Corvallis Covered with Snow!!

This year Corvallis is getting more snow fall. This morning it was completely covered with snow. This small city, formally known as cow town, rarely gets snowfall. Last year I saw snow on Corvallis only once and that didn't go even few hours. Last week also we saw Corvallis covered with white blanket. Oregon State University had issued a yellow alert to faculty, staff and students. I was expecting the school would be closed but it was open today and everything went not bad. I want to show you some pictures from around Corvallis Campus of OSU.

White outside as seen from my Window.

Enjoying snow while going school in the morning.

Infront of Chemistry Building

A memorable trip in US

From left standing): Binod, Mahendra, Mahesh, Bhanu, Nabin, Khadgaman, Nagendra and (sitting): Deep, Damber and Lekh

By Lekh Nath Adhikari,

Mr. Adhikari is a graduate student of chemistry at University of Nevada, Reno. He with his friends had visited many places in the US this winter. I wanted him to share the experience with us and he comitted to write. As a result you are able to read this blog. Enjoy it. By the way this is the first blog by guest blogger in Science to Society.

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It had been one and half year that I was living in Reno, NV. It is my hobby to visit more and more places around the world but, unfortunately, I have not got chances to visit many countries. This is my fourth country that I put my feet. After coming here in US, I visited New York, California, Oregon and Washington in last winter and summer. Some of my friends are living in mid-western and mid-eastern regions and from last year they were asking me to visit them and their places. I was also thinking that if I got chances I would be really happy to visit their places. Finally, we decided to take vacation in the time of Christmas and New Year and we discussed to make our trip. Since it was a time of winter, some of our friends are saying that it’s not a good idea to travel in North but some were saying it wouldn’t be a problem. I and my friend Nagendra from Reno bought a ticket to Nashville, TN and from there to Reno. Finally, we flew from Reno on 25^th of December (Christmas Day). We were in the sky in dark for about 3 hours. The scene in the Nashville ground was so beautiful in most of the places. It was because, the night was the Christmas night. All the buildings and streets were decorated with glorious and bright lights. The plane landed on time in Nashville. My friend Deepak Bhandari from Knoxville, TN was there to pick us up. We had a plan to go to St. Louis, MO early in the morning of next day. We were so tired from our six hours flight. So, we went to the hotel that we had reserved for that night, put our luggage there and went to a Chinese restaurant for dinner.

On 26^th of December, we got up early in the morning and after freshening up we headed to St. Louis. From Knoxville, one of Deepak’s friends Key (he is from Vietnam) was also with us. Four of us were in a mini sized van and I was driving. Actually, it was my first time that I was driving a big vehicle. So, I was little bit nervous too. The travel in the vehicle was so exciting and joyful because of the nice sight scenes all the way in sides of freeway. Two of our friends Binod Pandey and Mahesh Poudel were in St. Louis who were eagerly waiting for us with the yummy foods there. Finally, we reached to St. Louis at around noon in their place and had lunch there. After the lunch and rest for a while we decided to head towards Manhattan, Kansas. Weather was not so good there in St. Louis and we were worried about the possibility of snowfall in the way but we left St. Louis. Friends Binod and Mahesh also accompanied us so we were six persons in our trip thereafter. Our other friends Bhanu Bhakta Neupane and Mahendra Thapa were in Manhatan and they were updating the weather for us and preparing dinner for that night. Even the weather was not good (it was raining a lot for like 2-3 hours) we were able to got in Manhattan around 9 PM. Bhanu and Mahendra with other Nepali friends who were there in Manhattan were there to welcome us. That night became so great and excited for us because we felt like we were in Kirtipur (when we were doing our Masters in TU three years back) with most of our friends from Kirtipur. We had some drinks at first and then dinner with all together 20 friends there. It was really great stay there even it was for a short time. 
Next morning we went to the apartments of some other Nepali friends and after that we visited Kansas State University. We did not have enough time to stay there, so, we bought some lunch from subway and headed back to St. Louis having lunch in the van with our two more friends Bhanu and Mahendra. It was like 7 hours drive up to St. Louis so we did not stop anywhere in the way excepts two gas stations to fill up gas in van and use restrooms. Finally, we arrived in St. Louis around 8 PM and due to the tiredness from long travel we could not go to the Downtown that night. We had to prepare dinner ourselves, so it was almost 1:00 AM in the morning when we went to bed.

