恭喜发财!

Happy Chinese New Year of the Dog!

This is our year baby! It's going to be a great one! 汪汪!!

Google's New Service: Censorship

I was testing Google.cn, Google's new portal with servers in China. Searches, such after "the communist party" or, perhaps not so surprising, "faluñ goñg", will turn up a little message at the bottom of the page:

据当地法律法规和政策，部分搜索结果未予显示。
In accordance with local laws and policy a part of the search result is omitted

Censorship in practice. In China though, just letting people know that the information is being censored is a kind of progress. "Don't do evil", sort of.

Update:
Unfortunately searching 芙蓉姐姐 does NOT turn up any disclaimer. I mean, WHERE is the censorship when you really need it!! She seems to have gotten pretty desperate recently. Maybe it is because of the competition for internet fame. For those of you who don't know this very famous blog (atleast last spring it was...), go check it out! Keep the Sister Hibiscus hype alive!

Update2:
That link ('desperate') to pictures of the half naked hibiscus is not working anymore... Maybe the censorship actually do work.

More Serious Math Errors

Our hero.

Quote from today's math lecture and our Russian professor Grigori. He speaks with this strong Russian accent and looks generally pretty mad, which enhance the impression that he is really cool. ;-)

"You siiiold pay attiientijon to these specjial condiiitions, because if you do not, tsings like... Tjiiernobyl can happen. Sometime maybe I will tiiell you more about Tiiiernobyl... "
Stops talking for a while... then mutters for himself:
"I was involved in that. "

My university goes to far lengths to recruit the professors only with the very best credentials. We learn from the best!

UPDATE 20060210:
Today a paper was passed around for students to give comments on the class. Among comments about the lecture and the content, an almost unanimous class requested that the lecturer revealed more details about his involvement of that unfortunate nuclear plant! I thought I was the only one that noticed when he said that. :-)

UPDATE 20060303:
We just had our last lecture, (perhaps my last lecture at this university!), and finally Grigori got asked about Tjernobyl.
Grigori and Tjernobyl:
Grigori had been working in a very specialized group studying vibrations in the Soviet Union in 1986. There were two of these groups in the country, and one of the groups got assigned to study the experiments that was to take place in Tjernobyl.
Crash-course in Tjernobyl-style nuclear powerplants :
The reactor in these plants heat up water. The produced steam drives generators that produce electricity. The reactor need a very strong flow of water to be cooled. If the water stops, the reactor will overheat and explode. The water is pumped with the power generated by the reactor. If the generator stops, the generators won't produce electricity, the pumps will stop, and the reactor can't be cooled by water.

Instead of making tedious theoretical modeling, the leadership determined to make a practical experiment. The experiment described to some detail by Grigory, was to determine if the reserve diesel-powered generators would have time to turn on in case of an emergency. The answer: they didn't.

The vibration team was to take the opportunity and study the vibrations of the generators during the experiment. A last minute decision determined that the other team would take care of the measurements. They all died during that night. All of them colleagues and friends of his. Perhaps not so funny.

The New Grand Plan

This is the grand new plan:
Since my last two exams are coming up in March I will take the opportunity to follow the regular lectures in those two subjects and then finish them off. Will be quite a relief to be able to graduate after finishing the thesis.

I've had my first chat with my new supervisor John Holmberg at the department of Physical Resource Theory. I will do an investigation of the building sector in China, with a focus on energy efficiency in buildings. There is a lot of stuff happening in this sector at the moment here in Sweden and in Europe, so I'm quite pleased with the subject. We still haven't gotten it confirmed from the professor at Tsinghua, but I will start my preparations here in Sweden first. The plan is to head to Beijing after the exams.

After graduating I will automatically become a famous actor/TV-presenter/media-celebrity and get invited to all hip parties and pose in glossy magazines. That was of course the goal all along.

Wemmel-Ljung family

One of the reasons of going to Göteborg was to finally get to meet up with my god daughter Saga, her sister Mira, and my good friends Stefan and Toba.


Me and my buddy.


I was drawing some portraits together with Saga. Guess who it is in the drawing. Well, I guess she was able to figure it out herself.


A little after-dinner, before-glögg walk in the cold and clear weather. Saga almost immediately fell asleep despite the cold.

(glögg is a warm sweet drink, similar to glühwine)

Värnamo -> Göteborg

I'm right now in Göteborg, living together with Wen in my sister Johanna's apartment. We will try to stay in Göteborg to atleast the 12th when Wen fly back to Belgium.

