Privet!!!!

Hey!!
Since I haven't posted in a really long time, I finally thought it was time I wrote an update. First off things in lab are going really well. My experiments are showing much progress and I am getting results, which is always a plus! I have also talked alot with some of the other students in lab and have learned a lot about the school system in Russia. One thing that shocked me was the amount of corruption in alot of the school systems. The students told me that in a lot of the academic departments it is expected that students pay the department and pretty much buy their grades. Apparently paying off teachers is very common and an expectation in many of the institutions. Glad that this is not the case back in the states. Currently most of the people from lab are on vacation. The only people still working are the PHD students who will be defending their work in the fall. The PHD students work every day of the week and are currently rushing to get results and write thier papers at the same time. I feel bad for them because they seem pretty stressed. Everyone in lab is really nice to me and I enjoy working with them. They are eager to help me and I really appreciate it. Also I am more comfortable with my russian skills and have finally learned the names of the equipment and chemicals in russian.
Socially I have met alot of students at my dorm and I spend my time with them. Since the people in my lab are always working, I was lucky to find another social outlet. One of the things that surprised me was that Moscow had a huge July 4th celebration. When I thought about spending a summer abroad, I accepted the fact that I wouldn't be celebrating Independence Day. However, I could not have been more mistaken. The American Chamber of Commerce put on a huge celebration at one of the parks the saturday following July 4th to celebrate the American holiday. A group of friends and I attended the celebration thinking that we would meet alot of americans who are in Moscow. Instead there were tons of russians who had come together to celebrate the holiday. The celebration lasted from 3pm to midnight and included concerts, raffles, and of course a fireworks show. I have to admit it was one of my most eventful july 4th celebrations.
I have also had alot of fun adventures exploring the city by myself. I have gone to the theatre twice. The theatres here are not only amazing, but they are really affordable. When I went to see the famous Russian opera "Eugene Onegin" I paid eight dollars to sit in the fourth row. Unfortunately, the theatre is one of the only things that are cheaper. The prices in restaurants and stores are ridiculously high. The prices in the coffee shops here make Starbucks prices look much more appealing.
I also got on an overnight train and went to St. Petersburg to visit one of my friends from Emory. Visiting St. Petersburg was incredible. I was born there so I've always wanted to visit the city. Nevertheless, I would not even begin to imagine how beautiful the city was. The architecture was breathtaking. I spent three hours in the Hermitage Museum and barely made it through 1/2 of one of the floors before the museum closed. Even though I felt like I was rushing when I was moving through the museum, I never even made it to the other two floors. The city is built on water and I enjoyed being able to take a river excursion. One thing that I am always amazed by is the amount of history and culture that flourishes in Russia. Practically every part of the city has some historical meaning. One russian the other day told me that while living in america may be better, our country does not have the same historical richness and architectural beauty.
I have really enjoyed my time in Russia and am so grateful to have had this experience. I have met a world of interesting people in Russia and have had some of many meaningful conversations. I will truly never forget this summer. Too bad I have less than 2 weeks left!

Last post

I can't believe my 11 weeks have already flown by...I feel like I just got to the UK! Everyone at lab is too nice to me - they threw me a surprise goodbye party last Thursday. It was the sweetest thing ever and they all spent a week planning it so it was completely unexpected. Natalia took me into a restuarant where we were 'dropping off something for a friend' on the way to a bar to meet up with two other post-docs. However, at the restaurant was a huge table with everyone from lab, including the PI! It was a really nice and expensive Thai place and from there we went for drinks and then clubbing!! (The PI dropped out after drinks). It was so funny to see my lab out dancing - they all said I should feel really special because they have never gone out dancing together before. They completely spoiled me - not only did they pay for my dinner and drinks, but they bought me presents. I got an Oxford jacket and a poster for my room - it's called the Oxford Pub Crawl and it has little pictures of 62 of the Oxford pubs and you colour them in as you drink in them =)

I have successfully trained Lucy, my successor, and she's completely taken over my job. She gradually started running all my babies and I will be handing over the word association list for her. I finished scoring all the babies that I could and Lucy will continue to help Natalia and Nivi with that. Natalia and Nivi are both writing up papers for some journals, so hopefully they will all publish in the near future!

Something I learned here is that psychiatry is very different than in the States. Back home, you need to be an MD to study psychiatry, while here that is not necessary. Tomorrow I am going to a hospital close to town to discuss one lecturer's/researcher's work. It's related to psychopharmachology and mood disorders, two topics that I am very interested in. I know she is accepting DPhil (PhD) students in Fall 2008, so we will see what she can tell me.

I fly out on Wednesday afternoon to Miami. This has been the single best experience of my life - thanks again for this amazing opportunity!

Cheers!

Close to the end...

Last weekend, Clarissa and I went to Bordeaux and visited nearby St. Emilion (great wine...thought about smuggling some into the US illegally) and Arcachon. We definitely owe Kanwei for that wonderful suggestion. The Arcachon beaches are beautiful and the view from dune de Pilat (tallest sand dune in Europe) was amazing!

So I finished up my last set of experiments today, but because my lab presentation is tomorrow morning, we didn't have time to actually make any photos =( Basically I don't have any results, but as consolation for having to be in lab 11 hours today, Thomas spent almost an hour at the microscope and took a nice picture of the control to put in my powerpoint. It was really sweet of him to do that, considering it was 9pm already. I can't believe tomorrow is my last day in lab...those ten weeks flew by far too quick. At least I'll still be in Paris for a few more days, and then I'm off to London for a week!

I'm going to miss all my new friends, my wonderful lab...and all the amazing things about Parisian life. Thanks IRES for this wonderful opportunity!

Angelica

Perhaps it's about time for me to post?

G'day from Melbourne, Australia!


I am halfway through my ten weeks of research here and everything is going well...except for the fact that it is winter and I am already fighting my second cold, heh.

During my second week here my dad came to visit. The airport doesn't seem to be connected to public transport very well so I rented the car for the day of his arrival and had an exciting time driving on the left side of the road in a small car like you might find in Europe. Along with sightseeing and restaurant sampling (the best food in Australia!) around Melbourne we travelled to Sydney for a long weekend and guess what we especially made a point to see there?

In terms of accommodation, after spending the first few days in a hostel near the Melbourne Uni. I spent the first month in a shared flat in North Melbourne. Unfortunately the other two students (did they go to class or anything at all? hah) weren't the most active folks and spent a great deal of time with their televisions, and the building unit didn't exactly have central heating...yikes. I was almost dealing with it alright until the landlord mentioned after my first two weeks that the rent would be increased in the next month. Naturally I began my search for something else and ended up in a wonderful terrace-style house on a well-known street in an area of town known as North Carlton, about the same distance away from the university. Along with a good heating system (really does make a huge difference!), the four other people sharing the house are very social and I have enjoyed doing stuff with them.

