Ayokunle's blog

Birthdays

2009-11-18T13:35:00.001-07:00

I thought I’d outgrown them.I also felt like they were overrated and uncool, a source of facebook spam and not much else.

But yesterday was a happy day. The facebook greetings put a smile on my face, and it was great to talk to family. I couldn’t help but sit back and reminisce to remember who I was and assess who am I now.

Here’s to the 23rd year of my life!

Happy birthday Ayokunle.

Baby laughing at Nintendo wii

2008-04-20T22:52:00.001-06:00

Charlie bit me - remix

2008-04-20T22:49:00.001-06:00

Charlie bit me

2008-04-20T22:48:00.001-06:00

I love the world - Discovery Channel

2008-04-20T22:29:00.001-06:00

Cool video

"Baracky" : the movie

2008-04-20T22:25:00.001-06:00

Interesting video of Barack Obama, overlaid on a Rocky theme.

Destriction by *Uribaani on deviantART

2007-12-06T18:16:00.000-07:00

Destriction by *Uribaani on deviantART

Nice picture from DeviantArt

MEMS joy

2007-10-28T23:42:00.000-06:00

The past few weeks have been pretty hectic.
After every time of hard work, there is always a short yet enjoyable time of rest.
Here is the reward of 4 weeks of lab work - a fine Archimedian Spiral (which failed to actuate but still looks mighty nice :p)

Hamburg Freestyling

2007-08-27T00:36:00.000-06:00

Hi Everyone,
I just realized what a lazy blogger I've been - I guess it might have something to do with the fact that I only write when I'm feeling poetic or high on sugar.

A lot has happened since my last post - I'll write in reverse chronological order just because the details are fresher in my mind that way.
Here's my most recent adventure.

Hamburg Day Trip:
Yesterday, I went on day trip to Hamburg. Hamburg is only 50 minutes by train from Luebeck.
Hamburg is beautiful and very easy to navigate by foot. The Museum of Art Kunsthalle is just right from the main train station. The building is quite exquisite and it set me up for a trigger happy day with my camera.

Just down the road from the Kunsthalle, was the Alster, which is just by the sea. There was a festival going on in Hamburg over the weekend, so there were lots of people everywhere.

On the side, there's a picture of a guy playing his saxophone, quite well I might add, on a unicycle with five wheels arranged on top of each other.

The location was perfect, and the performers were pretty good, but I was getting hungry. So, I settled for some rice and curry :-) - I think I'm getting hungry again.

After a few more minutes at the festival, I decided to continue on my tour. I headed to the town hall, Rathaus, next. The building has a large clock tower so it was pretty easy to find. If I thought the Kunsthalle was exquisite then the Rathaus was off the charts.

There was a guy on stage playing Johnny Cash's Ring of Fire as I walked by.
He was followed by some kids playing bongos and hula hooping.

Right next to the Rathaus are the canals of Hamburg. There are restaurants and luxury shopping centers in the area.
Next, I headed to the War Memorial, a church that was bombed in World War II (~~sorry guys I'm too lazy to Wikipedia the name and I didn't pay attention when I was there.~~ It's the St.Nikolai Church)
I think the memorial is a good idea - I can't help but imagine how beautiful the church would be if it wasn't burnt given how good it looks now.
I went trigger happy here too - I think Hamburg has made me more touristy than I usually am.
I headed towards the harbor, crossing some more canals in the process.
Right next to the Harbor is the Hamburg Dungeon, but I was too scared to go in. I saw some pictures of the exhibitions in the Dungeon taken by my co-workers and they were scary and hilarious at the same time.

The Harbor was packed! People were walking shoulder to shoulder and there were people pouring out of the Harbor into the tour buses. There was an abundance of people playing accordions by the sea. There were lots of ships, and I could spot one in the distance with a Canadian flag on it
Sorry guys, my camera isn't world class- it's right next to the Italian one - if you dont know what color Italy's flag is, I'd advise that you watch more soccer or you could just google it.

Here's a picture of the harbor from a vantage point:

After the harbor, I had 2 more stops : the historic St Michaelis' Church and the infamous Reeperbahn (Hamburg's Red light district).

I didn't take any pictures of the red light district because I don't want you kids having nightmares :p. Although, I didn't see much because I was there at 6pm.

What I found interesting was that there was a McDonald's right there between two sex shops and there was a mother taking her kids there for a meal.
It was funny - people in Europe appear to be very desensitized to sex.

