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 persists in the US and around the world, and you are (hopefully) wearing masks when you go outside, avoiding large gatherings, and social distancing, I hope that you are all staying safe and healthy and that my blog highlights what the world can look like once the road to recovery begins. Once things improve, I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family. I’m sure you’ll find these interactions meaningful and enjoyable as I have.
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Life in Shanghai
I hope that this latest update finds all of you, your families, and your friends safe and healthy. For those of you who celebrated the Lunar New Year, also known as the Chinese New Year or Spring Festival, I hope that you and your families had a lovely celebration and enjoyed lots of dumplings! For those of you in places where it’s either cold or there is a lot of snow, I hope that you have been able to do some socially distanced activities that have gotten you out of your homes or taken the time to do something fun in them!
Before I begin talking about the Lunar New Year, I do want to comment on the recent political happenings. While the impeachment hearings occurred while I was asleep, I did follow them by reading many news articles (mostly on CNN). First, the Democrats presented a strong case that anyone with a shred of morality and impartiality would have accepted as grounds for impeachment. Second, I think it’s high time that all the Republicans stop coddling the fantasy world that they have allowed Trump to live in for the past four years. His own defense was a joke and it’s reprehensible that any senator believed it, yet alone complemented it (looking at you Lindsey Graham). While I’m glad that some moderate Republicans recognized that Trump was guilty, I remain disheartened by the deep polarization that exists within the US and especially within the Senate and House. Trump should have been convicted. Moreover, that McConnell acknowledged that Trump was responsible for the domestic terrorism on January 6th, yet did not vote to convict him only shows how broken and morally vacant the Republican party is. This sets a terrible precedent going forward and will likely lead to further danger in the future. While I hope that under the Biden administration the nation can heal from the wounds inflicted by the Trump administration, I remain fearful that the polarization, which existed well before 2016 will continue to persist going forward.
In terms of covid-19, the situation in China has remained much the same. Thanks to some strict policies put in place to restrict and monitor travel during the Spring Festival, there has, so far, not been a spike in covid-19 cases. However, I’m still being safe and wearing a mask when I go outside (even when I’m running). In terms of case totals, there are currently 119 cases in Shanghai (20 locally transmitted) and the recovery rate is at 93.4%. Beijing currently has 40 cases and a recovery rate of 95.3%. China as a whole has 1,453 active cases and a recovery rate of 93.8%. So, if any of you think that a travel ban/restriction or another lockdown is a bad thing, just remember that China only got this way because of those decisive actions.
Despite this week being the Lunar New Year holiday, which extends to next week, I still did some Astronomy work (though I did give my self a bit of a break). I’ve been mostly spending time figuring out how to generate my own mock galaxy catalog (actually made progress on that)! Additionally, I’ve spent a fair amount of time working on measuring the intra-cluster light out to high redshifts, and am starting to have some promising results! So, hopefully that project will also start to move forward more quickly as well! Additionally, on Friday morning, I gave a presentation at the weekly DESI research seminar (Asia + West coast friendly) summarizing the DESI secondary selection process.
With the Lunar New Year holiday and working from home, I was able to go for 4 runs this week! It has been very warm the last few days (60s), so I went for some long 5+ mile runs! One thing I’ve noticed throughout Shanghai is that flowers are starting to appear again! Below you can see some of the highlights from around Shanghai this week, including many beautiful flowers!
Thursday night/Friday was the Lunar New Year! This year is the Year of the Ox, so many of my friends/colleagues are referring to it as the Niu year, since Niu in Chinese means cattle! As a result, I saw a ton of really cool illustrations/cartoons/cards wishing people a Happy Niu/New Year on WeChat! Below are my favorites, including some really cool Astronomy related ones!
In terms of my own Chinese New Year’s plans, first, I did receive a traditional red packet (though done over WeChat). For those unfamiliar, red packets, are envelopes with money given on the Lunar New Year. My research supervisor Ying, gave everyone a red packet in the research group, though the amount is from a random draw. This time I got 65 rmb, which is about $10!
Second, on Thursday night, one of my friends from Moishe House/Kehilat Shanghai hosted a New Year’s party! Since last year I spent the Lunar New Year (and then the next few weeks, as a result of covid-19) by myself, it was really nice to gather with many of my ex-pat friends from the Jewish community! We had a lovely potluck dinner (I made some delicious tempeh!) and it was great getting all of us together to celebrate. Even though we didn’t have a traditional Chinese meal, we did have dumplings! However, the only photo I took was this adorable photo of Pina!
