Wants and needs

I know of a woman much older than myself who was given a very unusual birthday gift. She was offered a non-trivial but not lifechanging amount of money on the condition that she spent it on herself.

This woman is a private citizen with no government ties or connections. She is professionally successful. She is in good health. All her basic needs are well covered. If she had to spend on herself, she would have to do so on luxuries. However, she is not a luxury sort of gal. She likes to be comfortable, but you'll never find her shopping in Greenbelt 5, for example. She's actually quite frugal.

Feeling that she didn't need anything for herself that she couldn't already afford, she ended up turning down the gift (to the shock and horror of her family and friends who were more than willing to help her look for creative ways to spend the money).

What would I do in her place? Each one of us has a list of must-haves and the nice-to-haves. My list of nice-to-haves is pretty long. I am fully aware that each and every item on that list is self-indulgent and unnecessary, but if I *had* to spend the money anyway, yeah, I could wipe it out easily by working on that list.

Honestly, though, I don't think I'd be that self-indulgent. In that situation, I'd probably try to be a little pilosopo. There's another list--let's call it the "man for others" list. Given the constraint that I would have to spend on myself, I would probably enter into an off-setting kind of arrangement: I'd have the gift pay for my basic needs, while I use my basic needs budget for "man for other" stuff. Probably. Assuming I could get away with it.

I think about this woman's situation. It's such an unusual problem. It reminded me of the movie Brewsters Millions. I don't know how I would feel in her shoes. Right now, I'm just having fun fantasizing about what I might do if I were.

Classic con

There's a classic con that goes like this: Someone calls your house and tells your helpers that you have been in an accident. The caller orders the helpers to meet him/her at destination X, with the cash and jewelry from the house. If the helpers believe the caller, they gather up the articles and rush to the destination. Upon arrival, the caller takes the articles and tells them to wait. The caller leaves and never comes back.

There's at least one member of my family, my first-cousin, who has fallen victim to this scam. Just a few days ago, someone tried to pull the same stunt on my own household. Fortunately, our helpers knew about my cousin's experience. They hung up on the caller and tracked us down to let us know what happened.

No one was hurt. Nothing was stolen. Still, we feel disturbed that someone had tested us for vulnerabilities.

To our friends and family, be safe in 2012.

Blood test

Because I've never "failed" a blood test in my life, I decided to have a full blood workup two days after Christmas. What a mistake. The tests showed that my HDL and fasting blood sugar levels were above the normal range. Given the timing, the results should not have surprised me. They disturbed me, though, enough to start amending my diet.

Lowering the cholesterol is a novice task. There are things I did this Christmas season that no mere mortal should ever do, e.g. have lechon five days in a row. You don't need a blood test to tell you that that is bad, very, very bad. So less lechon in my life, check.

What challenges me is the sugar. I'm not big on sweets to start. I will take the *occasional* cookie, a slice of cake, or piece of chocolate. However, one piece is usually enough. I have students who can wipe out a whole bag of chocnut in one sitting and that's something I cannot do. I couldn't figure out where the sugar was coming from, until Redg said "Carbs!"

That was sad news because I loooovvveee carbs. Rice. Potatoes. Corn. Yum. And to have to reduce the amount of carbs in my life, argh, that for me is harder than giving up lechon.

The suggestion from my doctor was to adjust my diet for about a month and then repeat the blood test. With any luck, my readings will go back to normal by then.

Mentorship

One of the values that the Ateneo nurtures is mentorship. The senior faculty in particular are strongly encouraged to be mentors to the younger faculty as well as to students. We are expected to guide their research, to help them with classroom management, to vet course contents, and to provide other forms of support as requested.

Because I am already senior faculty, I'm used to being a mentor rather than a mentee. I have mentors of my own, some within the Ateneo, many more outside--people in my life with persistent, lasting influences on my direction and conduct. Mostly, though, when you get to my age, the usual case is for people to come to you for advice and not the other way around.

Enter Skyrim.

I mentioned that I'm not much of a gamer. This is the first RPG I've played in 5 years. I make a lot of mistakes, I have a lot of questions and I don't always have the patience to find stuff out on my own. Many of my recent Facebook wall posts start off with "Skyrim question:" followed by "How the heck do I do..." Fortunately, my current and former students (and one or two colleague) have all the answers. I think it's adorable that so many people are willing to give advice. I read all the solutions and try them out the next day. Mostly I still fail--sigh--which reflects on my skills (or lack thereof) as a gamer, and not on the advice. To my mentors, I am truly grateful. Thank you for your patience. We still have a long way to go.

