The Travel Adventures of the Ciesla Family

Day 1 of the conference

2009-07-15T23:33:00.001-07:00

Sorry...this is turning out to be a boring set of posts. Nothing too eventful, at least nothing that makes for a good story. Just your standard conference day, filled with presentations and conversations.

The one somewhat amusing part is that there was a poster session in the evening, during which they provided some beer. The beer was in a number of kegs, 2 of which were tapped at a time. However, the rate at which the beer poured out was incredibly slow. So the line for the beer got so long that I think more than half the people in the conference were in it...just waiting for beer. Here we were, supposed to be looking at people's posters, and instead everyone was waiting like they were at a baseball game...

More of the same today...

Bastille Day

2009-07-15T04:58:00.001-07:00

Do I know how to party or what? Bastille Day, independence day for France, was a bit of a bust. It rained all day. Not just rain, torrential downpours and big lightning bolts and loud thunder. So I spent all day in my room writing a paper. In a way, it’s good—it’s less I’ll have to do when I get back home. And actually, the writing went really well…to the point that it may have been my most productive day in terms of work in months…maybe I should come to France more often. The isolation and lack of internet likely helped significantly.
The work was interrupted periodically by getting together with Gareth who was doing the same thing as me. We went and got breakfast and lunch, then at 6:30 PM, when we had enough, took his PhD student and got some beers and dinner. Sitting and drinking beer under an umbrella in a thunderstorm…that’s the way to spend the evening.

Fortunately the rain let up and we made our way east for the Bastille Day fireworks show. Here it was, French Independence, a day of pride and celebration of all things French. The countdown begins, they launch the fireworks and start blaring music to celebrate. The first song? Desire by U2…also on the play list, Oasis, The Bangles, Amy Winehouse, and some other non-French artists. Not bad, though.

It was an impressive fireworks display though. In the US, it’s usually one firework that goes up, goes off, then fades. Then another does the same. Here, it was 30 minutes of continuous launching, with the grand finale being a bit sensory overload. It was very nice.

Now off to bed (as I write this…I’ll post tomorrow morning from the conference). Adieu.

Day 4

2009-07-14T01:54:00.001-07:00

End of the workshop and then registration for the conference in the evening. Registration is always good—drinks and food and getting to catch up with lots of people. Found Gareth and Tom, my collaborators for the project that I am presenting this week and headed down to the town hall where the reception was held…An absolutely stunning building. As Gareth, a Londoner said, buildings like this only survive when you give in during the war….Saw lots of people, chatted a lot, and then went to dinner with Gareth, Tom, Jay Melosh, and his wife. Had a very nice prisciutto salad and realized other than the 2 croissants I had grabbed at the bakery on the first morning I was here, it was really the first time food wasn’t provided for me this week, or bought from a store.

Tomorrow (or today as I write this) is Bastille day in France—the equivalent of their independence day. My plan is to work—yee haw! Well, for the morning anyway. Gareth and I will then walk a bit, if weather permits, and then sit and have some drinks and catch up for a bit. There’s supposed to be all sorts of celebrations this evening with fireworks and the such, which would be quite nice to see.

Day 3

2009-07-14T01:53:00.002-07:00

More workshop, this time I was merely a spectator—again lots of interesting stuff.

That evening, we had a party as part of the workshop, with dinner, drinks and music. Again, it was a lot of fun and very good food. Again, not much to tell in the way of stories.

Day 2

2009-07-14T01:53:00.001-07:00

Day 2 was the first day of the workshop. I gave my talk to open up the conference and chaired the session that morning. Overall it was a very interesting set of talks and discussion. I’ll spare you the details….

That evening I was invited to dinner and drinks at the house of one of the faculty members of the Nancy University. Again, a very pleasant time, but not one that makes for very good stories on the blog…sorry!

Bon Jour Mes Amis

2009-07-14T01:52:00.000-07:00

Ok, I apologize for not updating the blog here…things have been hectic. Not in a bad way, just overall, busy.

I left Chicago on Thursday to arrive in France Friday morning. It was an uneventful flight, to be honest. I slept for about 4 hours and was feeling pretty rested when I arrived.

The plan was to then take the train down to Gare du Nord, walk to Gare del Est, and take the train to Nancy, where my workshop and conference are. Figuring out how to get the train down to Paris was a bit of a challenge, and I was not alone in that regard. Everything I had read said that you could get a ticket at a machine in the airport and then head into the city. Many others apparently read the same thing. And in theory, it’s probably true. However, most American credit cards do not have the little chip in them that is needed here, so everyone’s credit card kept getting rejected. Eventually we figured it out, found a line to wait in and were able to buy tickets at a stand.

I made it down to Gare du Nord without issue and then made the 10 minute walk down to Gare del Est. I checked my bag as I had 4 hours before my train and walked due south to the Louvre. It was a very nice walk and the end was fantastic, as from my vantage point I was overlooking the Louvre and Notre Dame, with the Eiffel Tower in the background. I’m very much looking forward to spending next week there with Nina.

I walked back to Gare del Est to get my train ticket—well my boarding pass as I had bought my ticket online. I went to the electronic kiosk and entered my reservation number to claim my pass…”Invalid code.” Tried it again. “Invalid.” Ok, I had an hour, so I needed to find someone to figure out what was going on.

I found the ticket office and the woman who greeted me there told me to stand in a line with 25 people in front of me. At that point I had 55 minutes until my train arrived. I got to the front of the line in 45 minutes…My train left in 10. I explained that for some reason my pass wasn’t printing and that I had bought my ticket, here’s my receipt, here’s my code, I don’t understand what’s going on. The woman looked at me, looked at my receipt, spent 5 minutes just looking at her computer, and then printed my passes. I was grateful, but would have thought at some point she would had said something to me…hell, all the ticket people were chatting with the customers, whether it was in French, English, German, or what have you.

Anyway, I had my ticket and 5 minutes before my train left. I ran, got my suitcase, and then booked it to my train, getting on just a minute before it departed.

The train ride to Nancy was uneventful…I fell in and out of sleep for a while. I arrived, got to my hotel, grabbed a quick bite to eat, and worked on the talk I had to give the next day. Then I passed out.

Day 2

2009-06-22T13:14:00.001-07:00

Conference started.

No luggage still. "Located and Delivery Initiated."

Much anger.

WTF?!?!!?!?!??!

2009-06-21T13:57:00.000-07:00

So my itinerary for this trip was to fly from O’Hare to JFK at 12:50 PM and arrive at 4:00 PM, then catch the 5:25 flight from JFK to Zurich. Not a lot of time to make a connection, but since I was going straight through, that’s fine.

Things started badly and got worse. The flight I was on kept getting delayed—weather in New York made traffic control there bad so flights couldn’t land. Our take off got pushed back to 1:45 then 2:15. We’d get in 10 minutes before our other flight was scheduled to leave.

Eventually the time came for us to board—only for them to not let us board because a “foreign substance” was found on the plane. No details other than they were putting us on a different plane at a different gate. We march over, to have our flight delayed until 2:30, with a scheduled landing at 5:40. Crap.

Fortunately a colleague of mine was on the same flight, so we were in this together. We go ask what the people at the gate recommend we do. The woman who helped us said that our Zurich flight may be delayed as well since everything is so bad there. And if not, they’d put us on another flight, even another airline, so we could get to Zurich. Good enough…we board and fly to JFK.

We land at 5:25. I immediately pull out my iPhone and see the Zurich flight was delayed as well…until 5:45. JOY! Not only that, it was 2 gates over from where we would deboard. So all we have to do is run 200 feet and we’re there.

