Flying over Arctic, back home
Oct 20th
Back home at 0:30 CST, Oct. 20
Back home safe! Here ends my longest and furthest, and the my first around-the-world journey. Only two continents out of seven -- Africa and Antarctica -- yet to be reached.
It seems the 16-hour flight was long and boring to many passengers, but to me it's again an exciting adventure. According to my GPS, we reached 87.5N -- only a little more than 200km from the point where all longitude lines meet together!!! This will probably hold my "north limit" record for quite a long time. I observed a nice aurora show (although not gorgeous but still nice) when flying over the Davis Strait, saw half of Orion went down into the icy cap when flying over northern Greenland, again a nice Arctic sunrise with sun rising from the south. The cloud finally block the view when the plane fly over Siberia, force me to sleep for a few hours before viewing another beautiful sunset at 13,000m. A 4-hour old new moon was also been spotted!
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- Another 16-hour with this bird
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- Sunset over Labrador
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- The second sunset over China at 13,000m, do you like this magical palette?
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- Back home at 0:30 CST, Oct. 20
Under the Stars and the Stripes
Oct 19th
Washington Monument
Again, writing in rush before departure... and this post shall be the finale of this journey. I'll go to the bus terminal in an hour and catch the bus to Newark for my return flight to Hong Kong (another 16 hours!) But according to the most recent route, the flight may again come close to the North Pole (although my seat is actually facing south), probably closer than the flight I came here. On the other hand, a CME outburst is just detected by satellites, and an aurora activity around Oct. 19 is predicted, let's see if I can catch it "in the air"!
In front of Harvard-Smithsonian Astrophysics Observatory
While in New York I met astronomer Tony Hoffman, a very friendly New Yorker, and he guided me around the Museum of Natural and History; now for the next stop, Boston, I again plan to meet astronomers, the friendly staffs of the Minor Planet Center's director Tim Spahr. I met my sister's fiance Song who is studied as a Ph.D. student at Boston upon arrival at the bus terminal, and went to Harvard University in the next day. However I unexpectedly met two Chinese graduate students, among them there is Li Zeng, an old friend of mine but drop-out-of-radar for several years. I had a nice chat with all the friends, old or new, meet-before or newly-meet, and this marked a very nice Boston trip. What's more, Song and Li invited me for some Chinese meals and I temporary no need to eat hamburgers during the two days (I ate them all day long since they are probably the only affordable and easy-to-find food to me in the U.S.)
I also paid a short visit of the city. Boston downtown is very small, and I spent no more than an afternoon to explore it. But the roads are quite complex and it's easy to get lost! To make things worse my GPS cannot capture signal there.
It began to rain a few hours before I left Boston, unfortunately it's not cold enough to snow. According to the NWS reports I was already close to the snow area, but this time I missed it again. Song drove me to the railway station and I would catch the Amtrak train to Washington.
Policeman in Washington
If you can spot Obama, let me know
It's said that Amtrak service often suffered from heavy delay, but the train I caught didn't. The seats were large and comfortable (comparable to business class of airplane) and I sleep well. I was in a good mood when arriving Washington in twilight.
Unfortunately it was again a cold day with rain. Washington subway is relatively modern compare with New York's and Boston's, but the fare policy is not as simple as those two cities. I dropped my big bag at the hostel and only get my small bag with the city tour. You may just walk around to visit most attractions at Washington, as they are all locate around the Washington Monument. This is quite convenient.
I arrived the White House at 6:30 p.m. Where was Obama? Well, probably he was in office to avoid the cold and rainy weather, I saw no one in the open air.
Welcome to Philadelphia
The next day I got a Greyhound ride to my last stop of the American journey: Philadelphia. The first impression was not good at all, comparing to New York, Boston and Washington it appeared to be small, dirty, and the some citizens appeared to be bad-behaviour. Philadelphia has a horrible nickname, "Killadelphia", because of its high crime rate. But the Apple YHA was said to be the No.1 hostel in North America and indeed it's the best YHA I had ever visited, a detail map and guide was placed on my bed upon my arrival, so I still spend longer in the city than I expected. The narrow, old streets seem to be interested and full of historic smell, but due to the safety reason I didn't visit much of them.
