Cheesecake and Abendbrot

Hey all!

I had so much fun with Steffi and her family yesterday! It was wonderful. Steffi picked me up promptly at 3:00, and we went back to her house. I was really nervous, because when Martin and Steffi and I had gone to see her family, the whole conversation was very rapid-fire German, and I couldn't keep up. I was afraid that when I went back it was going to be something similar. I really shouldn't have worried. They were more than hospitable, and the whole time I was there the conversations were made up of a hysterical and slightly surreal mixture of German and English. Whenever we couldn't think of a word in German or in English and no one else could supply the necessary word, we would all say "LEO!" and run over to the German-English dictionary online to look it up. And quite often, if we were saying something in English, Steffi's daughter would tug on her mom's arm and say "Sag mal, Mama, Sag mal!" (Tell me please, momma!)

When I got there, Steffi's daughter was busy setting the table and making origami napkins (I am bringing mine home...It is quite lovely!) Steffi made tea, and we all sat down to have the best homemade cheesecake I have ever eaten in my life (and there were fresh strawberries! Yum!)

Afterwards, we all sat and talked and had a wonderful time. The kids showed me their rooms, and I found out that they have the Funky Chicken (is that what it's called? I think that that is right) here as well! With all of the same motions and everything! I giggled at that, and danced along with both of the kids. I also got to listen to a bunch of Disney music in German. The kids would sing along in German, and I would sing in English. It was great fun!

I mentioned that I needed to rent a bike while I'm here so that I could visit places that are a bit farther away. Steffi volunteered to let me borrow her bike, because she doesn't use it very often. So we went outside into their garden (which is beautiful, by the way) and pulled out the bicycles and took them out to the spielstrasse, which literally means play-street. It isn't exactly an alley, but it is a little road for the kids to play on where no cars can go. The bike was a bit too tall for me, and I haven't been on a bike in probably 6 or 7 years, so it was pretty funny. I almost fell off a few times. I'm going to have to practice in a parking lot or something before I will be willing to ride it out on the streets. (Also, I defy ANYONE to say that once you learn to ride a bike, you never forget!)

After that, we went back inside to hang out for a while longer, and they asked me if I wanted to stay for Abendbrot. Of course, I said that I would love to if they didn't mind. Abendbrot was a very interesting experience. Essentially, they simply heat up a bunch of different types of bread, and put out all sorts of "toppings" for it. So, for instance, there was salami, and pickles, and some sort of cream-cheese spread with horseradish, and all sorts of other things. Not really the sort of things you need in order to make a sandwhich, but somewhat similar. It is a very very light meal. I suppose that maybe they have a big breakfast and lunch and then only eat lightly at dinner, whereas we do the exact opposite. (That might explain why all of the guys at the lab stay until 9 or 10 at night without having any dinner). Anyway, it was very cool, and really delicious, and I thoroughly enjoyed it.

After dinner, we sat and talked even more, and I gave the kids some money from the States (a few quarters, a dollar bill, some other coins, etc). Michael (that is Steffi's husband) was very surprised by the state quarters. Apparently he has a few old quarters, but didn't know that we had started making a quarter for each state. I really wish that I had had a few of the new nickles and pennies to take, but I didn't. I did show them Lincoln sitting in the middle of the memorial on the back of the penny, though, and they thought that that was really neat.

The money was sort of my gift to them because I couldn't find any flowers to take. It is tradition that when you go to visit someone's house, you take flowers or something similar as a gift. Unfortunately, by the time I got to the city on Saturday, the Markt was closed and I couldn't find any flower vendors to buy from. I think Steffi liked the though because she said that it is very hard to find American money in Europe (yes I know that it may have something to do with the fact that they don't use American money here. Haha). Apparently, they don't like to get their money changed before they visit the States because it is so expensive to do so. She said that it costs 20 Euros to get the currency changed, which is about 30 dollars. Most people just use their credit cards and don't deal with currency at all, which means that they don't have any to bring back with them from their visit.

And that was my visit to Steffi's house. It was really lovely!

Erm...and that brings me to today. I finally met Pingkalai and Thomas! Pingkalai is very sweet. She speaks excellent English, although she speaks very quickly with a thick accent, so it is sometimes difficult to understand. She strikes me as a very practical, but pretty easy going person. She can't stay still, either. The whole time I was talking to her this morning, her leg was bouncing, bouncing, bouncing! I'm anxious to get to know her a bit better. I think that we will get along well. Thomas also seems very nice, although I didn't get to talk to him quite as much as Pingkalai. He, like most of the older guys in the lab, speaks with a bit of a British accent, which tends to make me giggle. The younger guys (with the exception of William and Simon) speak with very strong German accents.

Other than that, it was a fairly typical day. I set up everything for my behavioral assays tomorrow. I worked with William on collecting and fixing fly embryos and taking pictures of the in situ slides that I made on Friday. I read a few papers that I've been meaning to read for the last week or so. Etc, etc.

