Today was our last full day in Cyprus. I was up early this morning and decided to watch the sunrise on the deck of my hotel room. Getting the privilege to visit Cyprus over these last 2 weeks has been some of the greatest experiences of my life. The sunrise really showed off this countries natural beauty and made me truly appreciate this special place for what it is.
We drove back to UNIC today and sat in on more lectures. The first lecture was given by Dr Trihinas a computer science professor at UNIC. He discussed with us data science. His lecture was split up into a few main sections. Supply chain analytics, data mining, and machine learning. When discussing supply chain analytics he touched on 4 key types of data analysis. Descriptive where you explain what happened. Diagnostic where you explain why it happened. Predictive where you forecast what might happen and prescriptive where you recommend an action based on the forecast. He talked to us about data mining, stating that it is the efficient extraction of interesting non trivial and implicit patterns from data and also went into ways to fit models of data showing both clustered and classification models. Overall this lecture was very intriguing. I think Dr Trihinas was a very thoughtful and professional speaker and he really made great efforts to help us understand this information in a small amount of time. I really thought his pacing and content were super strong. I view data as one of the most crucial aspects when determining how to improve businesses or business practices. Data analysis can lessen cost and increase efficiency as you can learn exactly what works and what doesn’t with enough analysis. Overall this lecture was really well delivered and awesome!
After the first lecture the CEO of UNIC Mr. Antonis Polemitis came to talk to us about databases and blockchain. First of all this was really awesome to have the CEO of UNIC speak with us directly. He was a very throughout and detailed speaker and definetly knew what he was talking about. He began by introducing databases and discussed that society is packed with databases. They are all around us. One of his key points was that databases have become more centralized as time has gone on. He gives examples of centralized databases such as Google. He also discussed in great detail crypto and blockchain and how databases relate. He provided us with examples of crypto being art like NFTs and digital currency like bitcoin. He also explained to us about how over time databases have included fewer companies and because of this, more big businesses have arose. This lecture was super in depth and I really felt honored that the CEO of UNIC was able to speak to us and deliver a very well prepared presentation.
Finally after departing UNIC and getting free time we went out to lunch at Paul, a restaurant that was no doubt named after another student on this trip Paul. I was very hungry so I ate pretty fast and then we figured we could explore the city fast and easy by going on the scooters scattered around the city. We bought 3 of them and began to ride around on the street and sidewalk looking at the new city of Nicosia, a place much less explored by me on this trip. It was really nice out the sun was beaming on us and while I was a little hot I really had a great time navigating the streets and really getting to roam free and see whatever we wanted to see. After about 40 minutes of exploring we rode back to our hotel and I got ready for dinner and packed up my stuff as we are leaving late tonight for Larnaca airport to head home. This afternoon was definitely one of my favorites. I was able to spend the afternoon how I wanted to and take it at my own pace. I really enjoyed my time here in Nicosia, and while I’m sad to be leaving I really do intend to return here at some point in my life to explore this beautiful city once again.
Thank you very much for reading
Will