June 30, 2006(Friday)

There is a World Cup match between Argentina and Germany from 11 to 1:20. Most of my students went to watch TV during that time and only one or two left to do the lab. Therefore, it is very easy for me. We finished the class at about 4pm and I went for a tour at the city center Port of Spain.
This place (Port of Spain) is very much like downtown of Caracas: Capitolio. That means, this is a relatively old, dangerous and crowded places. There are a lot of black people, because this place is made up of a lot of Black people. However, in the downtown, it seems like some of them are very poor or homeless. In addition, I am not sure why some of the black men like to have very long hair, only to put all their hairs wrapped inside a cloth (similar to hat or a bag of hair). It makes me feel very dirty because I am not sure how often they wash their hair. There are also a lot of shops on the street too. And as expected, there are Chinese shops there as well! In fact, I went to "Hong Kong Supermarket" to buy some Chinese food! It is also a bit dangerous to walk on the street, besides some of the people looks like thief. The car system here follows the car system of England because it used to be a British colony. Therefore, the cars drive on the and this is something that I am really not used too. It is dangerous to cross the street!
I return to hotel at 9pm. The "Maxi Taxis" (similar to the small van in HK) driver drives fast and dangerous (similar to the small van driver in HK). Therefore I am glad that I make it home.
I got my evaluation back today. This is the worst one. Even though no one complain about me (some praise me), everyone complains about the problem with the online lab and that affects my grade.

June 29, 2006(Thursday)

It has been several days since I stay in hotel and there is still no internet access. Someone promised to fix it and some IT person came and take a look but still ended up to have problem. And I asked for morning call and it ended up that it is the IT person that called me at 8am and I am not sure whether the receptionist really did wake me up.
As for the work today, everything is ok so far. There is problem (as usual) with student using computer's netmeeting to make telephone call because it always crashes. And sometimes we need to reload the router. It just shows that the technology is not mature yet.
At night I was staying home read some comic.

June 28, 2006(Wednesday)

The people in Trinidad are as unreliable as people in Venezuela. I have asked for morning call every day. The first day, before I have my luggage back (with my alarm clock inside my luggage), they woke me up. However for the next two days, they did not call at all. In addition, the internet connection at my room is not working and I have complained for two days but nothing is done. In general, as I get closer to South America, then the service is more unreliable. For example, the service in Miami is semi-unreliable. I am a different person (with lots of complain and anger and never smile and very mean) in front of them because they fail me.
I let the students work on the lab. However, I always have problem with the CVoice lab, and today there is no exception. When they have to make the phone call across the POD, the voice path actually went from Trinidad to Europe (Where the online lab provider is located) and then back to Trinidad. The voice is delayed. In addition, since I don't have the equipment in front of me, it is hard to troubleshoot. When they are trying to call through the PSTN, I have a hard time making it to work.
I originally planned to teach until 6pm today. However, the students request to leave at 5 because the weather is not good and the road may be flooded. Therefore, I returned to hotel at 5, went out for a jog around the area for 42 mins. This area is very industrial, with lots of places making ship or docking ship. And local people fish at the shore as well so garbage is floating around. However, this is considered to be the high class area in Trinidad. I cannot image what other area looks like. Probably this is like Venezuela.
After dinner at home, I watched "Wong Fai Hung" movie at my laptop.

June 27, 2006(Tuesday)