Except we couldn’t…the gate we were going to wasn’t ready, so we sat in the plane for 20 minutes. We get out of the plane, run like hell, and find out that our Zurich flight just pulled away from the gate without us…at this point we realize there were roughly 10 of us who were trying to make that connection from Chicago. Ten! And they couldn’t wait 5 minutes.
We walk to ticketing to see what they can do. One person gets on a Delta flight 3 hours later that gets him to Zurich 3 hours later than he would have otherwise…good for him.

Not us, though. We talk to the ticket agent for 1.5 hours as she tries to get us to Zurich. The best she can do is get us to London, leaving JFK at 9:15pm and arriving at 9:15 am (or something like that) and then have us fly from London at 7:50 PM and arrive at Zurich at 9:55 PM. Now remember, Zurich is not our final destination…we have a 3 hour train ride to Davos for this conference…and the trains stop running at 9PM. She says to see in London if they can get us on an earlier flight, but she said, our bags may not make it. “They can’t pull them?” we ask…no apparently. “They can’t ship them to Davos for us?” No she says. Crap….

Oh, and our Zurich flight sat on the runway until 7:15...so was there for most of the time we were trying to get rebooked.

We get to London and talk to a ticket agent who immediately gets us on a 1:15 PM flight to Zurich, arriving at 4:00 PM. This is now British airways. She says no problem getting the luggage and that we’re all set. Hallelujah!

We get some food and then get on then get in line to board the plane. They scan my ticket and a red light goes off. The woman asks to see my luggage claim ticket. I show her, she scans it, and then says “You’re set.”

“Does that mean my bag is on this flight as well?” I ask.

“Let me double check.” Pushes keyboards…confused look. Not good. She calls over another agent. She says she’ll call down to see if the bag is there and asks me to sit before boarding the plane.

“You are set, Dr. See-eh-sla. Your bags are on board.”

“Great. Thank you so much.”

I tell my colleague we’re set and we head to Zurich. We arrive without issue and head down to claim our bags.

We wait.

We wait more.

We see the same ugly green plastic suitcase pass by 5 times. Our bags are not there. A baggage agent comes over and asks our names.

“Oh, you are not on the list.” “The list” is the list of bags in their office. He takes us back to take our information.

“According to the computer, your bags are at JFK.”

Blank stares.

“When they arrive, we will send them to you in Davos. Should take less than 24 hours once they arrive. In the meantime, would you like an overnight bag of shampoo, toothbrush, toothpaste, etc ?”

This guy was really awesome. I can’t imagine anyone in the US being as courteous as he was in this same situation. In fact, the times I’ve had baggage issues in the US, the agents tried to turn it around like it was my fault. This guy really tried to help. That was the one bright spot.

So I go buy some underwear, socks, and a t-shirt and travel to Davos. Here I sit, hoping my bag shows up tomorrow. It is cold and rainy here….my jacket is in my suitcase. I am set for clothes for tomorrow, but will have to do more shopping if I don’t get my bag then. I’m not happy. I’m tired. The end.

Now is the time on sprockets when we dance!

2009-03-05T12:36:00.000-08:00

One story from yesterday that I forgot to relay:

The first room on the tour of the castle yesterday was the entrance room, which had the family tree of the owners (who historically were the kings/emperors of Prussia/Germany) painted on the walls. The woman leading the tour described much of the history--who followed who to the throne, dating as far back as the 11th century. Then she went on to say:

"Then the final emperor left the throne at the end of the first world war when Germany briefly became a democracy."

That was followed by some giggles and laughters until we all remembered why that democracy was so brief. Then there was about 10 seconds of nervous, awkward silence.

Anyway, today was back to the conference--an interesting day overall, but again, little to report. After the conference, I wasn't up much for walking around, largely because it was raining/snowing pretty good and I didn't want to get wet, and I wanted to get a bit of work done as I have a conference to go to 2 weeks after I return to Chicago. So I must prepare for that.

I decided to grab a quick dinner on the way home. Realizing that I had been in Germany for 6 days and that I hadn't had a bratwurst yet, I decided to go find one. I walked around a bit and found a manned window where I could get a variety of sausages. I ordered two: a bratwurst and a currywurst. The currywurst is in essence a bratwurst chopped up, smothered in ketchup and curry powder sprinkled all over it. Now by "smothered" I mean ***SMOTHERED***! Wow..not a huge ketchup fan, but I had to try it once.

I got the bratwurst with mustard. Interesting way of cooking it--they roll the brat in dough and then fry it, so that instead of a bun, it's almost like a giant pig-in-a-blanket. It was quite nice. I enjoyed it.

I then came back and have been working. Sorry for being so boring. However, to make up for it, I leave you with this video that I saw on tv. It's not German, but it was on German tv, and I enjoyed it.

I'm as happy as a little girl.

2009-03-04T21:05:00.000-08:00

The 3rd day of the conference ended up being a short one in terms of science, but a long one in terms of goings-on. I did the usual--woke up and showered, checked things online, and then went and had breakfast. I then decided to walk a bit around Tubgingen, as I had a bit of time before the conference started. After a while, I headed up to campus.

The morning session was good, with me managing to avoid hurting myself in anyway. During the coffee break, somebody asked if he could take my picture for a Finnish astronomy magazine--look out, coming to a newsstand nowhere near you! We then adjourned for lunch.

In the afternoon, though, we all gathered at the bus stop and traveled off to Hohenzollern Castle. (Note: This says webcam, but I think the camera has not updated in 6 months or so.) It was a beautiful setting--castle up on the mountaintop, overlooking the surrounding valley. The bus drove us up about half way...the rest we were left to climb. That took some effort. Despite it all, it was a very nice visit.

We then headed back to town, dropped our stuff off at our hotels, and then headed to the Casino am Neckar for our conference dinner of "Traditional Swabian food." There were about 100 of us attending, and the room was well decoarated, with a jazz band playing. They decided to serve us drinks before dinner, which was nice, but poorly handled. There was a single door leading from the bar to the banquent hall. A single waitress would load up a tray with beer, then walk into the banquet hall where we were all standing (we hadn't sat down at this point) to pass out the drinks. The poor woman would get mobbed every time she came out--she could only cary about 8 at a time, and people kept moving closer and closer to the door so that they could get to her before she handed her beer to someone else. Eventually a crowd just started encircling the door she was using, throwing elbows and pushing one another to get better or maintain good position. It was amusing and sad at the same time.

Eventually, though, everyone got their drink, and we sat down for our food. It was a buffet style dinner--though with what seemed to be a very small selection. I loaded up on lettuce and vegetables, a small slice of turkey, and some fish--and that was essentially all that there was. We all sat down and ate...going through it pretty quickly, figuring we'd go back for seconds. However the waitstaff hurriedly cleared all the food, leaving bare tables. Fortunately, though, after about 5 minutes, they came back with the second course--the "hot course" as we finished our "salad course." We then had some pork and beef, some potatoes and some steamed vegetables. We then had ice cream for desert. Overall it was very good.

The only downside was that we did not start eating until about 8:30 or so, and the pace of the meal was pretty slow. Things were still going on when I left the banquet hall at 11. I wanted to get back to the hotel and get some sleep, though the coffee I had with dessert had me a bit wired.

Unfortunately, I haven't been sleeping too well since I got here. Usually in trips to places like this, I am sufficiently jet lagged that, come nighttime, I pretty easily am able to fall asleep--largely due to the concentration of the day ending and the exhaustion taking over. Here, though, I've struggled a bit. I've got no good explanation, though--I am tired, the bed is comfortable, there's no noise issue. I dunno...oh well, woe is me. I'll deal though.