In addition, to the celebration on Thursday, on Saturday, I went for a walk around Shanghai (with a mask on) to see some of the decorations and displays that were up for Lunar New Year’s in People’s Square, the centrally located park in Shanghai! You can see tons of red lanterns (those are everywhere), many cow/ox related stickers, and even the red signs on my door that SJTU gave me to bring me luck for the New Year!
Overall, the first part of my Chinese New Year holiday (the state holiday goes until the 17th, and the University will reopen on the 22nd) has been very nice and relaxing!
Jewish Life in Shanghai
For this week’s Kehilat Shanghai adult education presentation, I gave a talk on my research! Having talked to so many people in the community and having many of them ask me questions about topics ranging from black holes to exoplanets, it was really nice to share my research and expertise with some of the members of the community! I spent most of the talk explaining what the different components of galaxy clusters are (galaxies, dark matter, and gas), then describing how galaxies and clusters grow (hierarchically) and evolve (through mergers with smaller galaxies). Lastly, I explained the research that I’ve been working on (mostly the stellar mass – halo mass relation) over the last few years and shared some of the highlights of the papers that I’ve written!
The only downside was that the projector we were using didn’t have the power cord with it, so for the first half of my talk, we all had to look at my laptop. Given all the questions that I fielded, I think that everyone really enjoyed my talk! So, I definitely plan to give another Astronomy presentation to the Kehilat and Moishe House communities in the near future!
Overall, this was both a relaxing and enjoyable week. This upcoming week, I’ll do some work, while also continuing to enjoy the Australian Open (Vamos Rafa!), and enjoying my vacation. I also will have some fun activities with friends to share with all of you!
I hope that you enjoyed hearing about my week and seeing all the photos of the Lunar New Year decorations! If you have any questions about life in Shanghai, please let me know!
In peace,
Jesse
On a cold and rather bleak winter day in upstate New York, I was delighted to wake up to pictures of flowers and New Year’s decorations with the Ox! Red is such a bold color, Jesse, and the streets look so alive! Thanks to your experience in Shanghai, I got a trivia question right about the color of envelopes given traditionally at the Chinese New Year! Were you able to attend a lantern festival? I recall it was canceled last year.
Your runs, research presentations, and fun time spent with friends all point to your quality life in Shanghai and what good a fit SJTU is for you!
I had a busy week here. I gave a Webinar to the British Empire Study Group, and there were at least 267 attendees. People came from Spain, Brazil, Scotland, England, Canada, and across the US. Some of my current and former students were there too and friends and family—Pam and Grant and cousins Halli and Caren and of course Emmet and Michael! I will send the link to you. And I was asked to give a video memorial in honor of my dear student Sam Sasenarine who passed away unexpectedly last week. It was an honor but also rekindled the loss. So it was a full week here, too. I also put together Valentine’s bags for some of the children of friends and family and colleagues—just like I made for you and Emmet when you were growing up.
I look forward to seeing more posts of Shanghai in bloom and maybe a few cats, too.
I love you and miss you! Happy Valentine’s Day!
Love, Mom
Thanks Mom! The decorations do make the city come alive, even if a lot of people do leave Shanghai for the Holiday. I’m glad you got the trivia questions right! The lantern festival is actually a separate holiday. It’s not for a few more weeks, so I’m hoping to go see lanterns this year.
I’m glad to hear that you had such a busy week! I’m looking forward to watching your talk once you get the video link! 🙂 I’m sorry you’ve had to deal with the passing of your student, but I’m glad that it was meaningful for you to do a memorial. I wish I was able to get a Valentine’s day bag from you, but alas, international shipping is very expensive. Hope you continue to stay safe and healthy!
One of the beauties of this world is that we celebrate so many different new years. Even within Judaism there are four: Rosh Hashanah, (1st of Tishrei); for trees (15th of Shevat) one for the birth of the Jewish people as a people (1st of Nissan) and one for the tithing of cattle (1st of Ellul). The Chinese New Year sounds so delightful with so many gifts being exchanged and so much food being prepared and eaten and so many good wishes offered.
