Wonder Woman 1984, a Holiday Party, and Trivia!

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my life and adventures in Shanghai! As covid-19 continues to plague the US, and you are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside, avoiding large gatherings, and social distancing, I hope that my blog highlights what the world will look like after a recovery from covid-19 begins, which can only happen by following the practices listed above. Once things improve (which is not now), I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find these interactions meaningful and enjoyable. In Shanghai, life has returned mostly to normal.

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Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry continues to find all of you safe, happy, and most importantly healthy. Even though this has been a unique and different holiday season, I hope that you have still taken the time to relax and do something fun. More importantly, I hope that you are all continuing to take covid-19 and the dangers associated with it very seriously.

Before I discuss my week, I want to begin by saying how disappointed I remain in the general attitude and behavior of Americans with respect to the covid-19 pandemic. While I know many of you are remaining at home and are continuing to isolate and stay socially distant, based on what I’ve seen on Facebook and heard about from my family, that is not the case with most of America. I remain incredibly frustrated by the fact that Americans continue to act selfishly by traveling and gathering in large groups. Americans as a whole seem unable to recognize the sacrifices that are needed for the greater good. Given the dramatic rise in increase of covid-19 cases after Thanksgiving, I had hoped that this would not continue to be the case. Moreover, if there was ever a year to not travel to be with loved ones and to remain home and connect virtually, this was it. However, based on what I’ve seen, far too many people failed to follow the CDC recommendations and I believe that the number of cases will continue to skyrocket in the US in the coming weeks. While there’s little I can do, I will emphasize again that the only reason China was able to avoid the catastrophic outbreaks that exist in the US was that the government shut the country down and people wore masks and followed social distancing practices.

While I know a lot of the lackadaisical attitude toward covid-19 exists because people are being selfish and not recognizing the dangers, I think the continued absence of moral leadership from the Republican Senate and current President have only further worsened the situation. Whether it’s the inability to agree to provide more than $600 (which is chump change and in my opinion far more should be and already have been provided) or to extend rent relief and other social benefits, it is clear that the Republican party has a total absence of moral leadership and general morality. So, if you are a Georgia voter or know Georgia voters, please encourage them to vote.

In terms of the covid-19 situation in China, the situation remains under control. There has been a minor outbreak in one of the districts in Beijing, similar to what happened in Shanghai a few weeks ago. However, unlike in the US where there is no response to such an event, here the government acts quickly, using contact tracing to test everyone who came in to contact with the infected individual and also effectively quarantining an entire neighborhood/district. If the US wants to halt covid-19, these same swift actions must be taken. In terms of numbers, there are 108 cases (all but 2 are imported) in Shanghai. In Beijing, there are 21 cases. The recovery rate in Shanghai sits at 92.3%. For China as a whole, the recovery rate is 93.5%. Even though these numbers are so low, the government here always acts swiftly to nip any threat before it grows, which is comforting.

In terms of Astronomy, this was a productive week. Unlike in the US, the semester is still going on, so I’m still working every day. I spent most of my week working on measuring the luminosity function in a simulated mock data set (taken from my friend Haojie’s model — he’s also a postdoc at SJTU). We’re doing this to better understand what we are detecting in our background measurement for our observations. I’m just finishing those measurements now, so hopefully soon, I’ll have some interesting findings. I also spent more time working on my halo mass estimating paper, comparing the magnitude gap method (which I pioneered) to the Central + N satellites method and total satellite luminosity method. On that front, I’m going to refocus the paper to make it more narrow and clear. So, hopefully that will get done this week.

Outside of Astronomy, it was surprisingly warm for most of the week. Most days were in the low-mid 50s, with lows in the 40s. I was even able to wear my short tights during each of my three runs this week! It’s supposed to get cooler during this upcoming week, but the weather will maintain in the 40s for the foreseeable future.

During my walks and runs around Shanghai, I saw more cool things to share!

Now, before I discuss the different highlights of my week, I wanted to let you all know that I got my new passport on Tuesday!!! Only 11 days after I applied for my renewal! Clearly there’s no reason it should take as long as it does in the US. So, I will be able to join my some of my friends for a trip up north to Harbin next week!!!

Even with that to look forward to, I still made some time for some fun activities this week. On Tuesday night, Kehilat Shanghai and Moishe House hosted another trivia night! I posted the questions I wrote at the end of this blog for you to try out! I think some of them are a little bit harder this time. Then, on Friday, I was invited to a holiday party by my friend Clem (who is not in the picture)!

I had a wonderful time celebrating with great company and enjoying delicious food (I made chocolate peppermint cookies) on Friday night! I spent most of the night talking about travel plans for the winter as well as a great conversation about The Beatles! For those of you who celebrate Christmas, I hope that you had a nice and safe Holiday.

