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It seems that whenever I want to post something, a lot of things go wrong. As a colleague of mine would comment "Murphy is hard at work..."
For this post, I had lots of trouble posting pic on the web. I thought it was a prerequisite for posting pics on a blog (to have html tags on your pics). Well, I just learned that you can upload pics from your computer (Chico's voice saying COMPUTER!!). I was asking Jae how to upload pics and he gave some relevant advice. The saddest thing was I had to resize all my photos (for this set, thanks to Bern and Stenie!!) since each was about 1.5-3mb big!
I used my photobucket account for this but as of press time, most of the pics are loading. I'll post a link for all the pics in my next post.
Conference Stuff
I was sent to Hawaii for one main purpose, to present a paper on Probabilistic Dynamic Programming (try searching for this, hehehe). I was scheduled on a Thursday and that gave me lots of time to prepare for my presentation.
What's Ergo Boy doing in an OR conference??
Now I'm trying to stress a point. The "stressed" session chair seems to react positively to my inquisitive and highly intelluctual points.
My session included mostly maintenance stuff and there was more than enough for me to chew for that session.
The other sessions were very interesting.
DAY 1 - First session was the application of OR in the criminal justice system. Though the presentation was mostly for R&D allocation of high-tech police weapons, there are similar stuff that we can adopt in our SC project. I dunno if I can even mention it. Oops, I guess I just did... The next session for the day was the application of OR in healthcare. It included an assessment of Israeli hospitals and optimization strategies for NZ ambulances (interesting to note if they rescue sheep down there, which enjoys a huge numerical majority over humans). The day's last two sessions were on practical optimization applications and six sigma.
DAY 2 - I attended a session on recent advances in metaheuristics...
Uhh, ok. So I didn't. Sue me! Bern and I decided to cut the afternoon sessions and go to the mall. We went to Ala Moana Shopping Center (no pics... didn't feel like taking pics in the mall). The mall reminded me of SM Baguio. No A/C, nice surroundings. Went to Macy's and discovered that it's quite expensive there (but a sale was forthcoming). Less than a week later, AMSC would serve as my take-off point for my North Shore adventure (more on this in the succeeding posts)...
Waiting for a bus to the north shore just outside the Ala Moana shopping center... more pics and stories to come...
DAY 3 - Excursion day! Got some pics (in my kuya's iBook) and I'll post these pics from the Polynesian Cultural Center, Polynesia's equivalent to our Nayong Pilipino. As a side note, I actually asked my 19-early 20's students if they know about Nayong Pilipino and they all exclaimed "Syempre naman Sir!"
Maybe a post about this excursion??
I also had a sumptuous dinner at the house of Bern's Aunty Ala in the upper portions of Honolulu. The winds felt like a storm was brewing (in the middle of summer?!?) but they said it was normal.
DAY 4 - My big day!! Interestingly, I only attended my session and decided to go to Nordstrom later that day. It was also luau day. I got some pics from the luau but this is all I have now...
Me (Aloha shirt c/o Aunty Ala), Bern (in her lovely Aloha dress) and our Taiwanese friend Zhi Ping (fresh from Maui). I actually met Zhi Ping on the flight going to Honolulu from Taipei. Gumana ang nerd-dar ko, hahaha!
Oh, BTW... I have a pic with Frederick Hillier. You might not know him but I bet you Torveks knows. Also ask any IE you know. I'll post these as soon as I get a grip on my small photo collection...
Day 5 - Having spent Thursday night drinking at Planet Hollywood (with $5 beers!!), I woke up late on Friday and decided to just hit the beach instead. I went with some Italian economics professors to soak in the sun of Waikiki Beach. Later that afternoon, we (Bern, Stenie, Aunty Marge) went to Kuhio Beach Park. Pics below...
Hanging loose by the beach
It's 6pm but no sunset in sight... (Actually the sun doesn't set until 8pm. Wohoo!)
Nakapayong sa beach... Tsk...
Later that evening, I had another dinner at the Cua's. Moreover... I got to wear a grass skirt and dance Hula with Bern's niece...
Innocently watching the girls do Hula...
Innocently trying on the grass skirt...
Innocently trying to do my version of Hula... Parang kulang get-up ko???
Innocently trying on the coconut bra...
And to top it off... I innocently tried on some necklace adornments and a silk flower ala Jasmine Trias
Hmmm, did anybody notice my wonderful tan???
With that, I end this post...