The good news and the bad news

Dr. Raffy Saldana, site director of the ACM ICPC Manila Regionals, posted the updated scoreboard on his website. The bad news is that we are no longer in the top 10. The good news is that six out of the 9 teams increased in ranking.

In summary:

#13 Ambo's Disciples (Janssen Go, Vernon Gutierrez, Jay Saringan) - 4 solved; up from #15 with 3 solved
#15 Die Potato = Ateneo de Manila University (Raf Anson, Enzo Dayrit and Leland Suarez) - 4 solved; down from #8 with 5 solved
#16 Redwire (Robin Anupol, Mark Tan, Daniel Fordan) - 3 solved; up from #20 with 2 solved
#23 Eser (Jazz Eser, Ia Cabatbat, Oscar Silva) - 2 solved; down from 14 with 3 solved
#26 Cantina? (Gabo Santos, Jansen Ignacio, Aaron Ong) - 2 solved; up from 32 with 1 solved
#29 1000% Fabulous (Camille Ruiz, Hans Chua, Michelle Villanueva) - 2 solved; up from 44 with 1 solved
#31 RMF (Ria Tecson, Marlou Ramas, Francis Macam) - 2 solved; up from 37 with 1 solved
#33 b.add(s); (Gabby Sanchez, Amiel Reviche, Charlene Tolentino; all-freshman team) - 2 solved; up from 45 with 1 solved
#41 Zartyse (Jayzon Ty, Nino Salazar, Jonathan Sescon) - 1 solved; down from 35 with 1 solved.

UP had 2 teams in the top 10, 3 teams in the top 15 and 5 teams in the top 20. ADMU had 2 teams in the top 15 and 3 teams in the top 20. Only three Philippine schools made it to top 20--UP, ADMU and ADNU.

Thank you again to everyone who made this year possible. We should all start planning for 2012.

The case of the missing memory

A few days ago, I asked my driver to make a deposit for me. The following day, I asked him for the bank receipt. He told me that he had handed me the receipt when we were in the car on the way home the previous evening. I checked my wallet and sure enough the receipt was right there. The scary thing is that I had zero recollection of ever receiving the receipt from him. I don't even recall him handing me anything in the car.

If this were the only incident this season, it wouldn't bother me, but over the last few days, I've been slipping. I referred to the JDK as an SDK. I sent the wrong dates to a travel agent. I was asked several times: ARE YOU SURE about the dates? I said yes, I'm sure (this, despite the fact that my to-do list had the correct dates written in black-and-white. Taken in isolation, these incidents are nothing, but when they happen in rapid succession, they make you ask, what's happening to me?

I've known myself to go through occasional bouts of forgetfulness. The last time this happened wholesale was just when I assumed office at OIR. My goal at some point was to get through one day without forgetting anything. Admittedly, the past few days have been at the heightened levels of crazy that you'd expect from the Christmas season. It could be that these "senior moments" are the result of having too much on my mind.

What makes the situation ominous for me, though, is that the maternal side of my family has a history of dementia (yes, that explains a lot, doesn't it?). Back in the late 1970s and early 1980's, my grandmother had all the usual symptoms of Alzheimer's, though she was never formally diagnosed. In recent years, my own mom was diagnosed as having had a series of small strokes that have led to mild cognitive impairment. The behavioral result is she is very forgetful.

Because these chronic conditions take place over months or years, it's easy to rationalize them away by saying, oh, I've just been so busy. Eventually, they become harder to ignore.

The effect on me is that each slip scares me a little. A pattern of slips? That has me shaken.

Fortunately, there's enough awareness of these conditions to focus energies on prevention and coping. My to-do list is essential. A healthy diet and regular exercise are good for just about everything, including memory. Keeping mentally and socially active are good, too. A support system helps you cope and I am blessed to have people in my life who have my back, who point out the slips in the gentlest of ways. Assuming the conclusion is inevitable (and I don't believe it is), my goal is to reach it as gracefully and with as much dignity as possible.

All I want for Christmas

Well, I'm really thinking of 2012, in the context of ALLS. There are a number of research projects under the ALLS umbrella that I would like to see come off the ground.

There's more novice programmer data, this time from Scheme, that needs to be analyzed.

There's a new toy coming. Some of you already know what it is. I'd like to see more affect-sensitive apps built using it along side some of our other, older toys.

The EDM workbench has to keep moving forward.