I know I commented on this last year, but I will again. It’s both weird and really nice to be working during the period of time between Christmas and New Years. It’s weird because I have not been in school or working during this week for almost my entire life. It’s nice, because as someone who doesn’t celebrate Christmas, it lessens the emphasis that American society puts on celebrating Christmas and allows me to treat the day as I would any other day, which I quite enjoy.

The highlight of my week was seeing Wonder Woman 1984 in theaters on Saturday!!! This was the first time I’ve ever been to a movie theater in China and it was an interesting experience. A few things to note. I saw the movie at an IMAX theater in downtown Shanghai, so I think this experience is probably fairly typical for Shanghai. First, people can bring in snacks and drinks without it being an issue. Many people brought coffee or boba (bubble tea to the movie). Second, the theater didn’t actually sell any food. There was no snacks or popcorn to buy, only drinks. Third, there were no trailers played before the movie. Other than that, the experience was actually fairly normal. The only real difference was that the commercials were in Chinese. However, I was pleasantly surprised that I was able to pick up and recognize a lot of the words in the commercials! I will note that I did wear a mask in the theater. Many of the other moviegoers did as well. I was not bothered by this at all even though at this point it is purely a precautionary measure. Below you can see some of the advertising and signs up in the theater!

In terms of Wonder Woman 1984, I loved the movie. While I don’t think this WW movie is quite as good as the first one, I think the cast did a fantastic job bringing the characters to life. Gal Gadot does such a great job playing Diana/Wonder Woman, so I hope we continue to see her in the role for a long time. More importantly, I thought that the message and heart throughout the film was both very moving and timely. I have a wonderful time seeing it and I hope that you all take the time to see it (it’s streaming on HBO Max for those of you in places where it’s not safe to see movies in the theater).

Overall, this was a quieter week, which was nice since it allowed me to get a lot of work done. As I mentioned, next Thursday I’m flying north to Harbin (it’s really cold there, but there’s snow!!!). I do want to give you all a heads up that I return from Harbin Sunday evening (when I usually write the blog posts), so I won’t be writing a post until the next day. So, don’t worry if you don’t hear from me until Monday of next week. In the interim, I hope that you all have a wonderful New Years! Please make sure to celebrate in a socially distanced and responsible manner. Hopefully 2021 will be a better, healthier, and safer year for everyone!

I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my week and my first movie experience in Shanghai! If there’s anything you would like to know about my life in Shanghai, please let me know.

In peace,
Jesse

Trivia

Famous Last Names

For each question, provide the last name in common between the two people described.

Director of The Batman and War of the Planet of the Apes and the first actor to play Superman?
The creator of Doonsebury and the Prime Minister of Canada?
Actor known for his roles in Whiplash and Spider-Man and the founder of The Ringer and former ESPN talking head?
Senior Senator from New York and comedian known for her role in movies such as Trainwreck?
Musician who was part of the Hollies and CSN and a former two-time NBA MVP?
Secretary of State under President George W. Bush and retired Jamaican Olympian sprinter?
Formula One race car driver with the most wins of all time and the original actress who portrayed Sarah Connor in the Terminator Franchise?
The original actor who played Dumbledore and the vice-President elect of the United States?
Actress known for her work in Arrival, American Hustle, and Man of Steel and the Second first lady of the United States?
Actor known for his diversity of roles including Batman Begins, The Machinist, and The Fighter and a professional footballer for the Tottenham Hot Spurs?

Characters from the Bible

This father of Noah is described as having the longest lifespan of anyone in the Bible?
Who are the two adopted sons of Joseph?
Who was the King of Israel who was succeeded by King David?
Who was the third child of Adam and Eve?
Who is responsible for cutting Samson’s hair?
Who is the mother of the prophet Samuel whose exultant hymn of thanksgiving is described in the Bible?
This sister of Moses led the women in dancing and celebration after successfully crossing the Red Sea?
The Talmud names only Four angels, they are Michael, Gabriel, Raphael, and who?
Who was the leader of the Israelites that sent spies into the city of Jericho?
Who is the mother of Abraham’s other son, Ishmael?

I’ll post the answers for you next time!

December 20, 2020

Channukkah, Parties, and Peanuts at MOCA!

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my life and adventures in Shanghai! As covid-19 continues to plague the US, and you are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside and are social distancing, I hope that my blog highlights what the world will look like after a recovery from covid-19 begins, which can only happen by following the practices listed above. Once things improve (which is not now), I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find these interactions meaningful and enjoyable. In Shanghai, life has returned mostly to normal.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry continues to find you all safe and healthy. For those of you, like my family, in the Northeast, I hope that you aren’t still buried under too much snow and that there were no further complications as a result of that snowfall. Since I know many of you are in academia, I hope that the end of your semester has gone well (or is in the process of wrapping up). Hopefully, you’ve found remote teaching to be more manageable now that you’ve had more experience with it.