I've reached that point in the conference, though, that I am growing more and more ready to head home. Two more days. The conference ends tomorrow at lunch time, after which I'll spend some time shopping for the girls at home. Found toy stores and chocolate stores, so I think I have all the bases covered. Still need to double check that it'll be easy to get to the airport Saturday morning...I don't want to let that one slip.

Until next time...

Shocking...

2009-03-03T12:34:00.000-08:00

The room where we have the workshop is a nice room in the new theological studies building on campus. It’s in essence a lecture room, with wooden chairs and big tables. It’s nice as we can plug in our laptops into outlets that are underneath the surface of the table, so they’re open in front of us all day. As I brought my outlet converter thingy with me, I’ve been doing exactly that.

Before getting too far, let me start off this next paragraph by saying, “I am ok.” Really, I’m fine…just an idiot.
So before lunch, I reached under the table to unplug my laptop, but my computer plug starts coming out of the outlet converter…my thumb brushed the contact on my plug before it was fully out and…ZAP. A very strange, tingly, painful sensation went up my left arm, into my chest and my head. Fortunately, I felt it quickly and let go very rapidly…but it was odd. And scary. The guy next to me gave me a funny look and asked, “Did you zap yourself?” “Yes,” I said.

Ok…I don’t know if I have ever shocked myself like that before…it scared the crap out of me to be honest. It was quick and left no damage, but man…not something that I was looking to do, and not something I’m proud of. Particularly at a conference…Remember what I said about Kepler having gone to school here? He’d have laughed at me and called me an idiot.
So, I walked down and grabbed a quick lunch to take back to the conference room as I had the first talk after lunch. I got a slice of pizza and a butterbretzel…a baked pretzel, sliced in half, with butter spread throughout. Not too bad. Along the way, I made sure I could move all my extremeties and that I could remember how to talk and my vital information (name, wife’s name, child’s name, home town, etc.) I concluded there was no damage from the electric shock and was relieved.

The rest of the day? Not as exciting. I gave my talk and it went well…then we had a reception with the mayor of Tubingen, where he gave us German wine and more pretzels.

That’s about it. Now I’m typing this blog and have some work I need to do. That’s about it. I’m hoping to walk around a bit tomorrow morning and take some pictures and to check on how to leave this place come Saturday—you know so that if I have any questions I can get answers before risking being late for my flight come Saturday morning. We also have an afternoon excursion and reception in the evening…so that should be enjoyable.

Would you like to touch my monkey?

2009-03-02T12:02:00.000-08:00

I could not sleep last night. Have no idea why. Yes, I was working late, but even still...I stopped working, read a book for pleasure for a while, turned out the light, and just sat there, trying to sleep. So I read some more...until 2 AM. Finally I was able to sleep.

I intended to wake up early and work on my talk a bit, but that didn't happen--too tired, surprise surprise. So I got ready later and headed down for breakfast. Again a good one--sausage, sausage, yogurt and granola, sausage, and some pretzel bread. Yummy.

Then I headed to the conference center. There was a slight mist this morning, but nothing too bad. Got to the conference center, chatted with some folk, did the conference thing...nothing really exciting there.

Know what is exciting though? Two things:

1) Johannes Kepler studied here at the University of Tuebingen, where I'm speaking. I know he's been dead for 400 years and isn't going to hear a word that I say, but still, it feels like some sort of honor.

2) I had the beer that Nina's friend Judy (who spent a semester here at the university) had recommended. I went to dinner with a friend at the Ratskeller and had a Dunkel Hefeweizen. It was mighty good.

After that, I came back to my room, and here I sit, not working on my talk for tomorrow. Motivation isn't high. Partly probably due to being so tired...I dunno.

Anyway, that is all for now, meine freunde.

Your narrative has become tiresome...

2009-03-01T12:32:00.000-08:00

Slept solidly last night, waking up around 7 AM local time. I’m sure that’s an anomaly, though, reflecting how tired I was from jet lag. I expect to start getting up around 5 AM or so starting tomorrow.

I showered and got dressed and headed downstairs to get some breakfast. The hotel has a breakfast buffet that is included in your stay. I was curious what it was going to be like. Turns out it is fantastic. The selections included eggs, sausage, more sausage, priscutto, cheeses, breads and rolls, jams and jellies, cereal, fruit salad, and whole fruit. Plus coffee! (By the way, the Germans love their coffee. Love it—coffee and espresso shops abound. You wonder if I am displaced…) After stuffing my face, I set out to walk around a bit and see what this place is like in daylight.

First thing first, I walked out to find the entrance to this old castle (schloss) about 150 feet to my right when I stepped out of the hotel. Gorgeous. It’s at the top of the hilltop and overlooks the whole city. It now serves as a museum, but you are able to walk around the grounds a bit—I may explore more in the next day or so. I was still able to enjoy the view and take in a large brass band that was playing at the university on the hilltop across town. Quite loud, but quite good.

I then set out down the hill and into the large square where the pub I visited last night was. As I walked down I saw a familiar face—Sasha Krot from the University of Hawaii. Now, Nina usually gets quite nervous when I mention that I saw Sasha, because it’s usually followed by “and I’ve got another conference to go to.” Not the case this time, though—for now… ;)

We chatted for a bit and decided to walk around and check out the sights. We walked to the university and through the streets, seeing the different shops and restaurants that were there (and closed—most places are on Sunday, apparently). We talked science quite a bit, then stopped for some coffee before heading back to our hotels. I needed to work on my talk and rest a bit before the conference reception in the early evening.

(Side note: just saw a commercial for “Deutschland’s Next Top Model mit Heidi Klum” that had Heidi Klum yelling at some woman in German. It was amusing.)

I then went to the reception for the conference. Pretty uneventful, to be honest—not necessarily a bad thing, mind you. We had different finger foods: meatballs, cheese, croissants stuffed with pork product, etc. Also drinks—though no beer! I was disappointed, though I did get to have German Riesling, which is never bad and then some espresso at the end of it all.

Overall, I’d have to say it was a pretty uneventful day, for which I apologize…it meant no interesting stories, no getting lost, no lugging suitcases all over town, no horrible language issues leading to eating questionable food. And for that, I apologize. I’ll try harder tomorrow.

Hello, and welcome to Sprockets...

2009-02-28T12:33:00.000-08:00

Ok, so I have always wanted to go to Germany...maybe not always, but for a long time. There's lots that has attracted me, with one of them being the idea of being in a country where there's an entire month where the country shuts down to drink beer. Ok...that's not really what happens, but the idea is cool anyway. Also, Germany is filled with history, and great food--in my mind anyway: meat, meat, and meat, with sauerkraut. How does it get any better than that?

So anyway, I finally got my wish, and here I sit in Germany. I was invited to a workshop here and am giving a talk on Tuesday. Given the effort that goes into such a trip (changing 7 timezones and sitting on a plane for long periods of time) I decided to combine the Germany trip with a quick visit with some friends in London. The London trip was very good, catching up with my friends Gareth and Jess, and talking with Gareth in some detail about a project we are working on together. The visit probably would've been slightly better had I not been so exhausted from jet lag...while I was able to stay awake the whole time, having arrived in London at 6:15 AM and getting to bed at 10:30 PM, my mind was definitely not nearly as sharp as it normally is. Nonetheless, I had a productive and fun visit...I just wish it was for longer and that I hadn't made the visit alone.

Anyway, after just over 30 hours in London, I departed for Tuebingen, Germany. I must admit, despite wanting to go for years, I was very nervous about the trip. The main reason being, I had no idea what was going to happen when I landed....