I always have a hard time setting up the lab when we are using online lab. This morning is the payback time. Since I was not successfully setting up the lab yesterday, my employer is really nervous about this. They sent me an email this morning to make sure that everything is ok. Therefore, when I arrived to work at 8:40, I know that I better fix the lab soon. There are various problems (e.g. slow connection speed, wrong IP address etc) but then I finally set up the lab by 10:20 am. This is a very hectic 2 hours and I even block my employer on MSN before my lab is set up but I am glad that it is finally over. I know all along that if I give them any negative news, they would only be more worry and ask more questions and increase my pressure. Therefore, I only contact them when either I complete the task or there is complain about the online lab vendor or customer's problem to shift the focus from me.
For the rest of the day, I pretty much gave the students a lot of time to do the lab. I have nothing much to do and is really relax. I can update the photo that I took in the last few days to webpage too.
Previously, I thought that I was paid a fix amount per each course. However, I found out last time that I was paid hourly. Therefore, I stayed a longer time and left at 6pm, rather than the usual 5pm. This is supposed to be a 40 hours course. I am aiming to claim about 43 hours even though I plan to end the class early afternoon Friday so that I can tour around the city. Therefore, I need to teach about 9.5 hours per day and teaches 5 hours on the last day.
I returned to the hotel after work and had dinner. I went to workout at night as well.

June 26, 2006(Monday)

For about once in many years, I went out without devotion, because I have not yet gotten my luggage yet. I went to the training facility at 8:20. There are eight students, all from the same company called TSTT (a telephone company in Trinidad and Tobago). I have taught two of the students three weeks ago in Miami, so it is not entirely new to me. I started off today with lots of talking. I tried to teach slowly but I still go faster than the recommended time by Cisco. I have no idea how they do the time because they really go very slow.
This week I am teaching the CVoice class and we are using online lab. Last time when I used online lab for this class is about October 2004 in Atlanta and Boston. I had absolutely terrible experience with the online lab at that time and I hope that things would get well this time. However, it is not as good as I think. We took the whole day (actually, I spent most of the time doing lecture, but some of the students are trying to solve the problem) with setting up the lab. I have to download software to the router, but since I don't have the cable, I have to use student's laptop. Then I am trying to get a static IP (rather than dynamic IP) address for this router so that it can set up a VPN tunnel with the online lab. And this company TSTT must open a port in their firewall to allow for this VPN tunnel. At the end of the day, we still have not established a connection with the online lab. I hope that tomorrow we are able to have this connection with the online lab. As previous, my experience with online lab for CVoice is terrible.
Since I do not have the luggage, I asked my students to drive me to a mall (Called the "West Mall") to buy some stuff. This mall is smaller than the Dolphin Mall in Miami, and it seems older and still under construction. However, the goods inside are not cheap. I got myself toothpaste, short swimming pants, snacks etc. The mall closed at 7pm and I returned home at 8pm and have a late afternoon nap.
At night I have my luggage.

June 25, 2006(Sunday)