There are also two other HHMI students here in Melbourne as well and I was able to meet up with them right away (straight away? hah) especially when I didn't know anyone at all upon arriving in Melbourne. This past Sunday we rented a car and travelled to the "Mornington Peninsula" to see some of the Australian coast line and even made it over to a winery tasting right before it closed for the day. Just a couple of weeks ago we also went to a Australian Rules Football game which was a bit different!

My research seems to be progressing slowly... mostly standard techniques so far and there have been some issues with contamination involving a strain of the lab's model organism so we'll see how things go in the coming weeks!

Cheers,
Thomas

My time in the lab is officially done. I was sad to leave because I realized how much I enjoyed being around the people in the lab. I will be in Paris for Fall 07 and they have asked me to come to Marseille and visit them if I have a long weekend. It is too bad the lab isnt in Paris. This has been the greatest experience I have had while at Emory, and I am really grateful that I had the opportunity to be part of IRES. Thanks a lot IRES. I am in Berlin right now. My brother is coming tonight and we will see some of Europe. I am having some trouble with this German keyboard, so I think I will keep this post short. Thanks again!

Cosby

Half a month to go

Hello all,

I know it's been a really long time since I've posted. I've been meaning to write something for awhile but I've been pretty busy here.

Ok, first lab stuff. Things don't seem to be going by so fast for me as they have been for others. Most days I've really only worked about 8 or 9 hours in the day (a couple of times I've been in the lab for about 12 hours). It's never a problem because everyone else works about the same amount, and even if I wanted to work more, I wouldn't have anything to do. Also, most of what I've been doing hasn't been very theoretical or taught me anything advanced. I've had to make a couple of pieces of equipment that we will use for measurement on our samples but all that amounts to is basic construction work, not much advanced physics involved. Also it's taken me a very long time to build those pieces because I've had to wait for all the parts to be constructed by our machine-shop department. I've used some of my extra time to read up on Solid State physics, but you don't learn as much without doing actual problems. However, I am gaining a lot of valuable experience about how to work in a lab. It's the little things, you know, the daily routines and routes one has to take to get things done that are teaching me a lot. Also at least twice a week they have colloquiums where we hear presentations from visiting professors about new research going on in different fields of physics, so I get to see what's being done in the world of physics and what direction might be interesting for me to pursue. Also once a week most people in the department get together to discuss articles or presentations, so that the whole department can keep a current understanding of how the research our department is doing fits in with the research other people are doing. It's really helpful for me in terms of looking to the future.

Unfortunately I just got a phonecall and have to go back to work but I'll try to post again soon when I get the chance to talk about the social aspects of how things are here.

I can't believe I only have two weeks left in the UK. My time here really flew by. On Monday my replacement arrived and I began training her (Lucy). She graduated from Oxford last spring and she has a job with the government in London, but that doesn't start until October. She had my PI as a professor and had asked him if she could work in his lab, which he agreed to. What's really exciting is that I am training her on everything - the post docs and the PI have handed her over to me. It seems so strange because I remember being trained, just over two months ago, on how to work in the lab and now I am the one with all this experience. It's a little sad too that I am leaving just as Lucy came, because she is the only one at lab who is my age (Oxford undergrad is 3 years, not 4) and we have already started hanging out.
Most of my lab is presenting at a psychology conference in Reading, which is about 30 minutes away from Oxford. They each have a talk, explaining their research, on powerpoint slides that they present in front of many individuals in the psycho-linguistic world. They all had mock presentations in front of each other this week and I found out that my two post docs had put my name on their last slide of their presentations, acknowledging all the work I have done - I thought that was really sweet of them!
Within the last two weeks, the town of Oxford has dramatically changed. All of a sudden, wherever I go, I hear Americans. A lot of the exchange programs are here now, including Emory at Oxford. I spent some time with friends this past week who are over here. They are staying in one of the central colleges, which is only a 15-20 minute walk from my accomodation. I must admit, I preferred Oxford when all the Brits where here. Now, all I see are tourists and I feel more like a local than most of the people here. I've learned to save my Oxford University sweatshirt for when I return to the States - no real Oxfordians advertise for their school. Only the tourists wear them.
My lab is going clubbing tomorrow night - I really cannot wait to see that! =)
I really am not ready to leave yet. Even though I still have 2 weeks, I know it will all be ending too soon. There is still so much of Oxford and London I have yet to see! I will certainly have to return here!

So this will probably be my last post from Australia. I have a week and a half left in the lab and tons to do. My advisor is out of the country for my last two weeks so it is just me and the postdoc who does all the computer work. It is a bit scary to think that I am running serious equipment with no one to help me with troubleshooting but I'm actually doing really well and things are actually going smoother than they have all summer.

This has been an amazing experince for me and I'm realizing that I really do like research. At home it is a bit too theoretical for me but here everything is hands on and very experimental...I don't have to think too hard either. I'm working really long hours (12-15 hour) days so that I can get all the work that needs to be done for two papers, which I am really excited about. [I also work that long so I can take Friday afternoons off :)]

Last weekend I went surfing with some friends. They all knew how to surf, but they just told me to get on the board and try...with minimal instructions! It was really fun. I can get every wave I want but I have a hard time standing. I got to my knees, but I think I either need some practice or some coaching before I can stand.

I'm glad to see from the posts that everyone is having a great time! See you all soon.
Cheers!
RC

hi everyone!

Happy belated July 4th everyone! We thought about making s'mores to celebrate, but decided the only accessible open flame - Bunsen burners in lab - would not be worth the repurcussions of getting caught. The weather's been crappy all week....we had a terrible hailstorm today, followed by an hour of sunshine...I'm so confused. I look outside at 11pm and it's still not quite dark, but sunrise is still ridiculously early - by the time 7am rolls around, it's so blindingly bright you can hardly sleep.

On another note, my mentor left for a conference last Wednesday and won't be back until next week. He warned me SOOO many times to be careful around Shigella before he left but I finally figured out why everyone was so concerned about it. Apparantly it only takes 100 tiny bacteria to cause the nasty infection. In any case, it's day 5 of working alone and of course a lot more stuff seem to go wrong. But at least I got to practice taking pretty pictures with the microscope...

Everyone's starting to take vacations now...and most people are gone for the entire month of August. No I'm not just talking about lab people. Restaurants close for weeks. I've heard even the local boulangeries close...where am I going to get my baguettes?! Looks like I'll have to settle for the Monoprix (their idea of a supermarket - absolutely tiny in my opinion).

That's all for now. A bientot!

This is my second to last week in the lab, and I start to feel sad when I think about having to leave soon. I've really been learning a lot while I'm here. The work I've been doing in Marseille has been a great complement to my work at Emory, and my experience here is helping me to better understand the research I was doing at Emory and why I was using certain techniques there that we're not using here in Marseille. I haven't been able to establish much independence here in the lab, which is disappointing. My mentors here work much more closely with everyone (even PhD's and post-docs) than what I'm used to, and I think perhaps they are uncomfortable with the idea of leaving an undergrad on her own.

