My last post was Feb 29, 2024. And I had joked
that hopefully, the post frequency does not match the frequency of the date
itself. As you can see, that is thankfully not the case. What you
can’t see, is that it might not stay like this for too long.
And for those of you in my vast sea of fans
holding your respective breaths about “Student life in Germany/Aachen/RWTH,” I would (as is my habit) sadly have to let you down again by telling you this is not that post. But I assure you, dear readers, that the day will come. Much like Martin Luther Jr., I have a dream.
Well, I had one, before it was slowly and excruciatingly crushed. In my last
post, I said, and I quote
Depending on how things go, I might do it later, or very VERY later.
Clearly, it will be the latter, so very very later.
Hmm… ChatGPT, can you make a tongue-twister story out of the words later and latter?
“The latter waiter, a notorious traitor to timely service, always said
'Later!' when asked for water. Later that night, after the caterers had
scattered mini quiches everywhere, the latter waiter tripped, sending a batter
of mashed potatoes flying. 'It doesn't matter!' he cried, covered head to toe.
'I'll just tell them the letters on the menu got rearranged!' The other
waiters, knowing he was a hater of actual work, just rolled their eyes. 'He's a
relator of ridiculous excuses,' one muttered. 'He'd rather cater to chaos than
customers.”
(*actually created using Gemini 2.0, but who gives a damn)
I figured if the entire internet is filled with random AI-generated nonsense, why not contribute to the downfall?
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| Random photo of Gare de Liège-Guillemins |
Digressed again.
This post will be as usual about the things that happened, the things I
observed, and the things I did. Typisch.
Circling back to the statement I made regarding
the next post being either late or very late, that was dependent on how my 2nd/3rd
maths exam attempt went. Clearly, you can guess how it went.
On the morning of my flight from Frankfurt, I
got my math exam results.
5.0
Failed.
There goes my vacation mood, on the day of the
start of my vacation… Well, as much vacation as I can have when I am in India
anyway.
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| Plane and train spotting always makes me happy |
After looking at all possible options,
the most sensible way forward for me was to re-pay and re-register for the
course, which honestly is a privilege because normally 3 failed attempts mean
you get kicked out of the Uni and the course. Still, 1650 Euros for an irrelevant
math course taught over Zoom video calls in 4 weeks seems… *pick any adjective you like*
Well, now that this was decided, I started to
enjoy my stay in India a bit better. Obviously, that is unacceptable. So, I
ended up with my pinky finger fractured. Well… At least something new happened.
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| Jungle Babbler |
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| Visiting Chandigarh in March is just perfect if you want to see true nature colors |
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| My Bro Pumpkin |
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| Completely accidental shot of a Mig flying to the Moon |
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| The mirrorless AF systems allowed me to take this, which would have not at all been possible with the classic DSLR camera, at least with my skill level |
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| Those eyes |
Things like these are not completely in my
control, and so to cheer myself up, I decided to treat myself when I found out
that Snarky Puppy would be performing in Liège, a jazz band I absolutely adore
in a city that is weirdly interesting and not too far away.
Obviously, that is also unacceptable. So,
during the time we were in Liege, the place where I live was broken into and
robbed. Interestingly, it was not my exact apartment that was robbed, but my neighbors’.
And because I am a somewhat careful person, I had given all my expensive camera
stuff to my neighbor so that it is more protected when I am in India. Since I
had the fracture, I did not really need it back immediately, and well… you can
guess what was among the things that were stolen.
Dear EOS 90D, probably the biggest purchase I made with my own money, you will be missed. You catapulted my photography hobby from just and hobby into somewhat of an obsession leading me to spend unhealthy amounts of money in camera lenses and accessories. Your ergonomics were perfectly fitting to my needs, your battery life was amazing, and your sensor was super sharp and detailed. Special mention to all the lenses that were stolen alongside, the classic 18-55 with the polarizer, My favorite crop lens, the 10-18mm, also with the polarizer, the 24mm prime pancake, and the 85mm prime. And the Vanguard camera bag that has been my trusty companion since 2012. Each one of you will be missed. Especially because when combined with the R6, my kit was… PERFECT.
