Sunday, Mar 2, 2008 12:22PM /
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I came across a interesting record of my hometown in China, Hangchow(or HangZhou):
http://www.fordham.edu/halsall/source/polo-kinsay.html I am not sure about the accuracy of Marco Polo's descrīption about the city, but something about the lake, West Lake, is mostly reliable, and reminds me the rich history of the city, and breathtakingly beautiful scene of the lake:
"Inside the city there is a Lake which has a compass of some 30 miles [note: probably 30 li] and all round it are erected beautiful palaces and mansions, of the richest and most exquisite structure that you can imagine, belonging to the nobles of the city. There are also on its shores many abbeys and churches of the Idolaters. In the middle of the Lake are two Islands, on each of which stands a rich, beautiful and spacious edifice, furnished in such style as to seem fit for the palace of an Emperor. And when any one of the citizens desired to hold a marriage feast, or to give any other entertainment, it used to be done at one of these palaces. And everything would be found there ready to order, such as silver plate, trenchers, and dishes, napkins and table-cloths, and whatever else was needful. The King made this provision for the gratification of his people, and the place was open to every one who desired to give an entertainment. Sometimes there would be at these palaces an hundred different parties; some holding a banquet, others celebrating a wedding; and yet all would find good accommodation in the different apartments and pavilions, and that in so well ordered a manner that one party was never in the way of another. "
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Wednesday, Feb 27, 2008 1:33PM /
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I realized one friend of mine has posted our eating event online:
http://www.princeroy.org/?p=517they are a very nice couple that I often go out and try different cuisine with, and they are moving to Laos soon, after service in India and Hong Kong. Few of them from the group of diplomats speak perfect Chinese with almost no accent. I used to view diplomat's job a dream work: banquet, press release, parties, but it has a hard side as it requires you to move from once place to another very few years, until you get retired. Anyway, wish them good luck in another exotic place.
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Friday, Feb 8, 2008 5:56AM /
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今天是大年初一，妈妈在家里摆了些冷盘，开了两瓶（后来加上邻居家的第三瓶）香槟，邀请了左右两家邻居来家里喝一杯。两家喝的比较多，左边的里昂两公婆能喝会侃，一直和我和右边邻居家的男主人在讲布鲁塞尔的古旧建筑怎么没受保护，和Duvel啤酒是以前战争时候亲德比奸的厂里出的。。。一直到10点才走人。消耗了大量我带回家的腊肉和香肠，还有鸭赏。临走里昂说，差不多好回来了吧？随便找份工作么算了。
下周去面试两个公司，看看是不是有好的机会。
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Tuesday, Feb 5, 2008 10:28PM /
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Before I left Taipei for Chinese New Year (I am home in Belgium right now), I did some shopping and bought some DVDs for my mum and some SHISEIDO creams (moisturizer, emulsion) for my wife, and an eeepc for my daughter. At the video shop, the price for DVD is 199NT/box, I bought 4 pieces, the shop keeper said if I pay 1000NT, I can get membership, so I paid 1000NT and got a membership card, I got more than 600NT returned, I asked, "something is wrong, I bought 4 pieces, it should be 800NT something, how come you give me 600NT?", "Oh, don't worry, we are at promotion, if you buy one, you get one for free". At the SHISEIDO shop, I bought 2 bottles, with something around 6000NT, and the shop keeper firstly gave me a box with 4 bottles of SHISEIDO shampoo in a big box, "it is bonus", and then give me another bag of facial cream things, "it is another bonus". It was really not bad actually. :-)
But the eeepc was really a hard bargain, I headed into a shop without a friend with me, a guy approached me and I said I want to buy an eeepc with specification (4G version with Linux), and I have checked the price next door, the problem is that the next door shop does not offer memory upgrade, the guy looked at me and hesitated, "let me check our price", he came back with something higher than the next door shop, so I said, no, I think your price is not the best, and I started to count the money in my pocket, he turned back to someone, and check into their category, and then came back to me with some express of "it is really too hard for me" on face, and started to talk to me in Taiwan dialect, I said sorry I don't understand, but I want to buy the computer from you for sure, he sense that I am from a local, and I feel not so comfortable too, as it seems other shop would give the good price easier and I don't have to corner the dealer. Finally, he made a decision to give me 2G memory upgrade with slightly higher price than he offered, I merely agreed and gave him the money. Not easy this time.
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Monday, Jan 28, 2008 1:52PM /
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It is not related to my job, just my nerdy hobby: machine learning. I worked in radiology for a while before, where I developed my technical interest in computing and artificial intelligence that I learn from brain image processing, that was all about pattern recognition. I coded in Matlab and C to read and analyze images from MRI scanner, I found pattern recognition, and then artificial intelligence really amazing, I had to give up my research interest and turned into some better paid job, but I still read books in this field. It appears to me that human is emotional, that is the reason why machine or computer sometimes can win us in chess game, but the question is, will computer think more smarter than human brain? I found it hard to answer, if computer is not as smart as human, how can computer win human in chess game? If it is smarter as human, then despite the emotional element, are there any other part in human ntelligence that we actually fail?
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