Measure Theory and Disposable Teachers

Wheeden and Zygmund's book

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I’ve been working hard this week at learning more about measure theory. It’s a really interesting research subject and there are quite a few things that I didn’t know about it. In class, we are currently seeing the Lebesgue measure and topics. I’ve read up on the Borel, Haar, Radon, and Daniell measures.

I’ve got quite a few books in this area, including Paul Halmos’ Measure Theory¹ that I got for $6. The Measure and Integral² book that is used in my real analysis class is finally available. I have it photocopied, but I’d rather buy it. It’s a bit more expensive, but not that much. It’s $46. Einstein has it for $69.

The real analysis professor spends 3hrs a week copying that book onto the blackboard. It’s really strange. He doesn’t give any further examples and quite a few of my classmates abandoned the class after the first week.

As I mentioned before, the classes are what you make of them. At my level, having a great professor doesn’t really matter, unless he’s my thesis adviser. I’m actually lucky that 2 out of my 3 profs are good. Since I am going to specialize in analysis, probably abstract analysis and topology, the real analysis class is fundamental to my mathematical development, as it introduces all sorts of concepts that were probably not seen at an undergraduate level. We’ve started the Lebesgue integral and I hadn’t seen it before.

Rainy Mathematical Days

Lamy Safari fountain pens²

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The rain has finally abated. I love the rain in Canada, but I hate it here. Why? You just get wet all the time. You get wet when you get on the scooter, when you drive around, and when you get off. Rain gear does wonders, but it’s annoying to have to carry it around and wait for it to dry. Also, driving in the rain is a lot more dangerous. I tend to be really careful.

Temperatures have cooled down significantly. It’s no longer 30C, but only 24C³. It’s getting a bit chilly when riding on the scooter. I’ll need to take a scarf.

Using Moleskines As Class Notebooks

A3 Moleskines vs standard size

Honestly, it has been my plan to do so since last week, but the price of it all didn’t hit home until I was going around trying to find some Moleskines at ESLite.

After asking around to see what was available, I finally bought a Plain Soft Notebook – Extra Large (19×25cm), which is almost 8.5×11″, standard school sized paper. I was going to buy one for each class, but they are just so expensive here, about twice the price in the US. I think I’ll get them online. There’s no point in wasting that much money on these. I’ll try looking around to see if I can buy them cheaper, but I doubt it. Actually, you can get one like that for $13 on Amazon. The list price is $20. I paid $25.

Update: I just started using the Folio A4 Plain Notebook and it’s a joy to use. No bleeding from fountain pens or ink, the 100 g/m2 really makes a difference. The Plain Soft Notebook’s paper is noticeably of a lesser quality. The price difference easily justifies the purchase of the A4 Folio instead. The Folio A4 Sketchbook has got 160 g/m2 and the Folio A4 Watercolor has got 200 g/m2. The last two have noticeably less pages, 96 and 60 respectively, whereas the plain notebook has 176.⁴

Failing At Buying Class Books

I tried and failed at trying to get Complex Variables by Berenstein & Gay in Springer Verlag today. I didn’t really know where to go and none of the places I went to had any books. I should have just gone back to the one that my classmate showed me.

I checked online and the original hardcover of this book retails for about $100. I wonder how much it will cost here. I’ve learned that counter fitting is rife in the universities, as students are pretty poor. They can’t pay for books. Usually, they will borrow the book from a library, drop it off at a copy shop and have them copy it as well as bind it. The results are good but I prefer buying originals, as I see these books as reference for later things.

The other side of this is that there are actually real looking counterfeit books that are available here. They have been printed here and are extremely cheap. I paid $13 for Principles of Mathematical Analysis by Walter Rudin. It’s a counterfeit book, but looks pretty good. I don’t mind that. The other was is actually an original from Springer Verlag. It’s Topology by Klaus Jänich. I paid $22 for this one.

The bad part was that none of those books were actually class books. Oh well, I was looking for Measure and Integral by Wheeden and Zygmund and Real and Complex Analysis by Rudin.