So here ends my longest, farthest journey from home. But another 16-hour Arctic adventure is waiting for me -- let's see what's there!
Big Apple is magical
Oct 16th
This landmark would surely don't require any captions...
Look at that! A boy with a big bag walks in a tremendous speed along the famous Time Square 42nd Street, hey, I'm feeling rather cool. Here is the Big Apple, City of New York!
Hong Kong has a nickname, goes "Asian World City", now here is New York, absolutely the American World City. Walking down at 42nd Street, I have heard at least 6 languages -- English, Spanish, Japanese, Arabic, Mandarin Chinese and Cantonese in 5 minutes time. I'm even be recornized as a New Yorker, answering questions about how to go to the Bus Terminal for five times during my 3-day visit. I got surprise about how many non-European faces I have found in the subway trains, but surely a large fraction of them are New Yorkers! By the way, the New York subway system is also the most complex subway system I have ever encountered, even compare to the Tokyo's. Their entrances are difficult to find. My sense of direction gets quite a challenge here.
I could never imagine that a big city can be magical, but Big Apple does! Just pay a visit to the overcrowded Wall Street and downtown Manhattan, and the colorful Time Square 42nd Street and Broadway at night, then peaceful the Central Park. Even no need to mention the Statue of Liberty, unimaginable-large Musuem of Natural History and Mentropolitan Musuem, or the Empire State Building.
The last night at New York I went to the Carnegie Hall for a performance by Philadelphia Orchestra, my first oversea concert. I'll write about that later.
Okay, my blog writing is always behind schedule -- I'm now going to the railway station to catch the train from Boston to Washington now. It appears there are not much to see at Washington and Philadelphia (to be accurate, that's because I'm adviced to be stayed at the hostel at night by many friends at those cities. I hang out in New York and Boston at everynight night, but Washington and Philadelphia are said to be much more dangrous, so I must take care on this). Certainly there are lots photos but I suppose many of you have already seen many NYC photos, so I will temporary hold them for later process instead of post for hurry.
Hanging out in Puerto Rico
Oct 12th
Panorama -- At Peak II of Palomino Island
Sorry for the behind-schedule update, I was busy at all times, and when I wasn't, I was tired. But I'll still write some lines here.
On Friday most talks were not on my list, so I went to Palomino Island -- a small remote island about 15 minutes ferry time from El Conquistador. It's my fault for not bringing a swimsuit to here, the sea is remarkably clear and I can see many things in the water, it must be the best beach site I have ever been. I did a roundabout over the island and then walking in the sea when it's pretty shallow to walk without a swimsuit.
Panorama -- Palomino Island at the beach
Panorama -- Port El Conquistador
On Saturday, here comes the most excited tour -- the Arecibo Observatory. Big thanks to LOC Michael Nolan's arrangement, all the visitors were able to visit the platform -- which is only available to VIP visitors. The platform tour seems to be somewhat dangrous -- we have to walk for over 300 meters for a catwalk that is about 200 meters above ground, and the 900-ton platform is support by several guys and is also in the air. But surely it's among the most exciting things I have ever done!
Panorama -- under the big disk
Under the big disk
Arecibo catwalk -- in the air
Arecibo Observatory -- at the top
Here ends my days in Puerto Rico -- it can't be better. I flew to New York in the morning of Oct. 11 and here began the trip in the east coast. I took a large number of photos at Palomino Island and Arecibo Observatory, please be patient -- I'll see if I can process them during the 16-hour flight from Newark to Hong Kong, here I just give you a "taste". I'll complete my visit at New York on Oct. 14 and will take a Greyhound bus to Boston.
