World Cup 2010 Goes to Spain

So here it goes the double winner, Spain. They won the EURO 2008 and now repeating the victory to become the strongest football team in the 2010. Sadly to announce, last champion of the World Cup 2006, Italy cannot even go to the next second round after the group stage. Very sad indeed.

After seeing most of the good team defeated. These include, Argentina, Brazil, Italy and France of cause. Before the final game, most of the fan predicted that perhaps Germany will win the title. Not to mention, they played very well in every game except only one game defeats to Serbia. German also have many young players which most of them are very skillful and talented. But during the semifinal when they meet Spain, they lose 1-0 (the same goal they missed during the final of EURO 2008).

So, the winning team left to be either Spain or Netherlands. Both team never win the world cup. Spain in the other hand had never go to the final. The final game was a bit highly nerve breaking and dramatic, since both team desperately wanted to be the winner. Both have a 50-50 chances to win. Casillas did performed well during the game. Being a keeper and a captain at the same time is very challenging. But he did safe most of the shots from the Dutch player. He definitely deserved to be remembered during this 2010 game. I've seen him played since I was 20 years of age. At that time, he played with Real Madrid (until now) and he was just 19 years old. It was so tempting to think of how at young age he was representing one of the top football club in the world.

This year also, mark a very important year as I was enjoying the game during the day time. I don't have to wait until early morning at 2.30 a.m. to watch the game. But still, this is not so nice since during the day I was at school. Thus missing few early games in the group stage. But I do enjoy the game as much as before in the repeated game.

Long live football...

Hot Weather in Town

All around the news, especially in the US and North America regions, people are complaining about this year summer. We also bought a new fan because we cannot stand the heat in our house too. Not to say, the whole family are now having cold water as usual water usage instead of the warm water we used to. As for me, taking the public transport everyday making the feel of the heat even stronger. One thing for sure, taking the subways is less hot than taking the bus.

Right now, I really missed my home town ...

Pelita by A.P.I.

A very nice song. Boleh bikin naik semangat. Layan...

A Next Level

Yesterday, I sit for my oral physics comprehensive exam. It consists of a mini-project of current interest that also relate to my future proposal of Ph.D interest. It took me approximately 30 minutes to talk and the rest is for the Q&A session.

All together there are three committee members whom two of them are my internal examiners. Both are from physics department. The first was a high energy physicist, and the other was a theoretical condensed matter physicist. I was told my by my friend regarding this professor of theoretical condensed matter (he was from Greece), of how he usually give the student a pretty hard time if he was one of the examiner.

And this is in fact so true, because the first time when I sent him my type written report, he got so many suggestion in mind. There are certain things that he asked me to do and until the last minute of the day of the exam (presentation day), he event sent me an email saying what he aspect to see in my slides. This I cannot do of cause because of the time constraint that I have to follow. But at the end of my presentation, he again asked me to prepare another additional report and sent him a copy.

The story during the exam/presentation was a bit hectic. My other examiner asked few questions plus some suggestion of what I've been proposing in the current project. This is absolutely fine with me since I know absolutely what I did. But, the 1000 millions questions were by my Greek professor. His question covered from the very little things of physics to a wide knowledge of quantum mechanics but still in the interval of what I have said in my slide. I was so lucky that I did attend my supervisor's course on quantum mechanics and plus do some exercises on certain topics on the so famous nowadays coherent states. There are times, I was stumbled a bit, trying to focus and remember of what will be the answer, but overall I made his satisfied.

At this point, I believed I have give the best that I can and well, I did passed my comprehensive. This is indeed a good news as I am now officially a PhD candidate.

Thanks to the millions people around me and may I be prepared for the next level of the real research work.

Peace...

Life at SGW

I'm packing my things today. And later on will return my current office key to the department. It definitely a sad thing as I like my current workspace together with the rest of the students a lot. They are very understanding, helpfull and sometimes even hilarious. I can ask any question related to mathematical analysis and proof to these people. They're really nice. Thanks guys. I will be using my new office at Loyola Campus for now. Most people said that Loyola is more study-like environment, greener with its old building decoration plus quieter if compare to the SGW campus which is situated in the busy downtown area.

But, for me the busiest does not really bother me at all. Because the last time I spend my time at Loyola, I was trying my very best to cooperate with the so quiet motion. How bizarre that is. I told one of my friend that I'm going to move and pack my things. And he responded with, how sad it could be. Though I'll be seeing you guys again. It's not like I'm going back to Malaysia already.

Even though, I now don't have a permanent space/office here, but I will of cause definitely will come here now and then since my supervisor is here. There will be the graduate's room for which I can used. Also for the time being before the Fall semester is starting, I'll be using my friend's office to spend my weekdays for work purpose.

Today also, I'm able to take some pictures of the three of us. The mathematical physics student. Valerie is now Dr. Hudon and Ferenc will soon go for his thesis defense in July. Look how we pose in front the mathematical and statistic receptionist counter.

Me and Valerie Hudon

the mathematical physicist trio. ha ha

Fixing Thorough the Errors

It has been a while I'm using LaTeX as my word processor and I can say that I am quite comfortable with it. However, there are times when what you type and configure doesn't come out nicely. This never happened when I'm working in Microsoft word office.

Actually, there so much things you can do with LaTeX. Sometimes one can even experiment new style of writing, saving files, include files and so on. There are tons of references for those who would like to begin with LaTeX. And believe me it was really easy and helpful. But when one deals with the actual work with LaTeX, one can't imagine how one need to deal with the errors during the compilation of one files. Usually errors can be fix very quick. But today, it is very challenging. As I was writing just in a normal mode and everything was just fine. And next when I changed into a new file to continue with, I facing this kind of error for which I didn't know where to fix it since the file looked all perfect to me.

This is somehow very troublesome and annoying. Because now it has been one hour and more since I ever try to fix the error. It is related to the undefined references due to the cross-references in LaTeX. I somehow lost my focus since I cannot have the perfect compile pdf file. I guess I should stop running the compilation and just continue with the contents.

arrghhh...

p\s- I've emailed a friend who a master of this piece and perhaps he has the answer to it.

Oh Writing

I always get nervous, whenever I send my reports which definitely involved writing to someone who obviously experienced and smart. In this sense it is due to the academic writing (not when I'm blogging). Those reports which consist of technical and understanding of certain discussed topics. So in my case it would be the physics of mathematics. Graduate students, I assume will for sure experience the same thing. Of having to send reports, write-up, papers, theses and others writing materials to your supervisor. Doing this is to make sure that what you do is appropriately to what you have studied and mostly to witness your job in terms of documentation. And the viewers/readers are your referee to confirm your work.

I still remember during my final thesis writing of my masters. I supposed that I do OK in my writing but the results is not as I expected. The comments were made by my former supervisor was that,

"I think you watched too many English (US) movie. Your style of writing told me that. Please stop watching movies and you better start doing real writing. Meaning professional. " (I must agree, as people used to say your writing represent who you are)

From that day, I promised myself to work out my style of writing ever since. Not to do the same mistake again. And the most important part not to what Malay used to say "syok sendiri". My former also insist on knowing what your are writing and what is the thing you want really to say and keep your writing related to each other. He was also the one who taught me that equations and mathematical expression deserved to be treated as in line with the notions of a story. For example when you read a journals, you also read each mathematical equations together between the line if there is. Not to exclude them.

I must really really thank to my former adviser to really changed the way I write. Last two weeks, I sent my first report to my adviser. And I was so nervous about how it would turns out. And today we met, he told me he was satisfied. We just have to add some more to the idea. That's all. And more he didn't mention anything about my writing. Perhaps it is readable.

Thanks...