I took the chance to visit the University to see how the International Conference, "Microwave Materials and their Applications" was progressing.
I only listened to one lecture, one about Polymer Ceramic composites (rutile titanium dioxide dispersed in epoxy resin). I was quite disturbed to listen to such poor science emanating from "scientists" from Helsinki and Oulu University!
The modelling methods they talked about would have been thrown out of the window way back in the 1960's as the fundamental concepts of mixing theory of an organic with an inorganic phase were not part of the "equation" brought into consideration when preparing their paper - or if it was, it was not stated!
Luckily, I am retired, so I did not stand up and ask any embarrassing questions!
My objective to visit the conference site was to primarily ask the few Indians attending the conference to join me for dinner. As Annikki was pre-occupied with looking after her mother, I asked daughter Joanna to join me in hosting them. Her husband, Tony, was also busy with another prior engagement.
Here is a photograph after the occasion, which all of us really enjoyed, thanks to the wonderful hosts in the Pailin Restaurant.
(IIT Chennai, India), Ritesh Rawal (Punjab University and now Sheffield University, UK),
Prof. Mohanan (Cochin University), myself and our hosts, Unnop and Pailin.
Dr. Sebastian (Deputy Director, Regional Research Laboratory, Trivandrum) was there for about half an hour as he had to push off to another party.
It was great fun, and hopefully the next time these engineer-scientists come to Oulu, they will call me "before" they plan their visit!
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