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Category: Miscellaneous

Imposter Syndrome

Internet is a good thing: it allows us to see and experience things that were not possible decades ago. On the other hand, it’s sometimes also overwhelming. When I see capable people doing amazing stuff on the Internet, very often I feel I’m not worth of what people think I am. Occasionally I thought it’s because I’m shy and I’m usually not comfortable fully expressing my thoughts. In other occasions I’m simply not patiently enough to argue otherwise.

But it’s not just me. A lot of people are experiencing the same feeling and I’m starting to realize that I may be suffering from the imposter syndrome. After all, after so many years my personality has changed a lot. I’m no longer shy. I’m much more confident than I was. And I’m also a more capable person so I deserve a better life. It doesn’t feel right to be satisfied with what I’m getting. I’m better than that!

Meeting with people confirms that. There are a lot of people pretending to be expert in something and it seems they are enjoying quite a lot, although I can spot right on that they’re not what they believe they are. They’re not ashamed, why should I feel bad for myself? I’m much better a person than those real imposters, of course I deserve better things!

It’s more than a year since I wrote a blog post last time. A lot has happened during the past year. After years of depressing research career, I’ve published in a good conference and successfully defended my PhD. I’ve started working (again) in the industry. I’ve also found a long term direction that should keep me busy in the next five years. We’ve also got our foothold in Luxembourg, although there remains a lot to complete, it’s a good starting point. I’ll try to blog more often about what’s happening in my life, just to keep track of my thoughts and experiences, so that I can look back to them later and say “boy, I didn’t know I was so naïve a while ago.”

I’ve also updated my blog theme and fixed the HTTPS issue with WordPress and Cloudflare: I only needed to install the CloudFlare Flexible SSL plugin and enable “Automatic HTTPS Rewrites” on Cloudflare. Now the website feels more responsive and neater. That’s a good starting point to (re)start blogging!

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More beautiful than you’d thought

Two videos today. The first one: Real Beauty Sketches (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XpaOjMXyJGk).

We all get used to the good parts of ourselves and often get trapped in the parts that we don’t like about ourselves. However, others may not view you the same way as you do. Things you hate may be the favorite of another. In a different eye you are more beautiful than you think you are.

And the second one: Information management as an organization on Yabroad.com (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=l3IogtSHVR0).

I didn’t know I could make a video relatively smoothly with much confidence. But I made it. It sounds not bad. I’m confident when talking about things I know and familiar of. I’m not afraid of getting my voice heard. On those occasions when I’m reluctant to speak out, it’s not because of I’m afraid I have a horrible voice or my English is not interpretable. But now I know my voice is more than OK and so is my English. I just need a little confidence on the contents when I start to speak. I may do more of these in the future, but probably with a script before rolling the camera. 🙂

 

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判断机制

ifanr上看到一篇文章里面这样一句话,觉得很有意思:

蒙洛迪诺说,人做判断的时候有两种机制:一种是”科学家机制”,先有证据再下结论;一种是”律师机制”,先有了结论再去找证据。

在不同的场合,不同的时机,同一个人也可能会采用不同的判断方式。但我觉得我自己和大多数人更倾向于使用“律师机制”,不信?看我去找找证据……

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像孩子一样委屈

常说随着孩子越长越大,父母会越来越像孩子,这话一点都不假。回国之前母亲常在电话里缠着我给她讲我每天周遭的事情,有时候她还会小孩子般的耍耍无赖。现在回来了,跟母亲在一起,发现老人真的是越长越像孩子。

昨天母亲做了一桌丰盛的饭菜,其中有一盘鱼,结果她吃了一口就不小心被鱼刺卡住了喉咙。喝醋无效之下我陪她去了医院,医生让她张嘴放松以便检查鱼刺位置,但是她却一直很紧张。我看着她紧张而无助,医生一次次提高嗓门让她放松,却不知道怎么安慰她。

今天晚上批评她做事的方式,我说话的方式不对,说得她闷闷不乐的,让我也不知如何是好。

大人跟孩子的关系果真是马上就要颠倒了,一些东西,它怎么来就怎么走。小时候收到了关爱呵护,现在需要同样返还;彼时付出了心血,也适时回收了。

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People don’t remember acronyms