Last week, I asked a few people in the lab how to conjugate a certain verb in French. It was kind of funny. Nobody knew how except for one person, and a few minutes ago he came to my desk and gave me a very handy book with all the conjugations for French verbs. It was very nice of him and it meant a lot to me.

I need to get back to some lab work, but I'll post another update before I leave Marseille.

Things over here have been quite interesting. I arrived by bus to Glasgow on Saturday evening - the day of the airport scare. Luckily I chose that cheaper and slower option or else I wouldn't have been able to make it to the airport. There was an ERP conference in Stirling, which is a 25 minute train ride from Glasgow. My PI, his wife, Natalia (post doc), Vanja (Ph D student) and her husband had been planning to attend for quite some time. Last week I decided I would like to accompany them and I was pleased when I managed to get a spot at the conference.

It was pretty cool since I had never been to a real psychology seminar of sorts before. It only lasted 2 days but it was from 9am to 6pm and some of the speakers were really dull. I would say about half were Ph. D. students presenting their projects (like Vanja) and the rest were more like PIs, presenting research from previous papers and new experiments. The keynote speaker was actually someone who my PI at Emory looks very fondly on - we even had to read his book in lab, so it was nice to actually get to meet him.

I am leaving for a short holiday to Paris tomorrow and I will be returning Monday evening. My mom is actually really concerned about me travelling with everything that has been going over here, but I've been trying to assure her that I will be completely fine.

Work is still going well, but with all these days off from lab, I haven't been able to finish several tasks I have been given. No one seems too concerned at all though. What was pretty amusing to me was that today the PI was not in lab and everyone knew he would not be in. I had to come in to run 3 babies and only 1 person was in the lab! Everyone else was either on holiday or took the day off. So I came in late, ran my 3 kids and left to go shopping. That doesn't really ever happen, so it was a nice little break!

I am still loving it here so so much! I really do not want to leave in 4 weeks. Thanks again!

Update

Here are some pictures from our fiesta to celebrate all of the research groups moving into the new PRBB - Parc de Recerca Biomedica Barcelona, right on the sea! It began with some sort of um? surreliast act, live music, then a DJ pumping some pretty hard-core techno and of course tapas throughout

My project is coming around, we have been working on calibrating the GC/MS machines to the ions we want and bringing down the sensitivity. One difference with the vivarium here is that I have to change bedding, cages, food and water for my mice and with 80 little fellas that is a lot of work! I love how my project runs the gamut from detecting 162amu ions to handling 45g mice.

I even got to sit in on a human MDMA pharmacology experiment since one of the docs here insisted that I see one before returning to the states. I could write a whole paper about it and the ethics etc. but I will spare you for now -

Naoki

Stuttgart!!!!

Hello! I've been in Stuttgart, Germany for about 5 weeks now, and I've finally gotten into the groove of things. The lab work has been going amazingly, I've been learning so much and I didn't realize I would get to work so independently. The only problem is now I've learned everything in German. Essigsäuerethylester? Triethylamin? I don't know my Lösungsmittel in English!

Everyone in the lab is friends with everyone else and goes out after work at least once a week, so it was nice to have this group set up for me before I came. The lab is also pretty relaxed, we take coffee breaks three times a day! Everyone in the lab is addicted to it. I don't drink coffee and I've been drinking tap water instead, but apparently tap water is taboo here. The first couple of weeks my coworkers would repeatedly (and disbelievingly) ask me if I was sure I didn't want something else to drink besides tap water. And they warned me of the dangers of drinking tap water in countries outside Germany.

I've been traveling on the weekends with other students on different DAAD programs. I went to Geneva a couple weekends ago, which was a total culture shock because everything was in French and I'd never been to a place where I didn't know the language before. I've also traveled around southern Germany a bit, and next weekend I've going to Paris. A lot of the people I travel with are Canadian, and I've started to pick up a Canadian accent. A few times I've caught myself saying, "Eh?"

I'm having an amazing time here. Thanks IRES!

More from Oxford...

I really can't believe I've already been here about a month and a half. Time is going by way too quickly here. I love everything about the UK...especially the fact that everyone tells me that they love my accent!
Lab is still going amazingly well. My post-docs really are way too nice to me. On Thursday Natalia had discovered that I had coded all of her babies incorrectly, because I had been taught how to code for Nivi and no one had told me there was a difference. So I had to immediately recode about 40 babies, which I didn't really mind doing that much. It did take me about a day and a half to complete, but both of them felt so bad for me that one brought me a huge double chocolate cupcake and the other bought me some body wash and lotion. I don't think I could ever picture any of my superiors doing that for me in the States.
One thing I am learning to appreciate more is American boys. Now, I love the British accent as well as Italian, etc and I had always assumed that European boys would be very gentlemenly and proper. Not so much. The boys pretty much assume that if you talk to them, you will go home with them. They also assume that they can simply kiss you without really even knowing your name. At least boys in America tend to buy you a drink first. I know I can't really generalise as such, but I have experienced this lack of respect more here than in the States.
My coxing lessons are still going quite well. I love that I can yell at my PI and Nivi =) The only issue is that I really have to wake up quite early - around 6am to be at the river around 7am. Everyone has a cycle here, expect me, so I have to walk 45 minutes. Which brings me to another issue - cycles. They are so widespread here - everyone assumes that you have one. It's so funny to see rows and rows of cycles lined up against fences.
Another thing I find interesting here is everyone's relationship status at lab. Only two of of nine of them have a significant other who lives in the UK. One's husband lives in Montenegro and he is here now for 2.5 months and that is longest time they have spent together! One's boyfriend in in Germany, another's is in Glasgow, and one's girlfriend is in Switzerland. Even my PI's wife lives in Africa! I'm not too sure if this is because they are all from all over the world themselves and the name of Oxford pulls them in so they just continue to date long-distance, or if this is more common in grad school in general. But basically, most weekends they either travel to visit their partner or their partner comes here. This weekend, 3 of the partners traveled to Oxford, and one of the lab people went to Glasgow. They all spend a lot of quid (slang for pounds) per year traveling.
This weekend is fun for me since one of my friends from Emory is staying with me. She is on the Psych study aborad program which is in London now, so I have my first visitor this weekend and one more next weekend.
Thanks IRES!
Cheers!

so more news and observations.....

So I've been in Paris for one month now, and my project is slowly moving along. I'm supposed to give an oral presentation to my lab on my very last day at Pasteur, so I really need things to start working faster. I'm almost done cloning my constructs (have to fix a small problem with one of them), but the next stage is test their expression, which I will do next week. If that goes well, I'll have the entire last month for microscopy and I'll be taking lots of pretty pictures to study the localization and interactions of these proteins.

