Some Thoughts on Math and 7-11 pt.7

To those who know me, I'm thought of as someone who is at very worst, pretty decent at math.  However, I don't personally care much for the topic, especially after taking calculus, I lost all sense of its importance on my daily life.  For this reason, I'm going to talk about math, but more specifically numbers.  In particular, 7 and 11 will be the topic of these next two posts.
The two numbers 7 and 11 are the only two numbers in the English language that rhyme without use of prefixes like "twenty" or "negative" and don't end with "teen".  In addition, they are both prime numbers, which I will define as positive numbers with only 2 factors, namely 1 and them.  Now, as the mathematical implications of the number 11 and other numbers similarly formed of all ones is more interesting, I will focus my attention on the number 7 first.
At a purely mathematical level, the number 7 is largely inconspicuous besides its seat as a single digit prime number.  One interesting point mathematically about the number 7 is that its inverse, 1/7, is equal to .142857 repeating.  If you notice, pairwise those numbers are 2*7, 4*7, and (8*7 +1).  2/7 is equal to .285714 repeating or 4*7,(8*7+1),2*7.  It changes a little bit after that but that's not really all too important and personally I lose interest after 2/7.
In any case, regardless of the mathematical interest level of the number 7, humans have been fascinated by it since as long as we can remember.  It pops up in so many places that it simply cannot be coincidence.  However, there is no definitive reason why exactly so many cultures and belief systems from the Romans to Christians to Japanese customs see the importance in the number 7.  For a compilation I found when searching "lucky 7" on google, this link does pretty well at showing just how many cultures and different systems see how important the number 7 is.  Also, interestingly enough, a convex heptagon or 7 sided polygon is the first shape to have 2 distinct "star" shapes that look like this:

and this:

If you're being really anal, you'll notice they aren't perfect.  Well, screw you, drawing perfect heptagons is hard, it's not like I had a tool on hand to make them; making the diagonals is worse.  So if you have anything to say concerning how accurately I drew those, just don't say it.  In any case, 11's up next and will not have any obnoxious pictures to draw.  See you then....or maybe not.

--CsMiREK

Some thoughts on Hong Kong

Phew, that last post was really long.  It's pretty unlikely my posts will be that long in the future.  Anyways, this time I'm talking about my thoughts of Hong Kong from being here 3 weeks now.  Well, throughout my stay I'd like to describe Hong Kong as a land of 3 things: 7-Eleven, shopping, and food.  For this post I'll be tackling 7-Eleven.
I'd like to begin this by saying that Hong Kong has an inordinate number of 7-Elevens, just absolutely ridiculous.  Now I'll give you some history on 7-Eleven, fun right?  For a brief, 7-Eleven started in the US but eventually got bought by a company in Japan where it has the largest number of stores, even more than Hong Kong.  For your information, Japan has 12,349 7-Elevens with 1,557 in Tokyo alone, according to Wikipedia.  Hong Kong has over 711 7-Elevens meaning, if you were paying attention 2 posts ago, there is on average at least one 7-Eleven per square mile in Hong Kong since the total area is 426 square miles.  I'd like to say that that's probably not true but at the same time, there are sometimes 7-Elevens across the street from each other.  To give you an idea of how many there are, I created a composite picture of most of the 7-Elevens I saw from 5/26-6/6 which is at the end of this post.  Part of the reason why there are so many 7-Elevens is that pretty much every MTR station has at least one 7-Eleven.  However, even though there are so many 7-Elevens, what saddened me was that not all of them have Slurpees and being an American, that saddens me somewhat, although quite frankly I'm not sure why.  Anyways, here's the picture.

So, if you don't want to count, that's 10 7-Elevens in that picture, all of them are from different stores.  Interestingly enough, if you look closely at the times in the pictures, you'll see that two of them were taken only 2 minutes apart from each other.  Sadly, there was actually another 7-Eleven close by that I didn't take a picture of, but I think that that proves my point sufficiently.  I think that's all for this post.  It's a lot shorter than the last one but that's just fine.  Anyways, I'm taking a break from Hong Kong posting for the next few but the next Hong Kong post will be on shopping.

