Advancing Forward

Lama jgk x citer psl perkambangan Aisyah kat nursery. Skang ni everything is getting so much better, pg2 masa tinggal tu dah x nangis, kalo ada pon bunyi merengek sket2 la, so bearable dan tidak lah merobek hati sgt, syukur. Juga dah suka makan lunch menu yg disediakan kat nursery, so all is good. Dia mempunyai minat terhadap things that are on wheels, spt yg kita dah established dia minat sgt trains and car, even carer dia pon catit dia asyik duk main cars and car mat. Even before gi nursery pagi2 sambil breakfast tu dia suka sgt bila 'Chuggington' is on, and I must admit lagu dia pon catchy and cerita dia pon x boring, even aku yg dah tua ni pon ralit gak tgk kartun tu hehe.




Owh and on Monday, she brought home another piece of art work.Diorg buat string painting. Aku dah lama la jgk berhajat nak buat string painting ngan Aisyah, tp weekend lps demam dan mcm2 cerita lg, x terbuat2. On weekdays payah la, sbb schedule aku sendiri pon dah penuh padat. Pastu ada gak terpikir, kot aktiviti ni terlalu advance utk dia punya age group ke? Tau2 dah buat kat nursery. Bagus lah. Aku ni selalu pikir Aisyah ni baby lg, tp hakikatnya dah besar, dah ready utk mcm2 aktiviti. Aku je dok babying her lagi, kesian dia asyik kena undermine :P

A funny note here, carer dia melaporkan yg Aisyah ni suka menyanyi. Kalo aktiviti nyanyi aje dalam group aje, mmg dia enjoy lebih drpd anak mat salleh la agaknya, sampaikan carer dia bole tanya kat Hubs upon picking up Aisyah smlm, 'Does she do a lot of singing and dancing at home? She really enjoys singing in the class!'. Woh, siapa sangka Aisyah ku yg timid dan merengek2 drama bila dijemput Ayah nya itu sbnarnya siap bole nyanyi dlm kelas? Further mensahihkan cerita carer dia lg ialah apabila dah balik drpd nursery pon, Hubs ckp Aisyah ada nyanyi dan joget sorg2, seolahnya mcm ulang balik apa dia belajar kat nursery, tp x sempat nak rakam video nya. Must be mighty cute, tp sayang x dpt nak tgk sendiri. Hehe. And I noticed that ada perkataan2 yg kitaorg belum ajar kat dia, tp dia dah tahu sendiri, like Cup. Looks like the nursery is paying off already!

And smlm jg dpt surat chenta drpd nursery. Intipatinya ialah:



"Aisyah will shortly be moved to the next room (bilik 2 -3 tahun). If you would like to meet with myself or your child's new room leader for an informal meeting, we can arrange a mutually convenient time..."

Wah... dah besar dah anak aku, dah ready utk masuk kelas seterusnya. Ingatkan nak reply surat tu by going in to nursery esok and talk to Sam (the keyperson) herself, sbb ingatkan nak cari waktu yg aku lapang sket, and kalo bole x nak force pindah kelas ni lg on Aisyah, tunggu lps aku balik Barcelona ke. Ye la, takut la budak tu will have too much to deal with, mana nak bercerai susu lg, kena tinggal Ibu lg, plak nak ditambah dgn isu perpindahan kelas dan separate dgn kawan2 dkt kelas yg ada skang ni. X psl2 added stress je kan...

Rupanya hape, hari ni aku call Hubs tanya psl update Aisyah post-pick up at nursery, Hubs kata Aisyah dah transfered masuk kelas 2-3 years hari ni. Hubs dtg2 jemput je budak tu dah happy settling in, elok je duk main tolak2 pram dgn 2,3 org lagi budak baya dia dlm kelas tu. Sket pon x nangis. Hubs ingatkan aku yg arrange suh tukar kelas cpt2, so dia x tanya byk. Haha..

I guess I am a tad bit too paranoid about the whole thing. Turns out it was no big deal pon pada dia, in fact Aisyah lg sukeeee kelas baru. Maybe sbb budak2 nya lebih aktif drpd kelas sebelum ni. Again, kesian kena undermine ngan aku lg huhu. Kelas 2-3 years ni bingit sket, and lebih ramai budak2nya, tp majoriti dah pandai bercakap, berbanding ngan kelas dulu tu, sonyapppp aje. Ye la, budak 1-2 tahun kan, yg mulut duk still sumbat pacifier pon ramai lg dlm kelas sebelum ni. Anyway, bila dah ramai yg pandai berckp dlm kelas baru Aisyah ni, hopefully her speech development pon akan ikut accelerate la lps ni. So Nek Mi, Tok Ayah, Ayah Pa, Ayah Su, Mak Tok, Tok Abah, Mak Ude dan Mak Su sila lah bawak keluar kamus BM-BI tu skang ye (just kidding). Lps ni berabuks la si kenit tu bercoleteh in English. Ni pon sejak balik td Hubs kata dah start buat bunyi2 slang omputih, apa dia ckp, x tahu la, tp yg penting, bunyi dah ada haha!

Ni dia budak dah advance satu level. I am so proud of you dear!






