English journal. Gabriel

Journal

Monday 13th, 2009

Today I woke up in my house in the Estado de Mexico, at 4:30 am; I didn’t sleep very well because I was sleepless tonight and could fall asleep just at 3:30 am, and only slept 1 hr.

I went to my faculty early, approximately at 5:20 am, and I arrived there at 7:35 am, 25 minutes before my first class, something very appropriate because it is supposed that I have the opportunity of just 3 delays, and I think I haven’t gone three times to that class!

The name of my first class is Analytical Mechanics, it’s very interesting because in that class we learn mechanics from a new point of view, we begin to work in more abstract spaces, and we don’t use second Newton’s law, instead, we use two different formulations, the Lagrange`s formulation and the Hamilton’s formulation, and many times is easier to solve some problems although at the beginning is difficult to understand that point of view. Today we began to work with Hamilton’s formulation, and at the end we could find a new space where we can define a metric (we can measure distances) and it is more comfortable to work in these kind of spaces instead of a place where we can’t measure distances.

My next class in the day was Introduction to Quantum Physics, and my teacher began to teach us the duality between particles and waves, it is very interesting but at the middle of my class I began to fell asleep, it was horrible because I couldn’t do anything to wake up, and I was sat in front of the teacher.

My Introduction to Quantum physics class finished, and before going to my English class I found a friend and I was talking with her like thirty minutes, then, her boyfriend arrived (he is French), and we talk about their vacations in Oaxaca.

After that thirty minutes I went to my English class, I arrived at 2:35, and I found to Claudia in front of the classroom, we could talk just some minutes because our teacher arrived soon. At the beginning of my English class I was very awake, but with the time I began to fell asleep again, fortunately that lasted just one hour, my fiend Aaraon recommended me going to home, and I did it, but first I went to my Faculty to give back a book in the library, I found a friend, and we went together to home.

I arrived at 9:00 pm at home before sleeping I’m doing this homework, my English teacher gave us the opportunity to give him this until next Friday.

Tuesday 14th, 2009.

Today I woke up at 9:00 am, I took breakfast and I did some homework, I studied something about Complex Analysis, and at 6:00 pm I went to my faculty (Tuesday I usually have just two classes, one of them at 10: 00 am and the other one at 7:00 pm, but I had just the second class, my class of 10:00 pm is Electromagnetism, but our teacher told us that we won’t have class on Tuesday, that’s why I went to school until 7:00 pm. My Complex Analysis class was interesting; we saw a theorem about the complex integral around a closed curve, my teacher gave us a proof of that theorem and used something that he hasn’t shown, and that in real variable isn’t true some times.

After that class I went to home, and slept at 11:00 pm after having explained something to my brother (who is studying high school).

Wednesday 15^th, 2009.

Today, as every Wednesday and Friday, I woke up at 6:00 am, took a bath and went to school. My first class, as every Monday, Wednesday and Friday, was Analytic Mechanics, the teacher told us something nice, he told us that everything that we have learned (about Hamiltonian Mechanics) and everything that we will learn goes beyond the knowledge of every engineer, and that if any of them come to class, he probably wouldn’t understand anything, and would go out walking on the walls, that made me feel special and happy because that means that this is the point where my career becomes more specialized and where the real career of a physicist begins.

After my Analytical Mechanics class I had my Electromagnetism class, we are learning something about electric circuits, but honestly that topic bores me, and I wish we could finish soon. I would like that we could review the Maxwell’s equations deeply, because from my point of view this is the heart of the Electromagnetism class.

In my class of Introduction to Quantum Mechanics we continued reviewing the duality wave – particle, and found that thanks to De Broglie’s intuition, many scientists made experiments where they could proof experimentally the De Broglie’s hypothesis about the wave nature of the electron, I love this topic.

In my English class our teacher made us an exam and gave us the Friday to finish this journal activity. The exam was some kind of lecture comprehension, where we needed to fill some spaces with the correct paragraph of an article in a newspaper.

Finally, at 7:00 pm I had my Complex Analysis class, we reviewed something about vector fields, and their relationships with Complex Analysis and complex numbers.

I arrived at home at 9:00 pm, I talked with my mother and father about my day, we took dinner, and I went to bed at 12:00 am approximately.

Thursday 16^th, 2009.

I woke up at 8:00 am, took a bath and took breakfast, then I prepared a class of basic Algebra for someone who I would give class today, he phoned me yesterday, and told me that he needed Calculus classes for an exam, so, I prepared an Algebra class because I have seen that a lot of people has Calculus problems because they haven’t good knowledge and domain of Algebra. At 2:00 pm I saw that person and gave my class, everything was ok, without any problem, and the class finished at 4:00 pm approximately. Then I studied something about Analytical Mechanics and at 6:00pm I went to my school to take my complex Analysis class. We continued reviewing something about the Cauchy’s theorem, and the class finished quickly. I arrived at home at 8:00 pm, and took dinner, then I studied something about the De Broglie’s postulates, and finally I went to bed at 12:00am.

Friday 17^th, 2009.

I woke up at 8:00 am, I was strangely tired, I took breakfast and went to my faculty, I took my Electromagnetism class, and I met the teacher that will give us the Magnetism part of the course, he continued teaching something about electric circuits with voltage sources and resistances, and we began to study the RC circuit.

In my Introduction to Quantum Physics class our teacher explained us how the wave equation must be modified to fit the results of electron’s diffraction experiments. We saw that the classical wave equation won’t work, and we will review the real wave equation for an electron next class.

My class finished, and I went to home, I fall asleep, and I woke up at 5:00 pm, I ate something and I went back to my faculty to give back some book in the library. Then I went to the computers room in my school and I began to do this activity, but I didn’t finished, I couldn’t finish in home because my computer has a problem temporarily, and I could finish this homework finally on Sunday 19^th, 2009.