I woke up at 3:30am this morning to catch the 4:50 shuttle bus such that I can arrive to the airport at 6:10. My flight is supposed to leave at 8:20. However, it is delayed to 11am because, according to the airline attendant, the flight arrived to Indianapolis last night at 3am and the law requires that the air attendant must have at least 8 hours of rest between flights. Therefore, I have to wait at the Indianapolis airport for more than four hours. If I know the flight is delayed, I should take the next shuttle bus (at 6:50) so that I can have two more hours of sleep. I am also lucky that the next flight from Miami to Trinidad is at 3:30pm so that I do not miss the flight. Therefore, rather than waiting at the Indianapolis (Indy) airport for 2 hours, Miami airport for 5 hours, I have to wait at the Indy airport for 4+ hours and wait at the Miami airport for 2+ hours. I watched DVD (HK movie "Kung Fu master Wong Fai Hung") during the waiting time.
Since I only slept 2 hours last night (from 1:30 to 3:30), I am all ready to sleep big time during flight. In fact, I almost slept through the 2.5 hours flight from Indianapolis to Miami and 3.5 hours flight from Miami to Trinidad.
Finally, something that I envisioned for a long time happened. I lost my luggage at the Trinidad airport. I am taking two separate airlines, AA and BWIA today. I have asked the AA agent in Indianapolis whether or not I need to pick up any luggage in Miami. In fact, I asked her so many times (may be, 3 or 4 times?) that the next customer laugh at her and joked that being an agent must require a lot of patient. The agent told me repeatedly that I need to check in again in Miami (i.e. go outside the security zone, and re-check in) but I only need to pick up my luggage at Trinidad. When I was waiting at the Trinidad airport, I can't see my luggage! What a blessing it is for the so many previous flights that I never lost my luggage. I felt a bit lost and went to the airport baggage claim agent to report this. And then there is an angel besides me to make me feel a lot better. That is a woman in the 40’s also complains that she lost her luggage. She flied from Geneva (Europe) to Miami and to Trinidad. It is also a connecting flight and she was told, exactly like mine, that she only needs to pick up the luggage in Trinidad. And she lost her luggage too. She is very pissed off and said that her luggage consists of important and confidential document, and she can't work tomorrow and all the shops are closed and she can't buy anything. She said that she is very furious. Anyway, seeing her miserable condition makes me feel so much better. (And this is how I call her the "angel" of my night. I am so mean). It surely feels like the movie "Meet the parents".
Rather than complaining, yelling like she did, I need to formulate the "disaster recovery plan" inside my head. According to them, they will ship the luggage from Miami to Trinidad night, if it is not lost. I asked them to ship it to my hotel, because I do not have time and the taxi fee one way from hotel to airport is US$40. I have my Bible, diary, prayer book, music stand, (yes, I bring my violin wherever I go), clothes, shoes, toothpaste, sunscreen and computer cables. I think that I can survive with that for just one day, even though this is certainly a big breakthrough for me not having my Bible with me for over 24 hours. However, it better not be lost because my precious Bible and diary is there! Plus the music stand, which I have used since 1985.
The taxi ride from airport to the hotel is about 50 mins. This country, Trinidad and Tobago, is very much like Venezuela (not Caracas, but like Barquisimeto or Valencia), only that it is in an English version and there is some places that is a big upscale. Since this is a Caribbean Sea Island, it is surrounded by the Ocean and the weather feels very much like Venezuela Ocean weather. This is a nice vacation area but I am going to work this week. So I am not going to enjoy my time here.
I am staying at a "Hotel and Yachting Center". This is like some nice and high class vacation place for rich people, even though I seen some very small lizard in my room. The hotel fee is very expensive, costing $175/night. I am glad that my company is paying for that! This is right by the sea and there is a lot of yacht outside. I am going to take more pictures tomorrow, but I still need to wait until I have my luggage back in order to upload the photo.

June 24, 2006(Saturday)

I need to go for business trip today so I spent the last day here working on my PhD project for about 6 hours. There is some progress on the writing and I am glad about this. I am still aiming to finish the first draft by the end of this paper. I have worked on it since last October and I am still working on it.
Originally my group will go to fishing today. However, there is an emergency deacon board meeting happened today so Carmen and I did not go fishing. There are some minor changes required for the application to the Internal Revenue Service (IRS). We have to change the constitution in order to meet the change, but we need to have 70% of the members’ presence in order to have the church General Assembly. This is something that we need to talk about, because most of the people went oversee during the summer.
At night, we dropped by Jo's house after they returned from the fishing trip.

June 23, 2006(Friday)

I also worked hard today on the PhD project. Yesterday I spent time on Visual Basic but today I am trying to explain the result. This is much harder. Therefore, the progress is not as fast. Going to workout helps me to step back and rethink about the problem.
At night, the fellowship is a welcoming night for Joyce's husband Nicky. He moved from Texas to here to study. Therefore, we have a special night for him. And then we went to Jo's house for eating pizza, cake. Then we helped Joe to move house. There is a lot of thing that we need to move and he rented a U-Haul and it still takes two car loads.

June 22, 2006(Thursday)

Today is another productive day of studying. After driving Carmen to work, I spent most of the day working on the PhD project. I used Excel's Visual Basic to write code for the PhD project for 7 hours. I am satisfied. I also went to do workout and practiced music for tomorrow's singspiration.