I'd like to see if we can incorporate some of the Bayesian Knowledge Tracing logic in the Aplusix data. I realize the features from Aplusix are different from those of the Cognitive Tutor, but perhaps there's a way to reinterpret the data using the BKT framework. Once that's done, of course, the agent's logic has to be updated and re-tested.

I'm going to need my usual a cast of thousands to get this done. There are some people already working with me this year who are likely to continue working with me next year. I'm losing most of my minions, er, students to graduation, and there's no telling whether there is a next wave coming to fill the spots they left behind.

Party like it's 2011

When I was growing up, I used to join my parents on many of the gatherings they would attend during the Christmas season. By the time I had a social life of my own, there were years when I'd be out every night for about a month. By the end of the Christmas season, I'd be sick as dog with either a fever or asthma or food poisoning or something.

Eventually, I was sick of getting sick, and it was time to dial back. Over the last few years I've attended maybe 2 or 3 parties per season. Then 2011 rolled along and it's been a banner year for parties (at least in my life). Admittedly, some of them are work-related--the ALLS party, the DISCS party, the ACM party--but a few have been purely social. For instance, last night I attended the Mozu party, where Socorro and Redg were judges at a costume competition.

It's been fun, but Christmas is still a week away and I have already gotten a bad cold, asthma, and food poisoning. The irony is that we haven't been able to get together with certain close, close friends. If 2012 permits, I'm dialing back again.

Time, be my friend

I was reviewing my to-do list for the break. It includes fun family-and-friends stuff, some travel, some entertainment (read: TV, movies and Skyrim), but it also includes some work that needs silence, concentration and lots and lots of time. I was actually hoping for some hours with nothing to do except stare out into space, feeling my brain rot. I don't think I will have that luxury, though.

A boy you should date

Date a boy who gardens. Date a boy who spends his money on plants of all kinds instead of fancy cars and expensive watches. Date a boy who knows exactly how much water a bromeliad or a pot of rosemary needs, what plant will thrive in a spot that gets afternoon shade, and which ones glory in the full sun.

Date a boy whose garden is perfect for quiet meditation, a place where you can stare out into space for hours, or somewhere you can sit hand-in-hand, talking about nothing in particular.

This boy knows about patience. He knows that it takes time for plants to mature. He selects plans when they are young, so they can establish themselves in the environment, and gives them the years they need to grow.

He knows how to nurture living things. He fertilizes. He waters. He weeds. He prunes. He controls what he can of the environment so his plants can be at their best.

He also knows that there are things beyond his control. When a storm snaps off tree tops and flattens shrubs, when floodwater overruns ponds and entangles hedges with garbage and debris, he mourns the loving care destroyed in minutes. Afterwards, he clears the damage and starts imagining the garden's next, new look. This boy knows how to accept and recover from loss.

He recognizes beauty in its many forms. The sweeping grace of a palm tree. The densely-packed leaves of a ficus. The elegance of a vanda. From the precision topiaries of formal British gardens to alaga-ng-Diyos hills and mountainsides--his appreciation is unreserved.

And when the day comes that he sees the beauty in you, marry him.

FAQs about Skyrim and me

Q: What race are you?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How many dragons have you slain?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How many quests have you completed?
A: I have not yet started playing.

Q: How do you find it so far?
A: I have not yet started playing.

There's a reality TV show to be made from this.

Overparenting

As parents, we want our children to be capable of living independently. We want them to be able to regulate their own work habits, find their own jobs, earn their own money, run their own household, and all-in-all solve their own problems without us coming to the rescue. Yet it's hard to see our children as becoming more and more capable and, perhaps, harder still, to accept that we aren't (as) needed anymore. There is, therefore, a temptation to meddle, under the guise of "staying involved."

Overparenting doesn't always help, though, because the truth is overparenting elders tend to see what their children as the children they ought to be and not the people they are. Years ago, there was a girl who was leaving Ateneo because of an academic deficiency. Her father and grandfather came to see me to ask what could be done. I said that I was sorry but it was too late. The grandfather went on and on about how well he knew the girl and how certain she was that she would, if given the chance, recover from her academic failures and continue her Ateneo life as a stellar student. As the grandfather spoke, my eyes were only on the girl. She sat in silence, alternately rolling her eyes and scowling. When the grandfather was done, I asked her, "Where are YOU in all this?" She didn't answer. My sense was she resented the grandfather's claim that he knew are at all and just wanted to be left alone.

My suggestion: Stay in touch with your kids.