And I am proud of myself too. Baru2 nak reti ikat rambut bg symmetrical. Dulu2 asyik bantai lah, senget pon x pe. I never had a sister or niece masa growing up tau, yg bole dibuat sbg my hairstyling guinea pig, so jgn la gelak kalo ponytails pon x centre. Plak budak2 kan, mana nak tadah kepala tu senang2. Mmg bersilat lah nak menyiapkan rambut si Aisyah. Berpeluh2 ketiak sampai, jgn x tahu! The fact that Aisyah punya rambut is curly wurly pon satu jgk, I'm still getting used to styling it, sbb nya my own hair is just the complete opposite!




Dah masuk kelas budak besar sket ni, maybe it's time to potty train, I suppose? Ke tunggu balik Barcelona je la heheh... Barcelona lg... hehe alasan nak tangguh2! Ke unconsciously aku masih lg undermining her? Silap2 dia dah ready utk di potty train x, hmmmm?

Speaking of Barcelona, ni ha, committee dia dah mintak kitaorg isi what project we want to develop and which group do we want to belong to? Basically, spjg kat sana, there will be lectures in the morning, and after lunch kitaorg masuk group masing2 utk bangunkan project yg kitaorg dah agree tu lah. On the final night there will a concert, and every group will perform / present / play their composition. It should be really awesome!

Ada 4 groups: (1) Tangible Interface for Music Representation, (2) Sound & Music Computing Tales, (3) Composition of Realistic and Interactive Soundscape, and (4) Augmented Soundscapes. Yg first two tu mcm x berkenan di hati, tp nya, I am still torn between the two really good projects tu.

Ok, detailed description of the last two projects:

Composition of Realistic and Interactive Soundscape:
The process focus on recording and annotation techniques to compose realistic virtual Soundscape using an MTG system for Soundscape interactive composition. There will be 4 phases: soundscape analysis and recordings, annotations and database creation, virtual soundscape composition, soundscape performance. The students will analyze on-site a target Soundscape, they will define relevant Sound objects, set-up and performs the recordings using shot-gun microphones. Then, in a second phase, they will annotate interesting segment through Sonic Visualiser, creating and preparing the soundscape database. Finally, they will creates the virtual SoundConcepts using the MTG system for Soundscape generation & composition, written in SuperCollider language. In the final performance the student will play the soundscape moving a listener around the virtual space and controlling the soundscape parameters defined during the annotations. The environment recordings will be held in acoustically interesting environment, such as the Cathedral, the Boqueria or St Antoni Marketplace, the Barceloneta beach, the kitchen of the Hostelería Hofmann school, a Factory. Note that when we speak about acoustically interesting environment we means both the sonic properties of the acoustic space (the Cathedral) and the scenographic properties of its actors: the presence of interesting sources producing a notable activity of aesthetically interesting sound events (the Marketplace, the Factory, a huge Kitchen).

Augmented Soundscapes:
The capabilities of portable devices such as current generation mobile phones and media players is still severely limited in terms of computing power and storage space, such that only a subset of today's analysis and synthesis algorithms can be run in realtime. The goal of this workshop is to develop techniques and applications around the concept of augmented soundscapes according to the following assumption: What if we had available now the computing power of current desktop devices in a mobile package? Without the limitations of today's mobile technology, how would we design augmented reality applications? In this workshop we will create augmented soundscapes, starting from recordings of real soundscapes, that will be recorded by the participants during the first day of the workshop workshops. Using realtime machine listening techniques like onset detection, event extraction and segmentation, tempo tracking, etc. we will extract prominent features from real soundscapes. These features will be used to process and recompose the audio material with signal processing techniques such as granular resynthesis, concatenative synthesis, audio mosaicing and spectral modification. The processes to be developed by the participants can include --but are not limited to-- electroacoustic compositions, musically augmented soundscapes, auditory display and data sonification applications, etc. The goal of the workshop is to develop a single particular augmented soundscape in a small group, with the focus of presenting the results in a final concert or interactive performance.

Yg nombor (3) tuh, bunyi mcm best and adventurous skali. It would be very good for me yg x pernah done any professional recordings nih. And it sounded like a lot of fun sbb pusing2 Barcelona to capture the essence of the town. Plus, bole ah test power dlm composition sket. Pastu kalo konfius2 manjang, bole ckp, 'I'm not really a musician!' *dasar pengecut!* Heh. But if there is a time to be stupid and learn, it's now la kan? Although it does sound like a lot of work jg, annotation, then database lagi, and the tutor tu mcm pro-Supercollider, a language that I know of sipi2 sbb awal2 wat PhD dulu ada menyertai kelas tutorial tu selama 8 weeks, but have never gotten down and dirty selain drpd menyiapkan assignment yg diberi.

Yg nombor (4) plak, bunyi agak borrring sket sbb it involves alot of Signal Processing stuff, but to be honest THAT is the heart and core of my PhD project skang. Masa MSc lg dah berkecimpung dlm area ni jgk (audio feature extraction and what not). So it makes all the sense in the world utk masuk group ni kan? But takut area x berkembang la sbb balik2 area yg sama. Plus guek jugak khawatir kalo2 org lain maju ke depan especially bab signal processing tu lah, and guek sorg jek blur2, and they will be like, 'Loh, tadi kan lo bilang td ini bidang lo?'. Kaget la guek nanti haha *dasar tiada keyakinan diri*

Which one ah? Can you guys help me decide? Sbnarnya, mana group pon very intimidating, tp belasah la labu, nama pon belajar :P All advice welcome, and the sooner the better sebab nak register nih. Kang group yg idaman hati tu dah penuh, x guna jgk!