I created a website for the project I’m working on and also filled in relevant information for it. The project has a acronym of “CIER“, which I put on the website as “Communication Infrastructure for Emerging Regions”. After I delivered it to my colleagues, my manager, and the project partners, everyone seemed to be OK with that. However when I looked back and went unsure about it; I remembered coming up with the full name when I just wanted to put something/anything there, without looking up the project documents… And when I checked them again later on, I was wrong. The full project name is “Converged Infrastructure for Emerging Regions” instead. I corrected it, and still feeling funny about it. My manager had found one of my typos mistaking “funding agency” for “founding agency”, however he didn’t notice the acronym error I’d made, and neither did anyone else. Most people don’t remember acronyms correctly when they’re not used very often, AFAIK.

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Chinese characters

When I woke up this morning I tried to remember how to write a very simple Chinese character: “本”, it’s probably one of the most commonly used characters in Chinese — yet it’s took me a while to remember how to write it. Though it’s not the first time I experienced this, it’s still a bit embarrassing. I don’t believe it’s totally because of the fact that I’m not using Chinese much in my daily life, but rather I think it’s because of the fact that I’m using computers everyday and have no chance of practice writing Chinese. I remember not being able to write some characters even back in China…

Someone says on mitbbs.com that people tend to forget how to use non-native languages when they grow old. Well, I only hope I’m still able to communicate with others in one language — whichever language it is.

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No more Chinese

So this is it — I’ve decided not to write in Chinese anymore here on my website. Reasons being:

1. I need to practise English. The other day after an interview I was going to Jorvas with the interviewer.

He said, “Your English is good, better than most Chinese I’ve interviewed”.

I smiled, “I heard of the saying that when one is complimented that his English is good, it means he’s still not so good compared with native speakers”.

“That’s true.”

Then I explained, “My English isn’t as good as you’ve just seen; but I’m not afraid of speaking out and making mistakes; I don’t really like to hang out with Chinese either. I’m now in a foreign environment and I need to take advantage of this. Spending all days with a bunch of Chinese makes me feel like I’m still in China. And by the way, I’m not much a fan of China.”

Again I complimented him, “”Are you a Swedish-speaking-Finn? ‘Cause most Finns I’ve met don’t seem interested in Swedish — you talked to me in Swedish during the interview.”

“No, my mother tongue is Finnish. Most Finns study Swedish in school and they seldom find it useful. For me I go to Stockholm quite often and I’ve worked there for quite a period, so I got practising Swedish everyday with the Swedes.”

So that’s my point. Practice makes perfect.

2. I want to help the one I love with her English. I believe she is the only one seriously following my blog. She has read every single entry I posted here. By switching the language it may remind her keeping practising English.

3. I don’t have Chinese input in most of my OS’s. English is ubiquitous.

That was the preface. (*Long* preface as always, huh?)

Back to the interviewer I  mentioned above. I met him again the other day in the restaurant. He looked at my ID badge and said, “Now you just started here and I’m leaving the company.”

“Where are you going?”

“I’m going to a start-up.”

I was surprised, “What kind of company are you starting up?”

“No, I’m not starting up my own company. I’m working with others.”

He told me their idea, sounds pretty promising. I was still surprised. Leaving a Chief Scientist position sounds like crazy for me. But I admire his courage. People do think differently.

This evening I was just opening my door and going cooking, when the girl across the hall opened her door at the same time. I said hi and she nodded back.

“By the way,” she went in and came out again, holding “The Epoch Times”, “is this your magazine? ‘Cause it’s Chinese.”

“No… But it’s kinda ‘illegal’ newspaper from the perspective of Chinese government.”

I took the newspaper and found here room number and my name written on it.

“Shit, where the hell did they get my name, and why they put her address.” I said to myself.