The results of the impeachment was forgone. Given that so many Republicans appeared to absent themselves from the proceedings, the Dems should have called for a point of order (is that British?) and asked Leahy to rule on whether the “jurors” who declined to be present could vote. But that said, it looks like the GOP is now a neo-fascist party – That those who refused to find Trump guilty may have demonstrated gross cowardice (afraid the mob boss AKA Trump might chop them off at the knees at primaries) suggests that they are in fact unfit to govern and that their oaths of office were a sham.
Talking of astronomy (and this may be way off in left field), Avi Loeb, that Harvard astronomer, is raising to the front, discussions about the possibility of interstellar life. I have to say that even if we find single cell life forms on Mars or elsewhere that that could profoundly change how we think about ourselves and perhaps make it easier for us to create a world with far more equality and fairness so that we can begin to talk about ourselves as only a “we” and any “they” is life outside the earth.
Vaccinations being rolled out sooooo slowly. About 10% of the population have been vaccinated. But it is taking an incredibly long time for those who were not in the groups viewed as having the highest priority to be able to even make an appointment.
Stay safe.
Hi Bernard! I love your first point, it’s been one of my favorite parts about living in Shanghai! Your point about whether jurors who declined to attend/pay attention should get to vote is 100% spot on. It’s incredibly disrespectful and dishonest to not even attend. I completely agree that there are 43 Republican senators (and many more members of the House) who are not fit for office.
I’m somewhat aware of Avi Loeb’s interest in interstellar life (though sometime he tries to sensationalize some of these studies). However, I agree that finding any extraterrestial life could profoundly change how humanity views itself.
Thanks for the vaccine update. While I’m glad that the roll out is happening, I agree that it seems frustrating how long it will take. Hope you continue to stay safe and healthy.
Hi Jesse,
Happy Lunar New Year! I’m so glad that you got to celebrate with friends this year. I really enjoyed seeing all of the decorations and New Years greetings. The Astronomy one is my favorite. Do you know which nebula that is? I like seeing all of the lanterns and cartoon oxes, too! From your pictures, it’s hard to believe that it’s still February! Everything looks like it’s in bloom and it looks so warm, especially in contrast to Saratoga. I’m glad that’s let you go running!
That’s awesome that your presentation went well! I’m so glad everyone liked it and had lots of questions. I’m sorry about the projector though. It definitely helps when you can show pretty pictures on the big screen. How many people attended? I’m glad that you’re making progress on your research. I’m excited to see where the ICL project goes. Let me know if you discover anything that might be relevant to me!
In terms of the politics, the outcome of the impeachment, when tied with McConnel’s comments, are incredibly disheartening. I hope the Biden administration takes this as a message that though he may want unity, he might have to stick with the democratic majority to get stuff done. I’m also concerned that basically by not punishing trump again, they are normalizing his behavior and actions and that the racist right will become a mainstay in American politics.
Anyway, I hope the last week of your vacation goes well and that you have another productive week! Enjoy watching the Australian Open! Vamos Rafa! Stay safe and healthy!
Love,
Emmet
Thanks Emmet! I really liked the Astronomy one, too! If you look at it more closely, you can see that it’s made up of a bunch of different nebulae! It’s definitely weird that spring is right around the corner (if we ever had winter). Though I will note, many of the flowers were planted just for the holiday, so we’ll see how long they last.
We had about 10 people, which while small allowed everyone to ask a lot of questions, which was good! I’ll definitely keep you in the loop about the ICL research. So far, we’re still tweaking some of our measurement techniques.
I agree that Biden should view the impeachment trial outcome as a sign that it’s more important to do things to improve the current situation by working with the Democrats and not compromising to work with the Republicans. I definitely agree that the inability to properly punish Trump has normalized this racism and authoritarian actions.
Hope you also have a safe, healthy, and productive week! Enjoy what you can watch of the Australian Open, as well! Vamos Rafa!
Hey Jesse! Great to hear you had a nice presentation, despite some technology issues. I can’t believe how warm it is in Shanghai now! It sounds similar to where I’m from with mid February marking the beginning of spring. We’ve had a few nice snowfalls in Michigan so I went ice climbing with my roommates last weekend. It was pretty neat although difficult!
Thanks for the ox art pictures – happy new year and have a nice week!
Hi Ryan! Thanks! The weather in Shanghai definitely seems reminiscent of California (at least in the winter, it’s much hotter in the summer), which after 6 years in Michigan is so bizarre! That’s really cool that you went ice climbing! That sounds like it must have been a really challenging experience! Is it something you’ld want to do again? Hope you continue to stay safe and healthy!