After a few minutes, I took a train back to the main station, my legs were starting to hurt badly.

I caught my train back to Luebeck and fell asleep almost immediately.
I had 2 cheeseburgers when I got home - and surfed away the rest of the day.

Berlin

2007-08-05T09:02:00.000-06:00

Almost 2 weeks ago, I visited Berlin - the largest city in Germany and the second largest in the EU. It was a 3-hour train ride from Lübeck to the Berlin Hauptbahnhof (central train station). The train station was quite the sight - an engineer's daydream :-) This was my first independent trip in Germany, so as you'd expect, I got quite lost. My sense of direction can be very crude at times.
After an hour of wandering, I found my youth hostel - the JETPAK.
It was about 10pm and most people had already checked in and settled down. I quickly made a few friends there: Alex from California, Dmitri from New Jersey and Francesca from Vancouver. We decided to go and check out the Berlin nightlife. We settled in a local bar and tried out some of the local beer. We then went back to the hostel so that we could go on a walking tour of the city early the next day.

Walking Tour:
On Saturday morning, we set out with our umbrellas (yeah, it rained all day) for the tour. There's a group in Berlin that does walking tours for tips, so we figured that might be the best option. The tour started at the Brandenburg gate.

Alex, Dmitri and Francesca think about a riddle while we wait for the tour to start at the Brandenburg Gate.

The tour took us through most of the major attractions in Berlin and our tour guide Gary tried to give a lot of background information on the sights.
Right next to the Brandenburg gate, there's the Adlon Hotel, which is where Michael Jackson dangled his baby from the window.
It's a 5-star hotel with bullet-proof windows but no complementary breakfast.

Adlon Hotel

We stopped at the Reichstag ,the German Parliament Bldg.

There is a dome at the top that allows people to look straight down into the Parliament to remind the politicians who is really in charge.

Next was Gendarmenmarkt , one of the most beautiful squares in Berlin. There are 2 cathedrals and a concert hall in the square. There was also a guy playing his saxophone while we were there - He added to the overall coolness of the environment.

I found the Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe very sobering and thought-provoking. It was very weird walking through it.

The Memorial To The Murdered Jews of Europe

The memorial is a set of concrete slabs, that start off small and then increase in size as you approach the middle. On the edge, they look like gravestones and in the middle they form a wall so high you can't see what's around you.

I saw a lot of Cathedrals in Berlin.
Berliner Dom
The cathedral above (the Berliner Dom) was actually built very early early in the 20th century but was made to look really old school.

I don't think any trip to Berlin would be complete without looking at the wall.

Berlin Wall

It doesn't look very intimidating now as much of it has been torn down. The wall served more to slow people down so that the guards could arrest (or kill) them.

Here's a picture of my tour group.
$10 to whoever finds me first ;)

I met up with Arinze, a RISE scholar from Toronto. We walked down Postdamer Platz and ate some Indian food :-)

Postdamer Platz

Berlin is a fun city with a lot of history and lots to think about.

I definitely enjoyed the trip.

Downtown Living

2007-07-25T23:58:00.000-06:00

About a week ago, I moved from my on-campus residence to the city center.

I enjoyed living on campus as it was walking distance to my office and I could play basketball and table tennis with the students in my dorm. I met a lot of international students in my 2 weeks in the Studentenwohnheim.
Next-door there were 2 brothers from Yemen, down the hall there was a guy from Ghana, 2 guys from India and a girl from Iran. Most of them are in the International Master's Program here at the University of Luebeck.

Even though the building was quite old, I liked the atmosphere. Funny enough, my hosts here always apologized about how old the building was and they put in a lot of work to make sure that I got a room in the Studentenwohnheim in the center of the city.

The building is very new and very nice. It's very high tech - from the dial at the front door to the motion-activated lights in the hallways. My new room is in a 3-bedroom apartment. My roommate Mo is from a city called Schwerin, about 67km away. My other roomate, Chris is also from Germany and is on holidays.

My apartment is about 50m from the "Marienkirche"(see above) and the town hall.
Down the street from my apartment is the Trave river which flows around the center of Luebeck.
I got myself a bus pass so I can get around the city easily. My new place is much nicer but so far it's been really quiet. The 2nd semester of studies ended about 2 weeks ago so most of the students are gone. Weekdays, I'm usually either sleeping or having conversations about philosophy and religion with Mo.

Work has been pretty busy the past few days. I just realized that I'm almost halfway through my stay here so I'm approaching my work with a little more urgency.

