speech of Barry on June 17, 2010.)
Memorial Speech for Barry Chai
Barry追思會發言稿
By Fei-Fei Li (李飛飛)
2010.06.17
My name is Fei-Fei Li. I am an assistant professor at the Computer
Science Dept at Stanford University. I have been Barry's academic and
research advisor for the past two years, first in Princeton (Fall
2008-Summer 2009), and then in Stanford.
我叫李飛飛，是史坦福大學計算機系的教授。我是Barry 過去兩年學業和科研上的
老師，先是在普林斯頓大學，然後是在史坦福大學。
As a professor, one of the pride and joy is to deliver a speech for my
students. While I am very proud of Barry, I have never imagined that the
first speech I give for him is a memorial speech. No words can express
my pain.
作為一個老師，談論和介紹我的學生是讓我很驕傲和高興的一件事情。作為Barry
的老師，我非常的為他自豪。但是我從來沒有想到我會在這樣的場合介紹Barry。
沒有語言和文字可以表達我的心痛。
Barry first contacted me on Aug 25, 2008, in answer to a job
advertisement. In fact it was a pre-advertisement that I sent to circle
of colleagues and friends in the field, looking for a research assistant
for an NIH-sponsored computational neuroscience project at Princeton.
This project is jointly PI-ed by Prof. Diane Beck at U. of Illinois. At
that time, Princeton hadn't yet approved the job. Barry was among the
very first students who contacted me. After simply reading his CV and
email, I knew I wanted him – if it were not legal reasons, I would no
longer need to waste the next two weeks for official job advertisement.
On Sept 1, a few days later, Barry and I had a phone interview. It was a
very pleasant conversation, Barry sounded extremely smart, earnest,
pleasant and well mannered. So I gave Barry the job offer on the phone
without any hesitation. After I put down the phone, I immediately called
Diane and told her how lucky we are to have got Barry!
So that night, I sent him a 25-page document to read as a background.
This is a lengthy and difficult document written by two professors. It
is for sure beyond Barry's knowledge. So I expected that he'll take a
good number of days or even weeks to finish reading the document. But to
my great surprise, the next day, at Vancouver time 11am, that was just a
little over half a day, Barry already replied me, saying that he had
finished reading the entire document, and he "(will) read a primer on
database this morning and I think I can pick this up fast. My primary
goal is to learn database well before I start on this project." Alas,
that was even before I started paying him! For the following two years,
Barry's dedication has never changed a single bit.
This is the Barry that I will always remember: extreme diligence, and
amazing work ethics.
Barry和我的第一次聯繫是通過一封電子郵件，時間是2008年8月25號。 Barry來信
申請我的實驗室的一份研究員的工作。這個項目是美國國家衛生局的一個科研項
目，由我和Illinois 大學Diane Beck教授共同主持。實際上那時候普林斯頓還沒
有正式批准這份工作，我只是在朋友和同事之間小規模的寄出一份工作廣告。
Barry 應該是頭幾個應試的學生。在看了Barry的簡歷之後，我就知道我想要聘請
他。如果不是法律的限制，我都不需要再通過普林斯頓正式打廣告了。 2008年9月
1號，我和Barry作了一次電話面試。在電話上，Barry聽起來非常聰明，認真，也
非常有利貌和教養。我在電話上正式把這份工作給了Barry。完了以後，我立即給
Diane 打了個電話，告訴她我們好幸運，能找到Barry這樣的學生。
9月1號的當天晚上，我給Barry寄了一分25頁長的項目背景材料。這是一份很生澀
的文件，是由兩個教授所寫的。對於Barry來說，這份材料遠遠超出了他的學業背
景。所以我在心裡想Barry可能會花上好幾天，甚至幾個星期的時間來讀完這個文
件。結果第二天溫哥華的中午11點，也就是半天以後，Barry竟然就給我回信了。
他告訴我他已經讀完了這份此材料，他已經開始"讀一些關於數據庫方面的東西。
（他的）的目標是在來普林斯頓上班之前就把這些基本的東西學會。"要知道，這
時候我還沒有給他發工資呢！在這之後的兩年裡，Barry的認真和敬業絲毫沒有改
變過。
我會一直這樣懷念Barry：無與倫比的認真和敬業精神。
When Barry came to Princeton in the beginning of Oct, 2008, I was
somewhat worried that as a young student just out of college, he didn't
have any friends or classmates to help him settling down in a new
country, a new town. But I was quickly proven wrong. Barry became
friends with everyone, from the lab members, to anyone around him,
instantaneously. Let me give you an example. Our lab, including Barry,
moved from Princeton to Stanford in June 2009. In September 2009, three
months after we left, I went back to Princeton for a quick trip. I
stopped by a quick lunch place near the computer science department at
Princeton called Tomo Sushi. Barry and my other student frequented that
restaurant often when they were in Princeton. This is the kind of
college-town take-out restaurant that has seen thousands of students
come and go. But when the owner connected the fact that I was Barry's
advisor and just moved my lab from Princeton to Stanford, she
immediately asked me how Barry was doing. It was clear to me that Barry
had made a real connection with her, just like he has made such
connections with so many people, no matter where he goes. This is
Barry, he radiated friendliness and kindness. That's why so many people
who have crossed path with him can remember him.
