http://shirleysun.ycool.com/ Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:04:47 GMT Tue, 29 Apr 2008 17:04:47 GMT http://sta.yculblog.com/images/logo/general-88x31.gif http://shirleysun.ycool.com/ http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.1775292.html http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.1775292.html Wed, 03 Oct 2007 18:10:13 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.638953.html
I am sorry that this blog will be stopped. I will probably start a blog somewhere else, not sure yet. If so, there will probably be more technical other than description of my own life. Thank you for your support and attention all these days! Let's keep in touch.

Today is almost the first REAL rain in Melbourne ever since I came here. I am so excited about it.

Regards,
Shirley Sun... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.638953.html Wed, 13 Apr 2005 23:04:44 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.637386.html
Some friends of mine have taken the same trip a couple of weeks ago. They warned me that it was going to be a physical trip. Well, not really. It is the first real camping that I've ever done in my life. However, I don't feel anxious at all, when leaving the comfort zone that I am used to. With the thinking pattern of an engineer, I clearly know how to learn from the nature, accept new things quickly, reapply the learned knowledge to the nature and get accustomed to the environment. As a result, I do not really mind not taking the shower for three days; I do not mind drinking the tab water; I do not really mind eating some dry bread everyday instead of a formal meal; I do not really mind going to the toilet which is so gross and smelly; I do not really mind sleep in the sleeping bag and in the tent, even when it is raining outside and you feel everything is wet. Most of my group members are American and there's even a girl who goes to Berkeley. Most of them have plenty experience of camping and hiking. The only difference between camping in US and Australia is that there's no bear in Australia so that you do not need to put your food on a tree...There are, of course, some girls who are afraid of dark, and who take a lot of personal things with them to let them feel that they are living at home. This actually sets the wrong context for them. They do not have the mood to be truly immersed in the nature, and they are afraid of tiredness and dirtyness. As for us, we just eat when we feel hungry, we just sit on the grass or rock when we feel tired. We climbed the mountains, higher and higher for a better view.

I also gave a 10-minute presentation regarding questions as how I can do to protect the nature, how much do I know about this area and how does my study link with the nature and what is my former presonal experience with the nature. Most of them study arts subjects and I am the only one who deals with technical stuff, which makes my presentation especially appealing to most of them. The lecturer said that I did an excellent job and there's another girl coming to me saying that she really loves my presentation. I feel happy about it, and I cannot understand why people become so nervious before they present and they intended to write everything they want to say down. It is actually very cool, when a group of people sit down on steep rocks in the windy and rainy weather to discuss about human's approach to the nature.

This is the fisrt time that I have to realized that there's actually something special about Australia--people here have the opportunity to return to the nature and enjoyed the outdoor instead of living in the "box", in which the people in the city do.... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.637386.html Tue, 12 Apr 2005 04:04:12 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.633215.html
www.hi5.com
>>I cannot even remember who invited me to join first. Later on, I found out it was started by a friend's friend...

www.friendster.com
>>It is actually very popular overseas, but not in China. I don't have many friends added there.

www.thefacebook.com
>>I am just qualified to join this network and still in the process of exploration. The idea was very cool and I can tell it is running very well and have hugh potential for getting a great amount of cash into their pocket.

www.tianji.com
>>The thing I don't like about it is that it's in Chinese. It is started by a Stanford alumni. A lot of investment bankers, and most of friends are included in this network.

It shows obviously who are the hugh people networkers, because you can find out all the contacts usually all link back to a couple of people. To expand a little bit, you can find many similar business ideas in different fields. There are also something about doing project management through blogging. It is a pity that I don't have time to read about it.
-----
Some parting thoughts about communication. I just had a very interesting lecture today, which is actually a summary of the workshop provided for mid-managers. Look at the following paragraph:

Do not press the numbers 4, 8, and 9 as these numbers will set off the alarm immediately. To start decoding the trap, you need to press *. Decoding the trap requires you to press a particular series of numbers and symbols in order. If the order is wrong, the bomb will detonate. To decode the trap, we are 99.9% sure that the code is 5,1,6,#, 3.”