At about 6:00, everyone that was still at the lab went over to the Klinikum for ice cream. It was fun, but the conversations were all in German, and I was having some trouble following. I know that at first they were talking about old movies, like Ben Hur, and then about German soap operas, and other things. Again, I had a bit of trouble following along, but I really enjoy listening to the German and seeing what I can figure out.

Oh, and after we got back, out of the blue, Robert walks into the room and says "Um, I hope you don't mind me asking, but what happened to the back of your neck?" (Referring to my Neck Spot, of course). So then I had to explain that for some mostly unknown reason all of the fatty tissue in that area went away, and the skin hyper-pigments, and all of that stuff. I guess I was just surprised that it had come up because I had emailed Mom only two weeks ago to ask what it was called.

And thus, you have all the silly little details of my day that you probably didn't really want to know. (Just remember, I'm using this in place of a personal journal so that I can remember what has happened too! So please, be patient with me, all of you who couldn't care less about the details. And I hope that everyone else enjoys them!)

Abenteuer am Samstag!

Hello all!

First let me say that The Great German Laundry Experiment was a success! It helped that all of the instructions for using the machines were in both German and English. I did have a bit of trouble getting the dryer to start (I had put my token in and pushed the start button, but the machine wouldn't start). Finally, a really nice Italian guy came by and told me that the door may not be closed well, and when I tried opening and closing the door again, it worked. Whoo! It's a shame I didn't think of that on my own. Oh well. Silly me. Afterwards the Italian guy and I had a nice conversation, half in English, half in German, until he had collected all of his clothing and left. Oh, and one really weird thing about doing laundry here is that the you don't get a lot of time for drying your clothes. One token (which is 80 cents for the dryers) is only good for twelve minutes. I ended up using 2 tokens and then just bringing my slightly damp clothing home to hang up.

Erm, so after that, I had planned to walk to the city and buy a ticket for a concert that I wanted to see. However, once I got there I couldn't find where they were selling the tickets. I checked the Altes Rathaus and the University Mensa because tickets were supposed to be sold in both places. No luck. Nobody seemed to know. I finally just gave up. They are having another performance tomorrow night, so maybe I can try again then.

So, somewhat disheartened by my failure, I decided to go into a few book stores. Because bookstores are magical places and no one can possibly feel sad or disappointed inside one of them. They are just that cool. The first bookstore I went to didn't have The One Thing that I was looking for, but I did pick up a really neat looking Agatha Christie story collection that should be fun to read. (My former German professor highly recommended reading Agatha Christie novels in German. She said that they are fairly easy reads, and great practice.) I also learned a new word when I went to check out. The word for bag, I discovered, is Tute, with a u-umlaut. I was momentarily baffled when I was asked if I wanted a Tute, but realized after a second what the lady was asking me. By that point though, I had declined. My reflex when I'm not sure what someone is asking me is to 1. say no, thank you or 2. say nothing at all and hope that it wasn't important. This is not always a good strategy.

I wandered around for a bit, had a wonderful scoop of Tiramisu flavored ice cream (AMAZING!), and eventually found my way to another bookstore in search of The One Thing. I searched through the whole store, and just as I was about to give up, I spotted it. YAY! It was much more expensive than I would have liked, but this was one of the only things that I specifically came to Germany intending to buy, so I got it anyway. ::Grins:: Here's a picture:

Yup! That's right! And what is even cooler about it is that this is not the cover of the book (although, it would be a pretty awesome cover, yeah?) This is actually a metal case, and the book rests inside of it. As far as I know, this is done only for the German edition of The Graveyard Book. Here is a picture of the book and the case:

I was so excited that I had finally found it that I ended up coming straight home. I completely forgot about having dinner and all of the other stuff that I had wanted to do while I was in the city. Oh well! When I got back, I did run out to the grocery store to grab a few things, but I've been sitting and reading/translating since then. It's wonderful! Teehee!

Anyway, back to my book!

Two Days

Okay, so I guess I have about two days worth of stuff to get caught up on.

Honestly, everything is settling into a pretty nice routine. I get up, go in to work, help Steffi collect virgin flies, go to the molecular laboratory to do a bit of work (i.e. finishing up the in situ, which takes three days), have lunch with everyone at the mensa, and then do whatever else needs to be done until I go home.

One cool thing about Thursday was that I was invited to go with everyone to see a movie. It was a scientific movie about a Nobel Prize winner who was originally from Austria, but it was still pretty neat. The movie, thank goodness, was in English with German subtitles (I learned lots of cool new words that way!), but the discussion afterwards was all in German. I was able to pick up the occasional phrase, but for the most part, everyone simply spoke too quickly.