Left to right: Petr Pravec, Robert Stephens, Brian Warner, me
Take off at San Juan
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- Left to right: Petr Pravec, Robert Stephens, Brian Warner, me
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- Under the big disk
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- Panorama — Palomino Island at the beach
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- Panorama — Port El Conquistador
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- Panorama — At Peak II of Palomino Island
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- Take off at San Juan
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- Arecibo catwalk — in the air
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- Arecibo Observatory — at the top
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- Panorama — under the big disk
Meeting Day 3/4: Well done!
Oct 9th
Panorama -- poster session, can you find where my poster was?
Sorry for not getting something to write yesterday, I went to the banquet in the evening and had no time for the blog.
Everything went rather fine. Great people, great talks, great discussions, although it takes time for someone to intergret into a group, I feel I have learn much lots of things. I still get a lot of things to do and have a long way to go, but nevertheless I have a good start, all are good.
There are a number of brilliant youngests in America, I met some during the poster session, and there was an undergraduate named Melissa Haegert who gave a talk about her YORP study and receive quite a clapping from the big-names. Woo, simply brilliant there. With a lot of brilliant guys similar to your age around you just get more energy to work hard.
Hanging around
Coconut trees and the moon
There were a couple of people came to my poster and interacted with me, it's my fault that I didn't prepared a well-organized oral presentation for them. My presentation must be somewhat scrappy, but the conversasion generally end up with "nice job" and "thank you" so I still feel fine. Prof. Bobby Bus, a big-name scientist who had a poster a few steps from mine, received a lot of attention, I planned to step forward and ask him questions, but he was so popular so I didn't even get a chance to speak! Instead I drifted around and continuely paced myself into the professional world by talk something with the poster authors, generally every conversasion went pretty fine, I was even talk something in-depth with professors from Cal Tech, MIT and JPL since I was doing something very close to them, that's great. Although still quite far from native students, my oral English for serious acadamic discussion had greatly improved. I was even lucky enough to have lunch with Dr. Alan Harris and Dr. Petr Pravec and sitting next to Dr. Peter Jenniskens during the banquet -- and have a great discussion with them!
Dr. Alan Harris illustrating how asteroid light-curve works by showing picture of ox
Marek Kozubal (left) and Dr. Peter Jenniskens
It's sad that time flies quick, we are approaching the end of the meeting, but tomorrow I would like to listen to some talks on TNO -- and try to arrange a time to a nearby small island for sightseeing and then move to Fajardo Inn since there are no spaces at El Conquistador in Friday night. I have signed up the tour to the famous Arecibo Observatory (yes, the "huge disk" which has been appeared in a number of fiction movies!). Just when I was hanging from poster to poster, Michael Nolan (chair of this meeting and one of the heads of Arecibo) step to me and ask if I would like to be listed in a limited-number platform tour waitlist. "You are coming long-way from China and certainly I'll try to arrange you a better trip!" Wow how good you are, Dr. Nolan!
Okay, my days at Puerto Rico are approaching to its end -- great day around. I will still have a week around New York, Boston, Philadelphia and Washington, these big cities are said to be dangrous (thanks for warm-heart American friend Randy to advice me on this) and I will take care. But most Americans are really nice people!
Stay tuned for updates.
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- Panorama — poster session, can you find where my poster was?
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- Marek Kozubal (left) and Dr. Peter Jenniskens
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- Coconut trees and the moon
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- In the morning
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- Dr. Robert Jedicke introducing next-generation survey, the Pan-STARRS
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- Dr. Dave Tholen introducing one of the potential harzadous planet, the Apophis
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- Hanging around
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- Dr. Alan Harris illustrating how asteroid light-curve works by showing picture of ox
朱进@华师附小
Oct 7th
此pose很有形...
