Marhaba a final time from Istanbul.  Our troops are all at their destinations we hope not too much the worse for wear.  Except perhaps for Andrew’s suitcase which an enterprising parent used to put out a spectacular lithium battery fire at the next table.  Sounds strange, but the battery flamed out and since Andrew was leaving early and had his suitcase at our prep table, she grabbed it and smothered the fire.  We’re hoping  Harry has film of it for a real high lite film.  Andrew was actually compensated for it by the Robo folks.

They conducted themselves marvelously, making friends along the way and  absorbing as much of Istanbul as possible, especially the food.  Harry comes from a place in China where they are weaned on fire, so nothing was too spicy for him.  They all tried new things  in the markets and at the dinner table.  A serious group of trenchermen and woman.

This the ninth group of students that we have taken overseas and we have never had a a more congenial, cooperative, and cheerful bunch.  They were a delight at social sessions and at the dinner table.

Groups in a restaurant are usually problematic at best–not this one.  They were phenomenal from beginning to end.  They have all crossed the cultural humor barrier; eg they got our jokes and looked for the humor in things.

A few words about the competition itself.  Our kids had clearly not encountered the experience, skill and competition a world class event provides.  I talked with coaches from England who said their teams had the same problem.  There simply aren’t enough good teams in America and England to prepare us.  But, we return four members of this team who learned an enormous amount and are eager to go to Mexico City next year.  I would urge that we do home and home matches with Mercersburg Academy, the other team from the US there.

In terms of equipment, there was a serious problem.  The sensor we were sold by a Chinese manufacturer was one which reacted to a continuous signal system instead of a pulsating one.  This put our kids at a real disadvantage.  The same company sold a sensor to the Chinese teams which did respond to the pulsating ball.

Our kids explained this to me without complaining.  And this was their attitude throughout.  They did the right thing in always trying to win.  For them it really is how you play the game not whether you win or lose.  Their conduct was irreproachable and admirable.

Bruce Buckland NMH ’76  was at the competition and had dinner with all of us.  He and his wife were tremendously impressed with our kids.  He was NMH’s first computer hacker when it wasn’t even a rule.  He has since developed his own computer companies and I think is very eager to help our kids.

All of us connected with the event came away with a wonderful experience.
Dick and Louise

PS.  Andrew is putting together a photo album.

In answer to our queries this morning about the performances last night at the Junior Robotics Party, the students’ best description was, “It was like the InternationalCarnival with robots!”

Also, the Dance Division Robots performed!  (No belly dancers, alas!)

Today is the last day of the competitions; Andrew leaves late this afternoon for summer school at UPenn and the others are looking forward to sleeping in tomorrow morning and then coming down to Sultanahmet, the Old Town of Istanbul, with us.

Our friends, Joann and Bruce Buckland (NMH ’76) arrived yesterday and will come out to the Expo Center today to cheer on our troops.  Bruce was one of the original geeks at NMH in the early days of computers and now has his own computer company.

The Koreans were justifiably proud this morning, as they had just heard that the Winter Olympics for 2018 will be held in Korea.  Brian Han’s dad was part of the presentation group in Durban, South Africa, and had called Brian with the good news.

Cheers,
Louise and Dick

And the learning continues at Robotics, International!

Today we made some great people connections.  We have settled into a routine where we all have a luscious breakfast together here at the hotel at 8 a.m.; we head off to the Expo Center and after the first competition, Dick and I take a taxi to a grocery store and get the makings for lunch.  (The first day eating at the cafeteria was expensive and greasy…imagine the food you get on the freeway in the USA.)  We all meet at NOON of thereabouts for a picnic lunch of bread (today it was still warm) and cheese and borek (or other Turkish specialties) and yogurt and fruits and the now necessary baklava.  The students then have another session at 2:15 and then another at 5 p.m.

Today their partner teams were from Germany and from Japan so the communication was not as easy, but they still shared ideas and strategies and did better than they had yesterday.  They competed against teams from Portugal (the best they have met so far) and Singapore and Brazil.  Then tonight they were off to a Junior Robotics Party at an Amusement Park where they had free access to all of the rides and junk food and even a basketball court, where Yifei played a pickup game against a Turkish father of 7!

They all reported having had a great time and having met lots of interesting kids.
Dick and I, too, met interesting folks today.

As we were setting up for lunch this noon, I heard an Australian accent nearby and so, of course, went over to chat!  The speaker turned out to be an Aussie from Melbourne who until 2005 taught there with Elly Ackland (a very good friend of ours who was an exchange teacher in the US in the early 2000′s and whom Charlie and Gina will remember fondly!)  He, the speaker, Greg Hunter has since moved to England where he teaches Physics at Stonyhurst and had brought his Robotics team, who like us, were finding the learning curve steep.  He said that, unfortunately, there is simply no competition at this level in the US or in England, so the only place to truly learn and grow is in the international arena.

Just to underscore the level of performance here, Dick and I also met a man from NASA today who was here simply to observe and see what was new.  He said that many of the observors are professionals who realize that the threshold of knowledge is here at the International competitions among students; the professionals come, he confessed, to learn what is in the forefront in the world of Robotics!

Cheers,
Louise and Dick from Istanbul

WOW…our kids realize that they are well and truly in the Big Leagues here having played in the Minor League before!  We are in a group of 24 teams and each team plays with partners; each combined team has three contests every day.

