Stephen's Academic Family

Igor the Legend and me!

One of the great things about smaller and more focused conferences such as PPTR currently and my "home" conference of ICEE (International Conference on Environmental Ergonomics) is the real family reunion feel. They are great because they are <200 delegates, the conferences are relatively long at 4-5 days, and there are no parallel session such that everyone sees each other a lot. Also, the fact that the same folks show up time after time.

For me, it's a shock that I went to my first ICEE (held every 2 years) back in 1994 as a first year Ph.D. presenting my M.Sc. research, and now I'm not just one of the more senior members, but have been the Chair of the Executive Committee for 5 years since 2011. How does time fly like that?

The EEL crew: Gary, me, & my former Ph.D. student Andreas Flouris. Can't overstate how proud I was seeing Andreas present as a highly respected and established leader in our field.

Anyway, anytime I get together with my M.Sc. advisor Igor Mekjavić is always special, and even more so when his band of brothers Nigel Taylor (Australia) and Mike Tipton (UK) join in, which they did here at PPTR and which always happens at ICEE.

Four generations on the academic tree: my M.Sc. advisor Igor, me, my former student Andreas, and three of his own students!

I can't tell you what a wonderful and generous gift it is from these three in that they've known me since I was an academic baby, and they've since always just treated me as their equal and peer, to the point that I'm usually the 4th "constant" in the shenanigans and "outings." I've tried to pay it forward myself, always making sure I show students at conferences that they have strong contributions of their own.

Ljubljana Cafe Life

Travelling party band in full swing at a café at night

Nothing like finding a rut and digging deep. The three days so far (update - all 4 days!), Gary and I have ended up at the same outdoor café by the Ljubaniča river for our afternoon cappuccino at 1500h, just the perfect time of still above freezing temps, sun, amazing evening light in wintertime, and the entire rest of the city seems out and about too.

Really, there are few places that tops Ljubljana for café life. The old city is beautiful yet really compact, with all the cafés just about 5-6 blocks along 1-2 streets on either side of the river, so all the action is close by.

The terrific thing with coffee culture in Slovenia is that it is all about the social aspect of it. There is no such thing as takeout coffee in big travel mugs that people walk (run) down the street with. Indeed, my first time here on sabbatical in 2005 and even now, I have yet to see a N. American style travel mug. What you do instead is go walk down to the local café with your friends or your work colleagues, and you actually take a true break and enjoy sitting there with your coffee together. That relaxed attitude is SOOOO nice!

Of course, it also helps that your sidewalk café is on beautiful pedestrian-only cobbled streets next to a beautiful little river, not a Starbucks outdoor patio next to a busy street with noise and pollution from traffic roaring by!

And the wonderful cherry on top is that coffee and the general cost of dining is beyond ridiculously cheap. A really nice sit-down cappuccino on prime real estate in the heart of the old city in the capital city? All of 1.70 Euros all-in, or about $2.50! And tonight, 9 of us went out for pizza and beer(ssss) at another pub right next to Prešeren Square for all of 127.50 Euros, or about $21 each all-in!

The other thing that can't be beat is people watching, which you can just do for hours on end.

In addition to the actual cafés, there are all these kiosks selling "glauwein" or mulled wine, along with other drinks. Bulk discount of buy 5 get 1 free, or buy 10 get 3 free. That'll keep the blood from freezing!

The action definitely does NOT stop or even slow down once the sun and the temperatures go down.

Mont Ventoux!

In between Ph.D. defences and my upcoming cycling conference in the UK, I've been hanging out with my friends Eric and Astrid in Bilthoven, especially for Eric's 50th birthday cycling trip that he planned for Provence and the famous Mont Ventoux. 5 other Dutch friends along with Eric and I headed 1200 km south to the base town of Bedoin. Monday June 23 was D-Day, and here are some pics from the climb.

Basic stats: start 309 m, summit 1912 m, 22 km.

Nickname: "Le Geant de Provence"

After a gentle 3-5% first 4 km, you hit the forest and it's a relentless 10%+ for about 9 km to Chalet Reynard. From there, it's a moonscape rocky bald top 6 km due to clear-cutting. Strong winds and crazy weather can play havoc up top.

The memorial to British rider Tom Simpson is about 3 km from the summit, and is placed where he collapsed and died during the 1967 Tour from a combo of heat stroke and tons of drugs and alcohol in his system. It's a pilgrimage shrine for cyclists today.

Summit pic that Eric took of me around the final steep switchback. I rather like the composition and my leaning into the switchback. 

The tower is enormous, and makes the bald giant even more imposing from every direction. Those of you from Brock, just think how Schmon Tower sticks out from everywhere around St. Catharines and magnify the 100 m Niagara Escarpment by 19 times!

