Just a small citation from the captain:
"Great debuts from robust defender Omar, mercurial Rubens,..."
Life of a Frequent Traveller
10 years ago
Monday, October 26, 2009
First Game First Win
Yesterday I had my first game (football) with Darwin's team. We made a great 3-0. I entered the field in the second half as I was new in the team. All the 3 goals were scored in this half, may be coincidence, may be not :). However, the game was nice.
Thursday, October 22, 2009
Cambridge Colleges
Ok I see some followers, that's great :)
I'll try to present my view on the Colleges at Cambridge.
So what are these colleges anyway? They are the extra-scholar environment of Cambridge students. They provide accommodation, food, social events, sport clubs, seminars, library, advice and much more.
They don't have anything to do with the studies, as many people think. Well, they provide advice on studies and your academic situation is related to the college as well, but you don't have classes in your college. When you apply to Cambridge you can pick any college you want. It doesn't matter what you want to study. Consider the college as your place for fun.
My college is Darwin (http://www.dar.cam.ac.uk/). It is small in size, compared to Trinity, King's or Corpus Cristi, but it is in down town, close to my flat (see below), has a great and cheap bar (most people say it is the best pub in town), good food, many sport facilities and a very nice court yard by the Cam river. Also it has a great library, including all the books of Charles Darwin.
For a list of other colleges and may be some more info, check this:
http://www.cam.ac.uk/colleges/
Most of the colleges have single rooms for students. For couples (like me and Dana), they have flats near the college. We got a spacious 3 room flat. The main drawback is that is is very old, has a carpet that should have been changed many years ago, and it only has a bath, no shower. You should appreciate a lot having a shower in your home. Only when you get a flat like mine (without shower, just bath) you get to appreciate things like that. Well.. we'll try to improvise smth in the near future :D.
I've joined the football team at Darwin. We are more than 25 players, and we have two teams, each one playing in a different league, like the pro's and those just playing for fun. Actually I just got training today. We have games each week.
One week ago we had our fresher's Formal Dinner. That is, we all went dressed up in nice costumes (thanks Razvan for sending it) and we got a nice (free) dinner with all the members. We had time to chat and meet our Darwinian colleges. After the dinner we went to the bar downstairs and I must say it is really interesting to meet all these people with such different backgrounds and professions. I've never thought you can actually do a PhD in law. Well... it seems that I actually have several colleagues doing that.
The meals are each day (except Sunday), launch and dinner. The food is very good and the prices are as low as possible. Soup & Main course & coffee/tea 4 pounds.
Well.. I don't want to make it too boring, and Dana is calling for dinner. So I'll let you find more on the net if you want :)
I'll try to present my view on the Colleges at Cambridge.
So what are these colleges anyway? They are the extra-scholar environment of Cambridge students. They provide accommodation, food, social events, sport clubs, seminars, library, advice and much more.
They don't have anything to do with the studies, as many people think. Well, they provide advice on studies and your academic situation is related to the college as well, but you don't have classes in your college. When you apply to Cambridge you can pick any college you want. It doesn't matter what you want to study. Consider the college as your place for fun.
My college is Darwin (http://www.dar.cam.ac.uk/). It is small in size, compared to Trinity, King's or Corpus Cristi, but it is in down town, close to my flat (see below), has a great and cheap bar (most people say it is the best pub in town), good food, many sport facilities and a very nice court yard by the Cam river. Also it has a great library, including all the books of Charles Darwin.
For a list of other colleges and may be some more info, check this:
http://www.cam.ac.uk/colleges/
Most of the colleges have single rooms for students. For couples (like me and Dana), they have flats near the college. We got a spacious 3 room flat. The main drawback is that is is very old, has a carpet that should have been changed many years ago, and it only has a bath, no shower. You should appreciate a lot having a shower in your home. Only when you get a flat like mine (without shower, just bath) you get to appreciate things like that. Well.. we'll try to improvise smth in the near future :D.
I've joined the football team at Darwin. We are more than 25 players, and we have two teams, each one playing in a different league, like the pro's and those just playing for fun. Actually I just got training today. We have games each week.