This is a training in the army. The point is that when you are asked to communicate this message, the simplest way you'll use is actually "press *,5,1,6,#,3".... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.633215.html Thu, 07 Apr 2005 14:04:48 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.632532.html
I spent almost five hours to work on a 600-word journal the other day. That at least give me some feeling of hardwork back. There are only 12 academic weeks here, which is really short compared to the 20 weeks in China. The courses are not really intense. Of course, you can bury yourself into books day to day to learn more than you are supposed. Yesterday's tutorial is interesting. Only a couple of students have done the case study, which is not suprising to me any more. The tutor talked all the time. (poor guy...) I answered his question from time to time and naturally, the discussion was mainly between him and me later on. I gave him an important point that he ignored in the first place. He smiled back to thank me for bringing that up.

There are very interesting and diversified people in IH, not only the nationality but also the personality. The more and the deeper you get to know them, the more you can learn from them. There are people who speaks several French sentences but do not really know what they are actually talking about. There are people who are very talented in music and arts. There are people who think about their future and how to make the choice. (For most international students, they will finish their study, apply for PR and get a job here.) All in all, there are quite a few smart and hard-working kids.

Usually it is very sunny here every day, but unfortunately it is not. It was a similar overcast day that I had the last conversation with my hiring manager in Microsoft. I said exactly same thing to him and he responded, "It is very sunny in Seattle today..." It kindles my passion to fly over to the other half of the earth right away. Which indeed touched the chord is the feeling that people who don't really know you very well can treat you so nicely and provide so much help out your expectation. ... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.632532.html Thu, 07 Apr 2005 00:04:53 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.632523.html There are 142 entries in total.
Most of them have been categorized now into:
+Australia Life
+Random Thoughts
+Career Related
+Technical Stuff
for readers' convenience.

Some side notes:
-This blog is in English instead of Chinese because my friend all over the world will be able to read it.
-You are more than welcome to leave comments.
-All rights reserved and only personal opinions represented.
-Please contact me if your blog link wants to be added.
-All current links are blogs or websites of my friends. Some of them are really interesting. Check it out, if you have time.... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.632523.html Thu, 07 Apr 2005 00:04:05 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.625584.html
Today is a diversified today. After a lazy morning, I went to the Melbourne Museum with a friend from Malaysia as planned. However, we were just TOO lucky. There happened to be a fire drill in the museum and they were evacuating the building. The people who were let out got their name written down so that they could get a voucher of free admission later on. That sounds cool. As for us, we've got free admission as a student anyway, so that we headed for the art gallery.

It is called the National Gallery of Victoria (NGV). Most of the areas are free, except for sepcial admission. I love the design of the building. European canvas oil paintings are my favourites. They reminded me of Europe again. When I was there, I was actually able to see better paintings in a classical cattle, and now all the exhibits are displayed in a modern building. The feeling is quite different. There are also Japanese and Chinese things. The abstract works fromt he impressionlist are hard to understand as always. My passion for painting was kindled again. Yes, I should draw the natural scenery in Australia with my pencil some day soon.

The students in IH almost never buy the tram ticket. I felt so guilty when I followed them. I was so nervous that someone might just be the inspector. I know that the tickets are somehow expensive and they don't have concession, however, that is still dishonesty. I'd rather walk instead of cheat...

"American Idol" is regarded as a silly past-time/American TV show. There's surely someting similar in China. I watched it the first time today after dinner with a group of friends. I also played the soccer TV game for the first time. It was Brazil vs. England and I chose Brazil. That was great fun!

I should seriously get some study done tomorrow...... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.625584.html Wed, 30 Mar 2005 13:03:24 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.624486.html
Nicole left her cell phone on the bench and got it back from a cute Australian guy who lives five-minute away from St. Mary's College. She lost her wallet on the bus to the Grampians and got it back. I left my USB disk attached to the USB port in the Engineering library and got it back 20 minutes later on.