Barry是在2008年10月初來到普林斯頓的。他剛來的時候我很擔心他，畢竟他只是
一個本科剛剛畢業的小孩子，從加拿大來到一個陌生的國家，陌生的城鎮，沒有朋
友和同學。可是我很快發現我的擔心應該是多餘的。 Barry有能力和任何人成為朋
友，從實驗室，到身邊的所有人。讓我講一個小小的故事。我的實驗室在2009年6
月從普林斯頓搬到了史坦福。在2009年9月，我回到普林斯頓出差。我去了一個在
計算機系旁邊很小的外賣店買午餐。這個叫Tomo Sushi 的外賣店是Barry和我的實
驗室的學生們以前最喜歡的午餐點之一。當店裡的老闆娘聽說我就是把實驗室搬到
史坦福的老師以後，她立即問起我Barry好不好。很顯然，她是真心的喜歡和關心
Barry。不要忘了，這種大學城裡的小店，由成千上百的學生光顧，這位老闆娘不
知道見過多少學生和老師。但是Barry卻讓她記住了，就像很多很多其他記住他的
人。這也是Barry，他的身上散發著友好和善良，所以有那麼多人會記住他，懷念他。
When I talk about my students with my colleagues, I often refer to them
as "my kids". Of all of these kids, Barry is the one that is also always
at the edge. Christine, Barry's mother, and I were talking about this
last week. A phone call about Barry would come any time of day. I
remember a very early morning last year, I was in visiting my husband
Silvio in Michigan. The day before, Barry and I traveled together to
University of Illinois for a meeting. We departed at the Detroit
Airport, where Barry was supposed to come back to Princeton, and I
stayed for the weekend to visit Silvio. Around 6am, a lab member called
me because Christine was desperately looking for Barry. The Detroit
Airport police picked up Barry's passport on the airport floor, and
could not locate Barry. Through U.S. immigration and custom records,
they found Barry's home phone number in Canada and contacted Christine.
At that time, Barry was happily sleeping in a hotel near Detroit
airport, and his cellphone was discontinued by the carrier because he
forgot to pay his bill. This is also how I would remember Barry, still a
young kid full of adventure.
我在私底下和朋友們、同事們談論起我的學生們時，會稱他們叫"小孩子們"。在我
的所有的"孩子們"中，Barry是最讓我操心的。上個星期我和Barry的媽媽
Christine 談論起Barry。我們都說到那種不知道什麼時候就會收到一個關於Barry
的電話的感覺。我還記得大約一年前，我和Barry到Illinois 出差。會議結束後，
我們在底特律機場分手，他繼續轉道普林斯頓，我留在Michigan和我先生Silvio
度週末。第二天，星期六早上6點，我的電話響了。一個實驗室的同學打電話找
我，說Barry的媽媽急切的需要找到Barry。原來底特律機場的警察在地上撿到
Barry的護照，通過美國邊防和移民局打電話到Barry的加拿大的家裡。而這個時
候，Barry因為誤了飛機，正在底特律附近的一個賓館里高興的睡大覺。而他的手
機，因為忘記充值而被停機了。
我還會這樣懷念Barry：一個充滿了冒險精神，非常瀟灑的孩子。
I got to know Barry a lot better through an agonizing weekend we spent
together in April 2009. Barry was faced with a decision of choosing a
PhD program in another university versus coming to Stanford. Because
Barry performed so well as a RA in my lab, I personally recommended him
to a very good computer vision lab at another university. The professor
truly loved Barry. When Barry visited this university, the whole lab
spent a weekend with him and tried very hard to recruit Barry. Because
of the shift in notification time, Barry already accepted the offer from
this university when the Stanford acceptance notice came. This was when
Barry's agony started.
