I arrived at the office at 840am; very unhealthy. But the problem is, I have to rush to solve that bug. By lunch time, I was still at the task of removing the bug. My program just keeps hanging. And it is not a systematic kind of hang. It is able to run from start till end without an error. But when I run it the second time, it hangs. If I restart the PC and re run, it works well again. I had no mood for lunch at all. Just wanted to quickly go back and work. When I made my order at the counter, the auntie that served us everyday complimented that I was speaking French very well. She was too kind. I had to force a smile to please her. I wasn’t angry or what because of work. I was just “sian” and wanted to go back asap to do my work. I really admire the French as they can totally detach themselves from work while having lunch or coffee breaks. This is something I must learn from them. At the table, I saw the French-version of Xiao Long Nu. She was really out of the world kind of girl. Beautifully plain. And absolutely skinny of course. She helped to ease my stress a little.
After lunch, I immediately went on with work. I hadn’t have time to read my friends’ blogs for the past 2 days. Let alone surfing the net and chatting on MSN. My MSN was practically dead. The hanging problem was really irritating as I needed to restart my PC. Hence I went to ask Mr. Giant to teach me how to kill the process by logging in on another PC. In this way, I need not restart the PC everytime the program hangs but I would need to use 2 PCs at a time. Anatole came in the afternoon with my printed report and gave me suggestions on how to improve it. I didn’t expect him to read so thoroughly but he did and even corrected typo errors like double spacing. He said that for this report, as I would be talking mainly on the experiments, I need to show more figures, graphs and tables to reflect the data. Using just numbers and words isn’t the best way. And there are certain words like “significant effect” which I should avoid because we can’t say that the effect is significant until the data has gone through an ANOVA analysis test which of course would be done by a pro. But for this report, he said it would be acceptable. But for the eventual paper which I had no idea when I would write, he said we have to be more precise. But he said he would spend a lot of time with me to work out that paper. Thought he mentioned before that a paper normally takes 1 to 2 months to write. Not much time left and I certainly do not wish to work until the very last day.
Before he left, he said he would not be around from tomorrow until next Thursday as he would be at Laval (between Rennes and Paris) for some workshop. He would be back on Thursday morning for a meeting and can meet me for half an hour after that. Then he would have to rush back to Laval. I told him I would try to fix the program and conduct the exp from Monday onwards. He said not so soon. He would like me to spend the time from now till Thursday to ask people to do the fine-tuning. Then we would discuss the result on Thursday to finalise the experimental plan. Thereafter can I start to conduct the exp. Great. Just what I need now is a break. He said in the meantime, I should relook at the bonus technique that I had stopped halfway and also start on my paper writing. By 5pm, I have finally found the bug. My exp had a learning phase before the actual test. And the bug is inside the learning phase. By removing that learning phase, everything works perfectly. Well done. Now at least I am not completely lost. But I didn’t want to carry on because I still had got the report to amend. Deadline is tomorrow.
Although the bug is still there, I am quite sure that before next Thurs I would be able to remove it because now I knew where it is and its nature. Hence I went online MSN to catch a breath. Wanted to find some comfort by chatting with friends. In the end, I found myself rushing for the report because tomorrow I have only half a day for work. In the morning I would have to go down to the prefecture. Although I can leave it till Monday, but this VISA issue really is irritating and I do not want to carry it over the weekend and spoil my mood for the Nantes trip. Tomorrow would be even busier because I had promised Nicolas to review the English of his paper in the afternoon. Although I am really super busy, I didn’t want to reject him when he asked me for the favour over lunch. Ren Qing again. I guess I would work into the night tomorrow. I worked till 7pm and still had quite a lot on my report; more data and tables to be added and Linux Office is really user-unfriendly to add graphs and tables. For my paper I would ask for a XP machine to type. Feeling completely exhausted, I felt that I should go back and rest because I have a soccer game later at 10pm.