It was my first time talking talking with her and it turns out she’s planning to visit Beijing during the Christmas this year. She booked the ticked today and she wanted to go there because she “hates Christmas and the church”. She’s from Germany and has been here for several years. She first came to Finland as an high school exchange student and then got enrolled in the university.

“But I’m not really studying here. I’m working in a day-care and I’m transfering to the University of Amsterdam by the end of June. I have to study Dutch now.”

“But isn’t Dutch quite close to German?”

“Yes but I have to be as fluent as the native. I was studying Chinese but now I have to give my time to Dutch.”

I was surprised, again. Here when you talk to people you will aways be surprised, they always have something you’ve never thought of. She said two sentences in Chinese, not bad at all.

“I hope I can speak some Chinese when I arrive at Beijing.”

That may be one of the reasons why Chinese are so lagged behind. We talk too much but don’t know how to turn the big plans into actions. I’m ashamed of that.

Now I have two more reasons for not using Chinese anymore:

4. It’s much easier to record my daily life using English. I don’t have to translate everything into Chinese, which is really a pain in the ass.

5. English looks better with my current website template.

That’s it.

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新玩具

最近在公司做毕设,每天早上坐四十多分钟的公交车出城。在车上百无聊赖,于是在亚马逊上买了个新玩具,三星galaxy tab。看着像平板,用着也像,但其实它是个手机……一个七寸的巨型手机……上班的时候可以打打电话,看书,玩游戏打发时间。没有实体键盘确实不太好用,不过用习惯之后应该就好了。百度手机输入法还不错,现在差不多可以盲打了,这段话就是在新玩具上写出来的……

我出手的时间似乎很好,因为刚才看了下,竟然又涨了五十英镑……

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博客转移

今天把博客转移到这个站点了,因为以前的博客太像个博客了,不专业,不符合我爱装B的个性。于是就转移到这里了。

以前的博客已经不可访问(当然我自己是可以的),那个博客会显示站点已经转移,指向现在的网站。

估计这几天还得折腾这个东东。

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首页上线

捣鼓了两三天,总算把自己这个域名的首页建好了,结束了长达四个月没有像样首页的状态。

首页用Joomla!系统管理,主要列出了我做过的项目和一些小玩意,目的只是为了展示自己,当然自己有几斤几两我是十分清楚的。所以请看过之后不必对我表示鄙视或者仰慕,但是如果有建设性的意见,我一定会欣然接受的。

Joomla!系统总体来说还是很不错的,容易上手,而且开源且支持扩展。目前来说易用性还有可改进的地方,但相信不久就会有相应的更新或者扩展来让它更加好用。

最近还在上瑞典语课,但这几天感觉没有什么进步,一直在复习以前学过的内容,而且课程组织的也没有上个月的好,甚至可以说是杂乱无章。我基本不知道现在在学习什么内容,比较痛苦的是现在词汇量还没有跟上,发音也没有系统的巩固。

中午在地铁站碰见上个月教我瑞典语的老太太,她上来第一句寒暄我就没有听懂。厚着脸皮说了句“Ursäkta?”老太太只好无奈的换成英文问候。

知不足而后进,所以这个周末我要好好补习一下,争取能有长足进展。

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Introduction

Daoyuan LiHello, my name is Daoyuan Li and I’m currently a researcher at Ericsson Research NomadicLab in Finland. My research areas include Wireless Mesh Networks, Wireless Sensor Networks, Delay Tolerant Networks, and Prototyping.

I got a Master of Science (Technology) degree  in August 2011 from Helsinki University of Technology (TKK, merged into Aalto University since January 1st, 2010) in Finland. I also hold a Master of Science degree from Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Sweden, since I studied there from August 2009 to July 2010, as an exchange master student in Erasmus Mundus NordSecMob Program.

I got my bachelor’s degree in Software Engineering in July 2009 from Jilin University in China. During the four years there, I focused on Software Engineering, algorithms and data structures, databases, compiling principles and programming languages, operating systems and computational mathematics and so on.