I know that like many of you, I am excited to see the role out of the different covid-19 vaccines both in the US and Europe. However, I do want to point out a few different points that I believe may be being overlooked. 1). Just because there is a vaccine, this does not mean that people should stop social distancing and start gather in large groups. As such, in most of the world, it is vital that people not gather to celebrate Christmas and New Years. There was a large surge after Thanksgiving and I’m fearful of what will happen after Christmas. 2). Even though the vaccine is beginning to be rolled out, it will still take until the summer for the vaccine to be widespread, again emphasizing the point of maintaining safe and smart practices of mask wearing and social distancing. 3). We still don’t know how long the vaccine is effective for. What I mean by this is we don’t know if this will become something people get once, or is like the flu vaccine and something people get every year.

With those points in mind, I really hope that all of you, especially those of you who chose to gather in large groups (indoors) for Thanksgiving, reconsider and cancel any plans to do so for Christmas or New Years. I understand how isolating and lonely it can be to not be with all your loved ones, but in order for the US to recover as quickly as possible from covid-19, sacrifices must be made and people must act for the greater good.

In terms of covid-19, the situation remains entirely under control in China. Restrictions on who can enter the country are still in place, and China punishes countries by removing flights if too many people from one country enter with covid-19 on a single flight (hasn’t happened to the US yet). In total, there are currently 94 cases in Shanghai (all but 3 are imported). Beijing has 12. The recovery rate is at 93.0%. The recovery rate for China as a whole is at 93.3%. These numbers continue to be in stark contrast to the USA, where there are 17.6 million cases and it’s unclear how seriously people are taking this. This difference emphasizes why it’s important to put in place actual policies to halt covid-19.

On the Astronomy front, this was a relatively productive week. I wrapped up a draft of my paper on different methods of estimating the halo mass, the total cluster mass including dark matter, so hopefully that paper will be submitted in the coming months (there’s still 1-2 more science things to do). I also spent a lot of time beginning to use one of my colleague’s mock galaxy catalogues to do a simulated version of the Luminosity Function. I also spent time working on my measurements of the Intra-Cluster light and it’s evolution over the redshift range 0.2 < z < 0.9. Hopefully, I’ll be able to stay productive and make some more tangible progress in the coming weeks (my semester doesn’t end until around Chinese New Year — February). Additionally, we finally finished all our work as part of the DESI secondary spare targets selection committee! After meeting from 11pm – 1am on Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday, we were able to wrap our discussions and finalize which projects we’ve chosen to observe! Overall, it was a really interesting (and sometimes exhausting) experience! I’m glad I had the opportunity to participate.

Outside of Astronomy, I went for two runs this week! It’s a little bit colder now (weather’s in the 40s most days with lows in the 30s). So, I’ve had to break out some of my slightly warmer running layers (though by Saratoga or Ann Arbor standards, this is very pleasant weather, especially for December).

During my runs and walks throughout the city, I saw a lot of really cool things!

Also, even though movie theaters aren’t all open in the US and Europe, they are here in Shanghai. I’m very excited to go see Wonder Woman 1984 in theaters (likely next weekend)! There are even adds on it on my Xiaomi smart tv. Hope you all are able to see it on HBO Max as well!

This was a really fun week filled with lots of fun parties and celebrations with friends! On Wednesday, one of my fellow SJTU postdocs had a going away party. She’s moving back to South Korea at the end of next week, so all the postdocs gathered for a fun farewell dinner! It’s been a long time since we’d all gathered together, so it was really fun to see everyone!

Then on Saturday night, one of my friends hosted a holiday party! Unlike a lot of the social events I attend (either the Kehilat events, Moishe House events, or Heather and Shimi’s parties), I didn’t actually know that many people at this party. However, much to my pleasant surprise, I had a wonderful time and met a lot of really interesting people. I spent the night chatting with people from all different groups within Shanghai about vegan food and different recipes (everyone loved my wild rice salad and toffee squares!) whether fried rice is more culinarily interesting than Chinese American food, and the best ways to learn Chinese (which for me was quite useful — on that front, I’m still working at it and getting a lot better!). Also, unsurprisingly everyone wanted to ask me different Astronomy questions, which was fun! Sadly there weren’t any photos from the night to share, but it was a wonderful evening!

A few weeks ago, I shared some photos of a Peanuts exhibit in Shanghai. On Sunday morning, I went back and saw the entire exhibit at the Shanghai Museum of Contemporary Art. The exhibit was the first such exhibit in China, celebrating 70 years of Peanuts (mostly Snoopy). The exhibit featured different sculptures, multi-media presentations, and paintings representing the different themes and ideas that recur throughout Peanuts! I had a fantastic time exploring the exhibit and hope that these photos make you feel like you came along with me! I will point out, that you can see in the photos that I am wearing a mask. While not required outside, museums require patrons to wear masks.