Ok, first things first, I really get nervous about traveling to a country where I don't speak the language...I feel so ignorant and like I'm playing the role of the American stereotype--you know the one who sits there and goes to a foreign country and constantly asks for things in English louder and louder as if the problem with people in other countries is that they're hard of hearing. So it always makes me feel guilty that I never learned a foreign language so that I could get over that feeling. Of course, I have now traveled to Germany, Japan, Taiwan, Switzerland and France, so it's not like having become proficient in Spanish would have helped me in any of those cases. So traveling the world and being able to communicate everywhere is not a realistic expectation. Nonetheless, I feel crappy showing up some place and hoping that everyone I need to communicate with speaks English.

So in preparation of my landing, I tried planning my route to my hotel so that I could at least get to a bed without much difficulty. In order to get to Tuebingen, I had to fly to Stuttgart and then take a 1 hour bus ride to the main train station at Tuebingen. Fortunately, I printed out maps from google that showed how to walk from the train station to my hotel (500 m, or roughly a third of a mile) and then from my hotel to the place at the university where the conference was to be held. Upon arriving at the bus station, I pulled out my map and started to make my way to my hotel.

Problem was, as I was trying to figure out where to go, I could not make any sense of the map. In looking at the train station on the map and make sense of the roads around me, they were not matching up at all. The direction that I seemed to need to go was one way, but based on how the sun was setting (oh yes, did I mention I was particularly nervous as I was arriving at sunset so I was worried about navigating a city I didn't know in the dark?) it seemed that west was in the wrong place. So I started walking where I thought things made sense...that brought me to some places that eventually fell on the map and made sense, so I started following the path that the map had. After a while, I was getting tired--I had definitely walked more than a mile, not just a third of a mile, but I still had a good distance to go to reach my destination. This made NO SENSE...

Of course, then I realized that I was looking at the map that had directions from the hotel to the university, not the train station to the hotel. This put me about half a mile away from where I wanted to be, and made the time that I was arriving even later than I wanted to be. I walked back the way I came, until I reached a point on the OTHER map that matched up with the directions and was able to find my hotel, though with a wrong turn along the way. But I finally arrived, about an hour later than I should have.

At this point, I was *STARVING* and *THIRSTY*. I sat in the hotel, sent a few e-mails to say that I made it, and then headed out to find some food at 7:45 PM local time. At that point, most of the normal restaurants had closed, so the only place to get any food was at a pub. Of course, again, my nerves started kicking in--this meant going in, ordering food off a menu that I likely could not read and hoping that I got something that I liked. I wandered a bit and eventually found a place whose menu was posted and had a dish with some things I didn't understand, but included "tomate" and "olivena" which I figured was tomato and olive...why not? So I went in, sat at the bar, and the bartender came over and said something German to me. I just pointed to a glass and said, "Biere?"

"No problem," he said.

THANK GOD! He spoke English!

"Can I get food?" I asked.

"Yes, let me get a menu," he said.

I could cry.

I looked at the menu, and it was the same as the one outside--lots of German, with some words that maybe easily translated into English. So I pointed to the "tomate and olivena" dish. When I pointed to it, the bar tender said that it was "Sheep cheese" with other things. "OK", I said, and drank my beer--which was about 3 oz. in size...it was tiny.

Eventually my food came out and it was a flat bread pizza with cheese (the sheep cheese), olives, tomatoes, and...sauerkraut! It was very good. As I finished my tiny little beer, the bartender asked if I wanted another. This time though, I tried to break out the little German that I *DO* know.

Ok, all of the German I know revolves around beer. I mean, really, doesn't it make sense? Anyway, I nod my head and ask, "Weiss?" The bartender gives me a big smile and a big nod....then pours me a BIG glass of heffeweizen. It was very nice.

Then came time to pay the bill...and I froze. I couldn't remember if I was supposed to leave a tip or not. I tried to remember, but I never looked it up as to what the etiquette was in Germany. I decided not to...turns out to be the right decision. However, because I wasn't sure, I booked it out of that pub very quickly.

So I came back to the hotel, because I'm tired, don't know my way around, and there's very little that is opened right now. So here I sit, typing this blog post, watching the German version of "American Idol" called "**SOMETHING** Superstar." It's weird because all the interviews are in German, but then they sing songs that are from American artists...I heard Rhianna, Beyonce, and others who I don't know, but definitely Americans.

So I leave you with this final question...why do non-Americans have accents when they speak English but don't have accents when they sing? It's really weird...

Til next time

Eat it

2008-07-28T15:42:00.000-07:00

Ok, I have no idea what I had for dinner tonight and I think I want to keep it that way. Actually, I do have an idea and I’m not entirely proud of what I ate, but there you go.

The day started simple enough: conference, talks, lunch, more talks, then the SITTING AROUND began. This is the period where you find people you know and hope that someone presents a plan for dinner that includes you. This often isn’t too big of a deal, for example, in Houston every year it’s pretty simple as there are lots of people you know so if something falls through or you miss an opportunity, another one comes by.
Here, it’s more difficult. Not only do you hope you can find someone who wants to go to dinner with you, you hope you find someone who knows where there is a place to go, and you hope that one of the people going is Japanese, knows Japanese, or knows someone who is Japanese. I failed in the latter part. Instead I went to dinner with two folks from Washington DC, one from Chicago, and another from Albuquerque. We wandered a bit, finding one place that looked really good, whose name in Japanese we don’t know, but the English sign called it “Authentic Japanese Restaurant.” Descriptive, if not original. Anyway, I guess the Japanese word for “Authentic” is amazingly close for “Ridiculously expensive” for the meals on the menu started at 10,000 yen, or 100 dollars. No thanks.

We wandered a bit before finding a place called “Tori Tori” which was a yakitori restaurant. Fine, barbecued food, sounds good. We asked for “10 sticks of meat” and waited to see what they brought (keep in mind one of us was a vegetarian).
First was some chicken. Very good.

Next…Chicken gizzard? Never had it, never desired it. Well, I’ll try it. I don’t know what it tasted like, because I just remember being completely surprised by the texture…it was incredibly hard. Ok. Had it. Never will again.

Next was fish. Whole fish, of some sort. It was actually very good—cooked with lemon and salt. Yummy.

After that? Chicken skins with cabbage. Ok. Looked weird, but tasted very good.

Following that? Something. I don’t know what. I’m not proud I ate it. Let’s just say it made my soft-shell crab experience look tame. “Soft boned chicken” I think it was called? It’s pretty much as it sounds…lots of cartilage.

After that there were a lot of vegetables, thank goodness, and quail eggs. I don’t know, it blurs together. There were other things I wouldn’t eat normally. Oh, the soup which was “potato and chicken liver and other things stew” from which the vegetarian happily grabbed a potato, ate it, and then looked up at me only to say “That wasn’t potato.”

In the end, it was an experience. I tried new things. I didn’t enjoy all of it, but what I did enjoy, I actually enjoyed a lot. And thank god for beer. That washed away a lot of unpleasantness—both on the palate and in the mind.

Full day tomorrow—lots to do and I need to work on my talk.

I must now digest what happened today....in more ways than one. Later.

I'm turning Japanese-a

2008-07-27T16:09:00.000-07:00

Sunday morning, after breakfast, I headed out for Matsue for the Meteoritical Society Conference. Fortunately, there were other folks from the workshop I was at on my same flight, so we headed out together. Good thing because it required some advanced research that I hadn’t done.

