Week 2 has come and gone. So many things have happened outside the classroom, which made this week felt extremely long! The theme this week seems to be I assume too much, and I’m too slow.

115: I’m loving these civil engineers…for now. They pay attention, they ask a ton of questions, and they love playing with my magnets. Lots of them came to my office hours, and I got to learn many names now, which is good. In class, I’m about 1.5 lectures behind schedule. I over-explained too many things, and I made the mistake of giving them just a goal for row reduction, thinking that they could just use intuition to get it…but that failed. Should have gave them a systematic approach. Doh. Anyway, had lots of fun in the Friday office hour. Hope this keeps up for the rest of the term.

135: I’m just terribly slow in this course. I still haven’t completed lecture 3 even though 6 lectures were done. Explaining the discovery of a proof must take time and detours, so it was difficult to keep things on time. Doh…going to speed up things, which is not a good thing.

So I was just imagining things. The offer I put in was countered with a price that feels too high, so after a few agonizing hours, I decided to let it go. It was hard, especially after my mom kept changing her mind about this. But eventually it was starting from zero all over again.

That was Monday. But then, something strange happened. There was a new listing that day. On Tuesday, the agent took me to two places, including this new listing, and there were at least 2 other parties viewing at the same time. It looked pretty good. Decided to send an offer, but the seller’s agent says they have multiple offers (doh) and won’t look at them until the next day. So then it was Wednesday night. My agent and I prepared possible offers, and staked out a parking spot just outside the place. There were to be 2 offers in total that night. The other offer went in first. Then it was my agent’s turn. After some long waits, some bizarre things that the seller’s agent did, my offer was accepted.

So begins another chapter in this crazy life thing. I wasn’t nervous nor excited during this, I’m not sure why. Maybe it’s because it all just went by so quickly that there really was no time to react. Now I face more challenges…they will never stop coming. But thank God for everything, this is an especially humbling experience, understanding that I have zero control over the situation.

Saturday was when I viewed two houses full of contrasts. One is new, one is old. One is spacious, one is cozy. One is far, one is close. One is at a corner, one is close to the main road. In the end, after discussion with parents, the older house wins out, and an offer was sent out tonight.

What’s so strange about this is how Oct 11 is a recurring theme. Today’s offer gives a date of Oct 11 as day of possession. I can only live at my current place by Oct 11. Mom’s Canadian passport can be picked up on Oct 11. If there is any sign from God, that is it. Then again, I could just be imagining things.

There’s a certain disappointment, of course. I was originally hoping for something more modern, but that comes at a cost of location and price. I’m happy with this older place for now, let’s see how it goes.

A new semester has started, and a week has gone by. This time, teaching the froshes. That’s something I haven’t done since the very first time I taught. There’s a certain degree of excitement from the students, which I’m sure will fade out very soon. But so far, classes have been great, they’re not afraid to laugh and interact (sometimes a bit too much), and they seem to be learning well. Let’s see how long this lasts.

115: The engineers have a tendency to just shout out the answers to the questions I’m asking. They are just very enthusiastic. Or maybe because most of them have learned these things before. But somehow I fell behind immediately. There’s just too much material, and I had to rush a lot of things. I hate doing that as generally I would like to explain things in more detail. And 4 lectures a week is a killer. I even went to the classroom at the wrong time.

135: I somehow got applauded at the end of the first lecture (though Dan got tons more than that!). The classroom was basically full way before class time, and that’s a surprise for an 8:30 class. I started well, and then just went downhill from there. The students seem to be keeping up with the readings, so that’s a good thing. The technology is failing us, though, and don’t know how long this will last…

It’s fascinating how the mind changes in its thinking due to busyness. When I had almost nothing to do, my mind starts to wander…and I get really depressed about my current state, thinking that I’m too old already, and things are just not going well. But when I’m busy (like right now preparing fresh lectures), I forget about all these worries and concentrate on the work instead. There are pros and cons, of course. Thinking about life and God is necessary, but overthinking leads to negativity. So there must be some balancing act, I must be busy doing things, but not all the time.

So what keeps me thinking and depressing? I’m getting old, and there are so many things that I want to do but keep procrastinating about. I still have a job with average pay, even though I have a doctorate degree, but I chose this as I do enjoy what I do. As my friends are married off one by one, I’m getting more and more lonely. I’m still living in a basement. My spiritual life is still wobbly. My body is getting weird. It’s all about me, which is also depressing.

Anyway, the next bit will be quite busy, so I’m sure I’ll be more uplifting for a while.

I’m at Beijing’s airport right now, typing away on this old computer with a really slow internet. By contrast, the airport itself is new and huge! So weird…

No worries about missing the connection this time, so things are going according to plan. Hopefully I’ll be back in Waterloo soon and do all this moving and buying and teaching stuffs.

I should prepare one lecture for each of the two courses that I’m teaching. I really should have done this a while ago…but procrastination wins again. Doing this in business class isn’t too bad, either.

My trip to Taiwan is coming to an end. Mostly I just wasted time, but whatever, I booked the tickets long ago, so might as well be here.  Took 3 weeks to finally adjusted to the jetlag, and one week later I return to Waterloo. Yeah, not really good. Once again, I have this “I don’t want to be here nor there” feeling. Certainly the pollution and the heat and the culture in Taiwan is just annoying me, but there ares family and cheap food and most importantly, cheap and decent haircut! Going back to Waterloo, the environment is certainly going to be much better, but there are teaching challenges, the housing challenge, and being-alone challenge. So, not good either way. But what can I do…have to be somewhere…and apparently Canada wins.