Regarding my lab.... they love to make of Sarkozy. All the people around me talk to each other in German though, so my French still isn't wonderful, but I can understand a lot more than I used to. I don't think I will get to know my PI by the end of this summer, because he's in Japan now. There are too many lab meetings and the senior researchers in the lab take way too much enjoyment out of tearing apart the presenter (I'm really not looking forward to mine if you couldn't tell...) The Pasteur cafeteria is actually catered each day (no wonder it's so good...especially the desserts) and apparantly, there is a restaurant above the main cafeteria that is reserved for Nobel Prize winners who come visit Pasteur.

Yesterday was La Fete de la Musique and it was AMAZING. I went to the Musee d'Orsay first, where the National Orchestra of France was performing Beethoven's 5th. Hundreds of people sat cross-legged on the ground, covering the entire bottom floor of what used to be a train station, while others lined up all the balconies of the upper floors. It was so packed you couldn't even stand up and walk around, but it was a remarkable concert. After that, we walked around the Seine and heard tons of groups outside (streets, parcs, even on bridges) ranging from Latin American music and danse to drumlines, rock bands, choirs, and tons of wonderful jazz. The festival basically lasted until midnight or so, and all the concerts were free.

A few friends and I are going to Reims (Champagne region) this weekend for wine-tasting to celebrate the fact that we're done with MCATs forever... other than that, Paris really feels like "home" now, except with TONS more to see and do. Maybe I'll come back for my post-doc....

Hey!!

Hey!! I have now been in Moscow a little over two weeks and I am loving it. The city is absolutely gorgeous. It has the perfect combination of historic and modern sites. The metro is really nicely organized and you can hop on it and get to any destination quickly. The center of the city is beautiful. The people in my lab took me downtown and showed me around. My lab has been extremely welcoming to me and have gone out of their way to show me around. Sunset here is around 10:15 pm and sunrise is at 5:15 am. Since it so light outside most of the time, people stay out later. In fact the streets are practically full at 1:00 am on weekdays. Another difference between Moscow and the states is that people walk around the streets all the time with open bottles. I was really excited to finally get hot water yesterday, I had forgotten just how much I had missed it.
Lab life is also quite different than in the states. Here I work in lab from 9am till 8 pm and sometimes later. The lab is like a family, everyone is really friendly to one another and they spend alot of time together outside of work. Also since everyone works so much in lab, there is alot of dating within the lab. Within my lab there is a husband and wife working together. Also some of the other people in my lab have significant others who work in biochemistry labs. Alot of the girls my age are married or engaged, which is shocking given the fact that in the states people tend to marry at a much later age. Its funny that in that states people tend to ask me if I have a boyfriend, while here they automatically ask if I have a husband. Last friday we had our first lab meeting. We sat around a round table where there was wine and cheese and listened to people present on the progress of their work. It sure beats the donuts and coffee that I usually had in lab meetings in the states. The other lab workers address the PI by her first name and the lab environment is pretty casual.
The dorm where I live houses a lot of internation students, so I have been fortunate in meeting other american students. I hang out with them after work and on weekends. I am lucky in the respect that socially I have two outlets- lab and then the americans. I should mention that in my lab everyone talks to me in russian and presentations are delivered in russian. While everyone speaks english, they chose to speak in russian. This of course has been a little bit of a challenge for me. You can imagine how happy I am to be able to speak english with the americans. I am happy to report that my russian skills are definitely improving.
Overall I am really enjoying this experience and am starting to adjust to life here. One thing that I am not used to is that everyone is always in a hurry and rushing to get places. I have even had a few instances where an old grandmother will practically push me out of the way because apparently I am not moving fast enough. i ahve to run now, but will be sure to write soon.

10 things to know about France

1. Stuff is expensive.
The US dollar isn't doing so hot. I mentally multiply all prices in euros by 1.35 (by 2 in England) to get the dollar equivalent. Everything here (even wine!) is more expensive than in the US, save chocolate and specialty cheese.

2. People kiss a lot
You kiss everybody. On my first day at work, I broke my all-time kissing record in a single day. Ok, so it's only cheek kissing, and you do it twice, one on each cheek so the other doesn't get jealous. In Switzerland they do it three times so it sucks for the other cheek.

3. Smoking is still cool
A lot more people (scientific: higher proportion of people) smoke here than in the US. People don't look down on you and tell you it's bad for your health. There's actually a GIANT label that says "SMOKING KILLS YOU" instead of the discreet label on American packs. It just proves that smokers know the risks and do it anyways.

4. Lunch break is ridiculously long
The primary investigators at my lab usually have lunch by themselves, but the rest of us (4-5) go to the cafeteria together. It's only 2.75 euros. There is never any alcohol and the food is always better than the DUC at Emory (although it's also sponsored by Sodexho, hilarious). After lunch, we ALWAYS have coffee and everybody meets up to chat in the lobby.

5. Everyone is addicted to coffee
They got me hooked too. There's a coffee machine that dispenses 20 different varieties for 40 cents. Tastes better than Starbucks and is 5 times cheaper.

6. FOOTBALL (SOCCER)
There's always a bunch of people playing outside. The good players are amazing to watch and hard to catch up to. However, they're usually small and quick and I can usually get away with using my awkward made-for-rowing body to knock them around. When a big game is on TV, EVERYBODY watches, usually at bars and restaurants.

7. Kebabs are the French version of cheeseburgers
Döner kebab shops are more popular here than Waffle House in the American South. A kebab is basically a sandwich using meat carved from a giant block of meat rotating on an oven. Lettuce and tomatoes are standard, just like a cheeseburger, except that kebabs are much tastier and less bad for your body.

8. People love American music
It's funny how much every Western country's youth are influenced by American culture. Marilyn Manson, Maroon 5, Nelly Furtado, Justin Timberlake, and rappers I don't know are hugely popular here.

9. Foreign students are cool
Bordeaux has 60,000 students and a LOT of them are ethnically foreign. I hear from friends that racism is sometimes found in the classroom, but not rampant. France has been divided on the issue of immigration for a long time.

10. France is 10 times better when you're paid to be there
I would like to thank again the Emory IRES program and all who made it possible. The first month has been productive and fun.

My 15 minutes of Fame....

I have been here for over one month now and each day I am falling more in love with the UK. Work is still going well and I've pretty much settled into a routine now. The post docs don't really have to tell me how to do anything, unless they are explaining a new concept. One thing I like is that I don't really have set times of when to come and when to leave. I am expected to work roughly 9-5, but I wouldn't have to be in that early, unless I had a baby to run. But like I mentioned previously, everyone works so much here. I do usually work 9-7, but what is very nice is that the lab often goes out to dinner/a pub together directly from work. My typical work day consists of running x number of babies (usually between 3-6), coding for where the baby's eyes are looking, a 45min- 1 hr lunch with lab people, and various other tasks delegated to me from my two post-docs.