After the movie I was hoping that we would all go out for dinner because I hadn't eaten yet and it was about 10:30. Unfortunately, people from another laboratory came to join us, and I felt bad because I was the only one who couldn't speak German. I didn't want to make David translate for me all night, or have all of them speak English for my benefit, so I walked home with Guvanch instead. That night was pretty depressing. I'm learning so much German here and I can usually figure out the gist of what is going on around me, but my vocabulary is still so limited that it is difficult for me to keep up with a fast conversation. It was very frustrating to know that as much as I want to be fluent in this language, I am far from that point and it is limiting the things that I am able to do while I am here.

Friday was, once again, a pretty typical day. Except that when I got to work Martin popped his head in and asked if I was busy. He wanted to know if I wanted to come see the house that he was building. He hadn't been to check on it in a few weeks, and he wanted to see how it was coming along. So he, Steffi, and I all piled into her car and drove up to Nikolausberg (it is technically part of Gottingen, but it is set off from the central city) to see his house. It was super cool. We also dropped by Steffi's house, because she lives up there too, and I met her husband and her daughter. Her house, by the way, is AWESOME. She has bookshelves built into the walls!!! Whoo!

I noticed a few cultural differences Friday as well. (Or at least I thought they were cultural differences. Maybe I'm just weird/crazy/have odd and unrealistic expectations). Coming home from lunch, David asked me if I had any plans for the weekend. I was super excited, because I didn't, and I was hoping that he'd invite me along to do something, because that's generally what happens when someone asks if you have plans. Right? (Am I nuts?? Isn't "Do you have plans for the weekend?" usually followed by "Well, I was just asking because such and such is going on and I was wondering if you wanted to come....?") So I said no, except for Sunday when I am supposed to have lunch with Steffi, and he said, "Oh, okay." And so, I asked if he had plans, and he said he was going to a music festival and he was going to hang out with some friends, etc, etc. And that was the end of the conversation. He was honestly just curious as to whether or not I had plans.

At the end of the day, I found out that both Robert and David were going to the festival, and they left a bit early to get there. I stayed with Simon and William and tried to figure out what to do with the rest of my evening/weekend. The weekends are always a bit depressing because everyone goes off to do their own thing and I have to figure out how to entertain myself alone.

Anyway, there was this really weird moment when William asked me if I had wanted to go with Robert and David. I said that it would probably have been cool, and he said "Well then, why didn't you go?" And I sort of looked confused and said "Erm....because they didn't invite me?" ....And both Simon and William sort of stared at me like I was completely off my rocker. Maybe I'm a bit old fashioned, but you generally don't just invite yourself along to stuff, right? Especially when a person would have to make special accomodations for you (i.e. spend the evening speaking English so that I could understand what was going on). But apparently here, if you want to go with someone to do something, you just go. ::Shrugs:: Oh well. I thought about going to the festival anyway and trying to meet up with them there, but I found out that it was an hour walk to get there because it was up in Nikolausberg.

So, I walked down to the central city instead, and went into a few book shops and such. Completely by accident, I wandered into some of the other people from my program, so we all went to have dinner at one of the many Biergartens here. It was a lot of fun, actually. I love the way that eating at restaurants works here. You essentially walk in and find a place to sit down. Then, after a few minutes someone comes over to take your order and then essentially leaves you alone until you wave them over for something. There is none of this "please wait to be seated" stuff, or having your waiter or waitress popping over to ask you if everything is okay while you're in the middle of a mouthful of food or an interesting conversation. If there aren't any available seats, you find someplace else to eat. It's very cool. I like it because it is very hands-off and very low stress.

I found out that the RISE people were all riding their bikes down to a castle today. I really wanted to go, but unfortunately I don't have a bike (I really need to go rent one) and it is supposed to rain today. Plus, it was way too far to walk (about 20 miles). ::Sigh:: Oh well. I seriously need to go do laundry today anyway.

That was pretty much the entire day, to be honest. I'm going to walk back down to the city tonight because there is a concert that I really want to see. I'll probably get dinner while I'm down there. But first, I will do laundry! I hope it isn't too hard to figure out, but I guess I'll see! Wish me luck!

Tomorrow, I promise

Hi all!

I know I've been a bit MIA for the last day or two. There's been a lot going on and I haven't really had a lot of time. At the moment, it is almost midnight, and I am completely wiped. So I think that I will go to bed. But I promise to have a full update tomorrow morning, mk? Alright. Wonderful. G'night!

Good Morning, Alles

Hi all!

I'm still pretty tired, but I feel a lot better today. Yesterday was pretty rough. I'm sure it is because I got up around 1 AM (home time) and then had to sit around and literally wait all day. When I got to work, it didn't seem like it was going to be too bad because I was working on the second half of the in situ protocol, which was pretty lengthy. However, I got about halfway through, and then Steffi and I couldn't find the chemical we needed, and the only person in the lab that would know didn't come in to work (for some unknown reason). So, not knowing what else to do, we just stuck everything in the fridge and had to leave it. And suddenly I was out of stuff to do.

Oh, one really sweet thing was that Steffi invited me over for cheesecake at her house on Sunday. She said it was a good chance for her daughter to learn some English (she just started learning it in school) and she knows that there isn't much to do in Germany on Sundays, so she is going to pick me up on Sunday afternoon. I thought that it was really nice of her, and I'm very excited.

