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Gosh! I haven’t blogged in ages. I know, I know, I am terrible. So for the sake of the good ol’ times let me share a long-overdue post about what I did these past few months.

This summer was nothing short of amazing! I got the opportunity of a lifetime to go do summer research at a lab in Cambridge University in England, and it was spectacular.

King’s College Chapel as seen from “The Backs”

It was really amazing being in Cambridge. At the time of my visit the university was already 800 years old! Affiliates of that university have contributed to literally every field of science, and they include among others: Isaac Newton, Charles Darwin, James Maxwell, and Alan Turing. Isaac freaking Newton was there! How cool is that! I never expected to be able to go to pub and have dinner at the same table where the discovery of DNA was first publicly announced. This was unreal.

Besides the university, the town of Cambridge is amazing. It is old, has lots of history, and very bike-friendly. People use bikes to get everywhere, and there are bike parking spaces all over town. As a matter of fact, policemen hassle you if you break traffic rules with your bike! I was really shocked by that, and I can’t say that I really obeyed the rules I just learned to avoid the police if I am going backwards on a one-way street

Houses in Cambridge are more “European” than I’m used to

The town and university had much more religious affiliations than I would have thought. There were churches all over the place, and several places in town were named after iconic Christians, e.g. “Magdalene Bridge” and “Jesus Green”. Other than that, the weather in Cambridge was horrible unfortunately. It was cold for most of the time and almost constantly raining, and I was there in the summer! At the end I was glad to go home just to get some sunlight.

I am usually not an outgoing person. However, given that this was my first time in Europe, I decided to take the opportunity and tour around. If you are young and single you can get around Europe very cheaply. They have a huge number of deals for students in almost every country. For example, you can literally find good accommodation for just €18 a night! So I went on a few weekend trips.

Granted, you can never experience a city in just 48 hours. However, you can still have a great time and get a taste of the local culture. The process itself was really amazing. I would wake up Saturdays at around 4am and bike to the bus station, then go from there to the airport to catch the 6am flight to any European capital. I would then spend the weekend there, and travel back on Monday morning. The awesome thing is that Monday noon I would be back in my lab working. Never in a million years would I thought I’d ever get to do that. I’ll tell you more about my weekend trips later, for now let me share some photos from London.

A view of Westminster Palace from the London Eye

London was nice. We happened to go there on the Queen’s coronation anniversary, so there were very nice shows and marches around town. We went to Westminster Abbey where various kings, queens, and other famous people are buried. I got to see Newton’s and Darwin’s burial grounds which is very surreal.

Westminster Abbey

A view of Big Ben from street level

All-in-all, England was very nice. Unfortunately I didn’t see much besides Cambridge and London (I opted to go out to other places instead). It took me some time to get used to their accent and coins (they have so many coins) but at the end I was a professional . Probably the only two things I didn’t like were the weather (it rained constantly, and it was cold even though it was “summer”), and the local food. Everybody told me that English food sucks but I didn’t believe that until I went there. The food was bland and tasteless at best. Luckily, you can get plenty of non-English food all over the place. So over all, England was nice place to visit.

Human life is sacred. I think we all agree on that. So certainly one is saddened at any one’s death. But still, one can’t help but wonder. Usually the way something is conveyed is at least as important what is being conveyed.

Today an attacker in Tel-Aviv opened fire at a club for gay teen Isralis killing at least two people and wounding many. In the AP video report, the police chief says that he doesn’t know if the attack was carried out by a gunman or a terrorist but the evidence leans more towards it being a gunman. What is the difference you say  ? If the event is the same and the victims are the same and the attacker is the same, how can the event be a terrorist attack or a just an act of a gunman.  You would think that it all has to do with a motive. An gunman has his lone sick mentality that caused him to commit his act, while a terrorist does his act insited by other people and in order to strike fear in the general population.

True. But, not always. In Israel any Arab attacker is a terrorist, and any Jewish attacker is a gunman. Regardless of the motive. Yes, I have proof. Remember a few months back, a 19 year-old Palestinian from Jerusalem proposed to his lover and she rejected him, while he was driving back his car got off the road and veered towards some pedistrians, one of the pedistrians immediately shot the driver dead without attempting to do anything else. The Israeli police said that the boy was carrying a terrorist attack, while his family says that he probably just lost control of the car since that boy had no political interest or affiliation. What was interesting in that piece is that the boy was immediately judged to be a terrorist by the Israelis (and thus his family’s home had to be demolished) without any minute of investigation into his background. Simply the fact that he was Arab!

So yes. The words by which you convey an event are often just as important as the event itself.

God! I hate people who display a “big effort” while they are eating or chewing. I hate it when some people chew gum with open mouths or loudly. It is so freaking annoying! I hate it when people breathe heavily or make “internal grunting sounds” that you would associate with hard physical labour or terrible illness yet they have done nothing and are totally fine! And I specially hate it when the person right next to me does that for half an hour straight!

Pfft!

It is always nice to learn about the fascinating stories of the past. History can be very entertaining if relayed correctly. Unfortunately, many history textbooks are filled with boring dates and badly narrated stories. In his short book, E.H. Gombrich tries to remedy that. He narrates the history of the world more like a story. With minimal use of dates or boring details as you’d often fine in textbooks. In fact, his book was originally intended for children. But I find it suitable for all ages.

My only criticism of this book is that its definition of “the world” is really “Western Europe”, and not all of it. Mostly Germany, Austria and France. The history of the rest of the world is briefly, if at all, mentioned. Not only is it focused on western Europe, but it is written from a Christian point of view, even though the author is Jewish! For example, the Muslim conquests were described as brutal and ruthless, while the countless deaths caused by the Christian wars and conquests were described as sad and unfortunate!

But, don’t let that deter you. This is indeed an interesting book, and its material is presented in a very eloquent manner. You will briefly learn about pre-historic people, then the Egyptians, Babylonians, Persians, Jews, Phoenicians, Greeks, Romans, and briefly about the Arabs, Indians, and Chinese, all the way through the middle ages and beyond. It is an interesting read that tries to highlight each eras contribution.

My advice is, read this book, but don’t take it as absolute fact. Just an interesting read.

I was browsing online when I accidentally stumbled upon this site: http://www.israellawcenter.org/Missions-general-information.html (link not added purposefully).

Apparently this organization takes tourists on some sort of live military tour where they penetrate illegally occupied territories and sit in on courts of Palestinian captives.

Screenshot of the “tour highlight” !!

What year is this? Are we back in Roman times where Christians where being fed to lions in front of the cheering crowds? Are the destroyed lives and the misfortunes of the occupied people of Palestine a tourist attraction to this organization? Seriously, this is so barbaric!