I’m familiar with network protocols like TCP/IP and routing protocols such as OSPF, IS-IS, RIP, BGP and so on. I have a good knowledge of both CISCO and Juniper routers and bridges. I’m good at programming, especially in C/C++ and Java. I also like using bash scripts and I’m very familiar with the architecture and usage of GNU/Linux systems.

In my spare time I enjoy reading novels. Dream of the Red Chamber (In Chinese: 红楼梦) is my favorite novel. I also like Dan Brown, One Hundred Years of Solitude, and Pride and Prejudice. I like to take photos, too. I’m also a regular blogger, and you can find my blog here, but the earlier entries are mainly written in Chinese. My other interests are travelling, cycling and swimming.

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心烦意乱

对着电脑发一下午呆的生活

我早已习惯

脑子有时一片空白

有时塞满各种稀奇古怪的想法

讨厌这种状态

却不知如何改变

·

没有信仰

没有目标

没有动力

没有行动

一无所有

如行尸走肉

·

害怕前方的路途

却无力为明天准备干粮

让孤独寂寞笼罩自己

却连放声呼唤的气力都没有

让我堕落

让我沉沦

·

那些不甘呢

它们都在现实的侵蚀下荡然无存了吗

那些期待的目光呢

你忍心让他们一次又一次失望?

·

可是那些残忍的现实

和虚伪的人们

以及我们致命的虚荣

都让我窒息

让我直不起身

抬不起头

那些炫目的光芒

早已不属于我

甚至它们从未属于过我

那些过往

总是让我揪心不止

·

灵魂已被抽干

思绪无限混乱

如果生活是小说多好

不用担心那些琐碎

不用怀疑上天的恩赐

那个世界不乏正义

只是那里没有我

·

听着音乐

莫名的想放声大哭

也行我已经站在崩溃的边缘

有谁能推我一把

或者

拉我一把

也行

 

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斗志哪儿去了

最近越来越觉得自己活得失败了,没有梦想,没有目标,没有动力,昏昏噩噩,每天如梦游一般。

可悲的是这种状态已经保持了很久了,一年多以来没有任何改观。

从被录取开始,就不知道朝着哪个方向去奋斗,但Fight is not
over,我却像癔病的斗士,龟缩在战壕炮坑。

当初出来时曾短暂的踌躇满志过,但那种状态持续的时间比昙花开放的时间还要短。

知道自己意志薄弱,经不起风浪,却偏要装作一副无畏者的样子。

明知道内心的伤痛只有自己才能抚平,却满心幻想有人来为我解铃。

耳旁响起Viva La
Vida,听着歌词发愣,无尽沧桑不禁涌上心头。

突然想起离开时曾引用老毛的诗来激励自己,“男儿立志出乡关,学不成名誓不还。”

也行现在应该用下面的两句来勉励自己了:“埋骨何须桑梓地,人生何处不青山。”

不能每天沉浸在过去中不能自拔,不要去想过去的是与非。

过去了就过去了,不要活在自己的阴影下。

Move on。

 

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想得太多,乱了分寸

昨天竟然做梦了,做了梦今天竟然还能回忆起来,真邪门了。

事情是这样的:梦见自己找到护照了,它就藏在我翻了N遍地牛仔裤兜里。它还在梦里说,喏,我一直就在这儿,耍得你够呛吧!当然,我在梦里也知道自己是在做梦,否则事情就太荒谬了。而且我还隐约记得自己无奈的笑了,至于有没有说“你唬谁呢”就不得而知了。

从来不做梦,好容易做个梦,梦到的却是护照而不是某个美女,这让我感觉太失败了。

不过这个梦也证实了“日有所思夜有所梦”,为了能在以后的日子中多梦见美女,我每天得多想美女、美女和美女,而不是什么破护照。

当然,这样的事情想的再多也于事无补。空想也许能给人一点动力,但若是无边无际的空想,也会让人不知所措。

很多事情不是自己能决定的,所以不要刻意去探究出个所以然。就像看Lost一样,在结局之前你可以有自己天马行空的想象和近乎完美的解释,可是编剧不会按你的思路出牌。不管你多在意某些细节,你都不能左右事情的发展趋势和最终结果。

就是这样。

 

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