I'll leave you with a picture of the Holstentor ,Luebeck's main gate. It's also down the street from my apartment.

Scary

2007-07-16T09:03:00.000-06:00

What would you do?

First day of work

2007-07-15T11:50:00.000-06:00

Chilling in the office.

I moved into the office of a PhD student who just finished his work.

One of the robots at the institute - This one can be used to do brain surgery on mice.

I met Corey, a RISE scholar from Lehigh University, who works in the same institute.

Jetlag!

2007-07-15T11:42:00.000-06:00

Jetlag......

Settling Down...

2007-07-15T11:30:00.000-06:00

My room in Luebeck.
It's significantly bigger than my room in edmonton.
It's on the 8th floor of the Studentenwohnheim.

Another view of my room.

A view of one side of the University from my room.

I was kinda tired......

02. Original Heidelberger!

2007-07-15T09:42:00.000-06:00

Guten tag everybody!

I hope you're all alive and kicking.
I figured I'd update you on my adventures.

On Thursday I went to Heidelberg with the other DAAD RISE fellows (the technical term for our position here) in Luebeck. It was a 6-hour train ride on a fast inter-city train.

The DAAD ("Deutscher Akademischer Austausch Dienst" German Academic Exchange Service) RISE (Research Internships in Science and Engineering) program has grown steadily over the past few years. This year there were 270 students from the US and Canada in Heidelberg.

When we got to Mannheim we could hear other people on the train speaking English and sure enough they were RISE scholars too. By the time we reached the Heidelberg main station, there were about 15 of us travelling together. After the 5-minute walk to the bus stop, there were almost 30 of us!

My friends Alan (Washington), Daniel (Tennessee) and Ben (Toronto) in front of the hostel.

We got to Jugendherberge youth hostel, our accomodation for the conference, and there were about 100 students there. After waiting in line for several minutes, we got our keys, nametags and some cheesecake! I hurried to my room to drop off all the weights that dragged me down and I met my roommates: Alan from the University of Washington, Anthony from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and William from MIT.

Anthony and Alan

After this, we attended the intro lectures. During an intermission, I got to meet some more students. I met 3 girls from the U of A - Beatriz a friend I met in Lister Hall, Allison the president of EMBS (Engineering in Medicine and Biology Society) at the U of A and Arina from the Dept of Physics.

I met Beatriz when I lived in Lister Hall!

After 3 hours of lectures from special guests - it was time for supper. I demolished a mountain of rice, chicken and chili :-) and I was good to go.

Friday was tour day - not city tours, company tours.
I visited BASF in Ludwigshafen, the largest integrated chemical company in the world. The company headquarters takes up as much land as half of New York City. I've never seen more pipes and furnaces in my entire life.

At nite, we dined on suckling pig at a local restaurant that brews its own beer.
We then walked through the center of the old town of Heidelberg. I remember doing a few dance moves like the "Schrodinger wave equation", the "Electron" and the "Gamma Ray".

Doing the gamma ray!

Saturday was our last day in Heidelberg. We climbed up to the castle and took a group picture at the old bridge.
one side of the castle.

I have many fond memories of the city of Heidelberg and all the awesome people that I met there. I hope to visit some of my friends around Germany before I head back home to E-town.

Linkin Park - What I've Done

2007-06-16T18:16:00.001-06:00

Free Hugs Campaign. (music by Sick Puppies album out April3)

2007-05-16T23:06:00.001-06:00

Let's put things in perspective.

2007-05-10T17:57:00.001-06:00

The Size Of Our World

The earth is pretty big

But Jupiter is wayyy bigger

Now, the sun is even bigger

But Check this out- the sun has nothing on these guys

and these guys......

counting the dough..

2007-04-30T00:02:00.001-06:00

another picture of us counting the cash

by the way, all the money goes through world vision to people in need worldwide.

counting the $

2007-04-30T00:01:00.001-06:00

Here's a picture of me and my friends when we finished counting the money we raised at our 30 hour famine fundraiser.

Kicking it old school

2007-04-29T17:37:00.001-06:00

My room at a youth conference last year - it was awesome

Caneoing

2007-04-29T17:34:00.003-06:00

Dancing G.W. Bush

2007-04-29T17:34:00.001-06:00

BBC NEWS | In Pictures | Week in pictures: 21-27 April

Flickr Photo Download: P7230057

Camping '06

2007-04-29T17:32:00.000-06:00

Rest from canoeing

Rest

BBC NEWS | Technology | Mouse brain simulated on computer

2007-04-27T21:51:00.000-06:00

BBC NEWS | Technology | Mouse brain simulated on computer

"Half a real mouse brain is thought to have about eight million neurons each one of which can have up to 8,000 synapses, or connections, with other nerve fibres.