There were so many highlights, like the snoopy going to the moon exhibit, the different Asian interpretations of the characters, and the giant snoopy, but my favorite was a gigantic wall scroll of Snoopy dreaming about a great adventure scene!

Overall, it was a fantastic exhibit and it was a lot of fun for me to be back in a museum again! I haven’t gone nearly as frequently as I used to since covid-19 started. So, I’ll have to go visit them more frequently in 2021. 🙂

Food in Shanghai

On Monday, I got dinner with one of my friends. We went to one of my favorite vegetarian restaurants, Godly!

We enjoyed a tofu hot pot (similar to a miso soup), fantastic eggplant, mushroom curry, and Chinese yams! I think the eggplant is amazing here!

On Wednesday, I also took photos of the vegetarian highlights from our SJTU gathering!

I enjoyed a cooling fruit bowl (for a break from spicy food), a pumpkin and cheese dish (which was weird), seasonal greens, fried silken tofu (my favorite), a fried pumpkin ball (kind of like tempura), and peanut butter and mango ice creams! They referred to these as shaved ices, but reminded me of ice cream, which actually originated in China!

Jewish Life in Shanghai

In addition to the parties I previously mentioned, there was one more party! On Thursday, I was invited to a Channukkah party hosted by my fellow KS board member Bruce and his wife Cibele! It was mostly members of the KS family Shabbat community, so even though it’s just me here in Shanghai, I feel very fortunate to be included in these events and to be welcomed into that part of the community!

As you can see we had some beautiful and creative menorahs (and lots of kids to light them)! My favorite was the menorah made out of oranges (which were then devoured)! That came about because one of the children was watching his older sister make a menorah and he wanted to make one as well (and then he found a demo of how to make it our of oranges, his favorite fruit, online). It was really cute! I had a fantastic time celebrating Channukkah with many of the lovely people I’ve gotten to know and become friends with within the KS community. This Channukkah celebration, along with last week’s party, highlight how important Kehilat Shanghai and it’s members have become to my life in Shanghai!

And not to forget, I also lit my menorah each night as well!

As you can see, I had a wonderful Channukkah and week filled with many celebrations with many different groups of friends. This has again made me realize how fortunate I am to be able to celebrate safely with others. While I know the holiday times are difficult for many of you this year, I hope that you can take comfort in knowing that next year’s celebrations will be even more special and memorable. Overall, this was a really wonderful week filled with parties and a great time at the MOCA museum. Hopefully next week will be equally as productive and fun! Also, for those of you who celebrate Christmas, I hope that you have a wonderful, safe, and socially distanced holiday.

I hope that you all enjoyed seeing photos from my parties as well as exploring the Peanuts exhibit at MOCA. If there’s anything you’re curious about with regards to my life in Shanghai, let me know!

In peace,
Jesse

December 13, 2020

Channukkah in Shanghai

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my life and adventures in Shanghai! As covid-19 continues to plague the US, and you are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside and are social distancing, I hope that my blog highlights what the world will look like after a recovery from covid-19 begins, which can only happen by following the practices listed above. Once things improve (which is not now), I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find these interactions meaningful and enjoyable. In Shanghai, life has returned mostly to normal.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry finds all of you, your families, and your friends staying safe and healthy. I know that for many of you the winter has already been hard since you are no longer able to gather outside for socially distanced visits. Despite that, I hope you are all taking some time to do things that you enjoy (that are safe). Moreover, as the holiday season continues, please follow social distancing guidelines, do not gather in large groups, wear masks, and wash your hands. I know that some of you are tired of these restrictions, but if we want the vaccines to effectively work, we need to act smartly to first slow the spread of the virus.

I don’t want to comment too much on the situation in the US, but I remain continually troubled and fearful of the current political divide that exists in the US. It’s really dangerous that the Republican Party effectively announced to the world that it no longer believes in democracy (though their stance on voter suppression, especially minority votes, has long suggested that). While I’m glad that the Supreme Court has continued to toss out Trump’s frivolous law suits, the one raised by Texas and cosigned by over 100 Republican House of Representative members further highlights how broken the current political system is. If we can no longer accept fair elections, then the US is no longer the bastion of democracy.

Additionally, I remain incredibly concerned about covid-19 in the US. There are almost 16 million cases in the US and near 300,000 deaths. The level of complacency I continually see on Facebook and hear about from my family and friends is frightening. I can’t stress this enough, but the vaccine will not immediately improve the situation. It will take many months for enough people to be vaccinated for any kind of immunity to be built up, so it is paramount that you all continue to follow safe practices. Moreover, I’ll again ask that you not gather for holiday celebrations. While I know many of you didn’t for Thanksgiving, please follow these same precautions around Christmas and New Years.