In order to get to Haneda airport for the flight to Izumo, we needed to take the train to Hamamato (or something like that) station and then switch to the monorail which takes you to the airport. Fine, in theory. Problem is when you buy a ticket for the train, you don’t pick a destination, instead you pick a price, pay it, and then hope that price is good for letting you in and out of a given station. If you do this on a regular basis, you’re set. Completely clueless foreigner? Well, they probably make a profit somehow. Fortunately, somebody knew the fare, we paid it, and made our way.

Getting to the airport was no issue at all, really. We gave ourselves plenty of time to allow for any short bits (or extended periods) of cluelessness, but we didn’t need it. We checked in, checked our bags, went through security, and then had 2 hours to wait.

Security was…interesting. Let’s just say it’s different here. About 30 minutes before boarding the plane, one of the folks we were traveling with was called up to the gate agent, and then pulled aside by a security guard. They went behind some barrier, chatted, and then he returned. Turns out he had put a lighter in his checked bag, which they saw upon scanning his luggage. So they asked him to remove it from his bag (which they had brought up to the gate) AND THEN ASKED HIM TO HOLD ONTO IT FOR THE FLIGHT! The logic being, “if something happens and it catches fire, you’ll be right there to put it out.” To say that’s different from the US philosophy is an understatement.

We had a big 747 to load for our flight—8 seats across and probably something like 40 rows…so a flight of 300 or so. 15 minutes before scheduled departure, they opened the gate for boarding. For everybody. All at once. No “board from the rear” or “by group number.” Just, “Hey, get on board.” And you know what? It worked. We were set in 15 minutes and in the air maybe 5 minutes after our scheduled departure time.

So there we were, 300 some odd folks on a flight to Izumo, one of maybe 8 or 9 for the day. So I figured this must be a major destination or popular travel spot. Coming in for landing, I saw cars parked about 5 feet from the runway, and when we taxied up to the airport, I realized that it only had one gate. I felt like I just landed at the airport that was down the street from us when we lived in Maryland. Seriously. The only thing missing was us getting buzzed by a Cessna. I half expected to see a Japanese version of Emma sitting inside eating blueberry pancakes. Only they don’t offer nearly as much food as the airport in Maryland does.

We then hopped on a bus, drove for half an hour and arrived in downtown Matsue. I walked to my hotel and checked in. Room 510. Great. I head up and walk in. The bed has no sheets or blanket. It’s hot as hell. The tea cup is sitting in the bathroom sink. I’m not happy. There’s a knock at the door, and it’s the woman from the front desk apologizing profusely because she gave me a room that hadn’t been made up yet. Phew. I go downstairs, wait 10 minutes, the whole time worried about the fact that it was hot as hell in the room. I didn’t see an air conditioner control. I’m scared. It’s very hot. VERY humid. AC is needed. My room is made up, so I go up and it’s very similar to my room from Tokyo…just no internet.

And no AC that I can find. Bad. I start hunting for the controls. There are vents in the wall…that’s good. I start looking under the desk. I start looking in the bathroom. I look on the floor. Nothing. This is not good. I then sit down on the bed to think…and as I lean back, I bump my head on a control panel on the bed where the clock is, which also has the controls the AC. Thank goodness. I start that baby up and begin to recrystallize.

At this point, it was 2 in the afternoon and the conference reception wasn’t until 6. So I decided to walk around the city a bit. I think I got half a mile before my clothes were soaked through. I think it was more hot and humid than Tokyo. I don’t know for certain since I didn’t go out in Tokyo at the same time of day—I limited myself to early morning and evening. I really was just drained by it all here and decided sitting in the hotel with my clock/ac was a better option.
So I came back and did some reading. I then headed to the reception which had a giant buffet of food. It was huge and delicious. Among the attractions was a fully carved tuna and sashimi. As part of the display, they left the head on the cutting board. And the tail. And when the sashimi was gone, some of the more experienced members of the group begin pulling pieces of meat from the head and tail… I’m not that experienced.

Anyway, enough adventures for now. I’d say I’m pretty much adjusted to the time change here as I was up at 5 AM. I call that a victory and will be happy to keep that schedule for the rest of the week. Now it’s time to get to work and do the requisite schmoozing, chatting, etc. Good times.

I'm leaving on a jet plane...

2008-07-26T05:45:00.000-07:00

So tomorrow morning up and out of here at 8 AM to catch a train to Haneda and then fly down to Izumo, yadda yadda.

It was a good finish to the workshop today. Interesting stuff throughout and my talk went...ok. Not the best I've given, but people were interested in what I had to say, so I'm happy.

After the session, a colleague and I went to Akihabara, which is the electronic center of Tokyo--it's where people go to get computer parts, new electronics, and apparently lots of manga and anime (comics and cartoons). It was....interesting. Can't say I saw anything there that I wanted, but it gave you that "Tokyo feel," that is the one where you are one of a hundred thousand people moving among a mob of people with completely different agendas than the one you have. It was interesting, but we could only take so much.

We walked back to Ueno, stopping at a sushi joint along the way. Now, I like sushi. I like it a lot. But I tend to limit myself to things like salmon, tuna, crab, shrimp, and things I eat normally. The sushi joint we went to had no english menu, just a waitress who spoke a bit of english. Andy and I decided just to get the "fixed plates" where they give you a variety of sushi and you don't have to worry about what your saying or anything. Mine came with tuna, salmon, tuna roll, and others. The others were the things I normally don't order....however, not wanting to look like a wimp, I ate it all: salmon roe and lots of fish I could not identify.

And you know what? I was fairly disgusted by it. Actually, it wasn't too bad, though I'll pass on the salmon roe next time--the texture just wasn't right for me. I drank beer--just a mug--but it washed down the mystery fish while I savored the known tuna and salmon pieces.

After dinner, we had sake, which was amazingly smooth. It was a bit like lightly flavored water, but was very nice. We then headed back to the hotel.

I went out again to find the Hard Rock Cafe so I could get the old roommate the shirt he asked me to pick up. (I'll have you know, Terry, I got made fun of quite a bit when I asked at the workshop if someone could tell me where the Hard Rock Cafe was. You owe me.) I'm now back in the hotel room.

I know I could stay up a bit if I so choose, but I'm not sure I will choose so. My options are to watch tv in a language I don't understand, work, or read. None sounds appealing to me right now. Lying down does. So I'll likely call it a night soon and see if I can sleep beyond 5 AM tomorrow. That'd be nice. Then it'll be breakfast in the morning, then off to Matsue.

Oh and by the way, the humidity here is horrible. I stink, my clothes stink, and I don't know how to get through all this week with my limited wardrobe. We'll see.

It's a 5 o'clock world...

2008-07-25T14:33:00.000-07:00

After the workshop last night, we had a welcome reception, which included a buffet and drinks. The food was very good and included Japanese curry, rice, spring rolls, salmon sashimi, and a steamed fish which nobody could tell me the English word for, other than "It's like tuna." Whatever it was, it was very tasty. I also had about 6 glasses of beer, though they were the Japanese 2 oz variety (maybe I had the equivalent of one American bottle...we'll never know).

I stayed up later last night, getting to bed around 10:30 PM. The night ended very well with another computer call to the wife and kid back home--what a perfect way to end the day and go to sleep.

It was one of those nights where I didn't feel like I'd be able to fall asleep, and once I climbed into bed I tossed and turned for about 20 seconds before passing out. I woke up a few times through the night again, and finally climbed out of bed around 4:30. So I got about as much sleep as the previous night, so we'll see how today goes.

Around 5:30 I decided to go for a walk and check out Ueno. I really wanted a coffee and got very excited to see "Mister Donut" but alas, they don't open until 8 AM. I also found a Starbucks that wasn't open until 7 AM. So I wandered a bit and realized that 99% of the businesses were closed. Along the way, I was approached by a Japanese woman who was either asking me a question and trying to be nice or was a hooker. Really, in my mind, it's 50-50 which it was. Not sure what to do, I just kept walking.