One week ago we had our fresher's Formal Dinner. That is, we all went dressed up in nice costumes (thanks Razvan for sending it) and we got a nice (free) dinner with all the members. We had time to chat and meet our Darwinian colleges. After the dinner we went to the bar downstairs and I must say it is really interesting to meet all these people with such different backgrounds and professions. I've never thought you can actually do a PhD in law. Well... it seems that I actually have several colleagues doing that.
The meals are each day (except Sunday), launch and dinner. The food is very good and the prices are as low as possible. Soup & Main course & coffee/tea 4 pounds.
Well.. I don't want to make it too boring, and Dana is calling for dinner. So I'll let you find more on the net if you want :)
Wednesday, October 21, 2009
Romanian Squad
When I've first applied to Cambridge for a PhD (2008) I was the only one in my generation to do so. I've contacted a Romanian PhD student in the Computer Laboratory to ask him about life and work there. He told me that he would be happy to have another Romanian colleague at Cambridge as he thought he was the only one in the department.
Well.. what do you know? In my MPhil we are 4 Romanians out of 40 students! They said that for this master they took the best around the world. Well, if 10% are Romanians I must say Romania is one of the smartest countries, which is great. I must mention anyway that I am one generation older than my other colleagues and another Romanian actually studied in England and actually he is 2 generations younger, so basically there is a huge coincidence in this year. However, Romania rulz :)
P.S. Clearly we have a lot of Chinese as well.. but that's just common these days.
Well.. what do you know? In my MPhil we are 4 Romanians out of 40 students! They said that for this master they took the best around the world. Well, if 10% are Romanians I must say Romania is one of the smartest countries, which is great. I must mention anyway that I am one generation older than my other colleagues and another Romanian actually studied in England and actually he is 2 generations younger, so basically there is a huge coincidence in this year. However, Romania rulz :)
P.S. Clearly we have a lot of Chinese as well.. but that's just common these days.
Master at Cambridge
In this post I just want to give you an insight of how a MPhil (Master in Philosophy) in Computer Science is at Cambridge. I'll try to give all the aspects that come to my mind based on my 3 weeks here.
There are 3 terms (English partition probably..) equivalent with the old school trimesters. As a research master, we clearly have a lot of research to do.
We need to choose 6 courses (among 30 or so) over the first two terms (I have chosen 4 in the first term). For the remaining term, and part of the second one, we need to make this big research project. For some this could be considered as the graduation project (what we did at the university).
Each student gets a so-called "course advisor". You don't get to see much this person, but it is there "in case you need its help". I am not too sure what this means, clearly he/she is not there to do your homework. Actually I think I'm lucky because I've got to see my advisor already, as most of my colleagues didn't.
There are 3 types of courses: reading (Rxy), practical (Pxy) and lectures (Lxy) - xy are two bits given to differentiate the courses. On the reading courses you need to read a lot of papers (sometimes I get the feeling that I'm reading even more than when I was working in research). On the lectures you have the typical classes where the teacher speaks (I don't have any of those). In the practical courses, as the name says, you get to do smth practical. I am doing "Building an Internet Router", which is based on the Standford course and I find it really interesting as I am practically engineering the hardware of a router.
For the amount of work... well let's say that since I've started I didn't have more than a couple hours off. That is you are full. Actually if it would be to make everything perfect you couldn't afford to sleep, so basically you have to maintain a good balance between what you do and what you drop, while still keeping up.
On the facilities side I don't have any complain. We have a huge lab (Intel's lab) shared with the other undergraduates. Then there is the MPhil lab, where only we have access, which is very cool. Last but not least there is the MPhil room, where we have some nice sofas and a few computers. Overall the facilities are great, nothing to complain so far. Oh... and we have a relaxing room with a small billiard and foosball.
If you want to see more, check the website:
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/teaching/0910/acs.html
Just running out of time. I'll try to put updates (if anybody is actually interested in this stuff). I'll go on with seminars and may be colleges next time.
There are 3 terms (English partition probably..) equivalent with the old school trimesters. As a research master, we clearly have a lot of research to do.