在波多黎各开会期间偷闲一下，小换一下口味吧。当然还是和天文有关的。
朱进在9月22日到华师附小做报告。大猫来广州，当然是要去看看的，顺便也可以当今“00后”的风采。
靠近报告厅的时候就听到里面好像爆炸一样巨吵闹，吃了一惊…… 话说以前小学的时候，只要有点吵，还不给老师骂个狗血淋头？现在的00后也真是挺嚣张的。进去以后才明白，这是他们听讲座的方式，因为每当大猫放出一张照片，他们就“哇”一声，可见对这次讲座热情还是挺高的。
讲座之后的提问环节，成堆学生挤上前去问问题，甚至老师还要拦住后来者，开始让我想起那些“从小学生到大学生的退化”之类的争论了：大学的讲座有这么踊跃提问的好像很少吧。第一个问题是，“宇宙边界外面是什么”，大猫立马囧了，嘉宾们窃笑，一副很不以为然的样子，老师赶紧上前说“大家提的问题不要太难”，结果下一个问题是“宇宙有多少颗星星”，大猫更囧了…… 半小时的提问下来大猫满头大汗，却面带微笑，于是乎又给大家签名。虽然00后的小学生活和我们那时候截然不同，可看得出来，他们对这场讲座很兴奋。
哎，从小学生到大学生，恐怕确实退化了。这几天开会，听到了各种各样古怪而有趣的研究报告，可我们干这么多事，花这么多钱，回答的还不是那几个简单的问题吗？宇宙有多大？边界外面是啥？有外星人吗？等等。可我们搞了这么多东西，这最初的几个问题好像反倒给弄忘了。从物理学的角度来看，这从另一个角度说明了熵确实是在不断增大的……
有时候人也确实是挺可笑的啊，上帝的笑料确实不少。
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- 此pose很有形…
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- 好像这小孩问的是“宇宙边界外面是什么”
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- 你能找得到大猫吗？
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- 等待签名
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- 要签名的小孩连大猫打电话的时候都不放过
Meeting Day 2: Everything's more than good
Oct 7th
Panorama -- garden in the morning
The meeting moved into the second day and I'm feeling even better with how the things go. When there is a will, there is a way! I'm feeling rather lucky.
Again I got up at 6 a.m. in the morning for the sunrise, unfortunately it was slightly foggy in the morning to eliminate the possbility of a beautiful sunrise. So I went to the restraut for breakfast (everything went smooth as I was familiar with the procedure this time), then got prepared for the morning session.
The morning session was about the annoucement of awards and prizes in the field of planetary science and invited lectures for the recipients. I was adviced to attend the lectures, so although the titles were not yet specific, I still arrived early. The first lecture was the Urey Prize recipient, Dr. Sarah Stewart from Harvard University, presenting her work about the theory of icy body impacts. Then came the next, Dr. (Prof.?) Tobias Owen for the well-known prize, Kuiper Prize. This prize is the top prize in planetary science, and Dr. Owen must be a well-known and respected scientist, because when the annoucement was made, all the attendees stood up to show their respects for him. Woo, really cool.
Panorama -- Prize annoucement
And then the annoucement confirmed my guess, Dr. Owen was indeed a spectacular person in the field. He was said to be the father of Cassini Project -- the spacecraft that is now exploring Saturn. This reminded me something -- it was, actually, 12 years ago, I was 9 years old and had watched the news about the launch of Cassini, then keep track with it, and wondered what I would be doing in 2004 (the expect arrival time of Cassini to Saturn). After 12 years, I'm now sitting at this top-class planetery science conference, meet spectacular persons in the field, including the Cassini-related people. Everything is fantastic.
During the noon I managed to figure out the explanation of the Coriolis issue on the unusual trajetory of 2008 TC3 and sent an email to Dr. Jenniskens about this, really excited to be able to answer a question given by the big-names -- even the later discovery of being failed on getting the regular scholarship this year cannot eclipse my happiness. In the afternoon it was the comet's session, but I had a great discussion about 1998 CS1 with Alan Harris et al at the exhibition hall and was too excited to go to the talk's. At the end of the discussion they invited me to the lunch on the next day -- wow this is great!
Okay tomorrow will be a big day for me. Don't forget my presentation on the poster in the afternoon -- you are warmly welcome to Puerto Rico and have a look at it 
Panoaroma -- El Conquistador in the afternoon
Meeting Day 1: Everything's fine
Oct 6th
Panorama -- El Conquistador sunrise
I woke up at 6 a.m., the sun was about to rise and everything's quiet. As there were some cumulus at the horizon I didn't get the sun until it's high enough, but I still wait at the balcony until the sunlight reach my face. It's nice, although not yet spectacular. I'll manage to get every sunrise while at El Conquistador.
