8 Days Later

This week's post took a little bit of time to start

One week later, my group and I have figured out what our engineering problem is, and as we continue to work we break the problem down more and more. The problem is to come up with a method for communicating wirelessly underwater (the most common method people choose generally is to do so acoustically, but I’m sure if we were clever enough to come up with another method, they would accept it). This seems like such an open-ended problem that it’s unclear what they want, and what the expectations are; however, this seems like this is a purposeful part of the project – their goal seems to be to give 4 undergraduates an open-ended problem, 9 weeks, and loose guidelines. It’s almost like they’re just kind of curious to see what will happen.

 I don’t know, man, I guess we’ll do a good job.

It’s been fun, though; it’s a rare thing, I imagine, to be given the opportunity to choose what you will care about for a couple of months, and an external incentive to do a good job.

Teams, hard at work.

As for the rest of Hong Kong, I’ve been able to leave the campus a few times, and investigate this new place. After having left the HKUST campus a few times, I haven’t really felt that I’m in such a new place. Largely, if I don’t stop and think about it, I feel as if I am back at home in NYC – tall buildings, underground metro systems, and swarms of people are nothing all that new. Though, I will admit there are more Asian people here.

 

A lot of similar looking buildings

It’s the little things that catch my attention far more: the way that people naturally walk on the left-side of the sidewalk, mimicking the Hong Kong right-of-way for cars, hasn’t failed to cause problems for me.

The way that inside the subway cars there are no doors from car to car, and you can move up and down the entire length of the subway is pretty new to me – though, to be honest I could do a whole post on the Hong Kong Subway system (called the MTR). I’ve always loved the NYC subway system, and I really do think it’s an amazing piece of human ingenuity to get so many people in, out, and around a city, but the MTR does all the same things, and some. For one, big thing, is that the railway is covered by glass panels that have glass doors that open, only when the subway has arrived – this is a great system for preventing railway fires, accidental deaths, and (***house of cards spoiler alert***) KEVIN SPACEY KILLING YOU.

Hong Kong itself is seperated into a few parts, with Hong Kong Central actually as island adrift from the the rest of Hong Kong; I was told that until 1974 there were no bridges to Hong Kong Central, and until 1972 there were no tunnels to Hong Kong Central - meaning that the only way to get into the city, was by ferry.

Pictured: not a ferry, just a boat.

            Largely, throughout my stay in Hong Kong, I’ve felt that I am looking into a fish bowl, and that no real interactions have happened. I think this has something to do with the international nature of Hong Kong – being Caucasian isn’t anything that special, and I don’t speak the language, so for all intents and purposes I’m just a slightly old-looking, pale 4 year-old trying to find his way around a city. 

People seem to just let me/us be, it's probably easier to not even bother with the loud americans.

I don't know what their plan was here, though

Coming soon: more posts