Yesterday was a fairly exciting day for lab (at least I thought so). Some TV people from Spain came to tape our lab. The show is on the TV channel equivilent of BBC, in Spain, and it's called TVE. They are doing a special on babies and they were given permission from our PI to tape. Natalia, one of my post-docs is from Mexico, so naturally, she was chosen to be interviewed. They did, however, also tape two of our babies being run on our study, so I got to help out with that and as a result, I will probably end up on some TV program in Spain!

I have also taken up a new sport - coxing. Rowing is the biggest sport at Oxford and every boat has someone called the cox. The cox does not row, but sits at the front of the boat and yells out orders and steers the boat but holding two wires on either side of his or her body. My PI and Nivi, my other post-doc, row for our college, St. hughs, and they needed a cox. I offered to do it, even though I've practically never been in a boat! They were eager though and I have a coach to train me, so every Tues. and Thurs. I'm on the river from 7:45am-9:15am!

I have also been doing more social events. I went to a Garden Party last week and met some people and one of the Ph. D students in my lab is taking me to another Garden Party on Wednesday. Basically, it's just a lot of strawberries and cream, sun dresses, hats, and Pimms (the staple alcoholic beverage of Oxford). However, my lab is still like a family, as in we go to London together, eat dinners, and pretty much everything else. It's also nice because a lot of people from Emory are now arriving to London from the Psych Research program so I will be getting to see some of them in the upcoming couple weeks.

Pictures

Everything is my lab is going great! I love Australia and I don't know if I want to come back. Here they work to live not live to work, except in my lab. My advisor and I are the last two people in the department to leave EVERY night, but its good because I'm getting a lot done. I've run tons of EPR on samples that are actually interesting looking and the best part is I don't have to make them. Last Thursday I actually changed the cavity on the EPR machine, which is a big deal. It was cool and I knew what I was doing because I've watched so many times since I've been here. I also caught several mistakes that were being made in the lab it just goes to show that Dr. Warncke and Dr. Canfield (the post-doc who trained me at Emory) did a good job of teaching me how to take care of the equipment.

Socially things are going much better here! Yesterday was a holiday they call "The Queen's Birthday" even though it isn't actually her birthday, because of the holiday I got the day off of work. I went sailing for the first time with UQSail and it was amazing! I have a new hobby. This weekend I also got to go to Lone Pine Koala Sanctuary. It was wonderful and I found out that I love kangaroos. They are really cool animals.

Reporting to you from Marseille

So this is my fifth week in the lab, and I can't believe my time here is almost half done. I've been having such a great time! This week I was finally assigned to one definite project. This is really just an issue of timing. I came into the lab when there were two projects going on, both involving in situ hybridization, and my mentor here wanted to know the preliminary results of both before deciding which one I should join. So I now officially have a project. I'm studying the effects of deep brain stimulation on neuronal activity in the basal ganglia. It might sound worrisome that I'm in my fifth week in the lab and just officially starting on my project, but the in situ technique is very fast and I will be able to get a lot done within the next few weeks. I have found that, since I've been mostly following people in the lab up until this point, it has been difficult to establish some level of independence in the lab. I am thinking that this will get better now that I have my own project.

It sounds like others are really putting in the hours. Things here have been slow. We ran out of some supplies a couple weeks ago, and that really slowed things down. I had quite a bit of downtime then. I think everyone here is just expected to get their work done, but the environment is very relaxed. And the whole day revolves around lunch. An experiment will have to wait until the afternoon if it is too long and would make it so that we would eat too late.

There are a few people in my dorm that I have met and spend time with during the weekends. They are very nice. One of them is hispanic, has been here since the fall, and has learned French just by listening--no classes! Needless to say, I was very impressed.

So I really like it here. I did some travelling a couple weeks ago. Took a train to Geneva, and thought it was great. It's very small but it has everything in it, or so it seems.

A bientot,

Cosby

Greetings From Russia!

I just arrived in my lab in Moscow this past Tuesday. All I can say is that this is definitely a culture shock. Moscow State University is absolutely gorgeous. The building is huge and looks quite historic. There is one primary building and the dorms are all connected to it. The primary building has grocery stores and all kinds of different shops. It is the central hang out spot and students can always be spotted there. I am in love with the university. The weather in Moscow is also really nice. It is sunny with a light breeze. The food here is really delicious. The cafeteria is open from 8am to 8pm and you can easily eat a filling meal for four dollars. There are definitely plenty of differences. For example, there is no AC in the buildings. In my room, I leave the window open to get air in. Also until for the next 20 days, there will be no hot water in Moscow State University. Apparently, the city turns off the hot water every year for a certain period of time, so that the pipes can be fixed before winter. The lab is also not nearly as advanced. The equipment is much older and whereas, many of the tubes in the labs in Emory are considered disposable and are thrown away after one use, here these tubes are washed after every use and recycled. The people in my lab are nice and have gone out of their way to help me settle in. This weekend a few of the lab members have agreed to show me around Moscow. Additionally, i have met a few American study abroad students who I have been meeting up with. The fact that my dorm is considered an international dorm has made meeting other students all the easier. Overall, everyone has been welcoming. The lab is really extreme when it comes to working. The work day starts at 9 am and is still full at 8pm. Additionally, the concept of weekends does not seem to exist, as saturdays and sundays are considered working days. This is not what I expected, and I am slightly shocked by their extreme work ethic. I will make sure to write more about my events and tell you more about the city of Moscow after this weekend. Until next time

More Oxford Adventures....

So, I have been in the UK for nearly 2.5 weeks now and I still love everything about it. My lab was nice enough to let me take off on Friday, Monday, and Tuesday because my mom was in the country. We went to London twice (which is nearly 2 hours away via the Tube) and it was fantastic. The weather was of the stereotypical rainy/ cold/ windy type though. I really can't believe that it is summer! We had a high of 50 degrees on Saturday. Oh, one thing I am alway confused on is the differences of measurements. They use celcius and meters and military time. I always have to spend about a minute trying to figure out what time something like 16:24 is.

Work, however, is still going very well. I am now officially running babies on my own. Natalia, the postdoc I work for, is on vacation, so I'm running babies for her as well as babies for Nivi, another postdoc, and for my own project. In addition, I am editting the sound files used in our stimuli, which took me forever today. I had to go and isolate each word and adjust the volume and label them. Also, I am calling and booking babies, which is not my favourite thing to do. It's sort of redundant since a lot of times the moms aren't home or it's a wrong number, but it has to be done. I am also scoring more babies and Natalia was teaching me how to edit the computer program for the stimuli. Also, I am doing more on this word association project. Moms were asked to think like their two year old and asked to say what word came to mind when another word was given. A study was conducted 10 years ago where they were not asked to think like their child but just themself and we will be comparing the results. It is my job currently to go through the lists and get them in order. I really feel like I am accomplishing something here, which is great. There are still some tasks that I would rather not do - my PI asked me to reorganise his book shelves so they are alphabetical and categorical. And he has like a million books! However, he did tell me my primary job is to do research, which is nice.
I am surprised though, at how much work there really is to do. My lab at Emory is considerably smaller, so there weren't as many studies going on. I worked from 9-6 today and I should have stayed longer, but I was just really tired...when I left pretty much all of the 8 researchers (post-docs/grad students/etc) were still there. I always have lists of things to do and I never can finish everything. I even work when I get home quite often and I know I will have to probably either go in or work at home this weekend.