In stark contrast, the situation in Shanghai and China as a whole remains under control. There was a small outbreak in Chengdu, but thanks to strict lockdowns and contact tracing, thousands of people were tested and the outbreak was contained. In Shanghai, there 82 cases (all but 4 are imported cases). There are just 4 in Beijing. The number only rises in Shanghai because people (who are quarantined upon arrival) test positive. The recovery rate in Shanghai is 93.6% and the recovery rate for China is 93.2%. So, again the situation in the US was avoidable and strict policies must be adhered to to turn the situation around.

Now, for an Astronomy update. This was a relatively productive week. I spent a lot of my time working on my Luminosity Function analysis as well as my Halo Mass (amount of dark matter in a galaxy cluster) proxy analysis paper. We’re still working on understanding the background measurement for the Luminosity Function, but we’re exploring a lot of different scenarios (and will start looking at simulated mock universes as well). I also began taking measurements of the intra-cluster light (ICL) profiles for my DES-ACT analysis, and have begun looking at the redshift evolution in the ICL. So, despite all the planning for the Channukkah party (more on that later), this was still a productive week.

As a result of the party planning as well as some really bad pollution over the weekend, I only got to go for 1 run. Hopefully that will be rectified this week! I still saw a bunch of cool things that I thought I would share!

Additionally, though not a fun activity, I renewed my passport on Friday! I was making some tentative travel plans and found out that you can’t travel (by plane/train) in China if your passport expires in less than 6 months (mine expires at the end of April). So, hopefully in ~2 weeks, I’ll get my new passport and be all set for some winter adventures with my friends! Thankfully, it’s a lot faster doing it here than it is in the USA.

While most of this post will focus on my Channukkah celebrations, I did one other fun thing. On Saturday, the Unravel storytelling group put on an exhibition of photographed portraits of some of their featured story tellers. Each portrait was accompanied with a 1-2 minute piece of their story. The exhibit was really cool and a great way to continue to engage with the stories. Plus, at the event two of the people whose photos were used told their stories. So, it was a fun way to take a break on Saturday!

Jewish Life in Shanghai

First, Happy Channukkah to all of those who are celebrating! I hope that you’ve enjoyed lighting the candles on your menorahs as well as some latkes or sufganiyot! On Friday, I, along with my friend and fellow board member, Ha, organized the 4th annual Kehilat Shanghai Shabbatakkah Channukkah Party! This year, we partnered with the restaurant Tacolicious (where we do trivia — the owner is Jewish and a member of our community) for a fantastic party! Ha and I spent a ton of time preparing for the event and we were thrilled with the turnout! We decorated the restaurant with great decorations (from Taobao), which went great with the restaurants day of the dead aesthetic! 🙂 We had Channukkah music playing throughout the night (even the Friday DJ played Channukkah music!). We also had goodie bags of dreidels and gelt (real chocolate) for the kids!

We encouraged everyone to bring their menorahs and had a wonderful table of menorahs set up for everyone to enjoy the festive lights with!

However, the highlight of the evening was the amazing latkes and sufganiyot made by Chef Thijs (who’s Dutch) at Tacolicious! It was his first time making them and he did an amazing job! Everyone loved them and I enjoyed so many of them (along with a few tacos) throughout the evening!

I had a fantastic time celebrating with many of my friends (Hannah Maia, Heather, Shimi, Kate, Ilan, …) and fellow members of the Jewish community. One of the things I’ve really enjoyed about being on the board and leading the high holiday services is that I feel like I’ve really become a vital part of the Jewish community and gotten to know and become friends with so many wonderful people within this community! I’m extremely grateful for this community and how it’s helped Shanghai feel like home!

Overall, It was so wonderful to have the Jewish community gather together to celebrate! Everyone had a fantastic time (from the kids to the adults). It felt really great to hear so much positive feedback from the community about the event. In total, we had about 110 people come, which was amazing! More importantly, everyone had plenty of latkes, sufganiyot, and gelt to enjoy! So, my first time organizing a party was clearly a success!

Now, just in case you think I didn’t think I celebrated on my own, here are photos from the first and third nights!

My weekend was further filled with Jewish activities on Sunday. At Tov, there was a really interesting adult education session led by one of the community members about his grandparents journey of being refugees following WWI and WWII. He traced his families journey from Galicia (in Poland) to being refugees in Sweeden following WWII. Afterwards, some of the other community members discussed their families stories of emigrating from Europe or being refugees following WWII.

Moreover, Kehilat Shanghai followed up there Channukkah celebrations at Tov with a cute Channukkah carnival (dreidel, menorah making, cookie decorating)! I even made a menorah out of mahjong tiles! I thought it’d be a nice memento of my time in China!