I went to a lecture with Martin and a few other people in the lab about a new microscope that the MPI was testing for a few days. It was actually being set up in our lab. The lecture was really awful and dry, but later in the evening I went to go take a look at the microscope, and it was very cool. It is very powerful, but the software to use it is sort of clunky and hard to learn. They claim that it is so much faster than a normal microscope (which it is) but the time "difference" between a normal microscope and this new one is probably negligible once you consider how long it takes to figure out the proper computer settings in order to use it.

I spent some time reading some articles, and watching David do his testing. I felt rather useless, to be honest. And, of course, I kept running back to the office to check my email. Finally, around 7:00 or so, (I'm sure it was mostly because he knew that I was making myself nuts) David said that he needed to run to the Klinikum to get some money from an ATM, and while he was over there, he thought he was going to get some ice cream. He wanted to know if I would like to tag along. So, of course, I did. By the way, German ice cream is awesome. It is so much creamier than the ice cream at home (it is more like Carl's and less like Cold Stone), and the flavors are to kill for. So, he bought me an ice cream cone (I got a scoop of Haselnuss and a scoop of Pfefferminz....YUM!) and we walked over to a nearby park to sit and eat because the weather yesterday was gorgeous. It was probably around 70 degrees and sunny and amazing. Anyway, I was much more relaxed by the time we went back to the MPI, and so I left not long afterwards.

Then I went to the grocery store to pick up laundry detergent so that I can wash some clothes today. Whoo! Once I got back from that, I decided to hang out and try my hand at doing some reading in German. So, I found Alice in Wonderland online in German and began reading that. It is taking a while, because I have to look up a lot of the words. Craig emailed me to let me know that everything was cool around midnight, which was wonderful!

One really really cool thing that I've started to notice is that I am understanding a LOT more German now. For the most part, I can figure out what is being said around me. When I first got here, everyone spoke so quickly that I couldn't even distinguish individual words from one another, much less understand what was being said. Now, though, I'm much better at keeping up, and I'm learning a lot of new vocabulary. I still don't speak it much (except with Steffi) but I am making a lot of progress with regard to my comprehension.

And that was my day. And now, I need to go to work, because I am a bit late. Love you all!

Many Things

Hi everyone!

I am afraid that I am completely exhausted. It has been a long, difficult day. I will most definitely tell you all about it in the morning. Love you all!

Talking Talking Talking

So, I started out the morning doing an in situ hybridization, which was not really as cool as I thought it would be (lots of pipetting and washing fly embryos with various chemicals) but still pretty neat. I worked with Steffi and William on it. I really like working with Steffi. Her English isn't as good as everyone else's (although it is still much better than my German) but that means that we learn a lot from each other, and we have a good time. Plus, Steffi was able to tell me where there is a laundromat nearby. I will probably go out on Friday to do some laundry. I should have enough clothing to last until then.

Once everyone in the lab came back from lunch, we all sat in the social room to have a cup of coffee. I would like to point out that they drink a lot of coffee in this lab. A lot of really strong coffee. A half a cup of this stuff will give me the jitters. Anyway, we talked about lots of really random things (not the least of which was the fact that all of us belong to not only a different century but also a different millenium), and after William and Martin left, David and I pulled out our computers to show each other pictures of our families and friends and what not. He has two younger brothers, one my age, and one two or three years older than that.

David and I finally went back to work, but after an hour or two we ended up back in our office talking more about all sorts of things. Guvanch came by at one point and joined in as well. I learned a lot about the way that the Google search engine works from him because he's building a fly database of some sort. We also talked about the transportation system in Europe, and how neat it is to be able to hop on a train for a few hours and end up literally anywhere in Europe, or even outside of Europe (there is a train which leaves from Germany and travels directly to Moscow!) The three of us ended up hanging out until about 8 or 8:30, when we all realized how late it was and that we should probably go home!

So anyway, that was my day. Lots and lots of talking. I really wish I could remember everything that we talked about. It was a really interesting day.

But anyway, it is late, and I have to go to the lab early tomorrow, so off to bed! Night!

Gestern!

Hallo, all!

I'm running a bit short on time this morning, so I am going to jump right in. Yesterday was a pretty average day, except that I finally met the other Bachelor's student in the group, named William. He seems to be pretty nice, and very interested in Americans. (So.....Americans seem to name their daughters after months and flowers a lot. Why is that??) ::Smile::

Also, after lunch yesterday, Bjorn and David and I ran across to a little university shop for a cappuccino. It was crazy, because for some reason, my university card wouldn't work to let me pay for my drink. Apparently, because I'm not a student I can only use my university card at the mensa, or something like that. David realized that this was an error and so we went to some office to try to get things worked out. All I can say is thank goodness for David because I would've been completely lost otherwise. Anyway, the ladies at the office seemed a bit reluctant to do it, but David managed to get them to give me a "Mitarbeiterin" or employee, card. That way, my card will work at other places on campus, and I get a discounted rate (YAY!) for my food. This is absolutely WONDERFUL, because otherwise, getting lunch every day was going to be really expensive.

