My first (single author) conference article

Recently I was in a small city in the upper East coast of the US called Providence. It's in the state of Rhode Island, in the area they call New England. The city is small (~200,000 inhabitants) and, arguably, there are basically two places to visit: Benefit Street, and Brown University campus. The latter is one of the Ivy League schools. This comprises eight private schools in the Northeastern US: Brown, Columbia, Cornell, Dartmouth, Harvard, Princeton, UPenn and Yale. The name has it's origins in an athletic conference, but it soon became synonym of prestigious (and expensive) education.

Going back to Brown, the campus is absolutely beautiful. Small buildings made of brick, taking us back to the 19th century and the Industrial Revolution. Unfortunately I got there late in the afternoon, and couldn't explore the campus thoroughly; but the pictures below show how beautiful and picturesque Brown campus is.

Brown University campus

Another point of interest in Providence (RI) is Benefit Street and the Rhode Island School of Design (RISD).

  

Benefit Street is known as the US most historic mile, given the concentration of historic buildings in this street. The first Baptist Church in the country - where Brown's commencement is held every year -, John Brown's house - one of the first and most magnificent mansion's in the country -, the Governor's house and many more. George Washington himself is said to have visited Brown's mansion.

The first Baptist Church in the US

 

John Brown's house

Side view of John Brown's house, nowadays turned into a museum

  

  

  

  

As for the conference itself everything turned out good. This is one of the most prestigious conferences in my area of research: IEEE Conference in Computer Vision and Pattern Recognition. I have had people asking interesting questions about my work, and also had time to see a few colleagues that graduated from UC, San Diego.

My poster at the conference

Me and Dashan Gao having a lobster at a conference reception
(Dashan is the first PhD from my lab at UC San Diego)

Here is a link for my paper in case you would like to read it :-)

Uma alma gémea?

Sem conhecer a autora, eu diria que não. Antes um sentimento comum a toda a diáspora.

Estava a escrever um post sobre a minha recente ida a Providence quando me deparei com este texto, e decidi partilhá-lo. Depois de o lerem, verão como é um texto que me é querido...

Saudades: já chorei em aeroportos ao deixar quem não queria ver partir

Destaco as linhas finais:

"A saudade, que só se tem em ausência, é ainda assim um saco que nunca se esvazia, mesmo quando estamos juntos todos os dias, porque são dias contados. Nunca poderei devolver a quem amo os dias que lhes retirei. Posso só tentar que os que partilhamos sejam grandes. Posso só ser mais amor, tentar ser menos falha, e pedir com a humildade da minha pequenez que a vida me permita dar-lhes muito mais."

Sónia Balacó in "O Publico"

suplemento P3