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. 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 entry continues to find all of you safe and healthy. As vaccine eligibility opens to more of you in the US, I hope that all of you are scheduling your appointments (or have already done so) so that the US and the rest of the world can begin to recover. Additionally, as we all now enter Spring, I hope that you are using this as an opportunity to get out of your homes and enjoy some time outside doing some fun socially distanced runs, walks, or hikes.
In Shanghai, covid-19 remains entirely under control. As I mentioned, there was a minor outbreak in Yunnan (western China), but that outbreak appears to have been contained. In total, there are currently only 49 active cases and the recovery rate of covid-19 is at 97.08%. In Beijing, there are just 9 cases, with a recovery rate of 98.29%. For China as a whole, there are only 481 active cases, and the recovery rate is at 94.82%. These numbers remain very comforting. So,it’s important to remember that much of this has been able to happen because people continue to wear masks in public transportation/enclosed spaces and when outbreaks occur (like in Yunnan), cities or neighborhoods have been quarantined.
In terms of Astronomy, this was a productive week! After about 2 weeks of struggling, I finally got my Luminosity Function analysis up and running in parallel on the SJTU computer server. I hadn’t used parallel computing since my time at Michigan (and only figured out how to do it then thanks to help from my friend/colleague Hui), so thanks to help from some of my friends/colleagues and advice from my supervisor Ying, I was able to make the proper adjustments to my analysis to get my code to run quickly and properly. What would have taken ~ 77 hours can now be done in 25 minutes. I should start to have results from my mock analysis in the coming days. Additionally, I finally received more positive feedback on my DES Stellar Mass – Halo Mass relation paper (still waiting on 1 reviewer), but hopefully this analysis will move to collaboration wide review soon! Lastly, I’m back working on some of my high-z intra-cluster light (ICL) analysis (with my collaborator Yuanyuan) in order to look at how the ICL grows over cosmic time. So, thanks to a lot of time spent running code and getting everything back up and running on my computer, I was able to have a very productive week of research!
Although most of the time I spend on the SJTU campus is spent in my office, occasionally, I take the time to walk around the beautiful campus grounds!
Over the last week, we’ve had very nice weather, so this week, I got to go for three more runs! It hasn’t started to get very hot yet, so I’m trying to go for as many runs as I can before it gets too hot (generally June/July/August).
Spring is my favorite season in Shanghai! As you all know from my past entries, there are so many beautiful flowers planted all over the city. There are tons of small parks in each neighborhood as well as beautiful flower boxes scattered throughout the city. This makes the walks and runs that I go on particularly enjoyable this time of year! Moreover, there are also the gorgeous cherry blossom trees.
This week, I went for a really nice walk on Saturday and visited the Jing’an sculpture park. Sadly, it was too late in the year to see the tulips that are planted each year, but there were still other gorgeous flowers and cool sculptures to see!
In addition to all the gorgeous flowers, I also saw some really cool advertisements that I wanted to share with you all! I’m always on the lookout for DC Comics things, so I’ll have to stop by the bar that I took a picture of.
While most of my week was spent working (and thankfully making tangible progress), I did go to Moishe House on Wednesday for a Yom Hashoah event that I’ll discuss below. While there, I got to play with Daniel’s cat Osiris! He’s much bigger than the last time I saw him, but he still really seemed to like me! 🙂
Food in Shanghai
When I was at my local grocery store this week, I saw white strawberries for the first time! I’ve seen these before on tv and the internet, but I’ve never seen them in person or tried them. For those of you who are unfamiliar, white strawberries are very popular in Japan recently. They are sweeter and more delicate than regular strawberries. Their white color results from an absence of a certain protein that yields the traditional red coloring. The most expensive varieties that are cultivated in Japan are also exposed to little sunlight as well and only ~ 10% of the harvest is truly white (without the pink spots you see on some of time). I’m not sure if these are available in the US, but if you see them, you should definitely try them.
Jewish Life in Shanghai
As I previously mentioned, on Wednesday, Moishe House hosted a discussion to commemorate Yom Hashoah, Holocaust Remembrance Day. As part of this event we took part in an Israeli program called Zikaron Basalon, and listened to and discussed recorded testimonials from two Holocaust survivors. The testimonies were incredibly moving. Following that, we had a discussion of the testimonials as well as how the Holocaust is taught around the world and how we should react to modern genocides happening today. Overall, the event was a very important discussion, and I’m glad that I was able to participate.
This was a quieter week, which definitely helped me be very productive. This upcoming week should also allow me to get a lot of research done as well. Though, I’m sure I’ll have some fun things to share with you!
I hope that you enjoy seeing all the photos I shared of Shanghai in bloom! I hope that this upcoming week is safe and healthy for all of you.
In peace,
Jesse
Hi, Jesse!
First, I am so impressed that you were able to reduce the time to run code for your mock galaxy from 77 hours to about 25 minutes! Congrats! That is real progress. I am delighted by the positive response from the DES reviewer and hope you get equally positive feedback from reviewer 2 and swiftly to move on to the larger DES review. Lots of steps to publication here!