December mode

One of my colleagues was complaining that the students are already in December mode. They stare at him glassy-eyed and, if he asks a question, all he gets in reply are blank stares that say, "Duh?" I understand. Teaching, to some extent, gives you the same circadian rhythm as students. Like our students, we, the faculty, look forward to summer vacations, sem breaks, Christmas breaks and all those other in-betweens that people in corporate life do not enjoy. Admittedly, we use the breaks to catch up with work (as our students do), but we do also give ourselves time for family, friends, and otherwise being cognitively comatose. With about 10 days to go before the break begins, I can already feel my neurons blinking out one by one and it's taking more and more energy to keep them active. Soon, soon, I promise myself, you'll be able to leave this behind and focus all your time and energy on Skyrim. I claim this is for research.

A better person

A quote attributed to Fr. Dacanay is, "The best way to find out whether you are in a genuinely loving relationship is to ask, Am I becoming a better person?" Fr. Dacanay, in his wisdom, chose the word "better" as opposed to "happier." To be the better person is to be kinder, gentler, more forbearing, more forgiving, more generous, more loving, none of which are concomitant with pleasure or freedom from pain. The happiness that comes with being the better person is sometimes akin to what Sirius Black must have felt in Azkaban--the cold comfort of knowing that you are doing the right thing.

What do you do for an encore?

I mentioned in a previous blog post that I started the cottage industry that is my research area without a grand plan or vision in mind. I aimed for the low-lying fruit, did what I could with the resources I had, and never really thought too much about what happened next or where it was all going.

Despite a lack of vision, the group has done pretty well. 2011 has been especially good to us, ending with the conferment of the two CHED Best Higher Education Institution Research Program awards.

In the silence that follows, I find myself wondering: What now? What do we do for an encore? I refer not to awards but to the work in general. Over the last five years, I've done what interested me and I've let the awards come if they come. Am I missing an opportunity, though? Is there a big picture I'm not seeing or considering? Should I be acting with a little more direction, beyond the next research grant? One of the other candidates for the awards was given the opportunity to describe their project. It was a multi-million dollar project investigating poverty in different countries--just the sort of thing that could make me feel horribly self-indulgent.

How do we level up? What *is* the next level up? Something to think about.

The right stuff

During my tenure as Chair, my main role at the ICPC was to make resources available to our competitive programming teams. Doc Mana took care of the coaching. Grace and Lisa took care of the other details. In the lull that followed, I became a spectator. I checked the scoreboard or else texted the coaches for our standing. My heart rose with every point gained and fell for every position dropped.

This year, I got very heavily involved, more involved than ever before. Aside from mustering resources, I also handled some of the Lite coaching, the food-and-drink prep, transportation, and using my special ability to get in people's faces when it counted. Working this closely with the teams makes you reflect on what it takes to excel in a competition of this nature.

Programming skills are a given. You should be way past making fencepost errors to even try your hand at competition. To be fielded for competition, you should be struggling with the problem, not the programming. The programming should be like breathing.

Still, programming skills are not enough. You need to have rapport with your team mates. You have to understand each other's strengths and capitalize on them. There's no room for infighting, not if you want to win. If there's no chemistry in the group, the solution is to either work it out or change group altogether.

You need to be willing to put in practice time. You have to take the training seriously. You can't be lazy. Yes, this costs you hours with friends, playing Monopoly Deal or Skyrim. Into each life a little rain must fall.

You need the right attitude. You have to want to win. True, there are teams we field for the experience--the younger, less mature teams. After a year or two of playing for experience, it's time to kick butt in a major way. You have to be resilient in the face of failure. You can't be easily discouraged. The problems are hard. You can't fold just because you don't understand them at the first read. You won't always come out on top. There will always be some up-and-coming young'un who will school you in ways you never thought you could be schooled. When this happens, you can't lose focus, you can't lose faith. You have to keep going. Finally, problem solving needs to be intrinsically fun for you. If you find it boring or if you'd rather be doing something else, there's no point in you consuming team resources. Go where you're most happy. If, on the other hand, you get that endorphin high from when the judges respond "Yes", then you should embrace your nerd pride and invest your energies in becoming even better at this thing that you love doing.

If you have the right stuff, the rest is practice.

