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) continuing to wear masks when you go outside (even if you’re vaccinated), 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 recovery begins. Once things improve, I hope you enjoy small gatherings with friends and family and outdoor activities. 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 continues to find all of you safe, happy, and healthy. For those of you who are in academia, I hope that the end of your semester is going well. Additionally, I hope that more of you have been able to either schedule your vaccination or get your covid-19 vaccination shot. If you haven’t, I hope you are able to do so soon.

I want to begin this post by reflecting on the result of the Derek Chauvin murder trial. I believe that like me, many of you were relieved that a guilty verdict on all counts was delivered. However, there’s still a lot to process about this trial. First, it was heartening to see the collapse of the “blue wall” that generally protects police officers from getting convicted for these violent actions. However, I fear that this may be a solitary example of police casting aside the worst offender and not a true structural change. To me, it’s paramount that we stop treating police officers as being above the laws that they are sworn to protect. Moreover, it’s hard to view this as celebratory, because George Floyd, and so many others, are not alive today. I found that Utah Jazz center, Rudy Gobert, put it best in his tweet “Let’s hope that one day justice for all will feel normal and not like a celebration.” So, while this is progress, it’s vital to remember that there is still much more justice to achieve and it’s up to us to keep pushing and working to make structural changes in policing and the removal of infrastructure that supports the systemic racism and oppression that is still prevalent in America.

Now for your weekly covid-19 update. The situation in China remains largely the same. The only real news was that China is now allowing people to enter who have had the Pfizer or Moderna vaccines, instead of just those made in China. In terms of the number of cases, there are 66 cases in Shanghai (all imported) and the recovery rate is 96.28%. In Beijing, there are only 10 cases and the recovery rate is at 98.2%. For China as a whole, there are 530 cases and the recovery rate is 94.79%. All numbers come from OneTubeDaily, an expat English language news resource on WeChat that I follow.

In terms of Astronomy, this was a productive week. At long last, my DES paper on the Stellar Mass – Halo Mass relation and it’s evolution has progressed to the collaboration wide review (should go out soon) stage! This is the final stage of collaboration review and the last stage before I can submit the article for publication. Given that I’ve been working on this project for over 2 years, I’m ecstatic to finally get this paper in front of more eyeballs! Outside of that, much of my time was spent working on my mock Luminosity Function analysis. I’m now starting to make measurements, though it appears that there still may be some nuances that I’m trying to get figured out completely in how the measurements should be done. Additionally, I made some more interesting plots for my halo mass proxy analysis, so hopefully I’ll be able to start writing that up as well soon.

As you know from my previous posts, it is now Spring in Shanghai. However, it’s actually starting to warm up (reaching the mid-70s this past week and 80s next week). For those of you who remember my posts from the summer, Shanghai gets unbearably hot/humid in the summer, so hopefully the spring will hold out longer. This week, I was still able to go for two runs though and see some lovely flowers!

This was a very fun-filled week for me. In addition to my birthday celebrations, which I’ll discuss next, on Tuesday, Kehilat Shanghai hosted another trivia night at Tacolicious! We had another great turnout and David and I came up with some great questions! I’ll share mine with all of you at the end of this post. 🙂

The highlight of my week was that on Saturday, April 24th, I turned 30! Before I share some of my celebrations, I want to start by wishing my brother, Emmet, a Happy 30th Birthday! Thanks for being such a supportive and loving brother! I can’t wait until your able to move to Beijing so that we can see each other again and go on some China adventures!

In terms of my birthday celebrations, on Saturday night I had a lot of my close friends over to my apartment for a dinner party! I made tons of delicious food including Pra Ram Tofu (tofu with peanut sauce), Tempeh Fajitas, and Veggie Meatballs (following a veganized version of my great grandmother’s recipe!) as well as some salads. My friends brought some other dips, veggies and salads as well so it was a real feast!

For desert, we had a beautiful fruit/nut spread, choclate covered strawberries, and vegan cookies!

However, the desert highlight was the vegan carrot cake that my friend and fellow Kehilat Shanghai board member, Ha, made for me! I was incredibly touched that Ha offered to make me a cake and it was really delicious! It was the same recipe that my Mom used to make Emmet his cake, so there was a nice symbolism that even though we weren’t able to celebrate in person together, we were able to celebrate by enjoying the same cake!

For those of you who are unfamiliar, my family has a tradition of singing the birthday song: “Hooray Today is your birthday, not the pickles or the pears, not the beavers or the bears, not next week or yesterday, Hooray Today is your birthday!” And thanks to some help from my Mom (who reached out to my friend Heather), my friends surprised me by singing this, which I was totally not suspecting. This was then followed by Happy Birthday in English, 2 versions in Chinese, two versions of Spanish, 2 versions of French, and Hebrew! Overall, I had a wonderful time catching up with so many of my friends. I haven’t had a ton of dinner parties in my apartment, so it was really lovely to have so many people over and get to spend the evening with my friends here in Shanghai! While I’ve only been here for a year and a half, I’m incredibly grateful for my friends. I’m so fortunate that I’ve been able to make such kind, caring, and supportive friends here!

And as you can see, my favorite dog Pina was able to come join in my celebration as well and she also had a fun time! 🙂

While I’m not going to discuss most of the gifts I got, though special thanks to Emmet and my parents for getting me some really great and lovely gifts as well as my friends Heather and Shimi, I do want to share one of my gifts, because I think you’ld all find it really neat!