So here was Barry's agony: deep in his heart, he would like to come to
Stanford. Now that I got to know the family better, I realized that
Stanford was the first stop for Barry when he came to North America as a
very young child. It was a dream of his own as well as his family. But
he felt extremely guilty and bad for the other university. Barry spent
the entire 3-day weekend with me talking about this over and over again.
At several points, he was ready to go to this university just because he
felt bad for breaking the promise. I was in a dilemma too: As a
professor, I understand how badly the other university wanted Barry – I
recommended him personally to this lab; but as Barry's advisor, I could
see that coming to Stanford was the choice of his heart. It was a tricky
situation. While Barry had to make the ultimate decision one way or the
other, I told him if he were to decide to change his decision and
retract the other school's acceptance, I would do everything I could to
help him explain the situation.
Barry finally made the decision to withdraw the acceptance from the
other university and come to Stanford. I was very happy for him. But
what impressed me in this process was not so much his ultimate decision
of following his heart, but how much time and energy he spent to
consider the other people's feelings. As a young man at 24 years old,
embarking on a very bright and promising future, many his age would
probably have made the decision without a blink. But Barry is different.
He is not only a fun-loving, hard-working student, his sense of
responsibility, his kindness in regard of other people's feeling and his
moral characters really impressed me.
我在2009年的4月通過一個機會更了解了Barry。那是一個記憶中很漫長的周末，
Barry面對了一個很艱難的決定：到底是到另一所大學讀博士還是到史坦福來讀碩
士。由於Barry在我實驗室出色的表現，我在他申請學校的過程中幫他在這所大學
聯繫了一個很出色的計算機視覺實驗室。那個實驗室的老師非常器重Barry。他們
還邀請Barry去那裡參觀過一個週末。但是由於時間的差異，就在Barry已經口頭接
受了這所大學的offer後，史坦福大學的錄取書才到。這讓Barry非常糾結。
從內心深處，Barry非常喜歡史坦福。前幾天通過認識Barry的家人我才了解到，
Palo Alto 是Barry 很多年前到北美來的第一座城市。能來這裡讀書是他自己，也
是他家人的一個夢。但是Barry對這另一所大學感到非常內疚。我和他花了整整三
天的時間談論這件事。有好幾次，Barry 都幾乎決定因為他對這所大學的承諾而決
定放棄史坦福大學了。作為老師，我也很糾結。在申請過程中，我是一個人名義專
門推薦他去這所大學的；但是作為Barry的老師，我能看出他心裡更希望去史坦
福。這個決定最終只能由Barry來做，但是我告訴他，如果他決定去史坦福，我會
盡我的最大努力幫助他去解釋這件事的。
Barry最後決定選擇史坦福。我非常為他高興。但是讓我欣賞的不是他最後的選
擇，而是這個抉擇過程中Barry的態度。 Barry反反复復得站在對方的角度考慮這
件事。對於一個24歲的年輕人，面對未來的事業和憧憬，沒有多少孩子會花那麼多
時間去考慮別人的感受。但是Barry不一樣。我意識到，這不僅僅是一個有趣、愛
玩兒、工作努力的學生。他有責任心，有替他人著想的善良和讓人折服的道德觀。
Because of a delayed flight from Chicago to Urbana, Illinois, Barry and
I had a very memorable conversation being stuck on the airplane. Barry
talked to me at length of his dreams and goals, how he would like to
make an impact in robotic and vision research, how he would like to
travel around the world, and even girls. But most importantly, he talked
about how much he loved his family.
Christine and Ted, I know that as parents, you do not often hear
directly from your child how much he loves you. A 24, 25 years old young
man would not say this directly, especially if he comes from a Chinese
culture. But that flight from Chicago and Urbana Champaign, through
Barry's stories, I came to know how much influence each of you have had
to Barry. It finally all made sense to me. Barry's unique characters,
his adventureness, his moral strength, his kindness, his generosity, his
passion, his diligence and his unique Barry-ness, are a result of an
incredible pair of parents. On behalf of Barry, I would like to tell
Christine and Ted: Barry truly loved you, loved his sister, and loved
his entire family.
