How wrong could Roast go?

It can go pretty wrong... especially if

1) You do not put enough oil

2) You put the tray at the bottom of the oven (how daft is that?)

3) You are not constantly watching it and keeping time (muddle-head)

Today was one of those days when my cooking was bad. These were the nice people who came to my house. :) The company was really good. My new housemates Helen and Alena joined in as well :>

We managed to make good Yorkshire puddings though... haha credit should got to Max who did the mixing and watching them 'grow'; the research team... Renie and Helen who were in charge of finding the recipe on the net. :p

My First time (in 4 years) on the Women's safety bus

My friend 'forced' me to take the women's safety bus tonight (my dear friend... if you are reading this... I must say I really appreciate it... but its this pathological problem with me that I must feel as if I can take care of myself :p).

The women's safety bus is a really great service runned by the Sheffield Students' Union to send female students home after a late night out. It runs from 1130pm till late late. It is definitely something most people see as allowing women to party as much as they want without worrying about having to go home alone. But some how I felt dis-empowered travelling in it today... Its the thing about not being able to choose whether I can walk home by myself at night. I guess there's different standards of what it means to be 'free' for different people.

A different Mid-Autumn celebration - 另类中秋

My friend C decided today that he was going to have a party and invite his friends over. :p I'm not usually up for spontaneous social events but I decided to take up the invitation. After all it was Mid-Autumn celebration... a time for gatherings.

I had a really interesting night. :) I met some of C's friends, who he met online with the chinese student internet forum in Sheffield. They are really nice and friendly people and I would love to spend another time with them. It did take a while for me to warm up and join in the conversations. Firstly I was very confused by them using their internet aliases when speaking with one another. I did not even know they were refering to C at certain points during the night. Secondly, I was slightly lost in the 'Chinese Chinese' everyone was speaking. They spoke chinese with their beautiful mainland chinese accent and speckled their sentences with what I would think as posh phrases and sayings. There was a slight oxi-moron that while I identified myself as a being a rather traditional chinese person, I definitely would not appear as such to them. I actually felt inferior interacting with my new friends with the way I was speaking (to be fair... my chinese fluency has decreased since I came to study in UK :p). It was quite a strange feeling.

This comes back to our little discussion about ethnicity at SOUL last night. :) F was talking about how ethnicity is not only defined by skin-colour, but also by a common history or way of living. A group of chinese in one country may live a life completely different from another group of chinese else where. While they are bonded by a common ancestry long long ago, recent developments have put them down different cultural trajectories.

What I learnt today...
that there are savoury mooncakes!!! Apparently in certain parts of China, people use meat as mooncake fillings. Today J. made some and we all had a try. He used short-crust pastry to wrap the fillings in.


The mooncakes that I am familiar with are usually the ones that are filled with sweet fillings like lotus paste, bean paste, nuts. The only savoury bit I know would probably be the gorgeous egg yolk and the occasional time when I have the 五仁 type with bits of ham in there.

http://www.chinatownconnection.com/chinese-mooncake.htm

Start of Academic Year 2007/2008

Oh My Gosh!!! It's the beginning of Freshers' Week!!!... It's the start of Autumn!!!

and how does Mother Nature mark this special day in the calendar???

RAIN!!! Lotsa and Lotsa RAIN :>

Every year... without fail...

Homity Pie...

I had a really good weekend, catching up with my uni friends :) I met up with my Psychology friends last night for dinner, then with Kathryn and Jess today for lunch in Bakewell.

Did not manage to take a single picture with my friends... haha so I thought this picture of my lunch in Bakewell will remind me of this weekend. :>

中秋节- Mid-Autumn Festival

爸爸，妈妈，姐姐和Stephen 现在在新加坡庆祝中秋节。我却再Sheffield 无所事事。没有月饼吃，没有朋友陪我提灯笼和玩蜡烛。haizzzz...

至少这个周末约了几位大学老朋友吃晚餐，明天也会和 Jess 和 Kathryn 去Peak district 走走，吃午餐。

新的大学学期下周开始。。。 Sheffield 又会‘活' 起来了。

(A chinese friend got me to chat over msn with chinese... haha thought I practiced a few lines on my blog... feels funny writing/typing in Chinese... havent done that for a while)

42nd Street

I went to watch 42nd Street (the musical) at the Sheffield Lyceum tonight :) It was amazing!!! check out some of the music from this youtube link. This was performed at the 55th Tony awards. those tap dance moves.... wow!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vXKK8m_67NU&mode=related&search=

Apparently Catherine Zeta Jones was a chorus member in the 1984 West end production of 42nd St. :p and just like the main character Peggy Sawyer in the show, she was given the starring role of Peggy Sawyer when the star actress fell ill. :> hehe from wikipedia...

