I practically have a cult of the personality about this prof, this was still
I am swooning from the combination of crème brûlée, genius, Mozart/Rossini opera, tango, and attempting to converse in French.
The long-standing reader might remember my facsination with my amazingly multi-talented, complete GENIUS of a math professor fall semester last year. Our class went ice-skating, went christmas-caroling, and solved triple integral problems without having ever even known of triple integrals. Well, one of my classmates from that calculus class is in this special semester-long math-intensive program that this professor teaches a class for, and I just got back from quite the intelligentsia soirée.
This was also the professor who would spontaneously break out into opera during class. And the occasional argentine tango. So tonight I found myself once again with a plate of absolutely fantastic food sitting and watching one of the smartest people I've ever encountered sing excepts from 'Marriage of Figaro.' Another math professor played piano. And then the head of the German department came to play Argentine tango songs. It was truly glorious.
Later in the evening, I started to eavesdrop and began to lean towards a conversation my old professor was having with a colleague - in French! I could understand most of it (although quantum field theory doesn't make a lot of sense to me in any language . . .) and somehow ended up (awkwardly) speaking with the French guy, who, of course, was named Pierre. I felt like an IDIOT, because listening in and comprehending is one thing, but speaking and making a complete doofus of yourself is another. Thankfully, a British mathematician overheard a few words of French and jumped in to the conversation as well. Still, it was really exciting to hear people just chatting away in French, and to even (sort of) be one of them. Even if it mean solidifying my status as 'least intelligent person in 50 foot radius.' Hey, j'ai essayé, non?
I'm just perpetually in awe of some of those people - most of them multitalented and multilingual.
And it was really good to see my favorite professor again :-)