The Channukkah celebrations were wonderful this weekend! I know many of you were not able to celebrate or gather in the ways that you usually do. This makes me reflect on how grateful and thankful I am both for the Jewish community of Shanghai, but also to be in one of the few places where we were able to safely gather and celebrate together.

This was a fantastic week, filled with tons of Channukkah celebrations, delicious food, and even some research progress. This upcoming week, I’ll be back to the grind as I have 3 late night (11pm) DESI meetings about the secondary observing proposals (yes, we never did finish that). However, I also have some fun plans to look forward to next weekend as well! I hope that all of you also enjoy the rest of Channukkah!

I hope that you enjoyed seeing my Channukkah celebrations! If there’s anything you’re curious about with regards to my life in Shanghai, please let me know.

In peace,
Jesse

P.S. Here are the trivia answers. Let me know how you did!

TRIVIA

Category 1: Judaism and Food

During Passover, Matzah is eaten instead of Bread, in order to be Kosher for Passover, matzah must be made in less than how many minutes?
1. 18 minutes
During Channukkah, fried foods are eaten to remind us of the miracle of the oil lasting 8 days. Some of the traditional foods include latkes and these jelly filled doughnuts?
1. Sufganiyot
During Purim, hamantaschen are traditionally eaten as we recall Queen Esther’s triumph over the wicked Haman. Traditional flavors include raspberry, apricot, chocolate, and this ingredient, more commonly associated with bagels?
1. Poppyseed
Each week for Shabbat, Challah is enjoyed. However, during this holiday, instead of the traditional long braided challah, the challahs are round, often including raisins.
1. Rosh Hashanah
The Passover Seder plate features charoset, matzah, and maror. Maror refers to something bitter. Traditionally, this vegetable is eaten, either sliced or grated.
1. Horseradish
The Yom Kippur fast is a primary observance of the holiday. Traditionally, how many hours does the fast last?
1. 25 hours
Rosh Hashanah celebrates the sweet new year. Often people enjoy apples dipped in honey and these sweet crescent shaped deserts filled with raspberry jam, nuts, raisins, and sometimes chocolate.
1. Rugelach
This traditional marbled bread desert can come in either chocolate or cinnamon flavors.
1. Babka
Nothing may be more traditional to see at any synagogue potluck than this dish that can be made either sweet or savory often featuring potatoes and carrots or noodles.
1. Kugel
As part of this holiday, celebrated 50 days after Passover and commemorating the giving of the Torah, people celebrate by indulging in dairy foods such as cheesecake and blintzes.
1. Shavuot

Category 2: Things People are or were Thankful For

In the United States, many democrats are currently thankful for the heroic efforts to engage and register voters in Georgia led by this former gubernatorial candidate.
1. Stacy Abrams
In Argentina, football fans remain thankful to this former player and coach whose miraculous “hand of god” led to Argentina’s 2^nd world cup victory in 1986.
1. Diego Maradona (RIP)
In 13^th century Japan, citizens were grateful for this aptly named wind storm that saved the Japanese from two separate Mongol fleets led by Kublai Khan.
1. Kamikaze
During the American Revolutionary War, many were thankful for a victory in this small town in upstate New York, which turned the tide of the revolution.
1. Saratoga
In 1969, American were grateful to have won the space race when these two Astronauts became the first men to land on the moon.
1. Neil Armstrong
2. Buzz Aldrin
Europe was thankful in 1815 when Napoleon was defeated and exiled for the second time, this time to this small island off the coast of Africa.
1. St. Helena
In British folklore, the people of this town were grateful for the heroic thievery of Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men.
1. Nottingham
Many people are currently thankful for the two promising covid-19 vaccines that are being developed by these three companies.
1. Moderna
2. Pfizer
3. AstraZeneca-Oxford
The Ancient Hebrews were grateful for the military victory of Judah and the Maccabees over this group of people.
1. Assyrians
During World War II, soldiers were grateful for the heroic actions taken by many local fisherman and boaters to help rescue allied soldiers during this battle.
1. Dunkirk

December 6, 2020

Post Thanksgiving, a Quieter Week in Shanghai

Welcome to Astronomer in Shanghai! Thank you for following my blog and for your interest in my life and adventures in Shanghai! As covid-19 continues to plague the US, and you are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside and are social distancing, I hope that my blog highlights what the world will look like after a recovery from covid-19 begins, which can only happen by following the practices listed above. Once things improve (which is not now), I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find these interactions meaningful and enjoyable. In Shanghai, life has returned mostly to normal.