While I was at ESLite, I saw Dan Brown’s latest book, The Lost Symbol. At the last moment, before leaving the library, I bought it. It was only $20. I almost bought Day Watch by Sergey Lukyanenko and Vladimir Vasilyev. I saw Twilight Watch right beside it, but then I decided that I still had to read Night Watch again before starting out on those books.

I also struck out on getting Kafka on the Shore by Murakami and more Palahniuk novels. I could spend hours in book stores and art supply stores.

For some reason, I escaped the rain. I have been using my scooter as a locker. It’s much more convenient to put my motorcycle jacket in my scooter. However, it’s already packed to the rafters with my rain gear, that I absolutely need, and an umbrella. I’ve gotten tired of always getting wet. Strangely enough, if I compact it enough, the jacket fits in pretty snugly into the compartment.

Asics Sortie Marathon Japan Duo

Asics Sortie Marathon Japan Duo, the color I wanted

When I went sneaker shopping two weeks ago, I discovered the Asics Japan shoe line. They were specifically made for marathon runners. I was intrigued.

Let me tell you that I absolutely abhor going into a department store to find shoes⁵, even if it’s a high-end store like Sogo. In fact, don’t go to Sogo. You’ll save money by going to regular shops. For sneakers, I recommend the Gongguan area (公館站)¹, which has got at least a dozen different sneakers, carrying everything from Nike to Acupuncture².

Update: I’ve worn them for a full day and you barely notice that you are wearing any shoes. They are extremely light. I’d like to get a small scale to see how many grams they do weigh. I’m pretty happy with my purchase.

Spending Time Offline

The Reality Dysfunction cover painting, part 1 of 3 of Night's Dawn

Over the last few days, I’ve spent more and more time offline. I really like it. I’ve been reading a lot and spending time with my wife.

I don’t like being constantly tethered to the internet. That’s one of the reasons why I no longer use GTalk or Y! Pager. I don’t want to waste more time online. It’s also why I don’t really check on Facebook anymore. I barely log in once every few weeks.

I’ve been reading The Naked God, the last book of Peter F. Hamilton in the Night’s Dawn trilogy. I’ve already read the trilogy. I’m just reading it again. After I finished The Temporal Void, I wanted to read his other work again. In between substituting, I’ve been getting all of the paperwork ready for the start of school. I’m actually registered for 3 1-year classes plus a colloquium. There’s a basic Mandarin class that I want to register for as well. It’s only 4 hours a week but it gives you access to two hours of private tutoring for free. I tried registering for that today, but I’ll have to go by school again tomorrow to finish that up.

It was nice having about two days off. I didn’t have to write anything either. School starts next week. It’s going to be interesting.

Murakami & Palahniuk

Chuck Palahniuk's Invisible Monsters, image via Wikipedia

I drove my wife to Taipei yesterday so that she could pick up a book at the Jhongsiao Dunhua ESLite book store. I knew where it was because I had driven past there in 2007. I didn’t know exactly, but well enough to find it.

I don’t really like ESLites stores. They are nice, but they don’t have a good selection of English books. Page One has always been my number one choice. Anyway, beggars can’t be choosers, so I tried to find Kafka on the Shore by Murakami and some Palahniuk novels.

I found Sputnik Sweetheart and Invisible Monsters. I was a bit disappointed at how thin both books were, but at least I found something. I’m still re-reading Peter F. Hamilton’s Night’s Dawn trilogy. It’s over 3,600 pages and it’s taken me three weeks to read that. I’m entering the home stretch.

That area of Taipei is a prime shopping area, with lots of different shops. As I hate shopping, I won’t be returning! Just joking, but it was a nice area to be in. Kind of like the area surrounding Taipei 101.

Speaking of which, I remember that the Xinyi area had a really nice sneaker shop. I should pop by there and look if I can find the Asics Magic Sortie Japan Duos I’ve been looking for.

Graduate Trash and First Impressions

Apparently, a few months ago, there was trash all over the graduate student area at NTNU. It was so bad that the professors and staff talked about how to clean up your own trash for about 20 minutes today. It was kind of funny. Charlotte told me that most graduate students are babied and really don’t know what is going on. She told me that a student had left her with actual mice because of teh amount of trash that she had left there without cleaning up.