--CsMiREK

Hong Kong pt2

Ok, I was totally planning to have this post up yesterday, but I got sidetracked.  Anyways, this is the next Hong Kong post from me.  I didn't mention last time but in Hong Kong I'm staying with my uncle, now doesn't that tell you something about me?  I'll update the round 1 page with new clues when necessary.  As an apology for the late post, I'll be putting up another post right after this with more stuff, and a picture to boot.
So, this time I'll be talking about transportation and international travel as stated in the last post.  As far as transportation in Hong Kong, there are quite a few options.  Obviously, as in all major cities walking is the best way to get from point A to point B when the distance is short.  On that note, if you do plan to go to Hong Kong, make sure you have comfortable shoes, you'll probably end up walking a lot and uncomfortable shoes are a bad idea.  Also, as in the US, there are quite a few cars on the roads for most of the day....including late at night; expect loud nights.  If you're like me and don't like the sounds of cars in the middle of the night, bring earplugs.  When talking about public transportation there are 2 options, the MTR and bus.  The bus operates as you'd expect it to so there's not much to talk about.
MTR stands for Mass Transit Railway and is the subway system that pretty much holds up all of Hong Kong.  There are a multitude of stops, I'll show a map at the end of the post, that take you pretty much to any place in Hong Kong minus a few places.  Now, there are two methods of payment for the MTR, tickets and the octopus card.  Tickets are as expected, you buy one with the route you'll take and you pay.  The octopus card however is a different story.  For those unaware, the octopus card is like a debit card that can be used at all MTR stations and multiple other places.  It carries an RFID(Radio Frequency ID) chip inside it that allows scanners read data on it easily.  This expedites travel since you don't have to buy a special ticket every single time you take the MTR.  In addition, costs between tickets and octopus card actually vary slightly so sometimes it's cheaper to use the octopus card.  Mainly it's just convenient.  I'll have pictures of those at the end too.  Now, it should be noted that the MTR has really high traffic pretty much all day, I'll show a picture at the end as well.  As such, if you don't like getting on crowded trains, stay away from the MTR.  However, it should also be noted that a trip on the MTR is often much cheaper than driving and the wait time is much shorter than for buses.  For example, a trip from Tsuen Wan to Ngau Tau Kok costs $8 HK, exchange rate is roughly 7.75HK : 1USD, so about $1.  So even with all the troubles, including being slower than driving, the MTR is very likely the most used form of transportation in Hong Kong.
Now for a quick note on international travel to Hong Kong.  When taking a flight to Hong Kong, assuming it's the final destination, you have to fill out a card with a bunch of information although I hear on the way back to the US it's much worse.  From SFO or the San Francisco Airport the flight is about 13 hours long so make sure to have something to do or sleep.  On another note, I'll be using EST for most of my times since it's exactly 12 hours different from Hong Kong's time which makes it really easy.  If you don't know, outlets in Hong Kong are not the same as in the US so buy a converter for any electrical appliances you plan on bringing with you.  I believe that's all for international travel...at least for now?  So enjoy some pictures.

This is the MTR map

These are 2 examples of octopus cards

This picture was taken at 8:14 AM EST or 8:14 PM in Hong Kong.  I made it black and white because...well I wanted to, that's all for this post.  Next is on my actual thoughts and not information though you're probably more likely to have already read that one by the time you read this line....oh well.

*note: the ROUND 1 page has changed

--CsMiREK

Hong Kong, an intro...I suppose

So, as I said in my last post, I'm currently in Hong Kong for the summer and as such I'd like to give some initial thoughts.  To those unaware, Hong Kong is a region of China, technically part of it, however is given a special administrative region status or SAR, one of two, the other being Macau.  This means that Hong Kong is essentially another country with autonomous rule.  This can easily be seen in their not having the heavy censorship of internet as in China.  Hong Kong has around 7 million residents packed in an area of 426 square miles, smaller than the smallest US state Rhode Island, and about 6 times the size of Washington DC.  To give a sense of the population density difference, Rhode Island is about 3 times larger yet has about 1/7th the population and the city of DC has about 600,000 people so 6 times the actual size and assume population, and that's still only half the population of Hong Kong.
Onto the weather, during the late spring/summer months it is very humid and quite hot.  Since I've been here, a little over 3 weeks now, it has rained at least once a week and averaged around 76-80 degrees Fahrenheit.  Also, as you might expect of a heavily populated urban area, the air quality is not the best.  If that doesn't sound appealing, come in the winter when average temperatures are significantly lower, but not enough to snow.  According to Wikipedia, a great source for these kinds of things, the average low temperature in January, the coldest month is still a nice 57 degrees Fahrenheit.
Anyways, it's a pretty amazing place, albeit really crowded, and I'll have more posts coming soon.  The next post is on transportation and international travel, for those interested.

--CsMiREK