Xu's Chemistry UM/PKU experience

Summing It Up...

2008-08-13T19:56:00.000-07:00

To potential applicants:

I think this is an absolutely great program, especially if you enjoy traveling to other countries. Living and working in Beijing was an absolute blast! The group of people that came on the program made it that much more enjoyable. Besides work, there are always other things to do, whether its during the week or on the weekends. Activities range from shopping at the Pearl Market, visiting famous cultural sites, going clubbing etc... I'm not a big shopper, but even I enjoyed haggling at the clothing markets and the art shop.

If you are at all worried about the language barrier/living in a foreign city, just know that the program has a great support staff to help you both at the UMich Joint Institute in Beijing (Prof. James Lee and Julia Feng) and at the Chemistry department at PKU.

I apologize for my boring blog. For a more humorous and frequent blog, check out Spencer "the Hattrick" Leong's blog.

Feel free to contact me at xhan@macalester.edu if you have specific questions.

Last Week

2008-08-10T17:46:00.000-07:00

The last week in Beijing was pretty relaxing. I had visited my family the previous week and came back to Beijing via the night train on Wednesday morning. Later that day we went to visit the Birds nest and the Ice Cube by the Olympic park.

In front of the Birds nest

One of only two 7 star hotels in the world! (next to the ice cube)

In front of the ice cube

On Thursday, we visited the Capital museum where we saw some amazing collection of Chinese art and historical collections. Afterwards, we strolled over to the nearly Xidan shopping district to buy some Ma Hua (delicious twisted fried dough). The same night we had our presentations...via Skype...haha...the connection was on and off but in worked ok overall. To pass time when the connection failed, we all sang along to Beijing huan ying ni....the theme song for this olympics.

On Friday, Spencer and I visited the Fragrant Hills Park where we spent 2 hours climbing the mountain.

A view of the mountain side. The view is supposed to be even better in the Fall because all the leaves turn red.

I spend Saturday packing and left early Sunday morning for the airport with the rest of the group. On Sunday morning we got up at 4 am to go the airport. The drive through the empty streets of Beijing was pleasant and quite a contrast to the norm.

Cheng De Trip

2008-08-09T18:06:00.000-07:00

My Professor Pei Jian invited our entire lab including Kelly and I on a trip to Cheng De and the grasslands by inner Mongolia. The historic city of Cheng De once served as the primary summer vacation spot for the emperor. The "Avoiding Heat Mountain Village" (literal translation) in Cheng De was designed to be a place for the emperor to cool down and hunt. Two other sites that we visited in Cheng De is the Puning Temple and the Putuo Zongcheng Temple.

Just inside the city walls of the Avoiding Heat Mountain Village

A nice view from the mountain top.

Me at one of the temples in the Avoiding Heat Mountain Village

Putuo Zongcheng Temple as seen from the Mountain.

Puning Temple

In the grasslands we enjoyed the beautiful scenics, a fun horse ride, and a satisfying lamb feast.

On the way to the Moon Lake

Riding back to camp by the Moon lake.

Outdoor KTV after our lamb feast

Last couple weeks of work

2008-07-19T07:48:00.000-07:00

The past couple of weeks have been quite busy for me as I've been finishing up the total synthesis of my compound. In fact, I just completed the last synthetic step of my compound today. Over the past week, it's been more or less the same: lab work until dinner time, and then work on my poster and powerpoint presentation afterwards. It's not as bad as it sounds, however, because the organic labs are shutting down a couple of weeks before the physical and analytical labs due to Olympic regulations. That means that I essentially have two weeks to relax before heading back to the states. This weekend, I'm taking a trip with my lab to Cheng De, the city where emperors used to spend their summers. Next week, I'm taking a trip to Wuhan to visit some of my family members. So everything has worked out pretty well.

How to miss three consecutive buses

2008-06-30T07:46:00.000-07:00

I don't really have much to say, but I did manage to miss three consecutive buses today, so I guess I'll talk about that...haha There are 2 buses (355, 365) that go from the PKU East gate (where the chem building is) to our Wanliu apartments.

First, I was walking over the bridge that goes over the Zhong Guan Cun Road when I sighted the 355 bus off in the distant. I figured, if I started running, I could probably make the bus. So I sprinted all the way to the bus stop, got out my bus card, and was about to get on...but then...the bus driver decided to close the doors in my face and drive off. That's happened to me before, so I figured I'll catch the next bus...