Yesterday evening was pretty neat too. I managed to get in touch with a few other people from the my program and we all got together to go watch a movie at one of the other MPIs (there are actually several different MPIs in the city). It was neat. They were all nice, although it was a bit awkward because they've already been here for a month and they all work in the same building, so they know each other. I was sort of the odd man out. Oh well. It wasn't too bad, and I think that we all had a good time. One of the guys walked me back to my MPI because he was heading in the same direction anyway. I was relieved because the MPI that we were at was on the opposite side of the city, and I'm not sure I could've found my way back on my own.

Anyway, that was pretty much my day. Maybe not as exciting as I made it sound yesterday. Oh well, I'm sorry if I disappointed any of you.

Alright, now it is off to work! I get to learn how to do in situ hybridization today! WHOO!

Tomorrow, Tomorrow, Is Only a Day Away

Hi everybody! I hope you are all doing well! I just wanted to let you know that it was a very eventful day, but you will have to wait to hear all about it until the morning because it is very late here, and I am very very tired. But I will definitely post about it tomorrow! G'night!

Simple Day

Hey all!

Not much to report today. I seriously slept in (I won't even tell you how late I slept, because I am quite embarrassed by it), got up, had some breakfast, checked my email, etc. etc.

I waited around for a long time, hoping that someone from my program would email me back and say "Yeah, sure, let's get together!" but that didn't happen. I guess they all had plans for the weekend.

I finally went out for a stroll this afternoon, which was nice. I literally just picked a direction and started walking until I got tired of walking. I ended up at this huge intersection, across from some stores (none of which were open, of course). It seemed very much like Richmond because you have the big stores on one side of the street, and on the other side you have these pretty little houses. It was really comforting to know that really, when you get down to it, things aren't all that different here. Anyway, it was a very nice walk, and I managed to get back right before the rain started.

The rain here is really weird. It isn't like the rain at home, where the clouds will gather and then it is just sort of icky and drizzly all day. Here, a big cloud will pass over and it will rain for 5 or 10 minutes, and then it will go away and it is warm and sunny and gorgeous. And then, a few hours later, another suspiciously dark cloud will pass over and it will rain for another 5 or 10 minutes.

So, I came back, took a nap, talked to Nick, and then had dinner! And that has been the extent of my day. I'm super excited about getting back to work tomorrow. Again, I've just really been enjoying the work and the people, and even though it has been a good weekend, it has been a bit lonely. I'm anxious to get back to work, where I can understand what is going on around me. Usually. Although, now, even when they are speaking German, I can generally follow a bit of what is going on. I'm at least able to pick out key phrases or words that give me an idea of what they are talking about.

Love you all!

The Wochenmarkt

Hallo!

Well, today's excursion to the Wochenmarkt was a huge success! It was really neat, first of all, to see the main city on a Saturday, when things are still open. It is like a huge flea market or festival or something. There are little booths all over the city where people come to set out their wares; people selling jewelry, or flowers, or knick-knacks were everywhere.

The market, which is in a sort of secluded part of the city, was also very cool. They had all sorts of things; meat, cheese, bread, fruits and veggies, fresh herbs, eggs, pretty much anything you could think of. I ended up buying apples (about 5 and a half pounds of them!), eggs, and some tomatoes. (Unfortunately, I then had to lug all of that stuff back with me. You don't realize how heavy something is until you have to carry it for a fairly long distance).

I think the poor kid at the apple stand thought that I was crazy or something. I guess I was just being quiet, or maybe he asked me a question that I didn't respond correctly to, but he kept staring at me like I was nuts. It was funny. The ladies at the stand where I got the eggs were both very nice to me. I asked them how much the eggs cost, and they told me, but it took me a second to convert that back into English (I'm still at the stage where everything has to be translated back into English before I can process what it means. Hopefully that will change someday.) So anyway, I apologized and told them that I didn't speak very much German, and I had to think about what they were saying. They were very sweet, and promptly started telling me all sorts of things that I didn't really understand. I did catch that one of the ladies said that German is a very difficult language to learn. I, of course, agreed, and wished them both a good weekend before I left.

All in all, the market was really pleasant, and very affordable (all of those apples only cost 3 euro!) so I will definitely be going back.

I still needed a few more things from the regular grocery store, though, so after I had gotten back and put away all of my purchases from the market, I went out to the Penny Markt. I got all sorts of cool stuff. More bread, some butter for cooking (I know, I know, terrible for me, but I couldn't find any vegetable oil), some lunch meat (VERY EXPENSIVE!), cereal, milk, and a few other things. I got home and had a bowl of cereal, and it was fantastic! Their milk is all 3.5% (at least, that was all I could find), and as bad as it probably is for me, it is deeelicious.