June 21, 2006(Wednesday)

After driving Carmen (using my friend's car) to work this morning, I studied and had a short nap. Then with two other PhD students to take a possible PhD student candidate that may join us coming year for lunch. The department paid for our lunch so I can enjoy it. But since I am going to a lot of business trip, I do not really mind this small thing.
At night, I went to have a date with Carmen. After the end of school, I am busy traveling. It is until this week, when Carmen also went out for work, that I enjoy the time spent at home/workout and studying. Taking the advantage that we have a car and with this vacation mindset (but Carmen has to work), we went out for dinner. And then we went to Wal-Mart to buy some stuff too.
Today also marks a very special day because I finally purchased another watch. I have used the previously watch since Christmas 1988. The one before lasts for only one year because the sales told me that I can change battery for free within one year. I pressed too many button and I destroyed the watch. But then, this one I used for 18 years. I have only changed the battery once, in 1996 Christmas.
I will go to another business trip next week. I will go to a small country in the Caribbean Sea, called the Trinidad and Tobago. The closest point is very close to Venezuela but I will not go to Venezuela. Also, this country had a team in the World Cup this year, and most of my students two weeks ago are from this Island. Below is my flight schedule.


Jun. 25, 06 (Sun)	AA1861 IND - MIA 08:27 - 10:58 BW0483 MIA - Port of Spain 15:45 - 19:25
Jul. 01, 06 (Sat)	BW0484 Port of Spain - MIA 09:05 - 12:50 AA1682 MIA - IND 18:40 - 21:22

June 20, 2006(Tuesday)

I woke up earlier and force myself to do some work. At 11, I had an online tutorial section for the IPTX course that I taught in Miami two weeks ago, for 1.5 hours. And I also went out for jogging which really helps me to get focused to my work again. At night, I went with Carmen to the library because she has to take a course while I worked on the PhD project. In general, I started to gain some rhythm in terms of my studying. This is good news. However, next week I have to go out town for work again and so I need to work harder now.

June 19, 2006(Monday)

I had a hard time to concentrate on studying last night. I kept on browsing the web or reading comic book. It certainly needs more determination from me.
This morning, Carmen has to go to work. I woke up with her and spent 1.5 hours reading PhD papers. I fall back to sleep again but then during lunch time (total of 9 hours of sleep) I woke up again and went back to the business school to check the mail box and talked to prof. It certainly helps me to gain some determination and back to rhythm again. I also went to do workout and I am more fit now. I hope that I can get back to study mode soon.
After work, Carmen attends a workshop to learn how to use computer's program dreamwaiver. I studied in the library at that time while she was in class. I also went to Bible Study at night.

June 18, 2006(Sunday)

We went to worship today and then went with some friends to have ice cream. Then I went home to have an afternoon sleep and went to prayer meeting at night. Things are starting to resume to normal because Carmen needs to go to work tomorrow.

June 17, 2006(Saturday)

One of the Bloomington church friends left his car for us to use so we went to buy some grocery this morning. I also had a haircut. In the late afternoon, I went with my group people to go to fishing. I had previously fished before, last time being 6 or 7 years ago. Today, in the beginning, we only found frustration because the fish kept on eating the bait and we have changed over 15 baits without any fish. Afterward, Joe suggested us to use a smaller hook. Then we fished over 10 small fishes (about the size of my hand). One of our members caught a large fish, about the length of my arm. However, we were only focused on the small fish.
Since Hansel is mean to fish and does not find the piranha eating the gold fish to be disgusting, he would love fishing a lot. We purchased 24 worms as our bait. A worm is about 30 cm long. Rather than using the whole worm each time, I have to separate it to 3 cm each time. The process of tearing a worm, seeing some white/black and blood (red in color) coming out from the worm is absolutely disgusting. At first we use some white, thin medical glove. But then at the end Carmen just used her hand. In addition, sometimes the hook is stuck inside the throat or even the stomach of the fish. Therefore, I hold the fish tight while Carmen uses a scissor to cut the fish from the mouth all the way to wherever that is necessary. That is cruel. Hansel would love this.
There were thunderstorm at the end of the date and we returned home at 9:30pm.