Again the French bus had failed me. I planned to take the 2124hrs bus so that I will reach my destination bus stop at 2134hrs. And within 6 min I would be able to reach Nicolas’ place. He said we would leave in his car at 2140hrs. In the end the bus came at 2130hrs and almost every traffic light was red when the bus was there. Worse of all, all the passengers seemed to be buying tickets tonight. I seldom see people buying tickets. They either had a pass, cheat or already bought the tickets beforehand. And the bus driver had to stop and find change for the passengers. I reached the bus stop at 2145hrs and was sprinting towards Nicolas’ house. When I neared his house, he was already in the car and turned on the headlights when I dashed past his car. I hopped on and we sped off. At one point he was driving at over 120km/h along the dark highway.
We were 5 min late but that was ok because normally when we played at 2200hrs, we would be able to play half an hour more because there wouldn’t be anymore team coming. My team had an Italian goalkeeper who looked really pro with his gloves. And he really was superb. At one point he was talking to me and Nico about the formation and he thought I understood what he said until in the end, I asked him to repeat in English. I said I always pretend to understand French. Basically he was telling me not to run up and down the court and waste my energy. Tonight I had no goal but I was much more serious playing the game. Fighting more aggressively for the ball and making passes. And I had a super collision with Jean-Marie who was twice the size of me and probably 30kg heavier. In fact because of the coming tournament, everyone seemed to be playing with more tactic and formation.
After the game, it was already 2330hrs and Nico sent me home again. We chatted a bit and I asked him where is he from. He is from Lorient, a town in the south of Brittany. And Sebastien is from Marseille. Great. I would ask Seb about Marseille. And he said Seb and Mathieu had a different accent because they are from south France. Mathieu is from Montpellier. I told him I would try to catch Seb’s accent at lunch tomorrow. Then again we were talking about Anatole being a Parisian and we were ganging up to ostracise him. I told Nico that now I had been to more places in Brittany than Anatole. Nico said because he is an outsider. Then I said Anatole recommended me to go to this and that place but he has never been to them himself. Nico said because he is a Parisian; talk only. All these of course were for fun. Despite being a Parisian, Anatole really mixed well with the people here because he is that kind of social expert, with high EQ and a good conversationalist.
After lunch, I immediately went on with work. I hadn’t have time to read my friends’ blogs for the past 2 days. Let alone surfing the net and chatting on MSN. My MSN was practically dead. The hanging problem was really irritating as I needed to restart my PC. Hence I went to ask Mr. Giant to teach me how to kill the process by logging in on another PC. In this way, I need not restart the PC everytime the program hangs but I would need to use 2 PCs at a time. Anatole came in the afternoon with my printed report and gave me suggestions on how to improve it. I didn’t expect him to read so thoroughly but he did and even corrected typo errors like double spacing. He said that for this report, as I would be talking mainly on the experiments, I need to show more figures, graphs and tables to reflect the data. Using just numbers and words isn’t the best way. And there are certain words like “significant effect” which I should avoid because we can’t say that the effect is significant until the data has gone through an ANOVA analysis test which of course would be done by a pro. But for this report, he said it would be acceptable. But for the eventual paper which I had no idea when I would write, he said we have to be more precise. But he said he would spend a lot of time with me to work out that paper. Thought he mentioned before that a paper normally takes 1 to 2 months to write. Not much time left and I certainly do not wish to work until the very last day.
Before he left, he said he would not be around from tomorrow until next Thursday as he would be at Laval (between Rennes and Paris) for some workshop. He would be back on Thursday morning for a meeting and can meet me for half an hour after that. Then he would have to rush back to Laval. I told him I would try to fix the program and conduct the exp from Monday onwards. He said not so soon. He would like me to spend the time from now till Thursday to ask people to do the fine-tuning. Then we would discuss the result on Thursday to finalise the experimental plan. Thereafter can I start to conduct the exp. Great. Just what I need now is a break. He said in the meantime, I should relook at the bonus technique that I had stopped halfway and also start on my paper writing. By 5pm, I have finally found the bug. My exp had a learning phase before the actual test. And the bug is inside the learning phase. By removing that learning phase, everything works perfectly. Well done. Now at least I am not completely lost. But I didn’t want to carry on because I still had got the report to amend. Deadline is tomorrow.