So, our team was playing today with the Chinese team who won the competition last year…fortunately, we get their points and our points and the teams work collaboratively which has been great for us, as they have more experience as well as much more and better equipment.  For instance, we have two robots and they have eight, so they can always sub in when one of their robots gets “tired.”  They also have lots and lots of spare parts, so when the wheels get a little slow because of the fuzz from the playing field, they can change wheels.

The games are played on a pingpong table size field carpeted with pool table material, so the fuzz is easily accumulated.  Even though our team is a bit discouraged by their results, they realize how much they are learning.  The Chinese collaboration today was especially useful, as we have four Chinese native speakers and the two Koreans on our team are taking Chinese at NMH, so they could communicate most effectively for which the Chinese team was very grateful.  Interestingly, one of the members of the Chinese team goes to Choate!

The NMH team is quite philosophical about their losses and are improving with every game.

Off to a Turkish dinner and an earlier night tonight, as we were up last night until well after midnight as the team worked on the programming of the robots and were up and at breakfast early to get to the Venue in time for practice.

Marhaba to all,
Louise and Dick for the HOGGER ROBOTICS TEAM

We spent most of the day being impressed by the “creations” of our kids and the other competitors. Our team is both inspired and intimidated by what they saw in the demonstrations in the humanoids in the senior division this morning.  The goal for the soccer division (in which our kids are competing) is to have a robot team able to beat a human professional team (World Cup caliber) by 2050!  With what we saw today, we are betting on 2020!

It’s almost 9:30 p.m. and they are still at it over at the convention center which is an easy 15 Lira taxi ride away.  Dick and I just did a “treat run” and picked up baklava and chips (sweet and salt) for rewards.  They are frustrated that the compass in their robots seems not to be functioning as they had hoped but they are nothing if not imaginative and tenacious.

The Robo Cops won’t let Dick and me in close to the “work center tables” to which each group is assigned, as no mentors are allowed inside the ropes…but we can watch from about 10 feet away and call in encouraging messages. (I am always grateful to have been a highschool cheerleader.)  It’s too funny that we aren’t allowed inside the ropes to coach, as if we could!

The Center opens tomorrow at 7:30, so we will have an early breakfast at the hotel at 6:30 and head over for more work and practice time before the competitions start tomorrow afternoon.

The breakfast buffet here is extraordinary…four tables of food including lots of fresh fruits, breads and pastries, eggs to order, yogurt, tomatoes, cucumbers, peppers, olives (eight kinds), pickled preserves and sweet preserves and dried figs and apricots and dates, and for those unadventurous types (who do NOT include our kids) dry cereal!

Cheers,
Louise

Greetings from Super-geek-land (I use the term in awe and respect) aka Robocup 2011.  I have never seen such diversity;  everything from ten year olds with coke bottle glassed to covered Muslim girls, to some bearded  dudes who could easily pass for faculty. The eight of us arrived at various times on Monday July 4.  The conference schedule had been altered so that Tuesday was essentially a free day which we used to tour Sultanahmet, the old city.  This included visits to the Blue Mosque, Rustem Pasha mosque, and the Cerebatan Cistern.  We took in the Egyptian Spice Bazaar as well and walked and walked and walked!

The students checked out the Grand Bazaar without getting hopelessly lost (no mean feat.)  They have proved to be a friendly, cheerful and resourceful group.  They needed all of this to face our first major trauma.  Harry was bringing all their robots  and Qatar Airlines lost his luggage.  After many promises and trips to the airport it showed up at 200Pm today (Wednesday)  in time for our experts to get it all set up for the competition which starts Thursday at 930AM.    They held their anxieties in check  and are hard at working their stuff out as I write.  They (and we) have been amazed at the robotic creations we have already seen.

Minor trauma:  Brian left his glasses in a taxi and there’s been no sign of them. The biggest problem was that he had only very dark prescription sunglasses and is virtually blind without glasses.  We found a “glasses shop” where he got them “read” by an optometrist; he was back in the land of the sighted with new glasses in less than four hours.  A Turkish friend of ours, helped us get the original price reduced.  Meanwhile,  Kelsey has showed herself to be a devastating bargainer, much to the dismay and delight of the bazaar shopkeepers.  Brian did well with this also.  And, the kids are making friends everywhere they go with their open, appreciative manners.  They already love Turkish tea and are up to four glasses a day;  the shop-keepers say that 20 glasses is an average consumption.

Our accommodations are convenient and sufficient.  Turkish food is as good as always. Keep your lucky charms out for our troops tomorrow.

Regards to all,
Dick and Louise

The NMH robotics club was invited to participate in the  2011 international RoboCupJunior competition in Istanbul, Turkey, thanks to the group’s top place finish at the New York-New Jersey Regional RoboCupJunior. The international competition is from July 5-11.

The club won two of three categories at the regional event (the students chose not to enter the robot dance portion of the competition) after building and programing three autonomous robots. On Sunday, Jinsoo Andrew Byun ’12, Kelsey Deng ’11, Yifei Gao ’13, SooBin Brian Han ’12, Jianfu Jeff Liu ’11, Zeyu Harry Zeng ’12, left for Turkey to test their robots at the international level.

The students are now traveling with Dick and Louise Schwingel in Istanbul and sending updates along the way. Keep checking back for more news from abroad!