June 16, 2006(Friday)

Carmen went to check about her study in the morning. I learnt how to use Visual Basic of Excel for my project. And then I went to play basketball. I have not played since I played with Hansel in HK several weeks ago. At night we went to fellowship and it is good to see these people again. We had very few people and we spent sometimes to preach the gospel to one of the non believers. We also had Bible Study.
Afterward we went to watch the Chinese movie "Internal Affair" (Mou gaan dou) at someone's house because we will modified this movie and use this to make a DVD to advertise our church.
After we drove people home, the fire alarm of the church set off. I am the key bearer of the church on behalf of our group. (We are using the facility of another church for our Chinese Christian church). Our Chinese group left the church at 10:00pm and was the last group. As the three of us (Joe, the person who is responsible for sound system, Carmen and I) passed by the church around 1:25am, we saw several fire truck drove into the church. There was a fire alarm and they could not open the door. I opened the door for them and then they inspected the church and turned out that this is a false alarm. After 10 mins, one of the pastors came and the fireman explained the situation to him. This is quite an exciting experience to be in this special situation.

June 15, 2006(Thursday)

We went to see the doctor for check up today. Mom always asked me to check my right toe because there is some dried blood there. It turns out that this is normal and there no inflection. I also went to do workout. I am seriously out of breathed after the usual running schedule. I think that I am getting older and not workout enough.
At night, we went to Jacky's house to have dinner. We watched the NBA game briefly and we also had a good Bible study sharing time.

June 14, 2006(Wednesday)

We had lunch with some Macedonia group members because one of our members Frank is leaving town today. And then, Carmen and I had a deep sharing time and have some praying time as well. At night, the Macedonia group had hotpot in our house, as a gathering. After we left IU for a month, now they are more closely bonded and I am happy for that.

June 13, 2006(Tuesday)

I unpacked a lot of stuff today and throw away a lot of stuff. We went to purchase grocery and Carmen did a wonderful job to clean up the refrigerator. We also went out for a walk and had good sharing time, especially because the weather is so nice. At night we went to Jo's house for Bible study. We also watched briefly for the NBA Final, Miami vs. Dallas. At that time, Miami was losing. But then, afterward Miami won the game and now the series is tied to 1 (Miami) vs. 2 (Dallas)

June 12, 2006(Monday)

We left home at 7:30 am, together with both of our parents, we drove 3 hours to Seattle. For some strange reason, I am quite unlucky with the custom. Today, when we drove by the custom, they "randomly" selected us to be examined. We have to leave the car and then let the custom people examined our car. We are glad that nothing bad happened, but those still wasted 25 mins.
We arrived to the Seattle airport at 11:00am and then we left Seattle and took 4 hours flight to Indianapolis. Our fellowship friend Jacky picked us up. And then after 2.5 hours unpacking time, we went to Jo house because they have Bible study every night. Good for them.

June 11, 2006(Sunday)

I took a morning flight to Dallas then back to Vancouver. In the Vancouver custom, I had problem again. They have to examine every luggage and that is quite disappointing because this is the second time I have to do it. Last time it was Aug 17, 2002 when I first return to Vancouver after I went to Venezuela. I don't have to pay anything but still I wasted 40 mins there.
Carmen picked me up from the airport and then we went to have lunch together. And then we went to walk around the mall and visited her family because Carol will not be able to join us for dinner tonight.
At night, I specially requested dad to cook dinner for us. I have not eaten dad's dinner after I am married so it is nice to have his food again. He cooked a lot and the soup and also the shrimp tasted very good. I washed dishes as usual. I also spent time to update the online photo album so that I can synchronize all the photo that I have taken.