Another sad ending that came true during this visit. There is this bakery in the side street next to our place here. This is the place where we have bought nice bread for breakfast ever since we moved here…and that is more than 20 years ago. So it was sad when we found out that the shop was closing Aug 31. This couple has been doing this business for decades, and this is all they do, keep the shop open and serve the people living around. They open shop everyday, no rest. And now, they retire. Is that how lives should be lived? It’s a difficult thing to comprehend. Anyway, now our family don’t know where to go for bread…

I need a new beginning. This old life of mine is horrific.

Every time I come to Taiwan, I immediately regret coming here and want to head back. The pollution, the hot temperature (for this time of year), the crowds, the culture, and the jetlag. Couldn’t have wanted to leave faster. So why do I still come here? Family’s here, so it’s like an obligation. Also the frequent flyer program made sure the flying isn’t too taxing most of the time.

The usual jetlagging sleeping pattern persists…no >= 4 hours of continuous sleep since…well…waking up to mark the exams Sunday morning. So that’s been a week. Seriously.

The hot temperature is preventing me from wanting to do just about anything that requires some brain and body functions. In other words, nothing.

I suppose I write less on here now since I do keep a daily written journal. Nobody’s reading this anyway, so why am I saying such mundane things?

House hunting is a bust. Will wait until September to continue.

Next few days will be crazy… Moving stuff, exam stuffs, all sort of stuffs.

The last couple of weeks of lectures went by like the usual. Loud engineers, quiet mathies. Didn’t do too badly this time around, I think. Starting to have doubts about doing this for the long term…can I actually survive the teaching? I have no idea.

But for now, the main thing is to get a place…and by that, I mean buy a place. This is something I’ve always wanted NOT to do, but I suppose now is the time. Nobody can give me a place to stay anymore, so I had to find my own…doh.

Such emotional rollercoasters…

One of the things I’ve noticed this term is that I got lazy. I’ve done almost everything before, so I didn’t need to do much preparation, so I didn’t spend much time on that. Unfortunately this usually doesn’t end well for the lectures. Still need to get familiarize with the lectures to ensure that I don’t miss some of the subtle details. I really should make a point of typing up notes instead of copying notes. There’s more teaching to come next term. That’s the good news. The bad news is now I have to find housing, and so far it’s not going well.

103: The linear Diophantine equations went well, as it’s pretty straightforward. The primes, not so much. There were definitely more involved proofs here even though they are pretty short. I started playing music to attract people’s attention, but I doubt it will work in the long run.

235: The way SVD is motivated in the course notes is terrible, but I couldn’t do much better with my alternate derivation of SVD. The application lecture was supposed to be a highlight, but the lack of prep means I rambled on and on without organizing my thoughts properly. Not good. I did manage to get a class picture, though, and it showed the abysmal attendance. I guess some things never change.

We are getting close to the end of the term now, yet it feels so far from being done.

103: Double-duty week this time. The colouring lectures went well, as it’s one of those things that I’ve done a couple times in 239 already. The divisibility stuff is easy. But the GCD characterization is one that confuses people. I hate teaching EEA, but somehow I survived. Having Vedang, Boye and Sadat in my office is just too much fun.

235: The graphing part went well, for the first lecture. In the second lecture, the computer blows up, I destroyed the projector screen, and I got annoyed. The rest of the class went horribly wrong. So I had a bad week…and it’s a short week, too, which made for a longer lasting memory…

Lots of people asking for marks for midterms. I guess that’s what happens the week after midterm week. Still no sign of a job in September. I’ve been having throat problems due to this possibly allergic sickness thing. Next week is double duty week, not sure if my throat will hold up…

103: Planar graphs are easier to teach than I thought. But the assignment questions that I include are harder than I thought. So…no good. Visiting tutorials to hand back the exams was a good idea.

235: I was told to catch up as I’m behind, but it’s just impossible for me. Oh well…the attendance has been dropping to less than 50%. I don’t feel well about it. On the other hand, I think my lectures are going well, even though I get no feedback from the students at all.

It’s midterm week for the engineers, so no lectures for them. But it’s still a crazy crazy week. Monday and Tuesday were crazy midterm marking days while trying to satisfy the engineers looking for help on their coming midterm. Wednesday was the actual engineering midterm. Thursday and Friday were the crazy waiting-in-my-office-while-handling-TAs-marking-midterms days. Lots of long days and tiredness. But everything went smoothly.

Results of the midterms were not promising, though. 235 has a 60% average even though it is much easier than last term’s exam. 103 has a 65% average, which is still pretty bad considering that I have dumbed down the questions quite a bit. So…I don’t know. Hopefully the final will be better.

235: 3 lectures, and only 1 with Daniel, and he failed his exam…so I guess things aren’t going so well. Still way behind, and very surprised to find that they don’t remember anything about eigenvalues and determinants…

This week definitely flew by quite quickly. Before I know it, the week’s gone, and we’re half way through the term. It’s kind of crazy, actually. Lectures seem to be going well for the most part. Still very concerned about possible lecturing jobs in the future. But what do I know…

103: Bridges and trees and bipartite graphs. I don’t think I had enough motivation for them, and eventually did totally bad. The noise got so bad that I almost lost it by slamming my water bottle (slightly) on the podium. Annoyed by the repeated questions about midterms that they could have found out in the information sheet. More long hours in the office with students visiting, now Kay is the one logging the most time. There’s a great development in that David from the other section came and was just hilarious. And he’s generally pessimistic just like me, so he’s like my new best friend. He made office hours that much more bearable.

235: I find it essentially to have Daniel around. The class is so boring without him. There was a midterm, and at least they didn’t complain too much about it, so it looks to be better than previous terms. I think I went through projections in a good way, I felt good about it. Ended with a cliffhanger on the e^x thing, which is one of my favourite problems to do this course. Zach came in a couple of times, and it’s always a joy to talk to him, even though he still doesn’t come to my class.