Pt Lobos on Rani's Birthday!

Nimitz Way, Tilden Park, Berkeley CA

CREATE: Campus for Research Excellence And Technological Enterprise

We'll be occupying the 11th floor of this new building on a new campus that is across the highway from the National University of Singapore. The views are fantastic. The floor isn't yet finished. Current occupancy estimate: July-August 2012.

Yunnan Garden at NTU

Singapore — First impressions

I'm at the Nanyang Technological University (NTU) for a kick-off workshop for a new research program, "SinBerBEST" (Singapore-Berkeley program on Building Efficiency and Sustainability in the Tropics).

It's a long trip — makes traveling to Europe or to China or Japan seem simple. In all, 25 hours en route with 17+ hours in the air: SFO to Narita on ANA (11 h) and after a 3 hour layover Narita to Singapore on United (7 h). The drive across the island from the airport took nearly an hour. With the time change, I arrived at 2:30 AM on Monday after leaving home 7:30 AM on Saturday!

I've only had an hour this morning to walk around the NTU campus and shoot these first looks. Too bad that the campus is not so close to the city center, and with the work schedule I might not get more than a brief look at Singapore's urban core on this visit.

(The lovely building in the second photo houses the School of Art, Design, and Media. It's a short walk from the Nanyang Executive Center, where I'm staying.)

Happy New Year on Mt. Diablo