Kind of Dismay

Today I returned all my books, and that's when I found that the vacation is really coming to its end, and that, during the whole vacation, I've actually read little, too little.

It make me quite upset to acknowledge it, but it's the truth. I can have a long list of excuse, I can say "should I go through the vacation one more time, I'll definitely..." blah blah blah. However, the fact is here. After the whole vacation, I've not prepared myself much better for the goal, and I am, up to now, not in a very good mood to embrace the new challenges.

The only thing I've not drop is English. Yes, I haven't lost my skill in English, even made some teeny tiny progress in listening and speaking. However, that's crap. My English has long been in the situation that no great progress can be made unless thoroughly exposed in an English surronding for long enough. I've come to this level since, probably, one year ago. Since then, nothing can have made great difference. BTW, HKUST is not what I call "English surronding", for much Cantonese might be used. Though I expect to train myself in discussing on physics in English, and I do expect to prepare myself better for later life in USA with this exchanging thing, I've never expected to receive the feeling of "western country".

As to mathematics and physics, I'm sorry to say: NO significant, nay, noticable progress was made, if I haven't forgotten some of those I learned before. The only thing I've actually studied carefully is Modern History of Physics. In fact, that's just Inward Bound. I have to say it's not as "comfortable" as I expected. On the contrary, I was kind of frightened when I come across those struggles of human minds. Theory after theory was put forward and abandoned by those great physicists to explain a phenomenon. Some of these phenomenons are familiar to me, and most questions that once confused the all the physicists are, judging now, so simple and naive that even I can give the answers. It's quite a bit astonishing when one first come to know how much effort was spent by the human kind to unveil the secret of nature. That's why I always emphasize the learning of history of physics. If the new physicists don't realize the difficulty the old ones went through in establishing theories, they can never establish their own. See? I've gone too far, so let's come back. Besides, I've neither practised "the Four Mechanics" as I planned, nor made any progress in group theory, tensor analysis and functional, as I planned. I did read quite a bit about solid-state, but I'm still not so qualified to teach the ones in 181-324.

As to my plan of writing, it should only be fulfilled next semester.

Only 3 out of 5 of my requested course are approved, make it 12 credits in total. That shall give me more time to fulfill my further plan.