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| What my Gear used to be like Fuji-san is not mine |
Sidenote – Yes, I did manage to get an R6 for a
nice black Friday sale, and I am extremely happy with it. Although it forces me
to do a slightly different process for photos than my DSLR (*not DSLRs sadly
anymore, still have the 1000D alive and well), the results, especially with the
AF tracking and the dynamic range are incredible. Still miss the charge-it-and-forget-it battery life of the 90D.
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| I will miss you, 90D The perfect pair |
Side Sidenote – Dear Canon, I understand that the RF mount is different from the EF mount, and the lenses from the RF are not supposed to be mounted to EF, and EF lenses are not meant to be directly mounted to RF cameras. I understand that. Believe me, I also know that people are idiots and will try to do exactly what I mentioned above NOT TO DO.
But why, in the name of Jesus or Ganpati, did you make the rear lens cap so that it only mounts on the RF lenses when it is perfectly aligned? WHY? That genuinely grinds my gears to no end. EF rear caps were able to be screwed on at 3 possible angles. And because of the physically present notch, you could feel where the points were. RF caps only mount one way when it is precisely aligned with the notch, that is no longer a physical notch but just a paint line… why? WHY? Surely there can be a better solution than this…
Since I am already talking to Canon here, I
really wish there was more focus on companies making cameras for photos and not
everyone trying to chase video specs. I would have already got a replacement
for my 90D had Canon not made some stupid design decisions when it comes to
their APS-C crop sensor bodies. If you are reading Canon, stick with the 3
control dials in the same layout and position as the R6, R6M2, R5, R3, R1, 5DM4,
6DM2, and all other professional cameras you have made since… forever? And
concave joysticks are better. Ask anyone who has used a ThinkPad.
Digressed again.
My point here is that sometimes, you can put all the effort you possibly can and take all the precautions you can possibly think of, and still, life can find a way to mess up your plans in the most creative way possible.In the words of Andre 3000 – You can plan a pretty picnic, but you can’t predict the weather.
At that point, you can either give up, or keep
going, and find ways around the problem. I am the exact opposite of a religious
person, but I cannot help but quote Bhagavad Gita 2.47
“You have a right to perform your prescribed duties, but you are not entitled to the fruits of your actions. Never consider yourself to be the cause of the results of your activities, nor be attached to inaction.”
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| I did travel with the Vande Bharat. Pretty decent. BUT WE NEED BULLET TRAINS FOR EVERY ROUTE UNDER 1000km |
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| Roadside Bookfest, Any book for 2 Euro |
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| Indian Jeff, captured surprisingly using the manual macro mode of my phone |
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| Farm Fresh Farmer's Market Sadly the Government is still not accepting the demands of the farmers... |
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| Paan Gutka Accelerated Corrosion Test PASS |
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| Air India Inflight Meal Apparently, they have reduced the amount of food given now Which is rude |
Aber Egal.
I finally ended up catching a break with a trip to Cadzand (NL), and a trip to
Oslo. Both were not really relaxing because of their own reasons, but I will
take what I can get. What you get are some pictures from these places.
Oh and yeah, I was in India too and took some pictures, which was different
this time because it was March and April. I got to eat mangoes after 2019, so I
cannot really complain too much about anything this time around.
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| I got that Borealis Action in Aachen |
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| Cadzand |
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| I wanted to check out Ostend, but managed only Knokke Still very dystopian |
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| Brugge |
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| The public Library in Oslo was absolutely amazing, with access to 3D printers, professional color displays, Sewing machines and anything else you might need for your creativity. |
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| King's View, Utoya, Norway |
I feel like I should do another Best of What’s
Around post, and maybe also shortlist photos and do a printed calendar. Thoughts?
Edit - Yes I will for sure do another post with the newer pictures.