Socially, my lab is still my major outlet. The psych department had drinks at this nice place called the University Club, which is next to our Experimental Psychology building. However, each lab pretty much stayed to themselves and we went to dinner afterwards. I really like everyone a lot - we are planning to go see Pirates, play pool, and have a movie night at lab, all next week. They are also trying to plan real trips, like to Switzerland, but I don't know if I'll still be around. Even though they are older, I really feel comfortable and I completely fit in. And, thanks to my mom, I now know my next door neighbor. He's really nice and from Italy and he came to visit this evening. Apparently he had been wondering what I was doing in this building, as they are all grad students/professors...he had said that I look so young. Tonight he told me he thought I was 17. I told him he gave me more credit then some people - I've gotten 16 more than once. But that sums up my social life - even if I did meet more people, all the undergrads leave in a couple weeks.

This is seriously one of the best experience of my life. I was talking to another person over drinks yesterday and was telling him that I want to apply here and he directed me to quite a few people in the speciality that I want (which is not the Babylab, even though I love it) But, this is pretty long so until next time!

I love Paris =)

So it's nearing the end of my 2nd week in my lab, and I'm almost done with cloning my 3 constructs...yay! (I wish everything works this easily back at home.) No, most people don't drink wine at lunch, but we do always eat with our own lab. It makes it difficult to get to know people from other labs. They also eat very early...around 11:30, and lunch is the biggest meal for them. I haven't quite adjusted to that yet; I still eat everything in sight around 11pm like any good American college student. Since everyone in my lab is at least 26, many have families and don't go out to drink after work, though today they took me out to a pub because they can't get over the fact that I can't drink in the US (legally at least). I discovered that European beers are much stronger than American beers, but they're much better.



As for addressing other people in my lab... I've finally managed to call my mentor (head of our subgroup) by first name, Thomas, though it's a bit awkward sometimes. As for my PI, everyone refers to him by Philippe when he's not around, but in person, it's always jokingly "the boss" so I've decided to err on the safe side and always call him Dr. Sansonetti. Hierarchy is very prominent at the Pasteur, and even the PhD students don't really talk directly to the PI, so as the only undergraduate in the lab, I usually go to my mentor...who luckily is in charge of our portion of the lab and gets pestered with questions from everybody, including me.



Everyone in the lab seems to be surprised that I'm 20 and an undergraduate, but there are pros and cons. They don't expect as much from me (I'm allowed to screw up on my first try) and they are always willing to help me when I don't understand something. It's annoying in that they tend to keep a very close eye on me when I'm working and stare over my shoulder make sure I'm doing it right (talk about pressure). On the first day, Thomas actually said "Oh good, you know how to pipet." He's always worried about leaving me on my own, but I think I'm starting to convince him that I know enough to be a little more independent.



Alrighty, that's enough about my lab for now... Here's a view from my room...I have plenty more pictures on Facebook. =)



az

P.S. and yes, thank you SOOOOO much IRES =)

Two weeks ago...

Two weeks ago I had just arrived in Germany, roughly. I got here in a Wed. afternoon and today is Thursday. So far things have been going really well. Everyone here is laidback and the research is moving along at a nice pace. The work fluctuates back and forth between waiting for certain pieces of equipment to arrive, and once they arrive working very quickly to get them adjusted for our experiments and installed. I basically work with someone working on his doctorate. His name is Stefan, we basically are taking different crystalized substances and seeing what kinds of properties they have under extreme conditions. That's why almost every week we order or build new devices to test the different properties of our samples. It's really cool because I get a lot of hands on experience. I don't just sit at a desk all day and do calculations. Stefan works in a group of about 5 or so. A couple of them are kind of like undergrads, like me and the other three are also working on their doctorates. Also apparently two other students in the DAAD program are coming to work with our group too. Here in Garching we're just one of 22 departments that work on various areas of physics. The technical university also has technology departments, mechanics departments, biochem departments, math departments and everything here. There's also a Max Planck institute located on this sight as well as a couple small particle accelerators and a Nuclear Reactor that they use to do Neutron scattering experiments. The amount of research that goes on here is unbelievable!

So as far as work goes, things are great. As far as life goes, it's ok. I rent a room in a small town near the Institute, and supposedly I have roommates, but I really haven't actually seen them yet. I haven't made any friends outside my research group because I live in a small town so far away from where anyone else my age lives. Apparently most college students live in a part of munich that, when translated from german, is called Student City. I have become pretty well acquainted with all the people working on my team, and they all usually go out to the beergarten about once a week. Also last weekend there was a music festival in Student City that I went to. It was actually pretty fun. I actually don't mind that much that I haven't made too many new friends because I was hoping to do quite a bit of travelling on the weekends because there's still a lot of Europe that I'd like to see. As for what to do during the week... I've brought a lot of books and I'm looking into what theater organizations there are at the University here to see if I can get involved with them. So until next time Tchüss

Naoki, checking in from Barcelona

Do you play basketball?

That's the first question I was asked as I met the folks in my lab. Seems they are organizing a game tomorrow evening. Then we went for lunch and had un cafe out by the beach. Sodexho sponsors the hospital cafeteria, go figure.

Today was my first day, I arrived yesterday after being in Wisconsin for NCAA T&F Nationals.

I will meet tomorrow with the lady in charge of their vivarium to see if I can bypass the requirement for vivisection training. Otherwise things are falling into place, we will do a test run on our procedure next Friday. I have some papers to read about their methods for determining plasma drug levels but it is mainly gc and mass spec. Big shout out to Dr.(s) Y and G for educating me on the biochem tip. I don't think many people know I'm just an undergrad yet.


Here is a picture of headquarters and a view from my balcony down onto Rbla de Catalunya. I have two English speaking roomates to keep me company though my Castellano has gotten me farther than I expected.














Until next time, Naoki O

PS - IRES is amazing I am already loving it. Thank you, thank you , thank you, THANK YOU!

I've moved into a new housing situation and I'm already enjoying myself much more. I now have three fun, energetic and nice roommates, so I am very happy. Two of them are from Germany and one is Brazilian. They are all "occupational trainees" (like me) at different departments here at UQ. One of them is actually in my department, so that has been convenient. I'm the youngest by five years, but they are all very happy to have me in the house because I am a walking dictionary for them.