I wandered a bit up Ueno park, and found a full on baseball game being played with umps and everything. Pretty interesting see as it was 5:45 AM. I wandered by the "Grand Fountain" and saw a guy picking earthworms off the sidewalk with chopsticks.
I wandered by the zoo as well, but it was gated up and couldn't see anything. So I'm back in the hotel now, about to get ready for some breakfast.

My talk is today and the workshop ends sometime around 3:30 or 4. Not sure what I'll do this evening, but I've got some ideas. We'll see. More later.

Good Morning Starshine

2008-07-24T21:57:00.000-07:00

Man, did I call it or what? 3:30 AM, wide awake and nothing to do. Actually, plenty to do.

I woke up almost every hour throughout the night after getting to bed at 9PM (BTW: you've got to love Skype--being able to make a phone call with your computer to your wife and daughter on the other side of the world, for free, really demonstrates that Al Gore knew what he was doing when he invented the internet). After waking up at 3:30, I decided to just climb out of bed and start the day. Surprisingly, the outside was relative bright. As they don't observe Daylight Savings Time here, it was dark at 8PM here and bright at 4 AM--it was odd.

I just puttered around my postage stamp of a room for a bit, checking e-mail and then taking a nice hot shower. I then sat down to work on my talk for tomorrow, which didn't go so well because I found a number of ways to distract myself. However, many of those distractions involved other aspects of work, so I didn't feel so guilty. Also, I got to chat with the wife on gmail for a bit, which I won't call a distraction as it'll get me in trouble. Instead we'll call it "the highlight of my day." ;)

Anyway, I then went downstairs for some Japanese breakfast, which included french fries (those big, thick steak fries), a poached egg, miso soup, scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, salmon (with lots of bones), other stuff I don't know what it was, and some much needed coffee.

I then wandered around outside for a bit, taking pictures of the giant lily pads across from my hotel. After a while, I started feeling incredibly sticky due to the incredible humidity here, grabbed my bag from my room and wandered up to the University here for my workshop. That's where I sit now. So far it's interesting, though, I'm exhausted and continue to require coffee to make it through the day. Hopefully tomorrow will be a more rested day...it'd bad to fall asleep during my own talk...

Domo Arigato, Mr. Roboto

2008-07-24T02:32:00.000-07:00

Well, another summer, another trip to Asia.

This time around I've made it to Japan. I've just arrived in Tokyo for a workshop at the University of Tokyo that starts tomorrow (Friday) and ends on Saturday. Sunday morning I catch a plane to Izumo and a limousine-bus (whatever that is) to Matsue for the Meteoritical Society Conference, which goes until Friday. Friday afternoon, I fly back to Tokyo, stay over night, and then fly back to the States on Saturday.

So I have a talk to give on Saturday and another to give on Thursday. Neither is finished and I'll be relying heavily on this internet thingy to get things completed. I should be ok...I hope.

The flight here was not too bad. I left Chicago at 12:50 PM Wednesday (2:50 AM Thursday in Tokyo) and flew 12.5 hours and arrived here about 3:15 in the afternoon. The flight was relatively uneventful. I hoped to sleep just a little to make sure I was tired enough to get a decent night sleep here at the hotel--given that I arrived here at the equivalent of 4 AM Chicago time, I have to adjust to jetlag and fast. Should be ok. The flight was full, but not too bad. I read about parallel programming, which, surprisingly enough, was actually interesting and I have some ideas of things to do when I get back to work that will make my computer codes run much faster--in theory anyway. I also played some poker and blackjack on the personal tv screen at my seat, and let's just say that it was good that I had no layover in Vegas otherwise I would have returned home a very poor man.

Once we landed in Tokyo, customs was no hassle, I bought a train ticket to Ueno (the neighborhood--if that's the right word--where the University is) and rode 45 minutes to the train station here. While I had a map that pointed out where my hotel was with respect to the station, getting my bearings was a bit of an effort (fortunately 2 others were in the same boat as me and we made it as a team). So now I'm checked in, relaxing a bit, and about to head out for some seafood (I hope) and some sake (or a nice Sapporo). Then I plan to pass out and will probably wake up sometime around 3 or 4 AM here--if this is anything like my trip to Taiwan last year.

I hope to write a good amount while I'm here, and while posting pictures would make sense, forgetting the cable that connects the camera to the computer will not allow that. Sorry. You'll just have to wait.

Ok, sitting on the bed for a good 15 minutes awaits, as does some dinner afterwards. I'll be in touch.

Best wishes to all.

Getting ready to head home…

2007-08-03T19:12:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was a relatively light day in terms of the conference. We met in the morning, briefly and had some discussion about the overall themes for the week. It was a nice wrap-up. We then quickly ate lunch and boarded a bus to visit the Palace Museum in Taipei. That was quite amazing. The museum houses artifacts from the various dynasties in Chinese history, dating back 8000 years. There was a ton to see, and we only saw a small fraction of it. Still, it was quite amazing.

We then bussed over to a restaurant in downtown Taipei that was at one point named one of the “Top 10 Restaurants in the World” by a NY Times writer. It wasn’t a particularly high-class restaurant (that’s not intended to be a put down, I had just expected a very formal place, and I was actually happy to find it was not that), but instead, a very well run restaurant with delicious food. Their specialty was dumplings, and we ate a lot. A LOT. Pork, crab, vegetable, with soup, spinach, and the list goes on. It was all very tasty. Again, it was a great way to end the week.

We then boarded the bus and drove back to Hsinchu through a pretty amazing thunderstorm. The rain was coming down very hard and there were quite a number of nice lightning strikes to see. As we approached our hotel, I started falling asleep even though it was barely 9:30…I never fully let myself adjust to the time difference.

This morning, I’ve been getting my stuff together, doing some reading, and anxiously am waiting for the car to pick us up and take us to the airport. It’s been a nice week, though I am definitely ready to be back home. It’ll be about 25 hours between when I take off from Taiwan and when I land in DC, so it’s still a ways off. However, it’s good to think about that return trip being in progress.

I’m going to hell anyway….

2007-08-02T06:50:00.000-07:00

We were out for dinner tonight at a teppenyaki restaurant here in Taiwan. We’ve eaten well all week, though this place was more of a “above the food court in the mall” kind of place…definitely not on par with what we’ve had earlier this week.

So we’re sitting in this crowded room (because the teppenyaki in this place was brought to the table rather than having us sit at the grill). As we’re eating, from behind the wall next to us, we hear some noises. We all look up and just stare. We hear the noises again…the sounds of a dog barking. And we just freeze for a few moments—all 8 of us.

I know it’s wrong, but it’s what happened. I’m sorry.

Not too much exciting to report today. It was the longest day, I think of the workshop—not in terms of hours but in terms of just getting through the day. I think knowing that it’s near the end plays a big part in it…we’re all thinking about getting home.

I, personally, cannot wait to be home. I miss being there, I feel guilty for not being there, and I just like the comfort of being in my own place. I’m very excited to get back there.

Hey, let’s go out for Chinese!

2007-08-01T15:16:00.001-07:00

After my last post, a bunch of went out for dinner at a restaurant on campus here. Our hosts for the workshop were unable to join us, though they recommended this place. Fortunately, one of the members of our group was a Taiwanese grad student from UCLA, and he was able to order and translate for us. I don’t know where we would’ve been without him.

