| Volume 8, Number 1 |
October 26, 1997
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| Hungarian mathematics is something of
which the nation is very proud. They take their math very seriously.
After accepting "substract", "dewide" and "choosen" as parts of my new
math vocabulary, things started to run a little smoother. I was able
to take several math courses and a class on Hungarian Culture. All
the classes proved to be interesting and challenging. I have to say
that we did lots of work in our program. There was a range of classes
that were offered from hard to harder to crazy hard. I stuck with
the hard classes, although I did sit in on a crazy hard class for a few
weeks before I realized how little of a clue I had.
Thank goodness the classes were taught in English, considering my Hungarian vocabulary contains little more than counting and "how much". I did become rather proficient in the area of fruits and vegetables, however. As I digress, I might as well include that Hungarian is a very difficult language. Its closest modern day relative is Finnish, and there is no way that a Hungarian and a Finn would be able to understand each other. Besides the language being so darn hard, Hungarians are not used to foreigners who try to speak their language, so it becomes very difficult to communicate. Budapest was definitely a good experience for me. There is no way I can tell you that I enjoyed every minute, but in general I had a good time. I learned a lot about living in a foreign city, about myself, and about math. I now have an idea about what math is like beyond Wooster and what kind of people are going into graduate mathematics. There is a wide range of people who are going to continue in math, and I guess that I can be included in that group. Perhaps one of the best opportunities Budapest provided was its location in Central Europe. From |
Budapest we were able to travel to Vienna, Poland and the Czech
Republic, along with Slovakia and Romania. Being able to travel affordably
was one of the high points about living in Budapest. I was able to
see all sorts of sights that I had only imagined visiting. With other
Americans in the group, we took several weekend trips and a longer trip
over a national holiday. Spring in Central Europe was a beautiful
time to travel and enjoy the weather. Everything started to
turn green and warm up, and as we played Frisbee or went for long walks
through the city, the math didn't seem so overwhelming after all.
The weekend of Friday, February 7, through Monday,
February 10, our C.O.W. team of Dan Core, Jon Keim, and Steve Boughton
participated in the COMAP Mathematical Contest in Modeling 1997.
We were given a choice of two "real-life situation" problems, one of which
we were to solve (using a mathematical model) between Friday afternoon
and Monday afternoon. The problem we chose involved developing a
hunting strategy for a velociraptor and its prey, a thescelosaurus, given
certain data about the two dinosaurs. The data included the weight,
height, top speeds, and turning radii of both dinosaurs. In modeling
the attack and evasion strategies of the two dinosaurs, we had to consider
factors such as at what range the approaching velociraptor would be noticed,
what the acceleration rates of the dinosaurs could be, and how much effect
strategically placed turns would
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