Flavor Boulevard

Four-minute Vienamese tea talk, in Korean

… with English subtitles. It’s no secret that I’ve been into tea recently, and the interest is going to last for a while. Just in time for my mini-presentation in the Korean class, the topic was open, and I chose tea. Vietnamese tea, to be precise. Neither my Korean is good enough nor my tea knowledge is broad enough to give a more detailed slideshow, but it’s a start. Both will come, in time. The title [...]

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Two hours with Korean tea ceremony

Between 4 and 6 PM today was the most interesting 2 hours I’ve had this week, and also the most effortless educational experience I’ve had in a long time. That’s how the Korean tea ceremony is meant to be, as I’ve learned: formal but relaxing, and ceremonious but natural. The rules are rather simple to get acquainted to, the movements make sense, and just watching made my mind feel nothing but calmly pleasant. The kind of [...]

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So long, my smuggling days

So we’ve been stealing bananas for nothing. Today I discovered that St. John’s cafeteria lets you have take-outs. As many boxes as your heart’s content. I know, right? What school cafeteria does this? Their food is not out of this world or anything, but for us student conference attendees, who pay only $50 per week for a room and 2 meals a day, I’d say it’s pretty sweet. And here I [...]

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Oxford dinners (part II)

– Guest post by Paul Simeon – “My trip to England for a summer school in plasma physics” – Read Part I Week 2 – Monday 19th Starter was the melon boat we had last week. Same thing. Some people were expecting the meals to start repeating themselves, but when we saw the main course come out, we were pleased that we would still have new dishes to come. The main course was medallions of [...]

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Oxford dinners

– Guest post by Paul Simeon – “My trip to England for a summer school in plasma physics” It’s nice to try out another school or another country. I did both when I spent the last two weeks of July at the University of Oxford, eating and sleeping in St. Edmund Hall, the oldest place still teaching undergraduates in the world. Arriving with few expectations about the food, we were all pleasantly surprised at the dining [...]

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TAMU Physics building: Beauty and Brain

Just a few months ago, only certain people could go inside to inspect the construction, and everyone permitted had to wear hard hats. Now, driving on University, it would be hard to miss the gigantic banner leisurely hung to announce a brand new presence, that was much awaited and is worth every minute of effort put into it. The two physics buildings at A&M are a charm, and doesn’t one of [...]

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Nexus

After all I happen to stay in school longer than the average person, and if all goes well I will die a member of some academic body, so I figured school cafeterias might as well be another source of food and blabbing inspiration. Previously I blogged about the dining facility at Texas A&M, here comes Nexus at Stanford, where I ate last August. The price of course [...]

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Feast at the House of Sbisa(*)

This is it. My last day at TAMU, at least for a while. Also my last meal at Sbisa for a while. I’ve eaten here almost every Sunday and used to eat here every dinner my freshman year (I was naïve and got a meal plan then). They’ve raised the price since then too, so that if you don’t have a meal plan you have to pay [...]

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Old books

Some people like to be scared, some like to sunbathe, some others enjoy getting up early. Morning persons, they say. One of the kids at New Student Conference today chooses to have 8 am classes all 5 days of the week, except one of them, a running class, starts at 7. He assured me he’s a morning person; now I’ve heard that before, and I’ll be eager to hear what he’ll say at [...]

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