We’re having a conference this week, which is great. Exhausting, since it starts at 9 AM and ends at 8 PM (including lunch 12-14 and dinner 18-20, I kid you not), but great. I was one of the “chairs” of the reception dinner, which in effect meant making a short speech. I am not naturally inclined to give speeches, but I figured I have no choice so I should try to make the best of it. I sat for a while to write it in advance so I won’t embarrass myself. In the end it worked out pretty well. Here is the speech:

Hello Everyone, Cheers!

They say you should start a talk with a joke. Ask any of my friends, and they’ll tell you that I can’t tell jokes, so this concludes my talk.

Well, I guess not. So allow me to quote Seinfeld in lieu of a joke. There’s an episode of Seinfeld, where Elaine gets three new friends. Later on that episode, Jerry, George and Kramer get to meet them. Dramatic music plays in the background, suspense builds up, and, as you would expect if you watched enough Seinfeld, they turn out to look exactly like Jerry, George and Kramer, except for some very subtle differences. And so, Jerry starts referring to them as Bizzaro-Jerry, Bizzaro-George, and Bizzaro-Kramer. So, I don’t know whether you noticed by now, but China is such a bizzro-place. I fondly refer to China as bizzaro-world, because everything here is so big and so varied that anything from the west can be found here, except that is just a little bit different. So you could say that this institute, is a Bizarro-IAS; and you could say that this university is a Bizzaro-Princeton; and the desserts are actually bizzaro-deserts, and as many of you found, the restrooms are bizzaro-restrooms. And so on. (By the way, important piece of information: there’s a western bathroom on the 2nd floor).

Well, so I’d like to welcome you to our Bizzaro-world. To those who haven’t met me yet, come over and say Hello. I very recently arrived to the institute. I arrived only two weeks ago, and this is my first time in China, so I really didn’t know what to expect. And I can tell you that it’s been splendid so far, and looks like it will be spledid for the rest of my stay here. Many of you will find out this week how amazing the food is here, how nice and good-natured the people are, and how interesting Beijing is. What many of you may not know, is how much the institute is a good atmosphere for work. There’s no worries, we don’t have to take care of too much. All of the facilities are there, and we just have to sit and do great research. It’s very centered about collaborative work. The people here have, in a very short amount of time, generated an environment geared towards sustaining research. You can see it in this conference, and working here is just like this as well. You just have to show up and do research.

This institute strongly relies on its students, postdocs and visitors. When more people come and contribute, there’s more joint work and a more vibrant atmosphere. The institute is offering an amazing number of postdoc positions (I think 8 open positions currently), and there’s a very large number of visitors all the time. I encourage you all to come and apply to postdoc positions and to come to visit here. The institute has a big budget for visitors, and we’re actively recruiting people to come. If we haven’t talked to you about coming yet, then it just means we failed in our job, so come over and talk to us and let’s arrange a visit. Also, you can feel free to speak to us either in person or over email about coming for visits, and also to ask us about how it is being here, and how we can help you to come here.

So, to conclude, I expect you all after leaving this room to go submit an application to a postdoc here next year. And if you don’t do that, then to talk to us, and to arrange a visit.

Thanks Again.

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By the way, According to The Jerry Seinfeld Dictionary of Terms and Phrases bizzaro-Jerry (or any proper name) means: “1) the exact opposite of everything that is associated (ie. his/her friends, mannerisms, the layout of his/her apartment, etc.) with a given person 2) when a person (usually a loser) does the exact opposite of everything he/she usually does to realize success (and sometimes failure)”

The transcript of the episode is here or here.