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ビッグ・イージーの会議
今週は、研究室の教授が講義を行なう大きな学会に参加するため、ルイジアナ州ニューオーリンズを訪問中の雅子さん。5日間の学会が始まる前に、一晩だけ観光客気分で街に出ました。バーでカクテルを飲み、大好きなカキも食べ、大満足です。
Conference in the Big Easy
By MASAKO YAMADA
One of the nice things about working in Gene Stanley's group is that even relatively inexperienced graduate students are
given the opportunity to go to conferences and to engage in international collaborations. My adviser is a big believer
in exchanging information, as his busy travel schedule shows.
So, I'm now in New Orleans a k a The Big Easy, to attend the national meeting of the American Chemical Society. This is
a huge conference involving over 10,000 participants. The conference is supposedly aimed at chemists, but the
boundaries between scientific disciplines are fuzzy, so many physicists, including my adviser, are lecturers. I am
not giving a talk or presenting a paper, but I am here to learn from the lectures on water that are being given all
day every day during the five-day event.
I've never been to the South, barring a couple of trips to touristy bits of Florida, so I have been looking forward
to the conference as a cultural trip, as well as an academic one. Since I have only been here a day, the most striking
difference I've noticed between New Orleans and Boston is the weather (hot!) and in visual details, such as the
architecture and the flora.
Many of the private houses around my bed-and-breakfast have beautiful columns in front of them. These are not the
heavy, marble columns that I'm used to seeing in front of university libraries and museums. These columns are skinny.
Some are made of plain wood, some are made of simple metal pipes and some are intricately wrought cast iron. True to
Southern stereotype, most of these houses have porches, both on the ground floor and the second floor. These houses,
along with the tropical flowers and palm trees, make a striking scene.
My full schedule of lectures begins early tomorrow morning, so I decided to visit the tourist mecca of Bourbon Street
this evening. Bourbon Street is closed off to traffic in the evening, so there were packs of people on the street. I'm
sure it was unusually dense today because of the fun-loving chemists (!?) from out of town.
Bourbon Street was a mix of touristy bars, touristy T-shirt shops and touristy XXX clubs. The shops worked hard at
attracting the tourists with neon signs saying "No Cover" or sticking menus in the faces of passersby.
Perhaps because of the hot weather, the most popular drink on the street seemed to be the frozen margarita. Many bars
were little more than take-out stands with long rows of huge, rotating blenders filled with rainbow-colored slushy
drinks. Most flavors had interesting names, such as "Hurricane" and "Hand Grenade."
I decided to forgo the red, blue, green and orange drinks, and chose a relatively tame frozen "White Russian." Some
of the people bought their drinks in "yards," 12-inch-long glasses shaped like aliens or rockets. My drink was in a
plastic cup that I could take out onto the street. Public drinking is a no-no in Boston, but all the pedestrians on
Bourbon Street seemed to be carrying a drink.
Although it's technically not oyster season, I couldn't resist getting some famous raw oysters. I went to the
cheapest place: at $5 (¥550) a dozen, the price was reasonable by any standard. I could tell that the place was aimed at
tourists since the band started off with a hearty "Welcome to New Orleans!!" but I had a great time. I sat at the bar
and watched the oyster shucker.
Oyster shucking is not glamorous work, but whenever he noticed passersby watching him from the large showcase window,
he swung his knife around like a sword and did a little oyster dance, and showed off the oyster meat. When he noticed
me fumbling at the condiment bar, he ran over, quickly mixed some sauce and horseradish, plopped the cup on top of
my plastic plate of oysters, and threw a handful of crackers (wrapped in plastic) and lemon slices on top of the whole
thing. It was pretty rough treatment, but I think he enjoyed playing games with ignorant tourists. The oysters were
delicious.
I enjoyed the energy and the kitsch of Bourbon Street, but there wasn't much else to do besides go to bars, so I went
back to my b&b after a couple of hours. Besides, I remembered the real reason for my trip.
One of the nice things about working in Gene Stanley's group is that even relatively inexperienced graduate students are
given the opportunity to go to conferences and to engage in international collaborations. My adviser is a big believer
in exchanging information, as his busy travel schedule shows.
So, I'm now in New Orleans a k a The Big Easy, to attend the national meeting of the American Chemical Society. This is
a huge conference involving over 10,000 participants. The conference is supposedly aimed at chemists, but the
boundaries between scientific disciplines are fuzzy, so many physicists, including my adviser, are lecturers. I am
not giving a talk or presenting a paper, but I am here to learn from the lectures on water that are being given all
day every day during the five-day event.
I've never been to the South, barring a couple of trips to touristy bits of Florida, so I have been looking forward
to the conference as a cultural trip, as well as an academic one. Since I have only been here a day, the most striking
difference I've noticed between New Orleans and Boston is the weather (hot!) and in visual details, such as the
architecture and the flora.
Many of the private houses around my bed-and-breakfast have beautiful columns in front of them. These are not the
heavy, marble columns that I'm used to seeing in front of university libraries and museums. These columns are skinny.