Could not resist putting this in too :p Girl Power!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0C5uXz6Cy0&mode=related&search=

Helicopter in Weston Park

A luminous green helicopter landed in the middle of Weston Park today. :) My friends and I were having lunch in the park (just beside the Psychology Dept) and were just in time to catch the excitement.

2 policemen on bicycles cleared the grassy area where many people were having their lunch. The helicopter then hovered above the park creating swirls of wind that blew grass and flower petals around its landing perimeter. Then it slowed to a smooth landing.

We still have no idea what its purpose was for. There were some staff and patients from the nearby Children's hospital, who came to receive the helicopter. But whether some one was getting transported somewhere else or if the helicopter brought important cargo was not apparent. The people near the helicopter were evidently feeling the same as the on-lookers as they were taking photos of the not so common event :p

Too bad I did not have a camera with moi.

Autism Europe Congress 2007

I had a good time at the Autism Europe Congress 2007. :> There were many good speakers there from all aspects of Autism research and clinical practice. :p There was plenty fodder for the mind (if none for the body).


There was an Art exhibition displaying works from people with Autism. I thought this painting really matched one of the poster presentations about face processing and visual perception.

The study by Deruelle and colleagues was looking at high spatial frequency and low spatial frequency information biases in emotion and gender aspects of face processing in children with Autism Spectrum Disorders and typically developing children. High spatial frequency information in a visual image provides the details of the image; Low spatial frequency information provides the global outline (i.e. relationships between different parts of the picture) of the image. The picture above can be what a face would look like if only low spatial frequency information were given.

Hybrid faces were used. Each had a low spatial frequency filtered faces super-imposed on a high spatial frequency filtered face. The high and low spatial frequency face were either male or female, or of 2 different emotions. Each image was presented for 100ms and then participants were asked to categorize the faces they saw as male or female, one emotion or another.

Typically developing participants made more low spatial frequency choices for the gender task, more high spatial frequency choices for the emotion task. Participants with ASD showed more low spatial frequency choices in both types of task. The typically developing participants differed signficantly from the ASD participants only on the emotion task.

Participants with ASD did not show differential use of high and low spatial frequency information like the typically developing controls when switching between emotion and gender tasks. The authors suggest reduced top-down modulation on perceptual processes in participants with ASD.

People with autism have been known to show difficulties in processing emotions in faces. Could this low spatial frequency bias in hybrid faces be a clue to understanding why that is so? :p The picture is a pretty good description of this question isn't it?

Self Portrait with a Wine-Bottle

Edvard Munch is best known for his painting 'The Scream'. This painting is one of my favourites of his, after I visited the museum. It just feels to me that his paintings is his way to express his current state of emotions. There are times when he shows his confident side, but there are times his moments of pain and suffering slips out uncontrollably. Like in this portrait of himself... The wine-bottle (use of substance to get away?), his posture with hands clasped over his knees (a sign of resignation), the 2 waiters standing back to back who seem to grow out of his back (confusion? conflicting thoughts?).

For more: http://www.munch.museum.no/work.aspx?id=17

Concluding remarks about my Trip to Norway

I spent every last Kroner I had. If not for the unexpected 50 NOK fee (see... did not read the hostel description properly) I had to pay for bed linen hire each night I stayed at Anker hostel, I might have enough for a good breakfast before my morning flight back to Manchester, UK. Well, let's not complain and be thankful for what you have. :p I had a nice bread roll and a satisfying caffe latte. Coffee was good and fair-priced in Oslo. I've definitely become a coffee addict now.

After I came back from Sogndal, I was really tired. It might be age or the 2 consecutive nights spent on overnight buses really took its toll. The last bus ride was really crowded. I only had 1 seat to myself. The passenger in front of me placed the back of his seat so much into my space it was pretty uncomfortable. I must have annoyed the lady sitting beside me very much with my tossing and turning. Being by the window made me feel even more claustophobic.

The bus got to Oslo at 5.25am in the morning. I hanged around the train station till the attractions opened and went on to Akershuss castle. I had a nice walk around and then went to the Cultural history museum. I tried my best to absorb as many interesting facts at the museum (as it was really interesting... Did you know that the Vikings had a monetary penalty for murder? If you murder someone, you had to pay 1000x amount, and your brother would have to pay a lesser amount and so on with your relatives. That was meant to deter people from killing as it would impact your entire family... hmmm but just money for taking a life?). I was however overcome by hunger and fatigue by 11am. My idea of having a lavish dinner before I left Oslo turned into lunch instead. I took almost 20 mins to get to the cafe. I was so dis-oriented I was walking in the wrong direction!. I had my long-awaited meal of meatballs and pea stew (actually its like mushy peas) and a slice of cake.

