Extravagant

Fuhh...We're taking a day off today as to settle everything regarding family visa application, KPT, documents and so on. Fortunate that we managed to send complete documents for our visa, unlucky to other important task that need to be arranged AGAIN tomorrow.

I'm on the running...

Discussion #25

For our Quantum Theory Group Discussion (QTGD) 25 . I was speaker no. 1. and in yesterday topic, I was talking about Types of Modular Forms. Previously I updated on the Well Planned Writing. Also from the same book, I used the Well Planned Talk method.

5 important methods for a well planned talk

1. Brief Introduction
2. Main Points
3. Elaborations plus visual aids
4. Conclusions
5. Discussions

I found that after I implement this method my flow of presentation is smooth and direct. Last time, I did focus on important things to highlight to audience and at the same time trying to make my presentation understandable. But usually I can see confuses faces. As my sifu always remind me that, at one point you need to practice before your presentation and also timing yourself. He said that you need to value the audience since they 'sacrifice' their time to sit and hear you talk. And for the first time, I did what he recommended. Twice actually.

And for the result, I'm happy to see few audience wrote down what I've been talking about. It is a nice feeling.

Visits to Cameron Highlands

Last weekend, me and my family (for the first time) got together in what we call a hang out (slightly to a vacation) at Cameron Highland, Pahang. This is my first time to be here and and it feels great. We stay at the Greenhill Heritage apartment at Tanah Rata. Thanks to my brother for booking this CIMB apartment for us to stay. A waive accommodation fee is really enjoyable.


We traveled by car (two of them) and heading north through Tapah route. We were planning for the Simpang Pulai but due to time constraint we decided to just follow the nearest exit to Cameron. We reached the apartment at 8 pm. But the Tapah journey was really scary and there's landslide everywhere. However when we came across the Orang Asli and their home, it tells me that it's going to be safe.

We managed to visit the Rose Garden at Brinchang and stop at few stalls selling fruits (strawberries, Crystal Guava, Pearl Cornes, vegetables (freshy) and Bharat Tea Shop (on our way home, near Ringlet).

A very nice journey, visits and a get together family.

Suggested item- a second time visits to Cameron is worth it

A Well Planned Writing #1

7 Writing Principles

Introduction What did you do? Why?
Materials & Methods How did you do it
Results What did you find
Discussions Your interpretation of results
Summary Statement of main findings
Acknowledgements Who helped
References Details of reference cited

Source: SCIENTIST MUST WRITES: A GUIDE TO BETTER WRITING FOR SCIENTIST, ENGINEERS AND STUDENTS, Robert Barrass, 1978 (old edition), Chapman & Hall.

I found that I need to upgrade my writing skills especially when sometime I felt that I am OK with my writing and most of the time I felt that I’m doing it the wrong way. First I must read and try to analyze any interested papers/journals and later divide its contents into those 7 principles. I believed theoretical papers would probably cause me more than 2 weeks or months for extracting the contents.

Famous Groups Packing Early

EURO 2008- After Portugal, followed by Netherlands and now its time for my favorite team Italy. I stay last night and watch the early of the game and I know that the Spain will go through. The way Italy play last night was not the way they've played during the last World cup. The energy and ball control was not really a full blast. Without a doubt Spain reserve the semi-finalist title.

A very unexpected outcome German-Turkey, Russia-Spain. If the underdog team won this year EURO, Greece wining over Portugal will be remembered...

Academic Advisory Workshop

"Bengkel Penasihatan Akademik"- I was asked to join this workshop for future sake. It was announced one day before that tutors are compulsory to attend this. I'm being quite skeptical about this compulsory thing as I'm quite sure that when the day come, I will only see the faces of my department's tutors only. As the day arrived, yes I was right. Other faces are our senior lectures and some are the new young lectures. This is not hearing myself making complaint but I believed its a good practice of our head of department to show some enthusiastism from the member of department to any program launched by the faculty.

During the workshop, we were all been spread of by five talks given by respective speaker, mostly related towards academic advisory element since at the end of this month, new student will start to begin their new semester. Everything is mostly tackled on how a lecturer handle his/her student successfully. But above all I enjoyed the talk given by the head of Counseling Section of the university where he's content is most of not boring. I must say that usually a counselor know how to tackle an audience since that kind of thing is the thing they use to.

One thing I learn was, keep yourself happy and smile as it represents a smart people. To start a practice try to pronounce the number TIGA as tige, 3. Look at the mirror and I'll tell you that you will find yourself smiling. Even though you are trying enough not to smile. Go...try it on

Discussion No. 23

We had resume our 23rd discussion group. The topic is not related to either maths or physics, but it was related to the word editor used by scientist especially physicist and mathematician when they are publishing their journals, books, theses and so on.

This is again about LaTeX. I just found out that all this while I had pronounce it wrongly. TeX is not pronounce as Te(ks), it was actually Te(ch) like we said 'te(ch)nology". Our speaker of the day, as I can called him a pro-user of LaTeX as he's been using LaTeX for quite a long time and it has became of his a used to of word editor. He did highlight a few of importance of user to use LaTeX as it is professional especially for publications and most of all author concentrate on content without paying much attention of the format setting.

I personally think that, LaTeX is absolutely nice together with the slide presentation and drawing image option. All we need to do is make sure that packages related must be installed in the miktex system.

Right now, I am trying to convert my master thesis to LaTeX version, as I'm happy to see the result later on. God Willing...

EURO 2008

Well, my favorite season of all time is back. EURO fever is now back on and as always I hope my favorite team ITALY will be the winner of this EURO 2008.

Happy footballing guys!!!

LaTeX Workshop

I've attended 1 and a 1/2 day LaTeX workshop organized by the maths institute. This is my first time participation in a LaTeX workshop with a formality. Previously, I was using LaTeX by learning them by myself together with the guidance of my SIFU. Also perviously I used MikTek together with WinEdit as the LaTeX editor but joining the workshop, I have found out more nicer and acceptable editor which can make me learn and grabs the technique faster.

Just name them few, TeXniccenter, ProTeX,

I think later I myself might want to install this TexnicCenter since everything we want is in one window only. And furthermore there's more icons and everything which is very handy if to compare to the previous known editor. Or maybe it is because I used the old version of WinEdit.

I fall in love with this new word editor for REAL

Completion

Early this month I had defense my master thesis in front of few recognize faces as my examination committee. It was very strange and later on awkward to confidently present my work to them. It is becoming more churning to stomach that my external was now entitled a professor and he's a mathematical physicist which known to be precise and particular.

However, that morning also, the officer in charged gave me a very happy news indeed. My external won't show up as the report he send going well and he actually satisfied with the content. So according to the new university regulation, reports by external that written satisfied won't be invited to the defense session. Lucky me I guess.

I have now completed my master study. Thanks millions to my supervisor. His time, courage and energy have put me through all the hard and happy time during the digestion of my thesis. And of course for listening to all my cents.

Appreciation also goes to people around me, family, friends and so on.

Thank You.