Everything in the lab is going well. Sometimes when my PI talks I don't know what he is talking about, but it is okay because the postdoc that works for him doesn't understand him either :). I also had one of the postdocs in the chemistry group that we collaborate with tell me he doesn't understand him either. I'm learning how to use several different variations of my technique, but not very much about the samples. I run the machines all by myself, but if I have to use liquid nitrogen I have to have someone help me set it up, because the container is too heavy for my to carry after I fill it up. I've learned how to use a completely new cavity and now I can run it by myself and do a good job! I've been working a lot and I don't get home until fairly late, but my work is not very intense throughout the whole day just at some points. Socially I don't really fit in with my lab, considering there are only three of us (me, my PI, and the postdoc) but I've made friends with quite a few postdocs in the department and I've gotten the postdoc I work with to come out of his shell a bit. I'm really enjoying no homework! I think a 9-5 job would be great for me. Hope everyone is having a productive and fun summer.

From Marseille...

This is my third week in the lab, and I'm really enjoying my time here. Things have been sort of slow in the lab this week and last. Last week, most of the lab went to a French neuroscience conference. I stayed in the lab and shadowed a couple of people. I have not actually started on a project, although I have been introduced to two different ones. Both projects involve the same in situ hybridization technique. Depending on the results we get from the two different projects this week, I will join one of the projects next week.

I've met some people in my dorm (I live on the university campus). They have showed me around some of the surrounding area of Marseille, particularly these rocky inlets called the Calanques. I went swimming in the Mediterranean last weekend, but didn't last long since the water was so cold.

I'll update you about my project either next week or the week after, depending on how this week's experiments go.

Cosby

10 days later....

I finally have internet in my flat! Exciting! So, I have been at Oxford for almost 2 weeks now, and I must say I absolutely love everything about it. I guess I should start a little more from the beginning (sorry, this will be a fairly long post, as it is encompassing quite a long period of time)...

I flew in last Tuesday morning and made it safely from the airplane to a bus and to a taxi and then my flat on my own. And then I proceeded to sleep for about 15 hours. My Oxford PI (who everyone just calls by his first name, Kim) had suggested I come in on Wednesday whenever I was up and felt ready. I quickly learned that in Oxford, you walk everywhere. It takes me about 20 minutes to walk to work everyday, but I love it. I can either walk down the streets or through this beautiful park. Anyway, I got a little lost my first time getting to lab, but I finally made it in around 11am. I needed an ID card to be admitted in to the Experimental Psychology building, but the receptionist knew who I was...I simply said "Hi, I think I need a card..." and she was like "Ah, you must be Brittany. I'll call Natalia for you." Natalia is one of the people who works in lab (she has her Ph. D) and I did meet her when half the lab came to ATL in March. I found out that Wednesday morning was free tea and coffee for psychology people (to promote community and mingling), which was nice. I met most everyone in my lab that I hadn't previously been acquainted with and my PI came over and spoke with me for a while too. He warned me that my jetlag would be pretty bad until about my 5th day (and he was correct). I was shown my office, which I share with Natalia and Julian, and I do have my own computer, which is really nice.

Okay, so I'm rambling. Now to work stuff. In my lab they do have an ERP set-up (which I what I do at Emory), but it is quite small, and it's not what I'm really working on here. Instead, I'm working with the Preferential Looking Technique. Natalia and Nivi, the two people I'm pretty much working for, explained to me that I would shadow them a couple days, then help out for a couple weeks, and then I would take over their project with 12 month olds, which is what I'm starting now. Basically, I call moms and book the appointments, mail them all the necessary materials and then run the babies when they come in. What happens is baby sits on mom's lap and watchs 2 groups of pictures. Words are associated with the pictures and we record baby. Later on, I code for where baby's eyes are looking, such as right, left, middle, or other. That way we know which picture baby was looking at. We experiment on 12 month olds, 15, 16, 18, 24, and 30. I have run every age group excluding 30 months old. And British babies are so cute! I am still trying to get every study and every age group straight, but for 12 month olds were are just looking at whether baby will look at the picture that is audibly labeled as opposed to an unrelated picture. Additionally, I am working on a word association project that I will be able to report more on later.

Socially, we do go out to pubs and restaurants as a lab on Fridays. Also, Wednesday is movie night where we project a movie on a screen at lab and bring in dinner. More so, we do random stuff together too...two of the women and I went shopping last Saturday. But, the person closest to my age in lab is like 25/26, so there is a gap. It is difficult to meet people in college. My house has only 14 rooms and I never see anyone else around. My room is quite big, which is nice. There is only one shower in the building though, and it is 3 flights down, so I usually run down since I don't want the world to see me in my towel. I did actually meet some people tonight though, so there is hope. My mom actually arrived here yesterday, so we've been doing lots of tourist-y sight-seeing around and when we were coming back to my college area (Oxford has 39 colleges...mine is called St. Hughs), this kid practically attacked me asking if I had an hour to tango, as there was an odd number of partners. I'm a bit desperate for friends so I sent my mom back to my room for the hour that I danced. I was terrible, but the kid was really nice and we had a lot of fun. He invited me out to the pub with everyone, but I felt bad for neglecting my mom, so I told him I would come next time.

I think that's more than enough for now...that should make up for my lack of writing!

My turn

I finished up with Commencement and thought things would calm down a little. They did but I am caught in a swirl of end of semester student issues. I enjoye reading your emails. Now who is going to post a picture for us to look at?
I hope everyone has emailed their Emory advisors. Take the time now to send in a note about what you are doing, with some scientific details. I am sure they would love to hear about it.

For us, fill us in with things you observe around lab. I love the thought of 2 hour lunches. Does everyone drink wine in France during lunch? Does the lab eat together? What about after work? Remember what Dr. Krige said about everyone going to the pub? Brittany is not online yet so we will have to wait and see.
What do you call your supervisor? Bob or Dr. Sansonetti? What sort of questions are you being asked? How do they deal with the fact that you are probably the youngest in the lab?

And so on.
Its the Friday before Memorial day. Happy Memorial Day. If you are feeling terribly homesick, do call me!

from Paris now =)

So much has happened in the last three days I don't even know where to begin...

My flight arrived on Monday in the early morning and it took me far too long to find my way to the Pasteur Institute. I will never bring a suitcase larger than a carry-on ever again. I found my supervisor, Dr. Thomas Kufer, who introduced me to all 30 people in my lab and the PI (Dr. Sansonetti).....they take up almost the entire floor!!! Many of them speak at least a little bit of English, and Dr. Kufer is fluent in French, German, and English, so he helps me in our very multi-national lab. My French is utterly horrible, but I've managed to survive these 3 days.