I returned to the hostel well before check-in at 3pm. I was hoping to get a room early to have a wash and a nap. They were however very strict on timing that day. Still, by 4pm I was feeling fresh and clean and tucked myself in bed :>.

I woke up at 6pm and went to get some food. I had a ice seat in the botanical gardens (which I went on the first day too) with my bread roll and orange.

I went back to my hostel and had an early ngith. i heard the Dutch couple come in at about 10ish. They must have thought me lazy as they caught me sleeping at 4pm too when they arrived.

Finally, some other highlights of my trip that have not been mentioned:
- Kontikii museum: Thor Heyerdahl (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thor_Heyerdahl) and his amazing voyages on open seas with mere rafts.
- The FRAM museum: the story of Norwegian polar explorers. most impressed Fridtjof Nansen (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fridtjof_Nansen) and Roald Amundsen.
I might go read their books :>
- The Munch Museet: showcased lots and lots of Munch's works.
- BROWN CHEESE (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geitost)

Nigandsbreen - BiGgest Glacier on MainLand Europe

I went to the biggest alpine glacier in mainland Europe at Jostelsbreen national Park. It was a fantastic experience (this might be effort justification: I spent so much money, time and effort, that the outcome MUST be good :p). The scenery was spectacular. The mountains had mini-waterfalls and streams, likely consequencies of melting snow. The glacier was a massive blue crystal etched between 2 mountains. It was a valley glacier, slightly different from ice sheets in ANtartica and Greenland. Fallen snow collected within the valley became the compact ice structure. The blue arises from the water molecules absorbing some of red light. :>

I had a miraculous journey to reach the glacier. It began with a 7 hour overnight bus journey. Then 3 hours of waiting for a bus at Sogndal bus terminal. Further waiting (and not too sure there is a bus) at Gaupne, a nearby village. Then a private ride in the bus carrying also a truck load of goods at 70 miles per hour on the narrow mountain roads. I managed to get there in time for the only glacier walk that day. Finally I had to hitch a ride with a kind Dutch couple from the visitor centre to the base of the glacier.

Sognal

Gaupne

We were given spikes for our shoes, ice picks and harnesses. Our group of 8 were all belayed on 1 long rope. After the guide showed us the 'power' of the spikes... that as long as you kept your feet flat on the ice, you could not slip no matter which way you walked... I felt a sense of invincibility :p

the crew

View from the Glacier

A crevice

The journey back to Oslo was yet another adventure. I was definitely was like a 'fox thinking its safe passage, while it was being skinned' (a saying I learnt at the Cultural history museum :> opposite of better be safe than sorry). I got another lift back to the visitor centre with the Dutch couple. My intention was to have a look around the visitor centre, then take the bus back to Gaupne, back to Sogndal. I thought I double-checked with the lady at the reception about bus times and she warned me that there were no buses that day. The time-table I was looking as actually indicated return journeys only on saturdays. I was still in dis-belief as I thought it inconceivable that the bus will take you there, but not back. Still I took her advice to ask for a lift from someone. Luckily, I caught a Spanish couple in the centre and they were happy to give me a ride. They took me straight to Sogndal as it was on their way. :) I was really lucky to have met such nice people, or else I would have been stranded in Jostalsbreen (or be completely broke from getting a taxi ride for 500 NOK).

Oslo, Norway

:p It's been a long while since I've gone travelling. Here I am in Oslo, Norway. The most expensive city for tourists. yups they even charged me 4 pounds ish extra for rental of bed linen at my hostel.... grrrr...

Still, I've enjoyed the past few days and am looking forward to the next few. I tried to be a little creative in the post before this. :p Thought I wrote something about my morning by the sea. I went to Bydorg, an area where there was a collection of museums about marine exploration, Vikings and Ships. It was about 8am in the morning and while waiting for the museums to open, I went about the peninsula. I always loved the sound of the sea, but it was only today that I realized what the sea sounds like when there were no ships moving about in the near distance.

When the sea was calm...

The sea was calm
still asleep
breathing lightly
like a baby curled up in its cradle

The sea was calm
it tip-toed up the rocky shores
peace and tranquility
Music in silence

Then, the city wøke up

Boats sped across the bay
the airplane hummed overhead on its first flight out
All these,
just when I wanted to sit and enjoy the peace

The sea shared my agitation
Its waves clashed with the coastal rocks
the baby was crying
it will be a wait...

till the sea is calm again