There were 12 of us there, and we ordered 12 different dishes that we all passed around, as well as 6 beers that we shared (they come in big bottles here and they give you 2 or 3 oz glasses to drink them). It was a good meal. At the end of it, the bill came and the grad student did the math and told us that everyone owed 120 Taiwanese dollars…which is $4 in the US. FOUR DOLLARS! That has been the story for this week…dining out is relatively cheap.

We then went back to the hotel and I went to sleep. I got up early yesterday morning to go over my talk, which was in the afternoon. I hadn’t prepared for the talk as much as I usually do, so I wanted to remind myself of what I wanted to say. I then had breakfast and went up to the workshop.

It was another good day at the workshop. Good talks and good discussions. My talk was in the afternoon. Other than some technical issues with the projector, I think it went fine. Not my greatest presentation, but not my worst either. I knew I was in trouble, though, when I started talking about chondrule formation in shock waves (which is what my thesis was about). One of the organizers for this workshop really dislikes that model, and he wasn’t afraid to let me know. For the most part it was fine, though, whereas I’m willing to let people make their points in an argument, he is a bit more inclined to interrupt. To be honest, it seems I’m in the minority when it comes to that issue in scientific meetings, so it doesn’t bother me as much as it used to. Other than that, I think things went well.

Last night we went to a Japanese restaurant just on the edge of campus. Again it was quite good, and this time it cost $6 US. We came back to the hotel, and I read the Sports Illustrated I brought with me before turning out the lights and passing out.

One nice thing about yesterday was that I got my arrangements made for getting to the airport on Saturday to head home. It’s nice to start thinking about that. While it’ll be a monster of a trip, it’s nice thinking about being home, sitting with Nina and Emma, and having some sense of normalcy return. While there will be another trip 6 days after I get back, it’s one we’re doing together, so it’ll be much better….

Sleep. Sleep. And no sleep.

2007-07-31T02:50:00.000-07:00

I’ve heard that the second day of sleep is always the worst when dealing with jetlag. I think it’s true. I went to bed right after my post last night, around 9:45 or so and was asleep before my head hit the pillow. I woke up after a period and was ready to go, which would’ve been great had it not been 2 AM. I tried to go back to sleep, and around 3 AM managed to do so, only to wake up 45 minutes later. At that point, I just stayed awake.

This morning was less productive overall than yesterday morning. That was, in part, due to my working on my talk (which is tomorrow) that needed significant revisions based on what I observed during the first day in other people’s talks (I have to make things more basic). Also, Nina was telling me about how the husband of the woman who watches Emma during the day is in the hospital and unable to watch Emma over the next few days. So Nina has to take Emma to work then, which is daunting. I was trying to help offer ways to keep Emma entertained for those few hours while Nina works…I may have helped get about 45 minutes set. Hopefully the new environment and people will help keep Emma in check.

Other than that, I had breakfast and went to the workshop for 10. Today’s talks and sessions were a bit more stimulating, I would say than yesterday’s. That’s not to say yesterday’s talks were less interesting, but rather, I think people were a bit more adjusted and ready to discuss things in detail, so the workshop was a bit more lively. Lots of ideas, lots of yelling, lots of not-so-polite dismissals of other people’s ideas…pretty much par for the course. ;)

Back in the hotel room now, feeling sleepy. It’s not quite 6 PM, yet, and a bunch of us are meeting to go to dinner at 6:30. I have a feeling that I won’t last very long tonight and will be getting to bed early again. Waking up early tomorrow will actually be a goal, however, as I still need to work on my talk…and see if I can make it stimulating without getting yelled at. There are not guarantees.

I Am the King of Ribs

2007-07-30T06:45:00.000-07:00

I woke up at 4 AM here. That actually turned out to be a good thing. I made myself some coffee, though it was instant coffee premixed with sugar and creamer (blech), sat down, and did some work. It was actually very nice and productive. I then went downstairs for some real coffee and fruit and then headed up to the workshop around 9.

The workshop started at 10 and it was pretty low key—40 minute presentations followed by 20 minutes of discussion with lots of coffee breaks and a lunch (all fried dumplings, sorry Nina). The workshop went until 5:30. We then went back to the hotel to drop off our stuff and then caught a bus downtown to a very nice restaurant.

The food at this place was very good, and it just kept coming. I think we had 10 different courses. For the most part, they were very tasty, though I stayed away from the whole chicken soup (feet and all) and the sea urchin, which looked downright nasty. When I was looking uncertain of one dish, Frank Shu, one of the organizers of the workshop asked if I was a vegetarian. “No no no no!” I told him to many laughs. And when the next dish was brought and I was told that they were ribs, I said, “Now you’re talking.” “Definitely not a vegetarian,” Frank said. “Let the connoisseur have the first taste.” They were very good, though I didn’t have hear to tell Frank that mine are better…I prefer grilled to stewed, but I wasn’t going to complain.

On the way back, the bus had the Yankees-Orioles game playing. I guess every one of Chien-Ming Wang’s are broadcast here since he’s from Taiwan. As I got off the bus, the Orioles climbed within 2 runs of the Yankees in the fourth. I got onto the web in my room to get an update on the score, but was unable to do find it easily. That’s when I realized that it was 9 AM on the east coast of the US and that the game was being shown here on tape delay. Oh well, now I know the Yankees won the game (though are still 8 games behind the Sox). Despite it all, it was nice to see a glimpse of the game…

On the way back to the hotel, I started falling asleep, and I continue to be exhausted. So I’m off to bed…

First Impressions

2007-07-29T14:19:00.000-07:00

Huh. That’s it.

I should’ve sensed that the weather was less than ideal after I got out of the airport at 7 AM and was met by stifling heat and very thick, humid, air. My shirt instantly tightened its embrace, and I remembered some of those summers back in New England when I was younger—not every one of them, just the extreme ones, where I would sit in the basement for most days and sleep on the floor with the fan blowing 6 inches away. I also saw haze in the sky, the likes I hadn’t seen since I lived back in Massachusetts.

So it’s hot. After checking in to the hotel here, I showered, sent e-mails to the family letting them know that I had arrived and then started thinking about what I was going to do. I was awake enough that I knew I could make it until evening time without sleeping, which would help me adjust to the time difference. So I decided to head out about 9:30-ish to explore the campus and the city around the university.

I should say that I’m actually in Hsinchu and not Taipei. I don’t think I had fully appreciated that until yesterday, and I haven’t explored more than a mile away from the entrance to the university. So everything I describe is representative of that and not anything more, so don’t let me color your view of the country—as always, you should judge for yourself.

I hadn’t done much research about the place before coming here…I printed a map of the university provided by the workshop, and that map pointed to three landmarks: the guest hose I’d be staying at, the physics building (which actually is not where our workshop is being held), and the general direction of a Starbucks just off campus. Really, what more would you need? So off I went, into the heat, to explore, figuring it was better to do this at 9:30 in the morning than 1 or 2 in the afternoon when the temperatures would be at their highest.

The campus buildings remind me of 1950’s or 1960’s architecture, and it is fairly bland. By that, I mean that you could blindfold, somebody, drop them off on campus, and provided they didn’t look at the signs, convince them that they were on an American university. There are some artificial lakes, abundant with Koi fish, which are relatively serene. There is a good amount of construction going on, which, unfortunately, takes away from the atmosphere of the place. Other than that, though, the campus is pretty small, so I went off campus to explore.

That’s when it hit me…the smell of sewer. I’m not sure where it came from, but it could be strong at times. I tried to breathe through my mouth. And there was trash all over the place. At first I thought it represented a general “Who cares?” feeling of the populace, but then I never saw a single trash barrel on the street, and I started to understand. If there’s no designated place to throw it out, why not just drop it?