Some are made of plain wood, some are made of simple metal pipes and some are intricately wrought cast iron. True to
Southern stereotype, most of these houses have porches, both on the ground floor and the second floor. These houses,
along with the tropical flowers and palm trees, make a striking scene.
My full schedule of lectures begins early tomorrow morning, so I decided to visit the tourist mecca of Bourbon Street
this evening. Bourbon Street is closed off to traffic in the evening, so there were packs of people on the street. I'm
sure it was unusually dense today because of the fun-loving chemists (!?) from out of town.
Bourbon Street was a mix of touristy bars, touristy T-shirt shops and touristy XXX clubs. The shops worked hard at
attracting the tourists with neon signs saying "No Cover" or sticking menus in the faces of passersby.
Perhaps because of the hot weather, the most popular drink on the street seemed to be the frozen margarita. Many bars
were little more than take-out stands with long rows of huge, rotating blenders filled with rainbow-colored slushy
drinks. Most flavors had interesting names, such as "Hurricane" and "Hand Grenade."
I decided to forgo the red, blue, green and orange drinks, and chose a relatively tame frozen "White Russian." Some
of the people bought their drinks in "yards," 12-inch-long glasses shaped like aliens or rockets. My drink was in a
plastic cup that I could take out onto the street. Public drinking is a no-no in Boston, but all the pedestrians on
Bourbon Street seemed to be carrying a drink.
Although it's technically not oyster season, I couldn't resist getting some famous raw oysters. I went to the
cheapest place: at $5 (¥550) a dozen, the price was reasonable by any standard. I could tell that the place was aimed at
tourists since the band started off with a hearty "Welcome to New Orleans!!" but I had a great time. I sat at the bar
and watched the oyster shucker.
Oyster shucking is not glamorous work, but whenever he noticed passersby watching him from the large showcase window,
he swung his knife around like a sword and did a little oyster dance, and showed off the oyster meat. When he noticed
me fumbling at the condiment bar, he ran over, quickly mixed some sauce and horseradish, plopped the cup on top of
my plastic plate of oysters, and threw a handful of crackers (wrapped in plastic) and lemon slices on top of the whole
thing. It was pretty rough treatment, but I think he enjoyed playing games with ignorant tourists. The oysters were
delicious.
I enjoyed the energy and the kitsch of Bourbon Street, but there wasn't much else to do besides go to bars, so I went
back to my b&b after a couple of hours. Besides, I remembered the real reason for my trip.
Shukan ST: Sept. 3, 1999
(C) All rights reserved
- Gene Stanley
- 筆者の所属する研究室の教授で、筆者のアドバイザー
- engage in 〜
- 〜 に携わる
- collaborations
- 共同研究作業
- a k a
- (= also known as)別名
- participants
- 参加者
- is supposedly aimed at 〜
- 〜 対象というふれこみである
- chemists
- 化学者
- boundaries
- 境界
- scientific disciplines
- 科学の分野
- fuzzy
- あいまいな
- physicists
- 物理学者
- paper
- 論文
- lectures
- 講義
- barring 〜
- 〜 を除いて
- touristy bits
- 観光客向けの場所
- striking
- 印象的な
- architecture
- 建築
- flora
- 植物相
- bed-and-breakfast
- (=b&b)朝食付きの宿
- columns
- 柱
- marble
- 大理石の
- skinny
- 細い
- intricately wrought cast iron
- 手の込んだ細工の鋳鉄
- porches
- ベランダ
- palm trees
- ヤシの木
- mecca
- あこがれの地
- 〜 is closed off to traffic
- 〜 は車両通行止めだ
- packs of 〜
- 大勢の 〜
- (was)dense
- 込み合っていた
- XXX clubs
- 裸の女性がいるような風俗店
- No Cover
- サービス料不要
- sticking menus in the faces of passersby
- 通行人の面前にメニューを突きつける
- frozen margarita
- テキーラのカクテル
- take-out stands
- 持ち帰り用の売店
- rows
- 列
- rotating blenders
- 回転しているミキサー
- slushy 〜
- 少し凍ってみぞれ状の 〜
- Hurricane
- 台風
- Hand Grenade
- 手投げ弾
- forgo
- 見合わせる
- tame
- 無難な
- 12-inch-long glasses shaped like aliens or rockets
- 30センチほどの宇宙人やロケット形のグラス
- no-no
- やってはいけないこと
- pedestrians
- 歩行者
- technically
- 実質的には
- couldn't resist 〜
- 〜 を拒否できなかった
- a dozen
- 12個
- oyster shucker
- カキの殻を開ける人
- glamorous
- 華やかな
- swung 〜 around
- 〜 をふりまわした
- fumbling
- もたつく
- condiment bar
- 薬味のカウンター
- horseradish
- セイヨウワサビ
- plopped
- ドサッと置いた
- rough treatment
- 荒っぽい扱い
- ignorant
- 無知の
- kitsch
- 通俗的な派手さ