Like I mentioned in the previous entry, /me has been in Spokane (Washington State) to attend a workshop. I will try to keep this entry pretty short but fill them up with photographs, so that you get a better picture of what happened:

Accommodation was perfect – ambience of Montvale Hotel, apart from pretty good food in The Catacombs, was something that impressed almost every participant. Lecture sessions and hands-on sessions were organized in such a way that none was left out – beginners as well as advanced students. /me is very happy as they started right from the basics and each lecture built on the previous one, with hands-on sessions (room full of Ubuntu machines, yay) letting us work on what we learnt – nifty. Lecture Hall itself was artistically pleasing and more than once, I felt as though I was watching a drama, with people on and off the stage being the artists (venue was CenterStage, a theatre located few steps from Montvale Hotel). Food was great and I was pleasantly surprised to see many veggie stuff on the menu everyday. A short, half-day, trip to Institute of Shock Physics (Washington State University, Pullman) was interesting – we got to see some major labs, a tour of the campus with Chris (we did see Cougars practicing for their game against Stanford – we later learnt that Cougars won the game. Now you know who were responsible for it!) Poster Session and Farewell Social were great too. This five day workshop gave us plenty of opportunity to interact with instructors, fellow participants, learn quite a lot about their research interests/activities and meet Dr. Neil Ashcroft. Some of us may have felt at home being in company of known people but so did everyone else – including those who travelled all the way from South Africa and India.

And /me, as usual, had fun and quite a lot of it – learnt a new program, revised lot of theory that goes behind it, talked (a lot) to fellow participants, learnt some useful information about design of interstate highways and aviation,… Needless to mention, I shot plenty of pictures too – making me the the official paparazzi of this workshop Now, the pictures…

Montvale Hotel entrance, in the wee hours of the day…

Interiors of Montvale Hotel

CenterStage

CenterStage Theatre

Hands-on Session in CenterStage

Hands-on Session in CenterStage

On the way to Pullman, WA

On the way to Pullman, WA

Visiting labs in Institute of Shock Physics @ WSU, Pullman

One for the records… in front of Institute of Shock Physics @ WSU

Institute of Shock Physics @ WSU

WSU Cougars practicing for their upcoming game against Stanford…

Poster Session in CenterStage

Poster Session in CenterStage

Farewell Social in CenterStage

Farewell Social in CenterStage

Farewell Social in CenterStage

Another one for records… in CenterStage with Prof. Ashcroft

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Farewell Dinner in CenterStage

Celebrating one of the participant’s birthday… in CenterStage

Rest of the pictures are in my gallery. And now that the workshop is done and there are over 48 hours before /me should be in Portland (Oregon), we (Wil Slough and yours-truly) have planned some exotic adventures in the Pacific Northwest. Be sure to check out the next entry for nicer pictures…