10 min later, a 365 arrived. I can't possibly miss a bus while standing AT the bus stop right?!... Since there are so many different buses that arrive (seemingly simultaneously) at each stop, each bus has its designated parking spot. And the bus drivers are really picky about people getting own at the exact spot along the bus stop. Since I didn't want to po the bus driver, I waited at the 365 spot. But the bus decided to pull up at the 355 spot (the total opposite end of the bus stop!) and it wasn't even by curb, it was parked one lane over. The 365 stopped for 10 sec, while I was starring at it, and it drove off. (buses here apparently run in pairs and come at 20-30 min intervals as apposed to one every 10-15 min...sometimes it seems like the bus drivers are racing each other, but that's just my hypothesis). Anyways, so 10 seconds afterwards, another 365 came. But that bus assumed that the first one had picked everyone up from my stop, so it didn't even bother stopping...

Meanwhile, I was like "Oh crap! I guess I'll just take a cab home" (it was getting late 9:30pm). This shouldn't have happened, but 2 min later, another 365 came...I was half expecting it to keep on driving, but it surprisingly stopped at the right place and I managed to get on...miraculously! Of course my bus somehow got into a traffic jam at this one intersection as another 365 passed us. After passing that intersection, my bus driver assumed that the previous three 365 have picked everyone up, so we essentially only stopped at 3 of the next 6 stops...haha...and that was just to drop people off. But the funny part was, since we didn't really stop anywhere, our bus driver drove incredibly fast. In fact, he drove so fast that the entire bus was vibrating like it had two flat tires.

Lab Do's and Don'ts

2008-06-23T07:37:00.000-07:00

Lab Do's:
Experiments
Talking to Grad students
Fun
Smelling disgusting organic solvents

Lab Don'ts
1) Don't spill chloroform on the rubber gloves that you are wearing...it reacts with the rubber and gives off heat(if you do spill it on your gloves, don't leave your gloves on for 5 min like I did)

2) Try not to do reactions involving Sulfur....S-CH3 exchanged for a Br smells like rotten eggs x 20 ...I'm not even exaggerating...it smelled so bad we had to go on another floor to do our reaction just so that our lab group won't hate us for the rest of the month.

3) Don't forget what you learned in Ochem lab....when doing a reflux, the incoming water goes in the bottom of the cooling vessel and comes out the top, not the other way around....lets just say that I had a little mishap in the lab today

4) Don't pour your product into a column before the silica gel has settled completely. You will get a very crooked column and some of your product will come out at the same time as some byproducts.

Weekened adventures

2008-06-23T06:47:00.000-07:00

On Saturday, we decided to go to the Golden Resource Mall (Asia's largest mall) to do some ice skating. This mall is just absolutely amazing! It spans a couple blocks length wise and another 2 blocks width wise. The fifth floor is the dining floor and it has round 20 restaurants with cuisines from all around China. In addition, it has an arcade room and 2-3 bubble tea kiosks. Starbucks, McDonald's, KFC and Papa John's are on the first floor. Everything else between 1 and 5th floor is a shopper's paradise, but it doesn't interest me since all I care about is eating (ask anyone from our group...haha) Ok, back to skating. The skating rink is on the second basement level, one level below the car dealership. Think about that! A car dealership underneath a shopping mall! Anyways, ice skating was very fun. Once you buy a ticket, you get to skate for 90 min (skate rental included). Getting skates was an adventure in itself since all the sizes are the same as European sizes. Once we had the sizes figured out, I still couldn't fit into my skates because I apparently have wide feet. So I had to get skates that were 3 sizes bigger. Finally, we were able to get on the ice and have some fun. It was a blast! I also thought it was really funny that there were a bunch of 6-7 year olds in full ice hockey gear zooming up and down the ice trying hit each other.

Sunday was Allison's Birthday, so we out for dinner and afterwards had cake. At dinner, we ordered this delicious eggplant dish that we devoured in 10 min. So naturally, we had to order a second plate of it. However, the chefs decided to play a joke on us and purposely (maybe...) left the seeds in the green pepper that were in the eggplant dish(just fyi...peppers that seem like ordinary bell peppers are frequently hotter than any pepper you've ever had...so if you don't watch out, everything will taste like rubber for a month) After we were done eating, we had quite a few of those green peppers left. So I came up with the stupid idea of spinning the "glass spinner" (often times tables at Chinese tables are round, and have a glass spinner in the middle so that the food can be rotated around the table for everyone to share), and whoever the plate of peppers pointed to had to eat a green pepper filled with seeds. The spinner pointed to a few people and finally made its way in my direction. After eating my pepper (it wasn't that bad) I gave the spinner a big push....and along the way...it somehow knocked over quite a few dishes and tea cups and spilled some sauce/juice on Nicole's skirt.