Modelling such a system, the trio wrote, puts "tremendous constraints on computation, communication and memory capacity of any computing platform"."

"The vast complexity of the simulation meant that it was only run for ten seconds at a speed ten times slower than real life - the equivalent of one second in a real mouse brain."

BBC NEWS | In Pictures | Week in pictures: 21-27 April

2007-04-27T21:43:00.000-06:00

BBC NEWS | In Pictures | Week in pictures: 21-27 April

George bush knows how to dance ;-p

Choose God not Formulas.

2007-04-12T09:15:00.001-06:00

blog.worship.com: The Priority of Prayer

The Priority of Prayer
Posted by Jim Perdue

I had lunch with a good friend whom I greatly respect the other day and the conversation turned to one topic that usually comes up when two pastors talk about anything: effectiveness in ministry. We talked for some time about the newest ideas, the latest fads and the coolest ways to do church. But then, something interesting happened. We both began to lament the loss of a deeply spiritual side to the books, conferences, websites, blogs, magazines and coaching networks.

I understand that pastors should be practitioners and that church work, at times, is very practical. But I also know that church work has a deeply spiritual side that, to me, has been widely ignored. Where are the prominent pastors crying out for holy living? Where are the conferences challenging churches to embrace concerted, fervent prayer? Where are the spiritual leaders who continually raise the banner for holy living?

I'm not saying that these type of leaders and conferences don't exist (in fact, I can think of one or two). But what I am saying is that their voices have been muted by the clamoring throng that tells me the new "formula" to grow my church. All of this ranting to say one simple thing: in my life, ministry and family God is bringing me back to the basics. I need to rediscover the secrets to effective ministry: a passionate pursuit of God, the priority of fervent prayer and the anointing of Spirit-filled living.

(C) 2007 Jim Perdue |

ALL THE GOALS (7-1) MAN UNITED VS ROMA- QF 2ND LEG- 10/04/07

2007-04-11T16:33:00.001-06:00

This version is in English

ManUtd 7-1 AS Roma Champions League 07 HIGHLIGHTS

2007-04-11T16:25:00.001-06:00

Incredible

ManU 7 - Roma 1

2007-04-11T16:04:00.001-06:00

Man U demolished Roma 7 - 1 , in what some are calling the greatest perfomance by an English team in the champion's league

Nickelback - If Everyone Cared (video)

2007-03-12T20:53:00.001-06:00

Interesting video - message of peace from Nickelback. Don't know too much about the band, but seems like a pretty cool song.

Biomechanics of Jellyfish

2007-03-08T21:48:00.001-07:00

The Life Aquatic with John Dabiri

“I
had discovered that at the most fundamental level, all vortices form by
pushing fluid out of a nozzle,” says Gharib, “but John discovered
that for optimal thrust, the nozzle should not be rigid.” Such a
discovery might not be the talk of Toledo, but it could have significant
applications in transportation, energy production, and even in medicine,
for example, in the design and manufacture of artificial heart valves.

John Dabiri is doing some interesting work at Caltech, modelling the
fluid mechanics of heart valves by studying vortex motions of jellyfish.

Ronaldinho

2007-03-05T17:38:00.001-07:00

Ronaldinho Skills - The best bloopers are here

He just keeps getting better.

The Fray how to save a life HIGH QUALITY

2007-03-05T16:59:00.001-07:00

Heat Still rolling without D-wade

2007-03-04T13:21:00.001-07:00

Shaq

NBA.com O’Neal Explodes for Huge Night in Heat Win

I take it personal when people don't double me,'' he said. "It's against my religion not to double me. It upsets me. It makes me think they're saying to themselves I don't have it anymore.''

Ryan Smyth gets traded to NY Islanders.

2007-02-28T18:38:00.001-07:00

There's no place like home.

Snow Man

2007-02-24T10:45:00.001-07:00

Cool picture of statue.

From topleftpixel

Men in coats

2007-02-23T15:47:00.001-07:00

cool video- very funny.

247Think Blog: Group 1 Crew

2007-02-21T15:37:00.000-07:00

247Think Blog: Group 1 Crew

Good review of Group 1 Crew.
I'm thinking of getting their CD, just making sure i won't go broke right after... the life of a student.