After that, I came home and took a really long nap, and then got up and made some dinner (I had eggs! Oh, they were wonderful even though I forgot to buy salt to put on them!)

And that has been my day. Now I'm going to try to go to bed, even though I'm not really tired because I slept for about 3 hours this afternoon.

Love you all!

Die Nacht der Kultur and Other Things

Guten Morgen, alles!

I feel much better this morning after a full night's sleep. It is fabulous to sleep in a bit!

Yesterday was a pretty good day, except that I spent the vast majority of it in what I lovingly call "the hole," otherwise known as the dark room. I know, not overly creative, but it really is like a hole in the wall. And not the sort of "hole in the wall" in which you can find really good food. I made quite a bit of progress with my testing, which is great, but I couldn't spend more than about 45 minutes at a time in the room, because it is literally nothing more than a glorified closet. And I discovered that it is very difficult to work in red light.

After I finished with my "experiments" for the day, I decided to hang out for a while and see if the internet could magically find anything interesting to do in the city for this weekend. Surprise of all surprises, it did! Last night was the Gottinger Nacht der Kultur. Essentially, it was just a big festival in the main city with live performances, plays, and lots of food. I was sort of hoping that someone from the lab would go with me because it is always more fun to do things with a group of people and it is even better when that group of people can speak the language. But Martin had disappeared, Robert went to Paris for the weekend with his girlfriend, and David had to stay late to take some more measurements. No one else in the lab was around. So, I decided, "You know what, who needs 'em!" and walked the two miles down to the main city.

It was actually very nice. It was very crowded, but very nice. I saw all sorts of really neat performances (with the exception of one pretty bad A Cappella quartet). I had a lot of fun listening to the Gottinger Orchestra. They played a lot of very famous classical music, plus a medley of Henry Mancini music (The Pink Panther, anyone?). That one literally made me giggle out loud with glee. The festivities were supposed to continue until midnight, but at about 10 I decided that I was cold (the weather is still very cold at night, although it is warmer during the day than it was when I first got here), and I wanted to get back before it got dark.

All in all, it was a lot of fun!

I think that today I am going to walk back down to the city to go to the farmer's market (called the Wochenmarkt) and buy some fresh Gemuse and Obst (veggies and fruits) for the week. I'll probably also go to the regular grocery store and buy a few more things. I am going to have to start actually cooking for myself. I've had about all I can take of peanut butter and pseudo-jelly and Ramen. I also need to drop by an ATM (or Geldautomat, here) and get some money, as I think I have about 10 euro left to my name. Lunch at the mensa is much more expensive if you are not a student at the university, so a lot of the money that I had left went onto my ID card in order to buy lunch.

Otherwise, I think I'm going to try to get in touch with some of the other people from the RISE program who are in Gottingen. I'd like to meet them all. Maybe we can get together for ice cream or something tomorrow.

Anyway, those are my plans for the day. I'll let everyone know how it works out!

Oh, and for all of you who haven't seen it yet, here is a link where you can see pictures of everyone in my lab. That way, you can put names and faces together. (Surprisingly, there are three women in my lab, although you don't hear about them too much because they only work half-days. There will be even more when Pingkalai gets back! Whoo!)

http://www.uni-goettingen.de/en/114693.html

Just click on the names to see individual pictures of people!

Alright, see you all later!

I'm sorry

As much as I love all of you, I am very very tired and will opt for going to bed instead of writing an extensive blog post tonight. I had a very nice day, and I went on a bit of an adventure, but I will tell you all about it first thing in the morning (which means that it will be ready and waiting for you when you get up tomorrow! Yay!)

Again, I'm sorry, but I am mostly asleep right now.

Not Much Today

Hallo!

Well, I hate to say this, but there really isn't much to say today. I went to work, had a great time except that my RNA extraction didn't work, which makes me more than a bit grumpy because this means that I am going to have to pull the antennae off a bunch of flies again next week. ::Sigh::.

I sort of started my behavioral project today, which was pretty neat. Although they are sticking me in the dark room to do it. The dark room is very very small, and you have to stand in a cylinder and rotate it around you until you can get inside. It won't be too bad, it'll just be a lot of hours sitting in the dark. But I get to work with a red lamp! Which I think is super cool! Hehe.

I think that we were supposed to all go out again tonight, but we never got around to it. Everyone was very busy today because the electrophysiology guys (David and Robert) got a new piece of equipment in that they wanted to set up.

I do have a pretty funny story to tell all of you....(or at least, it was funny at the time. I don't know if it will be so funny now, though. Things sometimes get lost in translation.)

But anyway, I was talking to Robert this afternoon, and I said something about Martin, but when I said his name, it came out very very Americanized. (Martin is pronounced more like Mah-tin here.) Oops! So, I apologized and said that even though I know how to pronounce everyone's name, it sometimes still comes out a bit wrong if I'm not thinking.