Anyway, that I could deal with, though, it was unexpected. The main road in front of the University, Kuang Fu Rd., was lined with shops and restaurants. Unfortunately, being 10 AM on Sunday morning, most were closed, with metal garage doors blocking the entrances and concealing what the stores actually were. A few were open, and I saw bike repair shops, a Sony store, a dry cleaner, and many formal and informal restaurants making their preparations for the day. I walked around a bit and places began to open. I walked without purpose or destination, just trying to soak up my surroundings. The shops ranged from very clean and well kept, to very old and run down. Eventually I thought of getting food and a drink, I started to search for a good place to eat. That was a struggle.

Now, I only speak one language—I never learned a second. However, I have enough familiarity to go to a Spanish or Mexican restaurant and order something I know I will like. I can do the same at a French restaurant, though I’m sure the waiter would be disgusted by my pronunciation. I even managed to order at German and Italian restaurants when I was in Europe. The advantage there, however, is that all those languages used a common alphabet. I didn’t have that advantage here…all the menus were written with Chinese characters. So I searched and searched for a place where I could go without the shame of just asking, “Do you speak English? And can I have some sort of chicken dish?” If they didn’t have English translations of the menu visible from the street, I was looking for a place that at least had pictures so I could point and grunt in the hopes of communicating what I wanted. While Mr. Donut, Japan’s number 1 donut shop, was always an option, I wanted more than just donuts for lunch, though I’m sure if Nina were with me I would’ve had to been more open-minded about that option.

So I settled in at Starbucks--but I only got an iced tea. I was determined to not eat a bagel for lunch, though I knew it was my fallback option. Eventually I found “Mos Burger” the “Happy Hamburger House” also based in Japan. It’s a fast food restaurant, and I caved. Here I was in Taiwan, eating fast food. But I rationalized it knowing that the hosts of the workshop would be taking care of us the rest of this week and would give us authentic Taiwanese food then. But I ordered a Teriyaki Chicken sandwich, to lessen my shame. With French fries and a coke…shut up!

By this point however, it was even hotter and more humid than before. So I made my way back to my hotel room—and in just a matter of a few minutes, it began to rain and thunder. So I read in my room for most of the afternoon. It was actually very pleasant to just curl up with my book and read for pleasure and without any limit on the time I’d spend doing it…something I honestly haven’t done in over two years time if I’m perfectly honest.

Around 6 o’clock, my phone rang, and I was invited to dinner with a group of the workshop participants. The organizers came with us, and we had dinner at a very nice restaurant with authentic Taiwanese food. It was very tasty—we got a variety of dishes, with the baked cod being the most impressive, as the cod was obviously fresh. Everything else—the vegetables, the cashew chicken, the tofu—was also very good, though I was surprised to find it reminiscent of food that I had at restaurants back in the US. Though I was disappointed that we didn’t get French rolls with our food. We had “Taiwan Beer” with dinner, which was a mild lager reminiscent, a bit, of Heineken. It was very enjoyable, though served in 2 oz glasses…I tried to not just down each pour that the host gave me, but it was hard.

I then returned to my hotel room at 8, and passed out. I woke up at 4 this morning and am planning on checking out Starbucks or Mr. Donut around 6 or 7 and then getting ready for the workshop.

Until the next time…

-Fred

Fixed

2007-07-28T18:36:00.000-07:00

Ok, Blogger, I was able to decipher you....problems fixed. No longer editing in Chinese.

hmmm...

2007-07-28T18:15:00.000-07:00

Ok, Blogger has detected that I'm in taiwan and thus all the buttons on the site are in Chinese...so I have no idea what any of the links or anything are when I try to publish to the blog. That's why there are 2 of the same posts and why the formatting is messed up.

I will try to fix this, but I don't think I'll be learning enough Chinese in the next week to know what's going on. We'll see if I can figure it out...

Arrived in Taiwan!

2007-07-28T18:13:00.000-07:00

Hi all—Fred here, checking in from Taipei, Taiwan. What a travel experience thus far. That was by far the most amount of time I’ve spent in an airplane in a 24 hour period—over 4.5 hours from Dulles to LAX and then about 13.5 hours from LAX to Taipei. My itinerary had me leaving Dulles Friday at 5:45, arriving in LAX at 8:05 and then leaving LAX Saturday at ~1 AM and arriving in Taipei at 5:30 AM Sunday. The only glitch was that I was delayed taking off from Dulles by an hour due to weather, but fortunately, there was plenty of room in the schedule for such things.

My hope was to nap a bit on my way to LAX and then stay awake a bit into the long trek to Taipei so that I could be “waking up” close to the morning hour in Taiwan to reduce the jet lag issues. Well, I did nap a bit before landing in LAX, but I just passed out as soon as I got on the airplane in LA—it was, afterall, 4 in the morning back where I had originated. I “slept” for 6-7 hours into the flight, though, it wasn’t exactly restful. The rest of the flight was spent reading, watching some shows on my ipod, and playing video blackjack and poker on the consoles in the plane.

I flew China Airlines from LAX to Taipei. Not a bad experience. And, Nina, no there was nothing spectacular about the food. About an hour into the flight I was woken up and asked if I wanted a seafood rice bowl or some other rice bowl (I didn’t quite understand). I went with the seafood. There were three shrimp, some rice, some peas, and then some other meat that looked a lot like chicken, which worried me, as it was called a “seafood” rice bowl. I did not play “Name that Meet” so your guess is as good as mine. I also got a roll, some steamed veggies, and a cake of some sort. Not bad for airline food, but nothing to get excited about. For breakfast, about 3 hours before landing, I was asked if I wanted “Something I didn’t understand” or “Omelette.” I went with the omelette. It came with a hash brown, the blandest sausage I ever tasted, and then a very good cup of yogurt, some fresh fruit, and a very tiny croissant. Not bad. The folks sitting next to me had the “Something I didn’t understand” which looked like soupy rice with other stuff—a colleague of mine on another flight said that he had “soupy rice with seafood” for breakfast, so maybe that was it. I wouldn’t have minded being more courageous with the food choice, but I would just want to know what I was eating…I think. I won’t hold back this week.

Upon landing, customs was a nightmare, not from the hassle point of view, but rather, it was just such a long wait with “rush hour” being first thing in the morning for airline arrivals. As I said, though, no problems, I retrieved my bag, and then met up with the cab driver that was waiting for me and two others attending this workshop (one of which was on my flight). He drove us to National Tsing Hua University (about 40 minutes) in Taipei.

Taipei is a rather industrial looking city—lots of concrete buildings with some metal framework. Not a lot of cultural signatures, though I’ve had a very limited view thus far. It’s very dense in some areas, and the university seems to be located on the edge of a part of the city, though it’s hard to judge.

We’re staying at a guest house on campus, essentially a hotel run by the university. It’s nice, though it gives one the feeling of staying at one of the displays at an IKEA store: wardrobes and desks arranged in a space saving kind of way, but it works. And a hotpot with tea and coffee.

I have now showered, which was very exciting as I was cooped up in airplanes for something like 19 of the last 24 hours…maybe more come to think of it. Next, I’ll be off to explore the university and its surroundings, though I’m not sure for how long—it is very hot and humid here, and I don’t know how awake I’ll be come this afternoon. We’ll see though.

Check in later for more details. Hope you are all doing well!

-Fred

Blog Intro

2007-07-26T12:16:00.000-07:00

This blog will be used to post stories and news about the different trips that Fred, Nina, and Emma go on. In
this way, we can keep each other, and family, up-to-date on our goings-on, even if there is significant
distance (and time zones) between us.