June 10, 2006(Saturday)

I got the evaluation of the IPTX course. It was ok.
I have to teach today as well because some of the students need to take the CCDA (Cisco Certified Design Associate) exam and CTT asked me to teach several days again. Same as the IPTX course that I taught in the past few days, another instructor supposed to teach it. However, he has some personal emergency so I took over the whole thing for him. I gave some questions for the students to do and I am quite free. We only stayed there from 10am (started late) to 1pm.
This afternoon, I originally wanted to ask the student out to Miami Beach with me. However, they have to watch the World Cup. Therefore, after going back to hotel, I immediately (so lucky, I only have to wait for 2 mins, even though the bus is every 60 mins) took a bus to downtown Miami. And then I walked from downtown Miami to Miami Island (the one with the famous Miami South Beach), which took about 30 mins. I have walked through this nice bridge with several little island several times. I chose to walk rather than taking bus because this is the nicest walk that I can get, considering ALL the places that I have been to. There is sea, palm tree nice view. I enjoy walking in this kind of natural environment a lot more than walking through Mongkok in HK. However, the wind is relatively strong and from time to time there is very little rain drop. Therefore, it is not as nice as I hope to be.
"Walking 10,000 miles road is better than reading 10,000 books". The purpose of my traveling today is to walk. After walking from downtown Miami to Miami Island, I also walked along the Miami South Beach for 15 blocks. Due to the shadow weather (but no rain), there is very few people in the beach. Nevertheless, I walked along the sea coast and got my feet wet (I took off my shoes obviously). That one hour walk is enjoyable, but also physically and mentally tired because the water current created some resistant. As I was walking along, I also remember the time I spend with Carmen because we have been here twice. The first time is Sept 30, 2004. We stayed in Miami Beach for a night after taking cruise during my honeymoon. The second time is May 13, 14, 2005. Carmen and I stayed overnight on the street.
I took bus back to Miami downtown, briefly checked out the American Airline Arena where Miami Heat (NBA) will play NBA final next week. Then I took the last bus back to hotel and had dinner there.

June 09, 2006(Friday)

Friday is a half day class. Therefore, we left at noon. In the morning there was some equipment problem with the Cisco Unity Express but then after restore to factory default, the device is working. This is not nice to know that Cisco's equipment behaves like this. But there is nothing that I can do.
Today is the first day of the World Cup. People in my class are quite excited, partly because most of them are from Caribbean Island Trinidad and first time this country entered to the World Cup. World Cup is special for me too. I watched it in many different places. In 1990, my St. Mark's School soccer friends watched the game with me in a farewell (for me to move to Canada) camp in HK. And then I watched the 1994 in Canada. In 1998, I watched part of the game in China, during my Glenayre business trip there. I knew nothing about work at that time as I am only employed for 1 month. Therefore, the other senior technicians did most of the work and I was just walking around and watching World Cup if there is TV around. In 2002, I just arrived to Venezuela for about a month and I watched in Venezuela. This year, I will probably watch (well, I don't think I will ever watch a complete game actually) it in USA. Let's see where I will watch it next World Cup.
I went to work out in the afternoon and had 2 hours afternoon nap, while other classmates watched the two World Cup game. And then five of us (that stayed in Hampton Inn) went to Dolphin Mall. It is always difficult to get a taxi in Miami. I originally called the reception and she said that we can take the shuttle. But by the time I am downstairs, another reception checked with the manager and said that this is rush hour so she does not let us to take the shuttle. Therefore we have to order taxi. Since there are five of us, we have to order a taxi van. However, after waiting for 10 mins, a normal taxi cab came. They just came because they want to do business, but we turned them away. We ordered from another taxi company. They asked us to wait for 10 to 15 mins. After 15 mins, nothing happened and we asked the reception to call the taxi company again and they asked us to wait for another 10 to 15 mins. We are (at least, I am) quite pissed at that time. The five of us are stuck in the lobby for the last 40 mins, and the Hampton Inn Shuttle bus is still there. After bargaining with the manager, she finally lets us to use the Shuttle bus to the Hampton Inn.
I walked around the Hampton Inn, got some gifts, and then returned to the hotel at 10.