"Don't worry about it too much. It is pretty hard to mess up my name anyway." (I would like to point out that Robert is pronounced differently in Germany) "And it isn't a big deal with David's name either."

Of course, he says this as we're walking into the office where David is sitting, and he says Day-vid instead of Dah-vid when he says it.

So, David's head shoots up and he looks at us both with this horrified expression on his face and says "DAY-VID?? Who is Day-vid?? My name is DAH-VID. I don't know any Day-vids! Daaaah-vid!" And he shudders a bit and begins to mutter a bit under his breath about Day-vids... Robert and I just sort of look at him for a second and then start cracking up. It was priceless. The look on his face was what made it really funny. I wish I could've gotten a picture at that exact moment.

Anyway, that was literally my entire day. I guess I will go to bed now! Bis Morgen!

Last night's dinner, plus today!

Hallo, all!

As promised, today you get to hear about yesterday! And a bit about today, although there really isn't much to tell.

Yesterday was really fantastic. I went in to work at around 10, taking all of the gifts with me that I brought from home. Everyone was very excited about looking through everything, and so four or five of us (Martin included) went to the social room with some coffee and sat and looked through all of the books. It was really funny, because Martin decided that everyone in the lab should have a go at reading the names of the cities that were on the Virginia map at the front of the books. It was pretty hysterical. They did fairly well, except that NO ONE could pronounce Culpeper correctly. Simon (who is actually from China) did a pretty good job at saying Tappahannock, which I thought was pretty impressive. And Martin was VASTLY amused by all of the British names in Virginia. He had a lot of fun using a British accent and saying Staunton. He also spent the rest of the day trying to remember the lyrics to the John Denver song "Take Me Home, Country Roads" because he knew that he had heard of the Shenandoah River before.

Other than that bit of entertainment, it was a rather typical day. Martin sent me some articles to read, and so I read them and did some brainstorming about my project and what not. Then, around seven a bunch of people from the lab went out to dinner. It was me, Martin, Guvanch, David, Bjorn, Simon, and Robert. We went to the inner part of the city, but we walked through the school campus as we went because I hadn't seen very much of it yet. It was really neat. The whole campus is on cobbles. Not just the sidewalks, like at VCU, but the ENTIRE campus. It was really neat. (But a bit hard to walk on...I almost turned my ankle once or twice.)

We went to a place called the Kleine Ratskeller to eat. The food was AWESOME. I got the wurst with sauerkraut and fried potatoes. Delicious! One thing I've noticed, though, is that German portion sizes are even bigger than American portions. I haven't been able to finish a single meal since I've been here. I feel really bad about it, but there is really nothing that I can do. I almost made myself sick last night trying to finish off all of my food. And what is so funny is that these super skinny German guys are polishing off these gigantic meals and then throwing three or four beers on top of it!

It was a lot of fun though. It was very relaxed. There was pretty much no one else in the restaurant, so we sat and chatted for three or four hours. It was crazy. We talked about all sorts of things: World War II, September 11th, famous German actors, science...everything. Bjorn and Martin got into this super scientific discussion/debate for at LEAST an hour and a half. It was a lot of fun to listen to even though I didn't always understand what they were talking about (it didn't help that I was full of food and starting to get sleepy). And it was really nice, because everyone made sure that they had their conversations in English so that I could follow along.

After we finished our meals, we wandered around for a bit and had a really entertaining conversation about American vs. European toilets (Bjorn started it!). And I have to say that as much fun as it was, I was almost relieved when we started walking back towards our respective homes. It has been REALLY cold in Germany for the last few days (as in, around 50 or 55 degrees during the day) and I didn't pack an actual coat. I had packed my new "autumn" coat in my bag and then decided that I didn't really need it, so I took it out. Last night I was seriously wishing that I had it. The only thing I had was a rather lightweight jacket with 3/4 length sleeves. I was FREEZING. But anyway, it was great fun! David was nice and walked me back to the guest house to make sure that I didn't get lost (it was about 1AM by this time, and some of the streets in the city are not well lit, so it is hard to tell where you are).

So that was yesterday.

Today was also a really good day (and much warmer, thank goodness!) Today I worked with Ute and Steffi in the molecular laboratory. (I guess I should explain that Martin's lab is literally one whole WING of the building. They have a HUGE molecular laboratory, and a very large fly room with equipment for the hearing tests that they do on the flies. And Martin's office is the largest I think I have ever seen in my entire life. It big enough to be a bedroom!) Anyway, I spent half the morning trying to use a microscope and tweezers to pull one segment of the antenna off of a bunch of fruit flies. Very difficult, and really really gross.

Then Ute and I went to the basement to get some liquid nitrogen so that we could grind up some flies and extract RNA from them. The thing that really blew my mind was that they don't wear gloves all that often! I couldn't believe it! RNA is one of the most unstable molecules outside of our bodies, and our skin secretes an enzyme that causes it to break down. At my normal lab, you never touch ANYTHING that goes near RNA without gloves. And everyone in this lab is handling the RNA extraction kit with their bare hands! (Nevertheless, we did get a fair amount of RNA from our samples, so maybe I'm just too paranoid).