Total climbing time was 1:40 at a pretty comfortable 225W average. But with the howling winds up top combined with the long wait for the rest of the group, not to mention minimal body fat and Asian heritage, I was completely freezing as we started the descent. To the point that I had a pretty wicked case of top tube shimmy the whole way down the first 6 km to Chalet Reynard due to the combination of my shaking and the strong crosswind. Luckily I'm a decent bike handler and managed it by clamping the top tube with my knees along the straightaways.

Cucumber News

The very Saturday that I arrived here in the Netherlands to stay with my colleague Hein Daanen, his phone was ringing like crazy with media requests. This was due to his having just published new child clothing sizing charts based on changes in children's heights and weights over the past years. All the various stations were making a big deal on whether this meant kids were fatter or more obese, and apparently some medical groups are suggesting that sizing should not be revised and used instead to subconsciously shame people into doing things to decrease weight.
Anyway, that afternoon Hein was called to the main NOS studios in Hilversum to do radio and TV interviews, so I tagged along. Apparently those trees outside the studios are the most filmed trees in all of the Netherlands, as many TV interviews are done there!
Hein is often on media duties here in the Netherlands, and jokes that he's on the media rolodex under "C" for "Cold" but now also for "Cucumber" news, slang for filler on slow news days!

Windy Windmills

Can you count how many windmills are behind me here in the Kinderdijk area next to the town of Alblasserdam? Let's just say that there were a lot of them. Eric, Astrid and I have had some very flat but superbly scenic rides here in the Netherlands. There's endless quiet bike paths and town roads to explore and, when riding with Eric, get horribly lost on. Today we parked the car at the small village of Noorderloos and spent about 30 min wandering around trying to find it again at the end of the day. At least we highly amused the patrons at the local pub as we rode by about 3 times while scratching our heads.

When you're not being delayed by the numerous train crossings, there's always boat crossings and drawbridges. 

The towns are almost impossibly pretty, with canals, boats, nice brick city centres, and well-kept houses.

Some shots here of the local wildlife... 

Fancy-Pants Dutch Defence

OK, there was an actual official reason for me to be here in the Netherlands, and that was to be the "Highly Learned Opponent" for Koen Levels's Ph.D. defence at the VU Amsterdam. The Dutch have the fanciest and most formal defences hands-down. And yes, the candidate actually addresses me by that title after I ask a question! The 4-5 opponents, in addition to the "promoter" and "co-promoters" all are dressed in white shirt, black tie, and formal gowns. The event is in the main auditorium and the beadle leads us in an procession complete with mace. Then exactly at one hour, she comes back and drags us all out.

After we proceed onto stage, the candidate gives a presentation for 10 min. We then move to the front of the stage and the "Opponents" then share the remaining 50 min of questions. First before the defence, we all meet in the boardroom, and the Dean begins with reading a biblical verse about teachers. We then discuss our planned questions and get our instructions. As you can see, Koen and his two proxies (doesn't have to be academics) all dress up in tuxedos with tails.

George Havenith from Loughborough University and me. Oh yes, we also start our questioning with the opener "By the virtue of the rector magnificus and by my right..." Of course, my favourite part of the whole ceremony comes afterwards, when the candidate hosts a reception for everyone. Then later that night, we were invited to a private fancy dinner. And my own students don't believe me when I tell them I evaluate all defences based on the catering!

The Coolest Mexican Restaurant in Syracuse

OK, I've been offline with the blog for a long while, so let's renew with a blog about FOOD! We spent this weekend in Syracuse at the Wildfire Invitation gymnastics meet for the boys. Debbie searched out "The Mission" restaurant for us to try, and we went with the Siemens (Isaac competes with the boys).
What a totally cool place. First and most important, the food was fabulous (seafood enchilada for Tim and me, fish taco for Debbie, tacos and others all around). The decor as you can see is really neat too, with the kitchen right there in the shrine/altar area. Yes it was an actual Wesleyan Methodist church (2nd one in the USA) from 1847, and it was also a part of the Underground Railroad during the slavery era. There were lots of archeology from the basement areas, and our waiter Doug was a wealth of info and passion about the history. The church was also a meeting place in the early suffragette movement. The stained glass is all from the 19th century too.
Super fun night out. Thanks to the Siemens for the fun company too!