I also learned that I have a sort of office. It’s a communal office that I share with other students. This means that I can easily stash my bike there. That’s a relief. Charlotte told me that they have a lot of free space on the 4th floor. That made me want to request other office space, but I won’t. I don’t mind being around other students, it’s going to be fun.

The staff and older PhD students are all very nice, as well as the new students who aren’t too shy. Shida specializes in the education of mathematics and the history of math. Those aren’t my areas of interest, but I’ve been told that I’ll have an easier time studying there than at NTU.

The big thing are the qualifying exams that everyone has to sit in order to get into PhD programs in US universities. Charlotte is taking hers in about a month. I will take them next year in May. There is a chance that if I do well in those exams, I could get a “passage au doctorat”, which means that I’d get a M.Sc and PhD instead of just a PhD by just doing about 3 years. That’s pretty exciting, but that means that this year, it will get intense.

There are quite a few interesting classes. Above all, it’s Real Analysis and Complex Analysis that I will focus on, as Functional Analysis isn’t taught this year. I’ll have to take a Modern Algebra class as well in order to prepare fully for the exams. All the professors that I’ve talked with assured me that this should be my goal. This will make admission into a US university easier as well.

In more mundane tasks, I’ve secured a locker for myself as well. They have given me the access card and I still have one paper to fill in for them.

My wife ended up doing a lot of extra work for professors. This is totally of on top of what she has to do with her classes. It drains a lot of her time. I was curious to find out if this was the same in math. Charlotte assures me that this isn’t the case. She has been studying for her PhD for two years and she never does anything extra. Well she does, but it’s usually small things.

I’m really happy that I’ll be studying there with Charlotte nearby. She’s French and I love the fact that I can speak French with her all the time. I’ve only met a few French-speakers in Taiwan and I’ve never really been in contact with them for long amounts of time.

BTW, Charlotte is studying Mathematical Education and she is translating Sanskrit math problems into English.

Grocery Shopping

Went for a quick stop at the grocery shop with the wife, which is rare. We usually shop separately, when we come home from work. On our way back, we saw a scooter accident. Some woman was lying on the ground, people were around calling an ambulance. She wasn’t wearing much protection.

We wanted to get some food from the Thai-Vietnamese place, but it was closed.

Thai Vietnamese Stand

Chad told me that there was a really good food stand near my house. They serve Thai-Vietnamese food. The only trouble is finding out when it’s open. As usual, stands tend to have strange schedules.

The sisters who operated the stand/restaurant told me that they are open every day, from 3PM to 10PM. I’d come by two days in a row to find their stand all boarded up. It was 3:40PM when I arrived and they weren’t set up yet. They told me that I’d have to wait 20 minutes. I thought about this for a few seconds. I’d been trying to get food from them for this whole week. I also had a good book in my backpack, so I just pulled it out and read. The girls made me a complimentary French bun, kind of Vietnamese, filled with spicy meat and veggies for waiting so long. I was at the stand for about 40 minutes. It was delicious. It hovered on the verge of being too spicy, but wasn’t spicy enough to make me stop eating it. I told them that it was great.

I ordered a chicken/papaya salad. It turns out that they made me a chicken/papaya salad and a papaya salad. These salads are typically Thai. They don’t use ripe papayas, but green ones. I didn’t really mind. It was once again excellent food. In fact, I’m going to go back there tomorrow and the day after until I get tired of it. It’s just so tasty. And the spicyness. The spicyness of the salad was exquisite. It was dosed in finely cut red chilies. You never knew what you were going to get and when you got some, they were spicy, but not too spicy.

I ate the salad in two sittings. It would have been too much for just one meal. I’m pretty happy to have this nice eatery a few minutes away from home. Obviously, there are other places, but they tend to be noodle and BBQ stands.

Update: I know remember why I don’t eat that many spicy foods. They hurt on the way out. Still, it was pretty good. I went back for some French buns filled with meat and veggies today. I have been told that this is Vietnamese, not Thai.