June 08, 2006(Thursday)

There is some hardware issue today for the lab. Therefore, I spent some times troubleshooting it. I am glad that the students are understanding (I hope). I also postponed my return to Vancouver from Saturday to Sunday because I need to teach one more day, Saturday. I changed my online diary to reflect the flight change. At night, I ate a very full Japanese dinner. Then I went to workout.

June 07, 2006(Wednesday)

After waiting for over a month, I finally received an "A" in my statistic course. That is quite ridiculous, consider the time and effort that I put into the course. I don't think that I did well in my final exam and I just scrambled something. Therefore, I am expecting myself to either have an "A-" or a "B". Well, I am not complaining that I have an "A". I think that there are two possible reasons why I have an "A" in this course. First, I am taking this class with people from other major, such as optometry or psychology or sociology. They certainly have a much weaker math/statistic background than I do. Therefore, even though I think that I did not do well, they did even worse. The second reason is that, the prof is too lazy to grade everything and just gives an "A" to everyone in the class. (I don't think the third reason applies: I deserve an "A"). No matter what, the "A" is more than welcome. I have "A" in another two courses too. So I have straight "A" this term. I have a "B" in statistic class last term and two "A" in the other two courses. So I would not get kicked out from the program, as expected.
For the rest of the day, I still tried to go very slow for the course and also explain everything again and again, the slowest I have ever been teaching this course. Previously it was a bootcamp that combined two or three courses so I am used to go very fast. Now I only have to teach one course so I only go slow.
At night, when I do work out, I am more in shape now. I can run about the same time that I used to. However, I still need more training on the push weight.

June 06, 2006(Tuesday)

The second day of class is still pretty smooth. However, I am trying to go as slow as possible because there are not as many materials that I can teach. I think that this is actually a pretty good idea because from the mid-week evaluation that I gave to the students, they said that I explained thing well and gave me good marks.
At night, I went to another workout again. This time, I am a bit more in shape than yesterday. However I am not 100% yet.

June 05, 2006(Monday)

Ordering taxi is always a problem in Miami. I asked for taxi to come at 8:05 but then it arrived late and I have to reorder another taxi. When asked about what happened to the last taxi that is supposed to come, the operator said that he knows nothing about it. It pisses me off.
I am teaching the Cisco course number 16 times this week. The equipment behaves fine. Also, since I asked my friend in Indiana to upload some of my files to me, the morning is relatively smooth. And I was teaching in the morning and two of the eight students are quite knowledgeable. I have to present stuff and answer questions in a way that I would not sounds stupid. Actually I have not been in this industry for a while and I am not used to it. Therefore, I really need to catch up with the technology again, at least, this week. Also, I will take my time and talk very detail and slow, in order to avoid too much time for the section that is unknown to me.
At night, I finally have a chance to do exercise. Since the beginning of the trip, I have been diverting from my normal routine of practicing music and working out. (I have still been able to keep up with the daily devotion). It is a great feeling after working out. However, I am out of shape and it feels like my heart needs to pump lots of blood to clear the Cholesterol that I ate during the last two weeks. My arms are tired too.

June 04, 2006(Sunday)

In the morning, Carmen drove me to the airport for the training trip. This is my number 8 times going to Miami. This place is like my second home (other than Indiana) in US. We left home 5am and I took a 3 hours plane 7am to LA. And then I took another 5 hours plane to Miami. After waiting for the luggage to come out, I arrive to Hampton Inn (the one that I have stayed for several times) 11:20 pm.