Some things that needs to be done:
Meet the Ljung-Wemmel family
Discuss a potential project at Tsinghua with my professor

Unforgettable Moments 2005

Happy New Year!

My life the last year has centered around Wen, ending my life in China, and getting back on track to make up my mind about my future and finishing my degree.

Yearly Movie Tradition

After Narnia pizza.

This is the fourth year the family goes out to watch a movie during Christmas. The prevous were the Lord of the Ring triology. With our cousins we take up a large chunk of the theatre.

Vist to my Grandparents

The 25th, our Christmas Day, we went to my grandparents place to meet up with aunts, cousins, and another ton of food and cookies.


My grandparents live in Sandhem in Västergötland.


The farm where my dad grew up is located next to their house.


Grandma


Ella by the fireplace


My grandfather's shoes


Grandma and grandpa digging in


Cecilia making a careful choice


Me and Wen in front of the Christmas tree


Grandma singing her traditional 200 verses long songs.


Afternoon walk in the forest

Christmas Celebrations

Gift wrapping.


Christmas porridge.


Wen trying out 'Jansson Temptation', a dish me and Wen did together. It's a Christmas favourite of mine, though we also eat it during Easter.


Ella got a gift!


We got a tradition to put rimes on the gifts. Wen got a Swedish dictionary from my family. The rime says:

This is a perfect book
For someone who our brother took
Durkslag is only the start
Soon you will have a Swedish heart.

Kinda cute. Durkslag is the tool you use to rinse the spagetti in. According to my dictionary it is called a colander in English. Could perhaps be translated as a 漏勺 [lòusháo] (lit. 'Leaking Spoon') in Chinese. It is one of the few Swedish words that Wen has learned.


Midnight mass. We filled up a whole row in church!

Merry Christmas!!!

Marry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

Christmas Tree Hunting

Wen showing off her skills


The last lingon berry of the year


Posing with the catch


Taking a break to drink some hot chocolate.


Bringing home the catch





Mission complete

Christmas Preparations

Me decorating a gingerbread


Wen with a little piggy


Ready for consumtion

Flight Belgium -> Sweden

Ryan Air from Charleroi, Belgium to Nyköping, Sweden. Then Swebus to Jönköping. My sister Johanna picked us up at 3.30 am to drive us to Värnamo.

The Diarrea Square

Ladeuze, the main square in Leuven.

拉肚子 [lā dùzi] have diarrhea

Christmas Market in Leuven

Picture from the Christmas market down at the Ladeuze square.


Wen, Tomo, and Christine hanging out drinking Gluhwine.


Meat on a stick. Similar to what you can find in China, and to a similar price too. Well, except that here the price is in Euros. (4 Euro= 38.7 RMB)


"What is that stuff?!"


Oysters and snails for sale.


Looking for some real estate.


Belgian "American Idol" winner in front of a crowd of screaming teenage girls.


Under the mistletoe


Jesus has left the building.

UPDATE: Those sticks with meat was actually "only"2,5 Euro.

A Swede in Taiwan?

No, I don't have any plans of going to Taiwan, though that would be cool. Haven't been there.

I was checking out Michael Turton's blogroll and I noticed a "A Swede in Taiwan" entry. That kind of made me curious. When I checked it out it turns out to be an exchange student from Engineering Physics at Chalmers. My university, my program. :) Somebody must have been reading my blog I think. Well, copying is the best form of flattery. (My previous title on this blog was 'A Swede in Beijing')

Beatka's Birthday Party

Beatka is a Polish student in the Polish/German exchange student bunch that we have been hanging out with.

In the party there were some Brazilian guys too and I had an interesting conversation with one of them. He was telling me the true character of the Chinese people. He first rambled about Chinese having their own logic or something, but I didn't really understand what he was talking about. Then he said that when Chinese are looking at people, they not only look, they also intensively 'observe'. He showed me how they squint their eyes (by stretching out his eyes to the sides with his fingers) to show me how they look when they do this.

I realized this is how I thought this was the normal Chinese appearance. How mistaken I have been! They of course have similar eyes as us, but when I meet them they start to squint and 'observe' me! What a revelation! The great Chinese conspiracy, not only involving the Chinese, but all East-Asians!! A sign of the 'yellow peril' in Brazil?

UPDATE: Wen didn't like the previous picture (with the cup, making her looking like a pig) so I had to replace it. New pic below. This one approved.


Wen 'observing' the photographer.