Sometimes, you just cannot get it back. Then you feel that there is nothing in the world that replace your old baby and you are not used to the life without it...Of course, it will be an external regret when you lose someone or lose a certain kind of feeling, because you can never get it back at whatever cost you are willing to pay.... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.624486.html Tue, 29 Mar 2005 07:03:05 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.624302.html http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.624302.html Tue, 29 Mar 2005 02:03:01 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.623183.html http://webexhibits.org/daylightsaving/g.html

Today the daylight saving ends and we are supposed to put our clocks back on hour. I got so confused when I woke up in the morning. My computer and my alarm clock told the different time. I've checked "apply daylight saving" option, so my computer is right. It's actually pretty cool that you suddenly have one more hour. There are also people constantly coming to the dinning hall to ask whether there is no dinner today and I told them that it was not dinner time yet...There are only two hours' time different between here and Shanghai, which is more convenient.

I do enjoy the holiday, when not a lot of people are around and you've got your own time to do whatever you want to do. Watching a movie, reading a book, hanging around, and of course studying alone with concentration.

There's nothing interesting on TV today, only some cute cartoons, silly sitcomes and Lara Craft II (The Cradle of Life). None appeared interesting to me...
... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.623183.html Sun, 27 Mar 2005 14:03:12 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.620178.html
More than a months have passed and I fall behind a little bit with my course work. During one lecture, an exchange student sat in the front row and I saw him take out all the printed-out lecture notes and the reading materials with a lot of sentence being highlighted and commented. That truly shamed me, because I am also supposed to study hard, instead of being immersed in the total slack learning environment.... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.620178.html Thu, 24 Mar 2005 07:03:25 GMT http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.619623.html
Today's my last time to do the compulsory self-help. (We must do 9-hour compulsory work in the garden, kitchen, otherwise we should pay 0.) I've been worked in the kitchen on the past two Mondays. I still clearly remember my feeling on the first day. The lady in charge is a little but grumpy, and very picky about our work. I guess everyone got pissed off. We should set the table for 300 people in half an hours, including knife, fork, spoons, bread, fruit bowls, water, glasses, napkins, butter...and all the cutteries and dishes should be exactly aligned with a certain distance from the table edge. The lady checked things carefully and we've got to redo the work if we don't live up to the standards. The nightmare continues...we have to serve soup, main courses and desert to four tables under our charge and clean everything on the table afterwards. Of course, the table must be wiped and every dish and glass have to be washed and put back. Now I can understand the feeling of overseas students doing part-time job in restaurants for their tuition fees. Things are actually getting better. All the staff in the kitchen are so nice. "Hey, girl, I like your smile. Give me a smile otherwise I won't give you the food. A lot of people just look shit when they do the self-help..." Although the work is really gross and tiresome, we do it in a very happy and responsible way. We start to be proud of ourselves when we see the whole dining hall to be clean again. There's a guy from Malaysia who seems to have a rich father, and he did his first shift of self-help today. Obviously, he hates doing all the wash-up. A young kid like him still don't know how hard the life is and probably he won't even have the chance to find out later on. I told him my true feelings, but that actaully doesn't help much.

Lygon St. is a famous Italian street here. We go there almost every week to have wonderful icecream. Today, we went past a restaurent and the waiter (a white guy, should be Australian) tried to get us into it and eat. He pretended to fancy our orange juice and I joked with him for a while when he asked where we are from. I asked him to guess. "Hmm...must be KL, Singapore...China?" I was always shaking my head. Some of us said that we are from Korea and the guy spoke one Korean and a whole bunch of fluent Chinese. (That surprised me!) "Sorry, we're not from China, so that I don't understand what you just said now. We're from Japan." Then, that guy started to speak a whole lot of Japanese...oh my goodness! We escpaed before trying more languages with him.... ]]> http://shirleysun.ycool.com/post.619623.html Mon, 21 Mar 2005 13:03:41 GMT