We need to choose 6 courses (among 30 or so) over the first two terms (I have chosen 4 in the first term). For the remaining term, and part of the second one, we need to make this big research project. For some this could be considered as the graduation project (what we did at the university).
Each student gets a so-called "course advisor". You don't get to see much this person, but it is there "in case you need its help". I am not too sure what this means, clearly he/she is not there to do your homework. Actually I think I'm lucky because I've got to see my advisor already, as most of my colleagues didn't.
There are 3 types of courses: reading (Rxy), practical (Pxy) and lectures (Lxy) - xy are two bits given to differentiate the courses. On the reading courses you need to read a lot of papers (sometimes I get the feeling that I'm reading even more than when I was working in research). On the lectures you have the typical classes where the teacher speaks (I don't have any of those). In the practical courses, as the name says, you get to do smth practical. I am doing "Building an Internet Router", which is based on the Standford course and I find it really interesting as I am practically engineering the hardware of a router.
For the amount of work... well let's say that since I've started I didn't have more than a couple hours off. That is you are full. Actually if it would be to make everything perfect you couldn't afford to sleep, so basically you have to maintain a good balance between what you do and what you drop, while still keeping up.
On the facilities side I don't have any complain. We have a huge lab (Intel's lab) shared with the other undergraduates. Then there is the MPhil lab, where only we have access, which is very cool. Last but not least there is the MPhil room, where we have some nice sofas and a few computers. Overall the facilities are great, nothing to complain so far. Oh... and we have a relaxing room with a small billiard and foosball.
If you want to see more, check the website:
http://www.cl.cam.ac.uk/teaching/0910/acs.html
Just running out of time. I'll try to put updates (if anybody is actually interested in this stuff). I'll go on with seminars and may be colleges next time.
Tuesday, September 15, 2009
Cambridge
Shortly: from September 28th I'll be officially living at Cambridge.
So what happend with Toulouse and my PhD at IRIT?
Well... after many many turns around what to do (and nights without sleep) I've decided to follow my curiosity and go to Cambridge to study in the security field.
Actually this idea came well before knowing about IRIT. It all started in 2007 when I've met (virtually) prof. Ross Anderson, one of the best security experts in the world.
Before graduating (2008) I've met my former teacher , prof. Romulus Grigoras, and I enjoyed my internship at IRIT so I've decided to start a PhD there. However along the way came some economic troubbles (probably due to the crisis) and with these also some changes in my PhD. Just from nowhere I got an offer from Cambridge to start my PhD there. This took me by surprise as I wasn't really expecting a formal offer so late (my application was in December and response in June).
The period right after these news was a complete blurr. I wasn't sure at all on which direction to go: Toulouse, where I already had some articles and the path was set, or Cambridge where I would start from scratch my thesis but with a topic that intrigates me enormously. Also there was the big problem of money: in Toulouse I had everything, in Cambridge almost nothing. Fortunately in time the situation got better on the economic side for Cambridge as well.
So right now I am extremely curious to see how my new Master will be. Yeah... so I'll do a master prior to my PhD. Too many details to explain but the two main reasons for the master are: better financement on the PhD and better knowledge. Hopefully everything will turn well and I'll be able to get my PhD before the retirement of my good friend Razvan :).
Friday, May 15, 2009
iDTGV
In France, there are the well known TGVs (Tren a grand vitesse) which are, as the name says, trains which run at high speed. Generally if you buy it in advance the price of a ticket is between 50 and 100 Euros for the common destinations (around 500 km distance).
I've seen some incredible offers for 19-30 Euros for some iDGTV. I was really curious where is the "trick" in this. So I've found this interesting article (take a look at the comments actually):
I found it interesting to know what is the main difference between iDGTV and a normal TGV. So the answer is "the service".
Wednesday, May 13, 2009
Mobile Augmented Reality
It's been a while since my last post but i've been busy. More concretely I've been working on an article submitted at ACM Multimedia 2009. I won't describe (yet) the whole content but I'll show a descriptive image:
The idea is that I show the hidden engravings of caves in real time using the mobile device. Seems cool? Well... I'll post a video of it soon.
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