As it stands right now, I finally (FINALLY) managed to pass the Higher Mathematics 3 exam and am eligible to start with a master's thesis. 3 years too late, but I’ll take it.
I also would like to thank a few people,
who shall remain nameless for now. Their contributions were… critical in my
understanding of the concept behind the exam I had to clear. Also, a massive cheer
to all the developers and people who actively support open-source projects and
software stacks. It can be a thankless job, but your work and its open access
are the reason why we have the internet in the literal sense. (For the people who do
not know, Linux is the OS that runs almost all the servers, and Linux is completely
free to download and tweak according to your preference)
I also would like to thank you all software developers in general, now before it is too late. You see because while I was initially
a skeptic of the AI and LLM boom that was happening… I am not anymore. Even
though LLMs are essentially predictive keyboards on some high-grade cocaine and
steroids, I see the potential of what LLMs alone can do. And you guys are
essentially digging your own grave, along with a pit of chaos for everyone else
to fall into.
Plus, the AI boom has reignited interest in nuclear energy. Which is only great news. Maybe re-ignited is not the best choice of words...
Thanks to Ollama, LMStudio, Huggingface, Docker, and similar technologies, kids can say that they need a GPU like the RTX 4090
or the Radeon 7900XTX for their homework, and I would have no option but to
believe that.
It is kind of weird, but I think the analogy
from Oppenheimer fits neatly when it comes to LLMs and AI in general.
We imagine a future… and our imaginings horrify us.
They won't fear it until they understand it, and they won't understand it until they've used it.
For the uninitiated who cannot imagine such a future, I would point you to the LTT interview with the legendary Jim Keller. The whole interview is worth the watch, along with the interview he gave with AnandTech. RIP btw, AnandTech
Just dropping this here if you are already
bored by my ramblings.
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| Oh, yeah, I also got to witness the East Belgian Rally, with some crazy skilled drivers |
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| This guy won the rally Please don't tell him what his name means in Hindi |
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| Lancia Stratos! |
As I write this blog on the last day of the year, because I clearly have nothing better to do, the only thing I can say about 2024 is that it has been a year. A year with ups and downs and many weird sideways tangents.
I have some hopes for 2025, especially because I
have a nice, interesting topic on which I will probably be working for my Master's
thesis. Although I have not made much progress academically, I
managed to learn and do quite a lot of different tasks and little projects in
the meantime.
My latest personal project is setting up a
proper home lab with 24TB of storage, Proxmox with multiple docker containers to
get as close as possible to a solution that Synology offers. I think I might
have overpurchased the hardware, but If I can squeeze out every drop of
performance from it, and it runs for 5 years or more, I would be satisfied with
it overall.
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| The crowd of the Luttich Light Fest |
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| This is what the crowd came for |
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| Never saw the station at night It looks beautiful |
Once again, I ask my frankly gargantuan audience
to give me tips on what I should be doing with it. I have a 16-core AMD APU (R7
5845U) with 16 GB RAM and a 512 GB main NVMe SSD for boot plus all the
containers and services to run on. I plan on basic Samba drive sharing over the network, probably using TrueNAS Scale, CasaOS for containers like Immich and
Frigate, Nextcloud for the opensource alternative to GDrive and GSuite, Pihole,
because obviously, and Jellyfin for all the media center duties along with transcoding
capabilities. Maybe something like Bitwarden as well, and once I have the VPN
running in India, the whole of the *arr suite like Radarr, Sonarr, Lidarr, and
similar software packages. Honestly, this is a bit of a minefield with no clear
guides, but that is the nature of open source sadly, and while strides have
been made, it still remains as fragmented as ever.
(Yes, I will try to document this as well. No, I do not guarantee you anything)
Do I need to do all of this? No, not really, especially since RPi4 running OMV
and Samba have served me perfectly well.
But I do need new storage (almost 800GB of photos alone), and it would be nice
to learn new things along the way, so why not?