ROBO MADNESS

Pelham Lego Robotics Team Takes First at Regional Competition

At this weekend’s Niagara Regional FLL (First Lego League) robotics competition, Pelham was well represented having 3 teams out of the 13 competing.  The Lego Da Vincis took the 1^st Place Champion award, in addition to the Robot Performance award, while their mentor team, Legolas, won the Rising Star award.
The competition consisted of 4 categories: the robot game obstacle course, robot design, project research and solution and core values, which includes problem solving skills, team work and ethics.  This year’s topic was “Nature’s Fury” so the teams had to research natural disasters, identify a problem and develop innovative solutions. The Lego Da Vincis have developed a solution to connect neighbours in the event of an emergency, so they don’t have to call 911 as often, and efficiently care for others in their community in times of crisis.  This initiative consists of a website to raise awareness on local emergency situations, how to plan a “block party” and how to construct an emergency preparedness kit.  They have presented this idea to the Mayor of Pelham and Fire Prevention Officer Saskia Holditch and have been invited to present it to Pelham Town Council on the 16^th of December.  Teams are also judged on their robot design, with one judge commenting that the Da Vincis “set the standard for programming efficiency.”  The robots compete against each other to complete autonomous tasks on the obstacle field.

3 teams advance to the East Provincials Competition on January the 18^th in Oshawa at the University of Ontario Institute of Technology.  The Lego Da Vincis (a team from the home schooling community), the Fonthill Fury (composed primarily of St. Alexander’s students) and the Princess Margret Panther Bots from Niagara Falls. The 3^rd team from Pelham, the St Ann’s Stallions, made Pelham proud and took home the Robot Design award and put in a stellar performance in all other areas.

Congratulations to all students on the fruits of hard work and ingenuity!  Your community is cheering for you on January 18^th!

Food in Ottawa

When we were in Ottawa, we decided to go to zak's for dinner on our first night.

Me and Scott decided to split the Zac Attack Special (shown above) with a side of poutine.

And of course here is me trying to fit the burger in my mouth.

On the last day we decided to get Beaver tails before we left, and here is Jacob with his.

Jacob got half Nutella and half butter maple.

Here I am with mine!

Mine was half Scor and half oreo.

A GREAT Day!

May 6 2013 has been an amazing day for the Cheung clan, one that will certainly be marked on the calendar with big red letters and celebrated. I got the amazing news that I got not one but two scientific papers accepted - never had such a bumper crop of a day before! To top it off, I got another paper accepted two days later, for a total of 5 over the past three weeks!

But MUCH more importantly, we received the greatest email ever. Our Afghan friends Ali and Basyah, along with their children Abufasal and Sadaf, after 4+ years of uncertainty and a sword literally hanging over their heads, received refugee asylum from the Netherlands! Ali converted to Christianity and had a death sentence placed on him by his former mullah, but managed to escape Afghanistan and was smuggled to the Netherlands. We became friends in Amersfoort, where they were at the very end refugee camp prior to deportation with every avenue of claim and appeal pretty much exhausted. Their story is quite incredible and moving, and certainly has been a constant reminder of how fortunate we are to be Canadians.

The Remarkables

So it has been fabulous here in New Zealand with the ICEE. It really is like a family reunion for me. All the usual suspects are here: Igor (my M.Sc. advisor), Nigel, Mike, Mark, Hein, etc. We had the Exec Committee meeting Thursday over lunch and I got stuck with another 2 years of chairing the unruly mob. Not bad though as a gig. I just finished giving the closing speech and banging the gavel to end the conference. We're heading to a pre-season Rugby match between the Otago Highlanders and the Auckland Blues this evening, and then heading up to our big 4 day hike up through Paradise, which ironically was Isengard in the Lord of the Ring series of movies.

 The "Remarkables" mountain range on the left, an amazing view right from Queenstown, located on the shores of Lake Wakatipu. On the right are the Crown Ranges of mountains near Lake Wanaka.

Revenge of the Hotten-tot!

Revenge is a dish best served cold according to the old saying. But in my case, revenge is a pizza pie served flaming hot! This story started WAAAY back in 2005, at the end of my sabbatical trip with Jim Cotter. His Ph.D. student, Shawnda Morrison, who I co-supervised for both her M.Sc. and Ph.D., and I went on a trip out to the amazing Milford Sound. After a huge day of hiking, we were all insanely hungry. After getting to the campsite very late in the dark, we started making pasta. Little did I know that they only had "Sweet Thai Chili" tuna sauce. Not only that, they tossed the entire dish of napalm together instead of keeping things separate. Those of you who know my history with spicy foods can predict the result, with me pretty much putting out the campfire with the sweat geyser from my face...

So anyway, Friday in Dunnos, Shawnda, Geoff, and I went to Poppa's Pizza for a terrific lunch. Terrific for me because I picked the Veggie pizza with no capsicum. Even more terrific because Shawnda went for the Hotten-tot pizza (capsicum, jalapenos, peppercorn, chili sauce, and pepperoni) pizza. Her turn to recreate the Milford Sound Geyser!

