Boston 2009

This is my first time to Boston, the beginning of America. The brief history is that the revolution of early settlers began here against the British colonialist at the time. It was a bunch of people living in Boston Commons, who held radical views of freedom, that banded together and stood up to the military authorities at the time. Today, Boston is full of history...and oysters.

In fact, Charlene and I are here for the Psychophysiological Society annual meeting. This is the 50th anniversary of the conference and there was much to celebrate. This was my first time to attend this conference, and I was a little unsure of what to expect. Of course, this is not a neuroscience conference, so I did not expect to see the usual crowd. But to my surprise, I actually met a lot of old friends here. A bunch of people from the cognitive aging group, some people from Singapore, some friends from Japan, and a lot of people from Illinois! It felt good that this conference was, to me, more about meeting people than it was explicitly about the posters and talks, although some of those were interesting.

Back to the oysters. Have I ever told you that Boston oysters (which are actually mostly from Maine or at least, further out at sea and are so technically not from Boston), are awesome? You can taste the sea in them. Basically, you should eat these raw. Don't even bother with the lemon, and don't drown yourself in oysters. Have a few, like 3 or 4. And stop. And let the ocean water that was sucked up by the oysters cleanse your body as it permeates your mouth. Seriously, that's really what its like.

Fortuitously, we also met an old Singaporean friend who brought us to an awesome place farther out from Boston (Chung Shin Yuan) for the best bowl of 牛肉面, 豆漿 and 油條 that I have had in a long time.

And now...back home! Yay!