Going back to my student job, I always wanted
to play around with 3D printers, and I now have access to not only the Prusa XL
with 5 print heads but also a BambuLabs X1 Carbon. I am a fan of the speed of
the X1, but not a fan of the filament poops, especially with filament changes. If
it was my money, I would go for the Prusa XL just because of the versatility.
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| This needs a Diaper |
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| Oh look, a Benchy in my favorite color scheme! |
I also was kind of sort of in charge of
redesigning the lab area for the same office I started my German journey
with. Life can be so painfully circular sometimes.
Thanks to the… not-insignificant… budget that
we had, we were able to get a lot of nice fancy equipment and workbenches for
our lab. It was interesting to do all the thought planning and structuring
required, and even more rewarding now that we have all that stuff to play with
and build new and interesting things to try and iterate with.
I believe that engineering at its core is and
always was about building things and solving real problems that were faced by
people in the real world and real applications. RWTH really challenged this perspective
of engineering for me, but I will be vindicated about my worldview. In retrospect, on the very first day, RWTH gave the international students a sling bag with the definition
of engineer and if I think about it, should have been the first red flag.
Engineer solves problems that you did not know existed in ways you do not understand.
After 6 years of being in this godforsaken
university, I can confidently say that the aforementioned problems exist only
here, because of course they are all theoretical, and we pretend to solve them
in ways that no one would ever be able to understand…
I have just 1 exam to pass, and if make enough
sacrifices to the Incan gods, maybe, just maybe, I can finish with my 2 years
Master’s course in 6 years. Now that would be some next-level German punktlichkeit,
oder? I am competing with the BER airport after all. Or maybe Stuttgart 21.
Since it is customary to end the blog with
music and movie recommendations…
Atomized is a beautiful melody by the whistling
mastermind of Andrew Bird. I have already used his song Sisyphus before to
relate to what it feels like lately when I am doing anything at all. Atomized
in particular fits nicely in the post because, and I quote
“Bird paints a picture of societal forces attempting to unravel and demagnetize
individuals, leaving them atomized and incomplete. The song explores the
concept of atomization, a term often used in sociology and philosophy to
describe the process of breaking down social structures and individuals into
isolated, disconnected parts.
The lyrics echo the words of Joan Didion,
particularly her observation on atomization and the evidence that “things fall
apart.” Didion’s ideas, as interpreted in the song, suggest a reflection on the
disintegration of societal cohesion and personal identity. “Atomized” suggests
contemplating the impact of external influences, possibly driven by technology
(“blaming technology”), on the individual’s sense of self and connection to
others.”
No Leaf Clover, of course, is Metallica. But not just Metallica, but with the SF Philharmonie. I picked this mostly because it seems to be year-appropriate. "Then it comes to be that the soothing light at the end of your tunnel... Is just a freight train coming your way". But also because I have been revisiting old artists that I do not listen to as frequently and rediscovering some gems. Also getting a bit into the OG rap music. But, I save it for a future post.
For the movie part, it is a bit challenging since I did not come across anything particularly inspiring, at least not something I can remember. Maybe AIR, the story of how Nike Air Jordans came to be. It is all about being consistent and persistent after all.
Or is it?
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| Got the ATLAS |
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| Aachen, Snow, Sun, Pretty |
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| Somewhere near Maastricht |
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| Every time people say visible to the naked eye, it has been a lie |
Once again, I thank you, dear reader, for taking your time and reading my blog. I agree that this was not the most informative or exhaustive post ever, but I had a goal in mind, of posting A post in 2024. Trust me, Vodafone DE made it really hard, but I have met my goal, although I feel it is not up to my usual blog post standards. Apologies for that. If you are just here for the photos, you can also follow me on Instagram.
Comments and thoughts are always appreciated. The reason for appreciation differs naturally based on what you post.
I hope 2024 was a good year for you, and if not, I hope 2025 brings you what you expect and deserve. Happy New Year!
Cheerio!
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