Osiris is as beautiful as ever. I am glad he still remembers you and is friendly to you. The flowers are a delight! 🌸🌺💐And white strawberries—-🍓🍓🍓! I look forward to showing this picture to my friends John and Kathy Ariel at Ariel’s Farm where we pick strawberries every year. They grow many interesting varieties; remember the Malwena I picked that made such a great jam? These would make a lovely golden color, I suspect, though it would be expensive to make.
This week Rabbi Linda will share her mother’s family’s Holocaust experience from Poland. Where were the survivors from in your recording? In terms of our garden, we have daffodils and crocuses coming up and some Hyancith! I plan to out in seed potatoes this year.
It has been a long time since I have seen you, Jesse. I miss you but am so proud of all you are achieving in your research and life in your Jewish community and many friendships. Love ❤️ Mom
Thanks Mom! I hope the other reviewer returns her feedback soon as well.
I’m glad you liked seeing the flowers and the white strawberries! Definitely ask the Ariel’s about them. They are really good!
Rabbi Linda sharing her family’s story sounds like it should be very meaningful. I think one of the survivors we heard was from the UK and another in Israel.
I hope that your gardening goes well, too! I also miss you a lot. I hope that I’m able to see you all soon.
Hi Jesse,
I’m glad to hear that this was a very productive week for you! That’s awesome about getting your code to run in parallel, so that it only takes 25 min. That’s way more convenient for doing multiple runs if you need to tweak anything. I’m also super glad that you got another positive review! Hopefully you’ll be able to submit to ApJ in May! I loved seeing the pictures of your campus and all of the flowers! How big is the pond on campus? And do people run around it (it reminds me of the reservoir I used to run around in Boston). The sculptures and the flowers are really pretty too! I love all the ads you showed! Kermit with recycling! The Donovan Mitchell shirt! And Batman and Superman! Cool!!! The white strawberries look really cool, too! Whenever I get to Beijing, I’ll have to be on the lookout. I’m glad you got to go to a moving Yom Hashoah event. As mom said, temple Sinai is doing there’s this Wednesday. I’m also glad you got to spend some time with Osiris the cat! I hope you have another productive week! Stay safe and healthy!
Love,
Emmet
Thanks Emmet! The code is definitely more convenient. It’s still time consuming, since I have to run it a lot, but much more economical. I hope I can submit the paper to ApJ soon, as well! The pond is very big. I don’t think it’s quite as big as the reservoir, but probably a similar size. I’ve not seen people run around it, but I would if I lived closer to campus. I’m glad you liked the ads as well! I hope you’re able to try white strawberries, too! I hope that you have a safe, healthy, and productive week as well!
Yet another very interesting blog. Thank you, Jesse.
Your mention of tulips reminded me of Michael Pollin’s book – The Botany of Desire wherein Pollin explores how we have shaped apples, tulips, pot,and potatoes and how these plants have “used” us to shape their own “natural” selection. Cannot recommend this title enough. A really good read and one that makes you really think about how the evolutionary development of certain plants have really been part of our human culture.
Thinking about the holocaust, Lisa and I watched again a wonderful movie called Who Will Write Our History. This is the story of the group of writers (journalists, intellectuals and historians ), led by Ringelbum and who called themselves Oyneg Shabbos to hide their activities and who fearlessly and tirelessly recorded daily life of the Jews as they lived – and were massacred in the Warsaw Ghetto. Not certain if the movie is available on Hulu or Amazon Prime but if you can watch it I think you will enjoy it. After all, the idea about who owns whose history is as important today as it was during the Shoah – and not only for the history of the Jews but the history of every people and ethnic group that tends to be written by outsiders “for them”. And in the 1930’s and 40′ s the idea that history is the history of the everyday lives of people (and not the history of military battles, or the history of leaders or the powerful) was something very radical and new…
Slowly beginning to put in our garden for the summer: planted some carrots and potatoes and some peas and we put in our gooseberry plant and some additional lilacs. Planning on creating an enclosure to protect our one apple and one plum tree from greedy squirrels that are prone to steal just about every single fruit!.
Stay safe and stay well.
Thanks Bernard! Michael Pollin’s book sounds very interesting! Thanks for the recommendation.
Who will write our history sounds very interesting. I’ll have to see if I can find it on Netflix or Amazon. I totally agree about the concept of who gets to tell the story. We discussed that recently in one of the anti-racism sessions I’ve helped to organize.
Hope that your gardening goes well and that the squirrels don’t eat all your fruit!
Hey Jesse! SJTU campus looks really nice with the flowers in bloom! I just noticed this morning a tree outside of Munger is now in bloom so hopefully spring will arrive soon (although it’s projected to snow on Wednesday).
Do you think you’ll see the Demon Slayer movie? I’m going with my roommate next weekend!
Hi Ryan! I agree! I hope spring comes to Michigan soon! I know Emmet told me that it just snowed in Saratoga, so even if it snows in Michigan, I hope it doesn’t stick.
I definitely want to see the Demon Slayer Movie. I haven’t seen information about it playing in Shanghai (though seeing in Japanese with Chinese subtitles would be a surreal experience). Definitely let me know what you think!