Congrats

This is for my dad. You will be entering the temple this weekend for the first time. I wish I could be there to show my support, love, and pride. Our family has been a unique one, and I will never forget the experiences we have shared together. I love you so much Dad and I can not express in words how proud I am of you. I love you so much and pray for you! Good luck and know that I am there with you in Spirit. Right now in the trials that face me you are my strength and example. Anything is possible and you give me hope! I love you!! Congratulations!

Little People

Here are some of my favorite little people! They are all so unique! I will miss them!

Culture

So just another boring post... it will almost be like a journal entry. So, one thing that I absolutely love about science is that sooo many people are involved from different countries and cultures. I would venture to say that it is one of the most diverse fields out there! In the small building where I am working, in the small group that I am working with I have one German, three Russians, two Japanese, two Chinese, and one Wisconsinite as mentors and part of our team. Again, that is just my small group. We also have in the building people from Korea, Czech Republic, Lithuania, and probably more. I haven't met everyone there so who knows. In my down time I have learned some basic structures of Chinese, and furthered my understanding of Japanese (I have long remembered one sentence from my Sixth grade class). Also I reviewed the few words I know in Russian (thanks Svetlana! I have not forgotten!) I wish I could spend all of my time with these people learning more and more. Who knows maybe I will go into linguistics some day...or anthropology, where I have long had a passion.

A personal boasting moment: I was speaking with the Grad Student that I am working with, TengMing, about where everyone was from the other day and he stopped me when I mentioned that I was right in my guesses about where our Aisian teammembers were from. He said, "You can tell the difference between Chinese and Japanese?" with quite the shocked tone. I told him that yes, usually I am correct because there are quite a few not-so-subtle differences in appearence and demeanor. He then said that he can't even tell the difference! Of course I am not correct 100 percent of the time, but still this made me feel proud of my efforts to pay attention to details!

Oops...I forgot to give props to my program team. There are 13 of us including an Egyptian, Frenchman, Puerto Rican, Nicaragan, Cuban, and some really crazy home-bred Americans of all shades.

God Bless America

Hello from the south

Hey y'all. So here I am in Tallahassee. I have been set up with a laptop...unfortunately I can't upload pictures to it. At least I can post small updates of my experiences. I arrived here late Saturday night on June 6. I want to keep this short so I wont go into detail about my long and painful journey to and from the local grocery store, nor will I drag on about the near thirty mosquito bites that have miraculously appeared in the last two days on my arms and legs.

I will however give a rundown of my research progress. I am working with another teacher under and scientist/Florida State University professor in what is know as the Shaw building... which is part of the National High Magnetic Field Lab. We have an assistant scientist and two graduate students monitoring our work and results. This group of researchers and working the superconductor Bi 2212. I can't explain many details but I can say that his is a type of wire that we are trying to improve so that it can hold more current and withstand higher magnetic fields. If this product can be improved we can greatly reduce the amount of energy used by certain high level magnets. (Such as the 45 Tesla magnet they have here which is currently the largest magnet in the world.) We are mounting, grinding, and polishing cross samples of various stages of this Bi2212 so we can basically disect them and magnify them more then 10,000 times so we can look at the filaments and bridges that are beging changed during the melting and cooling process. Okay so that is the most simple way that I can put it. No, I don't understand every little part of it. Yes, I am learning and loving it!

I am working with undergrad and graduate students from mechanical engineering programs, as well as with post-doctrate physicists. This sure puts me in my place yet I feel so inspired to seek higher education. I am surprised at how much I have learned already and how much does really make sense! Only five weeks to go!

From what I have heard my family is doing well...I love them and can not express how much I miss them! I talk to Jesus every day and I can not believe how much he is talking and explaining things!! What a joy!