My friend Kate made me this decorative good luck charm. It says in Mandarin: be blessed by a lucky star. As an Astronomer, I thought this message was lovely and it will be a lovely memento of my time in Shanghai!

Food in Shanghai

On Tuesday, I got lunch with my friend Ha. We went to Duli, one of my favorite vegan restaurants in Shanghai. The food was as always inventive and fabulous! We enjoyed a cauliflower curry, sweet potato gnocchi, and ma po tofu hummus!

Duli is one of the few vegan restaurants that does fusion food, so it’s always cool for a change in culinary experience!

Jewish Life in Shanghai

On Saturday, Kehilat Shanghai held a Lag B’Omer BBQ. For those of you who have never heard of Lag B’Omer, this is a minor holiday that is celebrated on the 33rd day of the Omer and represents a break in the mourning period between Passover and Shavuot. This is joyous holiday, where people celebrate by having bonfires or BBQs.

My friends John and Alex (who invited me for Passover) hosted the BBQ and as you can see we had a fantastic turnout (there are a ton of kids not shown in the photos playing on the playground). You can also see that cool view of downtown Shanghai!

However, the highlight of the BBQ was when John and Alex surprised me with a birthday cake! I was absolutely not expecting it and it was really wonderful! John made me a delicious vegan chocolate cake! It was a big hit with the kids, and it was completely devoured! :).

I also have some great videos of being surprised by the cake that I wanted to share!

As you can see I was very surprised by this and it made me incredibly happy! I’m so grateful for all the wonderful friends that I’ve made in the Kehilat Shanghai community. It’s really been a huge part in helping me make Shanghai feel like home!

Overall, this was a great week of birthday celebrations! I had so many fun celebrations, both in person, as well as on Zoom/FaceTime with Emmet, my parents, and my cousin Margaret and her family! It was really wonderful to be able to celebrate so many times! This upcoming week will definitely be a little quieter, it’s not every week you turn 30, but I know I’ll have some fun things to share with you all as well!

I hope that you enjoyed seeing and reading about my birthday celebrations! I hope that this upcoming week is safe and healthy for all of you as well.

In peace,

Jesse

Trivia

This Day in History

1). In 2008, this racer became the first woman to win an IndyCar Series Race?

2). In 1986, Michael Jordan set an NBA record scoring 63 points in a playoff game against what team?

3). In 1980, Fidel Castro opened this port, allowing ~ 125,000 Cubans to leave the country over the next 5-6 months

4). In 1940, this type of microscope, that significantly improved upon the resolving power of light based microscopes was first demonstrated

5). In 1920, this Declaration officially made Palestine a British mandate

6). On this day in 1916 and 1912, these two famous and still used Baseball stadiums were opened

7). In 1862, the first of these tests, which later would extend the life of processed goods was done by this famed scientist

8). In 1611, this Shakespeare Tragedy featuring characters including Banquo, Hecate, Donalbain premiered

9). In 295 and 1910, this Astronomical Object was recorded as being seen in the night sky?

10). In 1937, this actor known best for his role as Sulu on Star Trek was born

Where in the World

1). Where did Dr. James Naismith invent basketball?

2). In what city was Arch Duke Franz-Ferdinand assassinated, leading to WWI?

3). What was the first city outside of the UK where the Beatles performed?
Bonus: Name the two former members who played in this show, but would soon after leave the Beatles

4). What was the first city outside of Greece to host the Olympics?

5). The emperors of China had seasonal homes, the northern capital was Beijing, name this southern capital?

6). In January of 1790, which city was the capital of the United States?

7). What is the name of the Island where Nelson Mandela was imprisoned from 1964 – 1982

8). The first manned flight by Orville and Wilbur Wright occurred near what North Carolina town?

9). The battle of this location in 1600 led way to the formation of the Tokugawa Shogunate?

10). Many of the world’s best and largest Telescopes are built in Chile in the Atacama Desert Region. This nearest city is 100 km to the Northeast and ~ 500km north of Santiago?

Units of Measurement

1). Which of these astronomical related distance measurements is the largest: parsec, Astronomical Unit, lightyear

2). Named after a French mathematician and physicist, this is the unit of electrical current?

3). Named for English Physicist, mathematician, and brewer, James Prescott Joule, the joule is the SI derived unit of what?

4). Name the three units that are commonly used to measure temperature

5). In chemistry, this is the unit used to describe luminous intensity

6). In astronomy, for measures of the mass of stars and galaxies, we use the unit solar masses. For planets, we use either earth masses or Jupiter masses. Which of these answers best describes how much more massive the sun is than the earth?
— 1 Msun = 300 Mearth
— 1 Msun = 30 million Mearth
— 1 Msun = 300 hundred thousand Mearth
— I Msun = 3 billion Earth

7). The Watt is a unit that is used to measure radiant power, in Astronomy, this is referred to as what inherent property

8). When this unit of measurement was originally introduced it was defined as the weight of a cubic centimeter of water

9). The modern formulations of Newton’s two Most famous equations begin with this quantity, that is measured in Newton’s

10). Named for a French mathematician, physicist, inventor, philosopher, writer and Catholic Theologian, this is the SI unit of Pressure