June 03, 2006(Saturday)

We had lunch with Auntie 1 and Uncle 1 in the morning. Now all three of my cousins have kids now. We are all happy for them. And then we visited Gary/Jessica and their son Nathan. I was the GM for their wedding and I have known them before they know each other. Therefore, it is such a great feeling to see them again. And then we went to visit Arthur, Garfield and their two daughters. I also have known them for 15+ years. It is such a great time to see their daughters. We talked about our struggles as well.
After dinner with Carmen's family, we went to Elim fellowship. We know most of the fellowship people for about 10 years. It is happy to catch up with these old timers. And then we also went out for a drink at night. Even our respected counselor Shirley and her husband came out to have drink with us too.
Below is the iternary for my Miami training trip.


Jun. 04, 06 (Sun)	AS674 YVR - LAX 07:00 - 10:01 AA252 LAX - MIA 13:45 - 21:33
Jun. 11, 06 (Sun)	AA2413 MIA - DFW 06:41 - 08:50 AA1379 DFW - YVR 10:32 - 12:40

June 02, 2006(Friday)

After returning the rented car, I went to have lunch with Ricky. And then I had snack with FCGC teens (not teens anymore) Eileen, Ian and Allen. It is great to catch with old timers. And then I walked around with Carmen in Metrotown. And then at night we had dinner with both of our parents and then we went to watch the "Da Vinci Code". We read the book but then we found that the book is a bit better. The movie is not as good as we expected.

June 01, 2006(Thursday)

Today is a long day, literally is a long day. In the *first* morning, we woke up early and exchange the Japanese Yen. Afterward, we went to some Japanese temple. We know Japanese culture, such as this kind of thing, quite well because we read a lot of Japanese comic. It is quite interesting to see it in real life. Afterward, we went to buy souvenir and ate lunch.
We then rushed back to hotel to pick up our luggage and took train and go to the airport. Even though we were only in Tokyo for flight transfer, we used the last 48 hours really well and visited quite a lot of places. I especially like the challenge of going to a lot of places with the minimal amount of time and money. I think that I am more suitable for tourist type "run horse see flower" then spend time and enjoy each place in detail.
We took a flight and left Japan 3:30 pm. We arrived Seattle 8:30 am and enjoy our *second* morning. Indiana University friend Yuling and her boy friend Dale picked us up in the airport and brought us to have breakfast. Then they dropped us off at the Fisherman Public Market, which is very similar to San Francisco's Fisherman Wharf. There is even the first Starbucks. We then rented a car and left Seattle at 1:30pm.
It took us about 2.5 hours to drive to the border. However, because we are too tired, we took about 1.2 hour nap in between the drive. We arrived the border at about 4:30. We then spent about 2 hours at the border custom. This is what happened. When we arrive to Seattle, we are "in transit" and should go to Vancouver. Normally, for Canadian citizen, this is not a problem. However, since we have "exchange scholar" J visa, they should issue us I94 form. But the custom in the Seattle airport says that this is not necessary because we are only in transit. Then when we arrive to the Vancouver/Seattle border, we want to have a stamp to prove that we entered and then left US. But the Canadian custom says that they don't do US stamp so they asked us to go back to the US custom, which is just next door. After lots of line up, the US custom says that our destination today is Vancouver so they will not issue us I94 and asked us to apply for it next time when we are returning to US. The US customs sounds not knowing what he is doing and we got different answer, which is very frustrating. The line up takes forever too, and comparatively, the Asia (e.g. HK and Japan) line up is much shorter and much more polite. I had this kind of terrible experience last August because of a missing I-94 form, also because of a mistake of (Miami) airport custom. Therefore, I had to spend over 24 hours and took a bus all the way to Windsor and then back to Indiana last time. This is definitely a bad experience.
I finally returned home at 7:20 and parents are waiting for us already. It is great to be back here. After I am married, I have never returned to Vancouver. This trip certainly allows me to return to two places that I have not been to for a while: HK and Vancouver. Since I did not upload any photo or online diary in the last two or three days, I probably will spend the rest of tonight with this kind of thing.