ACM ICPC

And the results are in! The top 10 were:

1. Staff = University of Tokyo (8/10)
2. Quiwarriors3 = University of the Philippines, Diliman (7/10)
3. --(Q_Q)-- = National Taiwan University (7/10)
4. Quiwarriors1 = University of the Philippines, Diliman (7/10)
5. Saklar Lhompat = University of Indonesia (6/10)
6. STsky = Nanjing University of Science and Technology (6/10)
7. Ah Moo Wa Dee Jia La = National Chiao Tung University (6/10)
8. Die Potato = Ateneo de Manila University (Raf Anson, Enzo Dayrit and Leland Suarez; 5/10)
9. Shiningcarolinegotofree = National Cheng Kung University (5/10)
10. NPC = SungKyunKwan University (5/10)

Our other teams placed as follows:

#14 Eser (Jazz Eser, Ia Cabatbat, Oscar Silva; 3 solved)
#15 Ambo's Disciple (Janssen Go, Vernon Gutierrez, Jay Saringan; 3 solved)
#20 Redwire (Robin Anupol, Mark Tan, Daniel Fordan; 2 solved)
#32 Cantina (Gabo Santos, Jansen Ignacio, Aaron Ong; 1 solved)
#35 Zartyse (Jayzon Ty, Nino Salazar, Jonathan Sescon; 1 solved)
#37 RMF (Ria Tecson, Marlou Ramas, Francis Macam; 1 solved)
#44 1000% Fabulous (Camille Ruiz, Hans Chua, Michelle Villanueva; 1 solved)
#45 b.add(s); (Gabby Sanchez, Amiel Reviche, Charlene Tolentino; all-freshman team, 1 solved)

There were 72 teams participating in all. We had three teams in the top 15. So did UP (2, 4, and 12). All other teams in the top 15 were foreign. In the top 20 teams, UPD and ADMU had 4 teams each. Ateneo de Zamboanga placed #19. The other teams were foreign. In case anyone is wondering, DLSU's top team placed #23.

Based on my knowledge of the history of our ACM ICPC participation, this is our best showing since 2009. UP started overtaking us in 2008 and we've haven't gotten back on top since. We really should start thinking about how to change this situation.

However, before the afterglow fades, there are people whom I need to thank:

Thank you to our ACM ICPC Managers and Coaches: Pablo Manalastas, David Diy, Jessica O Sugay, John Paul Vergara, and Jon Fernandez!

Thank you to our support staff: Alipio Salvador Gabriel, John Paul Contillo, Elisa S. Agbay, Grace Berganio, Mark Bautista, Deni Jaramillo, Tristan Manalang, Carlo Sanchez, and Ronald Panergo!

Thank you to our alumni guest coaches: Jan Vincent Liwanag, Danna Aduna, Melody Kay Carolino, Rafael Liban, Thomas Dy, Wilhansen Li, Clifford Lim, Miguel Arguelles, Jino Noel and Akie Mejia!

Thank you to our sponsors, Chikka.com and the Philippine Coastal Storage and Pipeline Corporation!

Thank you to the DISCS faculty and the Ateneo de Manila community for all their encouragement!

Most of all, thank you to our teams for their brilliance, dedication and HEART!

Don't hate us cause we're beautiful

During yesterday's ACM ICPC opening ceremonies, the Ateneo teams entered UP's Bahay Alumni flashing the awesome jackets from Chikka. Many other teams had uniform shirts, some of which had colorful, post-modern designs. The jackets, though, ah, those were attention-grabbing--royal blue, long-sleeved, sponsored, and SPARQCoded, we looked pretty bad-ass.

Dr. Saldana, the contest site director, wanted pictures by the team and by school. He called each team up on stage and asked them to remain onstage until a school's entire contingent was complete. Because we were the largest group, the stage filled slowly, until it was completely awash in royal blue. When it was time to take the school shot, the photographer, who took her job very seriously, was careful to arrange us so that we were tightly clustered and so that all faces were visible. This took a while, and each minute that passed made us stick out more and more.

After the opening ceremonies, it was time to move to Vidal Tan Hall for the practice contest. The organizers had arranged for a fleet of jeeps to take us from Bahay Alumni to Vidal Tan. We weren't told ahead of time that there was transportation available, so we, naturally, had our own caravan of vans and SUVs. As our teams walked down the steps, bypassing the contest-sponsored transportation, one of the boys said, "Siyempre, ang mga Atenista, hindi mag-je-jeep..." Hay, mga elitista. :)

I don't know if I was just being self-conscious, but my sense was there really was something flamboyant about the way we owned our space during this contest. Now if we actually owned the contest, we'd really have something. Three hours to go. In the meantime, don't hate us cause we're beautiful.