EFCC bust Nigerian 419 scammers

2007-02-21T01:59:00.001-07:00

419- it's so prevalent in nigeria

Monty Python's Dead Parrot sketch, scammer style!

2007-02-21T01:56:00.001-07:00

the things peopel do for money

Group 1 Crew - Love Is A Beautiful Thing (Video)

2007-02-20T16:47:00.001-07:00

sweet video- words make sense too

Shaq, LeBron, Dwight Howard All-Star Dance-Off

2007-02-20T16:21:00.001-07:00

These guys are having way too much fun!

All-Star Elvis

2007-02-20T16:18:00.001-07:00

NBA all star '07 'fun-ness'

Mr. Hot Sauce

2007-02-20T16:05:00.000-07:00

For want of a better name- i called this blog,

'The Chronicles of Mr Hot Sauce"

Hopefully that doesn't have any negative connotations...but in the world we live in, i'd be surprised if it didn't.

Newayz, it's been a low key day-

just chilling

peace out

Getting a little edgy...

2007-02-19T21:52:00.000-07:00

Here's my desktop - customized to taste.

Ubuntu edgy, funkyfied gnome panel, sweet wallpaper from gnome-look

Enjoy

Study like crazy :)

2007-02-14T14:14:00.000-07:00

Final MT on friday...

last week was more grueling... 4 in four days ..in retrospect, i'm impressed that I survived it.

I thank God.

Got to study for Genetics before friday.

Valentine's day

I'd rant about this, but frankly i dont think it's worth my time ;)

To keep it simple- I'm not a big fan

Peace out pple.

Na Promo Video

2007-01-28T22:15:00.000-07:00

Youtube vid for New Attitude 2007

Na 2007

2007-01-28T22:12:00.000-07:00

A conference this summer- focused on rediscovering the truths found in God's word and presenting them humbly to our world.

I sure would love to attend ....

Bionic Stock ;p

2006-09-15T19:45:00.000-06:00

This stock was fitted with a prosthetic bill.

Pretty cool.

Tribute to September 11

2006-09-15T19:40:00.000-06:00

I found this on BBC.

Tribute to all those who fell that day.

Inspiration

2006-09-14T16:35:00.000-06:00

One of my favorite hobbies is procastinating.

I was chilling online the other day and I stumbled on this quote:

"We should be taught not to wait for inspiration to start a thing.Action always generates inspiration. Inspiration seldom generates action."

- Frank Tibolt

This is very well said and is very true.

It's funny 'cos half the time, I'm waiting for the 'rythm', 'groove', 'perfect plan' before i get any work done.

Sometimes I just clean up and never get any real work done.

I guess in the end, it comes down to just going at it..from experience it actually gets easier as you win more and more battles against procastination.

Till then my brothers n sisters, I'm gonna chill a bit more and hopefully get some work done tonight.

Peace out!

Our Favorite Accept/Reject Letters

2006-08-30T15:53:00.000-06:00

Our Favorite Accept/Reject Letters

This is pretty funny..
I like the social insurance number one ( the second joke) best.

The Craving Growwwssss

2006-08-30T15:06:00.000-06:00

StumbleUpon
For some reason, I can't seem to get off stumble upon these days..

Maybe it's because I'm trying to avoid doing work.

#4. Grad School Dreams

2006-08-30T15:03:00.000-06:00

Bio-X Stanford University

I'm hoping that someday I'll work at a bioengineering facility this presitgious.

Still got a long way to go though.

I guess it doesn't help to dream........

#3. Dream Laptop

2006-08-30T10:41:00.000-06:00

Best Buy Canada Web Store: Computers: Laptops: HP Pavilion DV2020CA 14.1" AMD Turion 64 X2 Mobile Technology TL-50 1.6GHz Laptop

my dream laptop - at least for now.

with the way the standards go up, i'll be on a different 'laptop-high' in no time.

i like the new look, the webcam and quickplay

Let's just say HP took a few pointers from apple

Either way, i'm not gettin' a laptop yet, a brother's got to go to school.

;o)

#2. Golden Ratio

2006-08-30T10:00:00.000-06:00

Golden Ratio -- from Wolfram MathWorld

Definitely one of the cooler numbers.

It's amazing how interesting math can get and how certain numbers keep recurring in nature and geometry.

#1. Intro

2006-08-26T15:10:00.000-06:00

Hello world;

So...I figured I'd start my own blog thing...

here it is.

As time passes, I should have more to ramble about.

Till then, stay tuned !