Next morning, on 28^th of Dec, late morning get up, we left Mahesh there in his apartment and we (7 guys) visited few famous places in St. Louis including Gateway Arch and the museum therein. It was really nice scene there in the side of Mississippi River with big arch in the west of river. After that we headed towards Chicago, IL. We were going all the way north from there and we were thinking that weather was going to be worse in north than in south. But, we did not find that. Actually, the drive was so long and boring but we were not feeling and bore ness and tiredness because our friends were so funny if needed and they were saying jokes and stories in our entire trip. Especially, Binod was one of them. Whenever he would speak something we would not keep our mouth close. He made us laughing almost all the time. Some were saying their love stories, some were saying their tragedies, some were saying their real stories happened in their life, some were saying their future plan like go back to Nepal, getting married, what to do after completion their degrees and stuffs like that. So, we felt like we reached to Chicago within 1-2 hours even that took 7 hours for us. The interesting thing is our Vietnamese friend was also enjoying with us even though we were talking in Nepali at all the time and were playing Nepali music. We approached to our destination in the apartments of our friends where Shankar, Shiva and Suraj were there with plenty of food and different kinds of drinks to welcome us from their hearts. They were our classmates in I. Sc. and B. Sc. That night was one and only one night that I ever had in my life. I did one thing there with them that I had not done before and I have not done after that too because I couldn’t stay without accompanying them. We had long gossips for almost whole night but we could not share all the feelings that we wanted to share. Next day, after late morning wake up, we went to a Nepali restaurant for lunch. Even though, Chicago was very cold at that time we did not feel any coldness due to our best friends and their guidance to visit the places there. Since, they were there for a long time they know everywhere in the city. Therefore it was possible for us to visit more places in a short time. We visited important places there like Sears Tower, Science Museum, Aquarium and some other places all over the day.

CHEMICAL CONGRESS IN Kathmandu!!!!!

Nepal Chemical Society "NCS" (oraganising committee) is going to organize a "CHEMICAL CONGRESS - 2008" during May 23-25, 2008 in Kathmandu. Such types of events are rarely held in Nepal. NCS is organizing this congress in association with Tribhuvan University and Kathmandu University. According to the official site of NCS, the congress will discuss the latest developments in chemical researches, technologies and chemical education with special emphasis on role of chemistry on the sustainable development and improvement of the quality of life in developing countries.

The congress will provide a wide forum for students and experts of the related field. And it aims to awake people about the relevance of chemistry in the national development. The eminent scientists from different countries have been invited to present plenary and keynote lectures.

The professional society of Nepalese chemists(NCS) is very sluggish. It publishes its journal(Journal of Nepal Chemical Society).

More about the congress at www.ncs.org.np.

Official email ID of NCS is nepchemsoc@yahoo.com

No Divorce- Save environment

Are you single and getting ready to marry? Then thats good news. If you are already married then even don't think about divorce. Stay married. This will save our environment and earth. Divorce is bad not only for your children(if you have) and family but also for environment.

Higher divorce rates means it requires more houses for fewer people. More households means more energy expended to build, fuel, and provide water for them. Globally the number of households is increasing faster than the number of people. "Even in regions with declining population, we see substantial increase in the number of households. Divorce is the main reason for reducing the number of people in a household", says a report published in the proceedings of National Academy of Sciences.

So it comes out that life style, cultural aspects of the society is also responsible for the degradation of Environment. This is a clear indication that western society is more responsible for the degradation of the environment than the eastern society even when you talk from this angle.