Orchard is the downtown of Singapore and the place is beautiful during Christmas. One great thing about Orchard is that, there will always be some street performance and mostly they will be awesome. Yesterday, I happen to see this guy performing crystal juggling and recorded it in my mobile. Posting it here, for you!
Yes, I have been cycling to University for the last 2 weeks. You might have seen the last post I made when I bought a cycle here in Singapore. Someone stole that cycle soon after I bought that. I was not using that cycle much anyways and it was not my first experience in loosing a cylce. Anyhow, I bought a new one a couple of weeks back and the new cycle costs three times of that of the first one.
 |
| From Once upon a time in Singapore |
Shimano gear system, shock absorbers and the wide handle accounts to the extra money. I also changed the seat to a ladies seat to have a good cushy seat. Seat in boys’ cycles here are so hard and small. Why do they think that only ladies’ bums need to be cared.
Now, that I shifted my apartment, cycling is the best way to reach University. It takes me around 15-20 minutes to reach my lab in the cycle. Earlier it used to take a minimum of 20 minutes to reach the lab in bus (with all the walking and waiting for the bus). Also, I know the streets around the University better now. Cycling always make you explore the shortcuts.
P.S: The funniest thing about the cycle is its name - “Uranus Conqueror”
Long time since I blogged and I am not yet out of writers block. Lot of things happened in the past one year, completing first year of Ph.D. being the major one. So, this is a short account of my first year in research (if i can say so)
Coursework.
I am finally done with coursework! The two math courses I took almost killed me. Abstract Algebra and Convex Optimization are my cup of tea, but the fact that I was forced to compete with REALLY good mathematicians was a painful task. Somehow cleared the exams.
Presentations, Meetings and Reports.
Presentations which happens once in 2 months is fun. It is mostly about the work I have done, either to the funding agency or to the fellow Ph.D students. The weekly meetings with the prof is the hardest part. The embarrassment of sitting before him without any progress in the work to talk about is something which happens quite often.
Party, games and fun.
Mafia, taboo, badminton, cards, various hotels in Singapore, Universal Studios all with friends in a regular basis is something which actually kept me away from blogging.
Talk
I went to India in between and got this chance to deliver a talk in IIITM-K (Indian Institute of Information Technology and management - Kerala). I know most of you have not heard of it and won’t believe that Kerala has got a IIIT, but it is true. Check this link, if you don’t believe me. 
Conference
The latest news is that my paper got accepted in a conference - IEEE Workshop on Information Forensics and Security. It is a small work and the conference is yet to happen, so you people have to wait for some more time to read it. This link, has the list of accepted papers. Check out paper no:37 
I moved in to a new place. Compared to the old place this one is very spacious. We rented a two bedroom apartment. When I said we, I meant myself and my friend Eldho. He is a Ph.D. student in School of Mathematics whom I met during my maths course last semester. On top of that he is a deacon! (Ph.D. in Mathematics and Masters in Theology, nice combination huh!)
This link gives a glimpse of my place.
That’s all for now..
India is once again in the finals of world cup cricket. I still remember watching 2003 world cup final despite having an exam the next day. It took 8 years to get over the disappointment of loosing that game, when India kicked Australia out of the tournament last week.
This time it is Sri Lanka. Today evening I got this message from my Srilankan friend here.
“Ready to face disappointment tomorrow? Hehe”
And I replied..
“Yes! If I see you, that is.. :D”
Waiting for the match anxiously..
I doubt if I am an ADHD (Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder) patient. A year back in NIT Calicut, I started learning Guitar and stopped in say 2 months. I never touched my guitar after that. Then I started learning classical music for 1 week! The badminton court was occupied one day and I bought a table tennis bat and played TT couple of times. I bought the bat thinking that I’ll play it daily. Basketball was the next one in line (yes, I bought one). And hey, I played basketball with a national(Indian) and a state team player. Basketball went for almost 3 weeks. After that it was archery, which is still going on. And all of a sudden, couple of weeks back, I decided to try my hand in pencil drawing.
I used to draw long back when I was in school, mostly during art period. I was not great at drawing then and my artistic skill level has not changed much. But I was not bad too. I thought of sharing my drawings with my blog readers. And I am not sharing it in any other place in internet (well, I uploaded it in picasa. So, in a way I shared it in every other place in internet). This is exclusively for my blog readers.. :P. You can see my drawings here. The following is my favorite..
 |
| From My experiments with pencil, paper and eraser |
Do you want to pull a prank on your friends?? There is this wonderful way of freaking them out by making them believe that they are psychic. The following will teach you how to do it.. Barry and Stuart, you rock!
This works for real. We pranked three of our friends yesterday and their response were great. They said that they see things and stuffs like that. An added advantage of this video is that it is hosted by bbc, which makes the video looks authentic.
Use this link to prank your friends!!. 