Down Under in Dunedin!

The next phase of the continuing family adventures has me down under in New Zealand with my student Geoff Hartley for the 15th International Conference on Environmental Ergonomics (ICEE) in Queenstown Feb 10-15. ICEE is my "home" conference where many of the scientists I grew up with from graduate days reside, so it really is a family reunion. It's also interesting my life evolving, from being a first-year Ph.D. student in 1994 presenting my M.Sc. project at my first-ever conference, to now being one of the senior members of the field and society.

Above is the railway station in Dunedin (New Edinburgh from the major Scottish settlement to begin the city). This is where the Taeri Gorge Railway journey begins. I took it in 2005 and it's pretty stunning.

We started with a satellite conference in Dunedin at the University of Otago, where I stayed for Feb-March 2005 with Jim Cotter during my first sabbatical. It was a fun few days of deja vu, and also far warmer than I ever recalled Dunnos being! Interesting things so far:

• Seeing Sebastian Racinais, a French working in Qatar, wolfing down a massive plate of bacon every morning (recall that Qatar is a Muslim country, and there's only turkey bacon and beef bacon there!
• Watching Mike Tipton from the UK try to run a tutorial workshop on cold water immersion with no prep time and none of the equipment cooperating - just like a real experiment!
• The irony of a busload of thermophysiologists getting absolutely boiled and baked on a long bus ride from Dunedin to Queenstown under a blazing hot sun.

The main admin building at U Otago, the first uni in New Zealand in 1868

We're all soaking wet!

Yesterday we went to Hollyburn, and went snowshoing with dads friends Paul (who was dads professor at UBC) and Victoria. It took about 2.5 hours to get to the top but was much faster coming down. me, Paul, and dad went right to the top, but Jacob and Victoria, stopped about 15 minutes below the peak, because Jacob was getting tired. The best part is the descent because you can just slide down on your butt for about half the distance!

here me and dad are at the top of the mountain before sliding down on our bottoms!

in this picture, well... Jacob just decided he needed to cool of

aaagh!! don't shoot me!!!

Last saturday we went to one of our friend's (Jeb's) belated birthday party. and there we went paintballing for the first time, Zach got a couple bruises, but I didn't but it hurt a bit. there were 8 of us all together and we had the whole place to ourselves because it was cold and it was outdoor paintball. while we were there we did 6 rounds, and it was a lot of fun. 

1st Lego League

On Saturday we went to our First Lego league regional tournament, this was our first year of being a team, and we came first!! We had lots of fun, we had 4 robot matches and 3 judging sessions (Project, Robot design, and Core Values).  our robot started the day by being very crazy, but we figured it out by the 3rd round,in the third round we got 373 points, which put us in first place until we got bumped to 2nd. we had lots of fun, after all of the real matches were played, there was a little playoff which was just for fun we got to the finals and then lost to the team that beat us in the robot game. There were 15 teams at the competition, and every team got a medal. Since we came first we got the big gold trophy. We were one of five teams to qualify for provincials from this region; the five teams are The Lego da Vincis (us), The Fatima Falcons (the winners of the robot game), St. Alexander Senior Sleuths (also from Fonthill), St. Anns istallions (also from Pelham), and St. Philomena Bulldogs.

This is me doing the skit, with Connor beside me. I was playing the part of Dr. Adkin from Brock University.  I am in the big flat screen TV!! (which was made out of cardboard)

We all wore Christmas hats, and here is Jacob wearing his cute little elf hat.

Here is me, and Scott, doing the robot game, you can see part of the table in front of us. The rest of the team is where you would be standing in this picture to cheer us on.

Here we are at the Core Values judging session, There was one person who was behind a board, who had something built out of Lego, and the rest of the team was at the table, with one person building what the person who was behind the board said, and the rest were handing the "builder" pieces.

Here is me wearing a Santa Claus hat with my Flamingo sunglasses.

We came second in the robot game, so here we are at the playoffs which were just for fun.

Here is a picture of us at the robot judging session.

Here are me and Scott making some modifications to our programs.

This picture is of me and Jacob looking at the scoreboard.

On the left is Scott with the trophy, and on the right was me, The trophy was very breakable, because it wasn't glued together. 

On the left here is a picture of all 3 teams from Pelham, on the left is St. Alexander, in the middle is us and on  the right is the team from St. Anns. In the picture on the right is our team with the trophies.

Here is a picture of our 2 trophies.

This is at our after competition party.

here is a picture of our debriefing meeting.