在一次去Illinois 開會的路上，我和Barry的飛機晚點了，讓我們有機會坐在飛機
上天南海北的閒聊。我們談起他的理想，他對機器人和視覺研究的興趣，他想周遊
世界的夢想，甚至女孩子。但是最重要的，我們談起了他的家庭。
Christine 和Ted，我知道作為父母，你們沒有機會經常從自己的孩子嘴裡聽到他
愛你們的話。一個２４、２５歲的年輕男孩子，尤其是我們中國人，一般是不會這
樣直接的。但是通過這場飛機上的談話，通過Barry的故事，我了解到這個家庭對
他的成長有多麼深的影響。我以前經常想，Barry這麼一個特別的孩子是怎樣造就
的。現在我知道，Barry的瀟灑，他的正義，他的善良，他的寬容，他對生活的熱
愛，他的努力、認真和敬業精神，是因為他有你這樣的父母。我想代表Barry 告訴
他的爸爸媽媽：Barry非常的愛你們，愛他的妹妹，和他的大家族。
The fateful car accident took place on June 8, only 5 days after a major
paper conference deadline on June 3. If Barry's paper is accepted, he
will be presenting this work in Vancouver this year. Barry worked very
hard for this deadline. My last memory of him is still the overnight
hours between June 2 and June 3. Barry and I went over his papers and
experiments many iterations together. He and I would take turns to rest,
but the paper continued to improve in quality. This was the first
computer vision project Barry led. He poured his heart and soul into
this. He worked extremely hard. After the paper was submitted, Barry was
radiating with joy and pride. I was actually hoping to talk to Barry
after some break about where we are going with the future project. There
were so many ideas that we could try out. It was very exciting for both
him and me.
My students, including Barry, and I often talk about life and work. We
always talk about how one should love what he or she is doing. Then even
the sacrifices and pain become part of the fun and joy. This is my last
memory of Barry: a young man full of life, full of passion, and doing
what he loved!
奪走Barry生命那場車禍發生在６月８號，僅近距離我們剛剛過去的一個論文
deadline 五天。如果Barry的論文被大會接受，他會在今年１２月回到溫哥華宣
讀論文。 Barry為這個工作非常努力的工作了很久。我還記得我們在６月２號那一
夜全體實驗室的熬夜。 Barry和我輪流著修改他的論文，這樣另一個人可以短短的
休息一會兒。這是Barry作為第一作者所作的第一篇計算機視覺的論文。當我們交
稿以後，我能看到他的自豪和快樂。就在前兩天，Barry出事之前，我還想過等他
休息一段時間後，和Barry談一談我們下一步的很多打算。
我和學生們，包括Barry，經常聊天說起生活和工作。我一直相信一個人應該選擇
作他自己熱愛的工作，這樣的話即使是艱難困苦和犧牲都會覺得是值得的。讓我感
到欣慰的是，我對Barry最後的記憶，是他生命最綻放，最有激情，做著自己熱愛
的事情的記憶。
Ten years ago, I lived and worked in Tibet by myself after college. I
had the chance to get to know Buddhism. Today, I want to share with you
that I do believe in cycles of life. I believe that each of us will meet
Barry again in our own ways. Even in this life, Barry's life has touched
many of us in such a joyful and inspiring way. As Barry's teacher for
the last two years, I want to thank you, Christine and Ted, for bringing
Barry to this world, such that I have had the fortune to work with him
and be his teacher and friend. Thank you!
十年前，我在大學畢業後隻身到西藏生活和工作了一年。在那裡，我接觸到很多佛
教的理念。我想我是相信生命的輪迴的。我相信我們每一個人都會以自己的方式和
Barry重逢。就是在今生，Barry也給了我們很多美好的回憶和inspiration。作為
Barry過去兩年的老師，我要感謝你們，Christine and Ted, 感謝你們培養了
Barry，讓我有機會能成為他的老師和朋友。謝謝！
thank you for your inspiring writing. I admire you Fei Fei
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