Then I went to the restraut for the complimentory breakfast. I did have problems though, since I'm neither familiar with the customs nor with the food's name. It's, actually, funny, but I finally find way to work everything out and get myself fed.
I finally got into the oral talks session. Thankfully I'm getting myself used to listen to complex and speeding English now. Although I cannot understand every word them say, but at least, no problem for understanding what they want to express without paying too much attention, so I'll not be too tired.
Working in the lobby -- great Carribean scenery just out of the doors!
Panorama -- lobby of the meeting (the talks were in progress so there are few people)
I went to the Pluto session in the morning and listen to two talks about the occultation of Pluto, but they didn't interest me much. I had wish there would be free lunch supplies, but unfortunately, no... instead there were sandwiches at a price of $15 @_@ so I ate nothing.
I was highly anticipated the 2008 TC3 session in the afternoon, it indeed turned out to be an interesting one. Dr. Peter Jenniskens -- a big-name scientist which I had heard of for many times -- served as chair, and gave a report about the recovery of TC3 meteoroids. After the session I went into front and had a nice acadamic chat with Peter and other big-name scientists, everything works great, it seems I had overestimate the difficulties.
Talk of 2008 TC3's discovery, given by Andrea Boattini from CSS
The only problem might be eating. As the price is terrible here, I'd rather to bear hungry. But there are still ways -- since the breakfast is free, I can eat as much as I can in the morning, then take some biscuits and coffee at the break, then it should work fine. Anyway, tomorrow will be a busy day, with several lectures by prize-holders, and dozens of posters and talks, I must get myself well prepared. Nevertheless today is a good start.
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- Working in the lobby — great Carribean scenery just out of the doors!
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- Interesting models of the dynamic Earth and Cassini spacecraft
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- 2008 TC3 meteoroid — it’s in my hand!
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- Talk of 2008 TC3′s discovery, given by Andrea Boattini from CSS
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- Panorama — El Conquistador sunrise
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- Panorama — lobby of the meeting (the talks were in progress so there are few people)
Great Carribean days, great challenge on the way
Oct 5th
Panorama -- looking out to Atlantic Ocean from the balcony.
I met Dr. Alan Harris and Robert Stephens at the airport, and Dr. Harris drove us to El Conquistador (the meeting place). There is much to see from the highway.
El Conquistador must be one of the best place I have ever been, I stay at a room which is faced to the Atlantic Ocean, with beautiful beaches, coconut trees and some remote islands to be seen from the balcony. I did not spend much time to walk up and down here but I'll do this in the following days.
The on-site registration opened at 3 p.m. and I completed it immeadiately, and eagerly hung up my poster at the Carribean ballroom. It appears I was the first to hang the contributed poster up. There some big-names around, like NASA or so, with their staffs busily hanging up their commercial poster -- or advertisement, on their research projects or products.
All right! The poster is up after traveled for more than 20,000 kilometers!
The Fajardo scenery and the meeting's atmosphere is great, it can't be better for me, and I can see those big-name scientists drifting around me, friendly and easy-going. However I'm feeling quite unease. Everybody speaks a speeding English which I must pay extra attention to understand and respond, all day long -- it could be exhausted for anyone. But the meeting is not yet began! What's more, even if I can get a quasi-infinite energy on processing those English, how to approach them? During the dinner time, the top scientists sorted into groups and speeding their English with lots of special words which I could barely identify, such as "2MASS", quasars, or galaxy redrifts. It's quite deflated.
Okay, even if I was indeed too confident about my English ability, now I have traveled across the globe and attend this top-class meeting, so I must work everything out. I'll listen to two sessions tomorrow -- Pluto and 2008 TC3, let's see what's over there. I should go for pre-study of these programs now.
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- Guess what’s out?