Life in Shanghai

I hope that this latest entry continues to find all of you, your family, and your friends safe and healthy. As the situation in the US continues to worsen, you all remain constantly in my thoughts, even as the situation in Shanghai remains under control. With that in mind, I hope that you all are continuing to take covid-19 seriously. Despite the existence of possible vaccines, there are many questions that exist about covid-19 that haven’t been definitively answered (can you get covid-19 twice, how long is the vaccine effective). Moreover, it remains unlikely that everyone will be able to get fully vaccinated until next summer (at the earliest), so it is paramount that you all follow social distancing practices, wear masks, wear gloves, wash your hands, and generally follow smart practices.

From my outsiders perspective, this was a relatively normal week in the US, which means that it was still unsettling. I am very much troubled by the attitude of the Republican party and it’s members. It is disgusting that in a recent Washington Post poll only 25 Republican house of representative members acknowledged that Joe Biden won the election. I hope that the beginning of the Biden-Harris presidency can return things to normalcy. However, the extreme polarization that exists within the American electorate is very scary. Moreover, if any of you are in Georgia, or have family/friends who are registered to vote there, please make sure that they are registered and vote. If you want Congress to actually pass a stimulus bill that will help the American people and not corporations, it’s paramount that the Democrats gain control of the senate.

In terms of covid-19, the situation in the US seems to have further accelerated following Thanksgiving (with no look of slowing down). The US is up to over 14.5 million cases. So, I’m going to ask all of you to not travel for Christmas or attend religious services. If we want the virus to slow down, everyone must act responsibly and start thinking about the greater good and not their own selfishness. In stark contrast to the situation in the US, in China, the virus remains entirely under control. In Shanghai, there are 61 cases (no new local cases). There are 4 in Beijing. The recovery rate for Shanghai sits at 94.8% and for China as a whole, the rate is at 93.2%. I will note that there have been more cases in Hong Kong (~1100). However, since that’s an island (with somewhat separate regulations about who can enter), there doesn’t appear to be any additional spread to the mainland.

In Astronomy, this was a very productive week! On Friday, I finally submitted my Dark Energy Survey (DES) paper on the Stellar Mass – Halo Mass Relation to the DES Cluster working group for the collaboration wide review. Since this is a paper where the analysis was done as part of DES, the paper mush be internally reviewed by two members of the collaboration, followed by a short period where anyone in the collaboration can review it, after which it is then submitted to a journal for publication. So, this is the start of the publication process for a project I’ve been working on for almost the last two years! Needless to say, I’m extremely excited to start to share this analysis with the larger scientific community. I think a lot of the research that is discussed in this paper nicely synthesizes all of my prior work from my dissertation building a really cohesive narrative (that I look forward to discussing further once it’s published).

On top of that, I spent a fair amount of time working on other projects. I’ve begun the scientific analysis on the higher redshift DES-ACT clusters as well as continued to work a lot (and use most of my computing resources) on my Luminosity Function measurements. I also finished the main scientific analysis for the project comparing different methods of estimating halo mass (magnitude gap, central + N satellites, satellite galaxies). I’ll spend some time this week revising the drafted paper.

As you can tell, this week was largely dominated by my research, which is good, since it was very productive! However, I balanced out all the time in front of my computer by going for three runs. It’s still warm enough that I’m able to wear my short tights (which is nice). My friends complain that it’s cold, but having lived in Saratoga Springs, Providence, and Ann Arbor, I’m perfectly fine with temperatures in the 40s and low 50s. 🙂

During my runs and walks around the city, I continue to see a lot of cool things! The Pagoda is on the SJTU campus!

As you can see, Shanghai is always lit up, so it’s hard to tell what’s Christmas decorations and what’s just normal!

In addition to all the work, I did take some time for some fun stuff. On Friday night, my friends and I got together for another improv night and potluck (I made tofu meatballs)! It’s always fun playing different improv games. Although I’m still not really good at the games where you have to randomly jump into scenes. I guess it’s still a little hard for me to think completely on the fly without getting into the right mindset. This time we played some favorites including freeze (where you freeze people and insert yourself into a scenario), change word/change action (where you tell actors they have to do one of the two options randomly), paper chase (where you act out a scene and then have to randomly do 3 actions/phrases that are written on pieces of paper in your pocket), and half-life (where you act out a scene in 1 minute, then 30 seconds, 15 seconds, 7 seconds, 3 seconds). Overall, it was a lot of fun and a lot of laughs!

On Saturday, I spent most of the day helping my friends Hannah Maia and Sydney with their apartment renovations, mostly helping to clean up and remove a lot of junk left behind by old tenants. While exhausting, it felt very good to help my friends out. Plus, it’s nice to have friends who are only a 5 minute walk from my apartment! I didn’t realize that not all apartments get completely cleaned out like what I’ve experienced (I guess I’m lucky).