I forgot to mention that we've played our second soccer match on Sunday as well. Every Sunday there are a whole bunch of students from the University playing recreationally. Spencer "the Hattrick" Leong dominated the game like Cristiano Ronaldo did in the Champions League Final. It was just a great overall performance! Mr. Hattrick even promised more goals in the near future. Also, Melody "Gerrard" Campbell showed her smoothness and agility on the pitch by defending the back end of the field like no other player. Her toughness and leadership will certainly lead to a contract extension from FC Liverpool.

Last days of Fun, First days of work

2008-06-10T07:07:00.000-07:00

Here are some of the interesting things that we've done during the past two weeks.

Michigan Alumni Event: We "students of this chemistry program and the joint institute" were invited to participate in Michigan's 3rd annual alumni event. This event was quite an experience because was gathering of alums as well as featuring speakers such as Rich Rogel and Lloyd Carr. In addition, we got to listen to an absolute marvelous violin performance by Xiang Gao, a world famous violinist. Not only was the music amazing, but the violin he used was also very impressive: 1699 Stradivarius violin “Lady Tennant”, which he received from the Stradivari Society of Chicago. Below is a link to some of Xiang Gao's play.

http://www.udel.edu/violin/music.html

During that week, we also attended an acrobatics show and the Peking opera. The acrobatics show was just great! One of the performers juggled 9 balls on the floor and another biked along a rope while ridding a unicycle with shoulder pads. The Peking opera was interesting because we were allowed to see the actors paint their faces.

By the end of the week, some of the people from our program went on a trip to Xi'an. The rest of us stayed behind and visited the summer palace on Saturday and the Temple of Heaven on Sunday. The summer palace was a nice place to just chill and walk around. We also took a boat out to the lake.

Temple of Heaven was cool but the main temple wasn't as big as I expected...haha I guess those National Geographic people did a good job filming. Prior to visiting the Temple of Heaven, Julia the Join Institute Program director, took us to a famous dumpling restaurant, where Tom and I had an eating contest....it ended with each of us consuming 35 dumplings...pretty disgusting..haha

First week of work:

It was great to finally start doing what we are here for, but as with most internships, we didn't get very much done the first week. Kelly and I are both in Prof. Pei's lab, which focuses on the synthesis of novel light emitting materials, which could potentially be applied to electronic devices. So the type of work done in this lab is definitely very interesting. The past week, I watched my Ph.D student Hai Bo conduct organic reactions such Sonogashira and Suzuki. It was exciting to see how these reactions, which I've learned about in Ochem, are actually done. Next week, I will start ( and hopefully finish) a set of reactions that were just completed in our lab and the findings have just been submitted to a scientific journal.

I think it is also important to mention the lab setting here at PKU. The inorganic and physical chemistry department have just moved into a brand new building this year. The old building, which is undergoing renovations will house the organic department and others that I don't know about...sorry I guess that was my random short update on the chemistry buildings.

Pictures from Week 1 and 2

2008-06-05T06:51:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures of our trip so far.

Si-Ma-Tai portion of the Great Wall

Jin-Shan-Ling portion of the Great Wall

Shopping at the Pearl Market

the Forbidden City

1st week adventures

2008-05-30T06:28:00.000-07:00

Whewww...I finally have time to update my blog again!

It's definitely been an adventurous and busy week to say the very least. Our schedule for this past week has been language class in the morning, a special luncheon, and culture class/sightseeing in the afternoon. In addition, we've had a few get-to-know-each-other luncheons with the UM/PKU staff, past and present participants, and the professors of our respective labs. As far as sightseeing goes, we've visited the Forbidden city, witnessed Tiananmen Square and the National Flag lowering ceremony, and the Hongquiao Pearl Market.

Without reciting every little thing that we did this past week, I'm just going to mention the major events that occurred.

Language classes:
The daily language classes are taught in morning by Liu Nian. Since the level of Chinese ability varied in our group, Nian prepared separate material/assignments for the different students. I found this method very effective because the students who had no previous Chinese experience were brought along by Nian, and those students who are a little bit farther along with their Chinese can work individually at their own pace. Nian is great at turning the lessons into an "easy-going" learning experience for everyone. It was comforting to know that Nian gave each person the individual attention that they needed to work on their Chinese proficiency no matter of their starting level. And sometimes, it could get pretty amusing....haha....see pictures.....