So, yeah, that was pretty much my day today. I killed a lot of flies (which, I admit, I sort of feel bad about....it's one thing to smush them in your house, it's another to look at them up close while you are pulling them apart). But anyway, dass ist alles fur heute! (That is all for today!)

Love you all,

Me

Hi everyone!

You guys are going to kill me, and so I apologize, but I'm afraid that the post for today is going to have to wait until tomorrow. A lot of the guys from the lab and I went out to dinner tonight at 7, and it is now about 1:30, and I just got home. I had a great time...it was a lot of fun, but I am absolutely exhausted. Plus, I have to be at the lab in the morning at 9 so that I can do an RNA extraction with Steffi. I promise, though, to put up a post tomorrow telling you all about my day. Again, I'm sorry I don't have the energy to do it now. I love you all!

Me

I AM NOW IN BUSINESS!

I am terribly sorry about the lack of posts since I've been in Germany! I haven't had a password to get into the wireless at the guest house, and then I didn't have the right adapter for my computer. But now, I have both, and I can tell you all what I have been up to so far! (Also, this will probably be a very long post, because I dutifully recorded all of the happenings of the last few days on paper until I could get the internet up and running to make a proper post). 

My trip to Germany wasn't too bad. It was just very very long and exhausting. Getting through the airport in the U.S was pretty typical, although I had to wait in line to check my luggage for more than an hour. The flight itself was nice. I was sitting next to this old man who looked and sounded like Vizzini from The Princess Bride. He was going home to Geneva after a visit in the States with family. I found lots of rather interesting information from him, especially about the flight, because he worked with the Airport Authority in Geneva. This was wonderful because I got hopelessly lost in the Geneva airport while looking for my connecting flight. I ran into him again, and he helped me figure out where I needed to go. The flight from Geneva to Frankfurt was gorgeous. I got to see a bird's eye view of the Alps. The ICE train to my city was also very nice (and very fast!). By that point I could barely keep my eyes open, so I didn't get to admire much of the scenery. 

Simon met me at the train station and brought me to the guest house. He was very friendly and showed me where my room was, took me up to the laboratory to give me a tour, and even took me to the nearest grocery store so that I could go shopping (where I bought the staples of almost any college dorm - Ramen, bread, peanut butter and something that is similar to jelly).

My room is lovely. It had everything I could wish for: a beautiful picture window that looks out on a little garden (see above), linens,  a small but very well furnished kitchen, a desk and closet/wardrobe thing, even an alarm clock, should I have forgotten my own.

Sunday was also a very nice day.  I decided to walk down to the central part of the city to see the famous Ganseliesel fountain and find a Deutsche Bank ATM. When I inquired at the lobby as to where I might find an ATM, I was more than a little dismayed to discover that there was only one Deutche Bank in the entire city. Worse,  the man at the desk didn't know if it had an ATM. He was very nice though, and gave me a map (marked with the location of the bank) and also recommended that I visit the Old Botanical Gardens. The city is not very hard to navigate, but it is a 2 mile walk to the central part. It is beautiful. It is also very odd, because you see a lot of newer looking buildings nestled in right next to "traditional" German architecture (i.e. the picture to the left). 

I had no problems finding the Ganseliesel or the bank (which does have an ATM inside, YAY!)

 and decided to just wander. I found a floh markt (literally, flea market), bought some ice cream and bread, and finally went to hunt down the botanical gardens. They were also very very pretty, and I found something which tickled me PINK! 

Polk salad! In a botanical garden....in GERMANY! That literally made my entire day. 

And now to today. I know, I talk too much, but please be patient with me for a few more minutes. Today was my first day of work. And it was awesome. The people in my lab are all very relaxed ( I can call the boss Martin!!) and wonderfully nice. When I got there, the secretary opened the door for me. I initially said (in English, bad me!) that I was supposed to meet David at 8:45, but I got a blank stare, so I repeated myself in German. The lady does not speak very much English, which is okay. It means I get to practice. 

David showed up a few minutes after I got there and we walked to the Kartestelle to get my University ID printed (so I can get food at the Mensa). He is also very nice, and we were chatting merrily by the time we got back. He showed me some of the stuff that he is working on (VERY COOL!) and introduced me to everyone else in the lab. They are all wonderful. I spent the most time with Robert and David, chatting and preventing them from getting their work done (I felt really bad about it, afterwards, but they seemed happy to talk to me). Martin told me about the "mini" project that he wants me to work on, and it sounds very neat. He also suggested that we all go out together tomorrow night. I am super excited. I think I am going to have a wonderful time with all of these people. They are all friendly, and helpful, and they have promised not to laugh at me when I try to speak German with them and fail miserably (hehe). 

So that was a not so short summary of the last three days. Expect to hear more from me soon!

Love, 

Me