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- Hanging the poster
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- Hanging the poster — another angle
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- Fixing the last pin into the corner
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- All right! The poster is up after traveled for more than 20,000 kilometers!
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- NASA’s poster about SOFIA
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- Even LED TV was brought here
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- Icarus — the best journal in planetary science. When can I sign up?
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- Non-watermarked final version!
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- Panorama — looking out to Atlantic Ocean from the balcony.
Mid Autumn Day at San Juan
Oct 4th
Carribean days
It seems I don't have a jet lag problem, at least for this journey, so I got up early and plan for a day tour around the city.
Oct. 3 is the traditional Mid Autumn Day (中秋节) for Chinese people. Since there is 12-hour timezone difference from Puerto Rico to China, short messages from friends flood in to remind me for a moon-seeing. Quite interesting.
Nevertheless, I chatted with parents and friends in the morning, and then went out at noon. The target today is Old San Juan, the oldest district has a history of 500 years. The friendly hotel assistant (I'd wish to stay at YHA but there are no YHA hostel at San Juan, and I'm not sure if it's safe to find a hostel) informed me I could take B-21 bus to Old San Juan terminal. However I got attracted by the beautiful scenery of Condado beach, so I decide to walk to Old San Juan (~6km to go).
Capitolio de Puerto Rico
It took me about an hour to reach Old San Juan. Holding a GPS device (installed on my Nokia N79) in hand felt great, I located a McDonald's by it and made straight in. It might be a little bit nonsense to search for a McDonald's after flying around the globe, but the most important thing is get myself fed so I don't care about it.
After having a BigMac at the McDonald's I walk to Fort San Felipe del Morro, or "El Morro" in short. Unfortunately it began to rain, but oddly it was mostly clear, except a small convective cloud overhead. But the cloud kept growing and poured down the rain despite the clear sky and sunshine, quite freaky, so I was held at the stores along the street. My biggest fault should be forgetting to bring an umbrella.
Panorama of El Morro entrance
Panorama on the top of El Morro
Panorama at the top of El Morro, looking to San Juan port
Panorama of El Morro rainbow, looking east
I finally arrived at El Morro, unfortunately when I was on the top of the fort it poured again. But the fort is great, a very fine historic place, although without much introduction around the park, the old fort speak itself. Another famous castle, Fort San Cristobal, is nearby and the ticket is only $5 for both forts, so I decided to walk to San Cristobal's.
There are much more introduction at San Cristobal about the history and construction of the fort. San Cristobal is much smaller than El Morro, but it preserved several original "garitas", i.e. a lookout tower, which is the symbol of Puerto Rico. A small poster presentation informed the visitors about the history of San Juan forts and Puerto Rico. Interestingly, it doesn't contain any information about the American victory against Spain in 1898, which Puerto Rico was transfered after ruled by Spanish for about 400 years. Deep under the fort, there is some ship paintings on the wall, which is remarked as "opus of a to-be-execute Spanish captain". Poor captain, but his doodles kept himself alive after so many years.
Panorama - El Morro fortifying San Juan port
Panorama - Front side of El Morro
Entrance of Fort San Cristobal
Observation deck built by the U.S. Navy at Fort San Cristobal during WWII
In front of a garita
It was about sunset after I walked out from Fort San Cristobal. I didn't want to walk for another hour to back to Condado so I decided to take a bus. The public transportation system in San Juan is not quite visitor-friendly, I spent quite some effort at the bus terminal to figure out how it works. The buses are also rare (maybe I got used to frequent bus service in Guangzhou or Beijing...), I did wait for nearly an hour to get on a C-53 to Condado. There are no site-reminding boardcast on the bus, and the driver would not stop without a stop request -- very inconvenient, but I finally figure out the right stop to get off. The moon had rised when I back at Condado, it's now my time to do Mid Autumn Day moon-seeing -- but without mooncakes.
So here ends the day. Tomorrow I'd met Dr. Harris et al at the airport and we are heading to Fajardo -- the meeting place. Real oral-speaking challenge here!
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