Culture Class:
Culture class is taught by Dr. James Lee or some of the sociology graduate students from either PKU or UMich. So far, we've had four culture lessons and I've found all the talks very interesting and informative. I think culture lessons are an essential part of this program, especially at the beginning of this trip, because it provides a new/different lens from which a culture can be analyzed. I felt that these lessons were helpful in clarifying some misconceptions of Chinese culture and society. For instance, Dr. Lee's first talk on elite Chinese education discussed historical and practical reasons for standardized tests in China as well as impacts that these tests have on education methods and standards. Today's talk by a graduate student from UMich was on urban migrant workers. This talk focused on migrant workers' motivation to move to the cities, their struggles, and the socioeconomic boundaries that have limited these workers throughout their journey. Overall, these talks have been extremely helpful in touching on a wide array of issues that face contemporary China.

Hongquiao Pearl Market:
The Pearl Market......oh man..... I don't even know where to begin. We all know about those popularity competitions where the person receiving the loudest cheers wins. If that were the case, I must have lost in a heartbeat. Walking through the clothing section of the market with Marko and Tom was quite a sight because we (or shall I say "they") absolutely got bombarded with bargaining offers. Later I strolled down the same corridor by myself and received a non-response....haha Anyways, the bargaining process is something everyone should experience at least once. It feels great to buy something for 1/3 to 1/2 it's original asking price. However, it could also get extremely uncomfortable when one argues with an experience dealer. From what I was told, the key is to be able to walk away if your price isn't met, because 9 out of 10 times, the dealer will run after you and literally pull you back to their stand to renegotiate. Just when we thought we were done haggling, the our taxi driver started bargaining with us.....

For those people who are still concerned about the idea of working in another country, I would just say that this program is extremely well organized in every aspect. The support system of Dr. Coppola, Dr. James Lee and the UM/PKU Joint Institute Staff are incredibly knowledgeable and have all the necessary contacts to make our stay as comfortable as possible. It's only been a week, but after being exposed to all the resources and support staff, my comfort level of living and working in Beijing has increased dramatically.

Why participate in the UM/PKU program

2008-05-22T13:39:00.000-07:00

As we were told, not everyone who expressed interest in the program ended up applying for it. Here are my reasons for applying to the program:
1) I'm interested in international research
2) I'm interested in improving my Chinese writing and reading skills
3) I'd like to see how working in China compares to vacationing in China (which I did the previous summer)
4) I'm originally from China
5) I think that it's important to establish working relationships in another country.

Orientation in Ann Arbor

2008-05-22T07:35:00.000-07:00

So I'm here in Ann Arbor!

I flew from St. Louis to Detroit in the early afternoon. There was some confusion in regards to our housing situation, but we ended up settling down in Markley housing. For the past couple of days we have been doing a variety of orientation activities. These activities were designed to help us get to know each other better as a group and get a sense of what to expect once we're in China.

The first day, we had a casual get-to-know each other session with Dr. Coppola and our language instructor Liu Nian. Dr. Coppola briefed us on the main goals of the orientation-program in Ann Arbor as well as the UM/PKU program and how we were expected to contribute to the continuation of this program.

The main goals for the orientation program in Ann Arbor are: 1) for the participants to get to know each other and establish a support network 2) for the participants to learn how it's like to conduct research in a foreign country 3) for the participants to get comfortable with the idea of living in a foreign country.

After having lunch with the participants from last year's program (Justin, Brian, Tiffany), we participated in a small "group-relations" activity. The main purpose was to make the students aware of potential problems that could arise within a group of people and how to ensure that everyone's opinion is heard.

On the second day, we had two intense language sessions with our instructor Liu Nian, who will be accompanying us for the first 10 days in China. It was very interesting because Nian gave everyone a Chinese version of their own name which everyone was supposed to memorize. Then we had a very expensive.....haha....yea....($369) lunch at a Chinese restaurant and tasted a variety of delicious and "weird" dishes such as pigs intestines and pigs blood (......Allison!), spicy frog legs (Go Spencer!), duck tongue (Allison again!).....etc. In the afternoon, we had some more language instructions on basic Chinese phrases.

The third day, we had another group activity. The purpose of this activity was to promote a multicultural perspective on different situations and withholding judgment of a situation until the whole story in known. In the afternoon, we had a panel discussion with some Chinese students about Chinese culture.

Overall, I found this pre-program orientation very useful and effective (especially the language lessons and the group discussions) because they helped the students be aware of different issues that they may encounter in China. And on top of that, we were given plenty free-time to explore Ann Arbor and further get to know each other. Some things that we did in our spare time include touring the campus, watching the Finals of the Champions league's game between ManU and Chelsea, going the Natural Science Museum, pick-up basketball, etc. I think this pre-program orientation is something that should definitely be continued in future programs.