One highlight of helping Hannah Maia and Sydney, was that I got to meet Sydney’s cat Friday (seen below along with two other cats of Shanghai!). The white cat lives at the foreign import store I go to and the other cat lives in my neighborhood.

Trivia

Since some of you asked for them, I thought that I’d include the trivia questions that I wrote for last week. Some are easy, others less so. I’ll post the answers at the end of the blog next week, so you can all test yourselves!

Category 1: Judaism and Food

During Passover, Matzah is eaten instead of Bread, in order to be Kosher for Passover, matzah must be made in less than how many minutes?
During Channukkah, fried foods are eaten to remind us of the miracle of the oil lasting 8 days. Some of the traditional foods include latkes and these jelly filled doughnuts?
During Purim, hamantaschen are traditionally eaten as we recall Queen Esther’s triumph over the wicked Haman. Traditional flavors include raspberry, apricot, chocolate, and this ingredient, more commonly associated with bagels?
Each week for Shabbat, Challah is enjoyed. However, during this holiday, instead of the traditional long braided challah, the challahs are round, often including raisins.
The Passover Seder plate features charoset, matzah, and maror. Maror refers to something bitter. Traditionally, this vegetable is eaten, either sliced or grated.
The Yom Kippur fast is a primary observance of the holiday. Traditionally, how many hours does the fast last?
Rosh Hashanah celebrates the sweet new year. Often people enjoy apples dipped in honey and these sweet crescent shaped deserts filled with raspberry jam, nuts, raisins, and sometimes chocolate.
This traditional marbled bread desert can come in either chocolate or cinnamon flavors.
Nothing may be more traditional to see at any synagogue potluck than this dish that can be made either sweet or savory often featuring potatoes and carrots or noodles.
As part of this holiday, celebrated 50 days after Passover and commemorating the giving of the Torah, people celebrate by indulging in dairy foods such as cheesecake and blintzes.

Category 2: Things People are or were Thankful For

In the United States, many democrats are currently thankful for the heroic efforts to engage and register voters in Georgia led by this former gubernatorial candidate.
In Argentina, football fans remain thankful to this former player and coach whose miraculous “hand of god” led to Argentina’s 2^nd world cup victory in 1986.
In 13^th century Japan, citizens were grateful for this aptly named wind storm that saved the Japanese from two separate Mongol fleets led by Kublai Khan.
During the American Revolutionary War, many were thankful for a victory in this small town in upstate New York, which turned the tide of the revolution.
In 1969, American were grateful to have won the space race when these two Astronauts became the first men to land on the moon.
Europe was thankful in 1815 when Napoleon was defeated and exiled for the second time, this time to this small island off the coast of Africa.
In British folklore, the people of this town were grateful for the heroic thievery of Robin Hood and his band of Merry Men.
Many people are currently thankful for the two promising covid-19 vaccines that are being developed by these three companies.
The Ancient Hebrews were grateful for the military victory of Judah and the Maccabees over this group of people.
During World War II, soldiers were grateful for the heroic actions taken by many local fisherman and boaters to help rescue allied soldiers during this battle.

Jewish Life in Shanghai

On Sunday, Kehilat Shanghai hosted another Adult Education session at Tov, this time on Jews and Hollywood. We began by discussing how many of the earliest Hollywood studios were founded and run by Jewish men. However, we noted that while the owners were Jewish, they did not turn Hollywood into a Jewish industry (meaning it did not turn the focus into Jewish related themes/topics). Additionally, we discussed the roles that Judaism and Jewish characters played during the golden age of Hollywood (including the Jazz Singer and Fidler on the Roof). Then we ended by discussing the current situation in Hollywood. Overall, it was an interesting conversation, touching on topics to Jewish actors who changed their names to the reasons why Jews began to invest in entertainment in the first place. Considering that Jews are often stereotyped as running Hollywood, it was interesting to discuss the history behind that.

Next week, on Friday, Kehilat Shanghai will be hosting it’s 4th Annual Shabbatakkah Channukkah Celebration! I’m one of the board members coordinating, organizing, and promoting the event. We’re holding the party at Tacolicious (the owner is a member of community!). So, I look forward to sharing with you all a lot of the highlights of our celebration! They’ll be latkes, sufganiyot, and tacos for everyone!

This week was very much a work focused week, which after Thanksgiving was needed. This upcoming week will be a bit of a mixture as I spend most of the first half of the week doing research and attempting to join for some of the DESI zoom collaboration meeting (starting at 12:00 am most days — the west coast and daylight saving time are the worst) and then working on preparations for Channukkah! For all of you who are celebrating Channukkah, I hope that even though you’ll be celebrating with your immediate family, that you are able to make some latkes and enjoy them yourselves along with the festive glow from your menorah!

I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my week. If there’s anything you’re curious about with regards to my life in Shanghai, please let me know.

In peace,
Jesse