Although the bug is still there, I am quite sure that before next Thurs I would be able to remove it because now I knew where it is and its nature. Hence I went online MSN to catch a breath. Wanted to find some comfort by chatting with friends. In the end, I found myself rushing for the report because tomorrow I have only half a day for work. In the morning I would have to go down to the prefecture. Although I can leave it till Monday, but this VISA issue really is irritating and I do not want to carry it over the weekend and spoil my mood for the Nantes trip. Tomorrow would be even busier because I had promised Nicolas to review the English of his paper in the afternoon. Although I am really super busy, I didn’t want to reject him when he asked me for the favour over lunch. Ren Qing again. I guess I would work into the night tomorrow. I worked till 7pm and still had quite a lot on my report; more data and tables to be added and Linux Office is really user-unfriendly to add graphs and tables. For my paper I would ask for a XP machine to type. Feeling completely exhausted, I felt that I should go back and rest because I have a soccer game later at 10pm.
Again the French bus had failed me. I planned to take the 2124hrs bus so that I will reach my destination bus stop at 2134hrs. And within 6 min I would be able to reach Nicolas’ place. He said we would leave in his car at 2140hrs. In the end the bus came at 2130hrs and almost every traffic light was red when the bus was there. Worse of all, all the passengers seemed to be buying tickets tonight. I seldom see people buying tickets. They either had a pass, cheat or already bought the tickets beforehand. And the bus driver had to stop and find change for the passengers. I reached the bus stop at 2145hrs and was sprinting towards Nicolas’ house. When I neared his house, he was already in the car and turned on the headlights when I dashed past his car. I hopped on and we sped off. At one point he was driving at over 120km/h along the dark highway.
We were 5 min late but that was ok because normally when we played at 2200hrs, we would be able to play half an hour more because there wouldn’t be anymore team coming. My team had an Italian goalkeeper who looked really pro with his gloves. And he really was superb. At one point he was talking to me and Nico about the formation and he thought I understood what he said until in the end, I asked him to repeat in English. I said I always pretend to understand French. Basically he was telling me not to run up and down the court and waste my energy. Tonight I had no goal but I was much more serious playing the game. Fighting more aggressively for the ball and making passes. And I had a super collision with Jean-Marie who was twice the size of me and probably 30kg heavier. In fact because of the coming tournament, everyone seemed to be playing with more tactic and formation.
After the game, it was already 2330hrs and Nico sent me home again. We chatted a bit and I asked him where is he from. He is from Lorient, a town in the south of Brittany. And Sebastien is from Marseille. Great. I would ask Seb about Marseille. And he said Seb and Mathieu had a different accent because they are from south France. Mathieu is from Montpellier. I told him I would try to catch Seb’s accent at lunch tomorrow. Then again we were talking about Anatole being a Parisian and we were ganging up to ostracise him. I told Nico that now I had been to more places in Brittany than Anatole. Nico said because he is an outsider. Then I said Anatole recommended me to go to this and that place but he has never been to them himself. Nico said because he is a Parisian; talk only. All these of course were for fun. Despite being a Parisian, Anatole really mixed well with the people here because he is that kind of social expert, with high EQ and a good conversationalist.
When I was back in INSA, I found out that there is actually an underground discotheque below the student lounge and people were queuing up outside; just like Zouk. And there were student bouncers too and groups of students were wandering around the campus with one hand holding the bottle and the other the cigarette (marijuana perhaps). They all looked super high but those who were slightly sober greeted me “bonsoir”. Well I guess this is the party life of the student. No need to go to city centre to “cheong”. Can do it right inside the campus. Maybe NTU hall bash could be held in campus.
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