Other than the excessive paperwork, the French keyboards, and doors that don't open unless you press buttons (even to get out!), I do love the Pasteur. Dr. Kufer gave me an overview of my project on Monday. Yesterday (Tues.) he explained all of his current research to me as well as my own project, and I started my first experiment. Today I saw the biggest microscopes I've ever seen...they were really really cool. oh...and they take 2 hour lunch breaks =)

Today while going back to the Residence, another trainee stares at my Emory shirt and asks "are you from Georgia?" in a perfect Southern accent. It turns out she is a UGA student in the Zuccaire program who also can't understand a word of French. I was so thrilled to find another undergrad =) We met up with another Zuccaire fellow, hopped onto the Metro, and spent a few hours exploring the Louvre.

That's plenty for now............ au revoir!

One week down

I've been working in the lab now for a week. I've already learned a surprising amount and the work that I've done previously is making even more sense. Yesterday and the day before I learned how to use three different variations of my technique, which has been really awesome. I'm the only one in the whole department that isn't a post-doc or a professor so it has been a bit intimidating, but they have been taking very good care of me. The best part of my work is that I don't actually have to make the samples. The chemists in the group bring the samples to me and I get to run them, which is the fun part. I've also gotten to play with the parameters for my experiments which has helped in my training. The lab I work in has created several computer simulation programs which have also been fun to play around with..

While the lab is going well it has been very hard to meet people. My roommate is really awkard, so I'm currently looking for new housing. In addition to a nonsocial roommate I work with all "adults"and I don't have any contact with students, so it has been a challenge to meet people. The first week was really hard to get over the jet lag and my homesickness, but I feel like myself for the first time today.

Brisbane is a really cool city and the public transportation is great, so I've had a great time exploring the city and I still have a great more to see. It gets dark here around 5:30 pm so I have to do most of my city exploring on the weekends, but that leaves weeknites (when I get home from the lab before 1:00 am:) )for me to catch up on reading.

Ich bin ein Praktikant

So now I'm writing from Germany. It takes a bit longer to write because the keyboards are slightly different. The y and the z keys are switched, so I do a lot of stopping and deleting. But there are also some wonderful new keys, like ä, ö, and ü and the @ symbol is hidden in a place that's easy to forget. I'm actually have way used to all of this cause I lived here before, but it's still fun to go through the whole adjustment process once again. Yesterday I went grocery shopping like a real german! Inside I was just bursting with excitement even though it's should be a boring everyday task. But I'm sure zou (see the freaking mistakes I alwazs have to correct) don't want to hear about that part of my internship.

Yesterday I also began my internship. It's actually really great, everyone here is so nice and the research goes at a nice easy pace. They said that they don't expect everything from me right away and that it's totally ok when I make a mistake (which luckily I haven't yet) because I'm here to learn.

I actually got here last wednesday but my internship didn't start until yesterday, and seeing as most of Europe was on holiday on thursday (and of course not many people went to work on friday either, the even have it built into the calendar that way. Many holidays are followed by "bridge days" so people can sleep off their hangovers, I'm totally not kidding) I travelled to another part of Germany to visit a family I had lived with for a year. That was a lot of fun and I returned on Sunday.

So far I've done a lot of watching and listening, the day goes by pretty quickly and you don't feel like you've done much. There are no classes to go to. You just figure things out in your office and call the right people when you have questions can chat with your co-workers about problems and what to do next and stuff. So far they have about three or four machines that use liquid helium. We do experiments with sample crystals at very low temperatures and very high magnetic fields and very high pressures. We use so much Helium that we actually have an internal helium ventilation system. All the helium that get's vaporized in the tanks get's fed through the system to a cooler room where it's cooled to a liquid again and then used to fill up empty tanks. They're repairing one machine that, when we're finished, should be able to achieve temperatures as low as a few millikelvin and B fields as high as 20 Tesla!!! Right now my projects are to build a susceptometer and attach it to the part of the machine that holds the sample. It feels pretty crazy that I'm going to build something myself that they'll actually use to measure things with. I also have a lot of technical reading to do. Lock in Amplifiers, Susceptometers, and lots with Physical Property measurement systems (the big tanks and machines we use). Everyone seems to have a lot of confidence in me and they say it's easier than it sounds, so I'm worried, but hopeful. Well I gotta go! Till next time...

Kanwei, reporting for duty in Bordeaux France

My name is Kanwei and I'm an alcoholic.

Well, not really. Quite the opposite actually, but I'll talk about that another day. I'm writing at 9pm from the bench outside the cafeteria (closed) which is next to the library (also closed). Has Emory spoiled me to the point that I expect every university to provide food and shelter 24/7? Why is there no Internet in my dorm? How do French students get any work done? Am I really complaining on a blog that will be read by my benefactors? (benefactors: no, I'm not really complaining, and thanks for the support)

You see, I arrived at the dorms on Friday at around noon. The previous day was a national holiday, and they forgot to tell me that in France, when Thursday is a holiday, Friday is naturally a holiday too. Duh. I was supposed to speak with the RHD of the dorms (on holiday) and ended up having to convince them that oui, je suis American, non, je ne suis pas un idiote qui n'a pas ses papiers, et oui, j'aime le football. I got to my room and instinctively looked for the ethernet plug. Nope. So I was stuck in my room, no Internet, no phone, and everyone was on holiday. What did I do? Go downtown, of course.

Since I didn't feel like spending more euros on transportation (1.30€) because the exchange is now 0.7 €/USD, I walked along the tram tracks into the city. There, I found everyone that I had previously mentioned were on vacation. The streets were narrow and were absolutely packed. I had a good time looking at people I'd never met before (everyone) as I passed them. French people are taller than Americans on average, it seems. The city center was pretty nice, with an esplanade. I was pretty tired though so I left early. I'll come back with the camera another day.

When I got back to the dorms, I met some of my neighbors. Yassine (Moroccan) was one of them, and I played Pro Evolution Soccer 6 (best football game ever) with him and his friends. It's weird because I'd actually played this exact game back home (weird huh) and so I actually won a couple matches. We're still friends to this day.

So anyways, I start work tomorrow and I'm still outside the cafeteria. It's now 10pm and getting cold. Talk to you again soon, mon ami.

yay!

I'm finally done packing......nine hours before my flight this morning.
I'll be arriving in Paris on Monday morning. It's been rainy and cold in Paris all week. hopefully that changes soon.

Au revoir!

Hello everyone! I seem to be a bit late in posting my first blog. Not to worry, I took care of all my packing and travel specifics before handling this. Well, today was Commencement at Emory and tomorrow I leave for Munich. It's a pretty small time frame, I must say (although I wasn't one of the graduates, so I actually wasn't that pressed for time). I will arrive in Munich Wed. morning and then travel to the research institute which, as it turns out, is only about 10 km from the Munich airport, so I shouldn't have any trouble getting there. I don't start my internship until the following monday, so I have a few days to settle in. I will be working from about mid May until the beginning of August and I will be doing physics research investigating quantum phase transitions in certain superconducting alloys.
As complicated as that all might sound I'm really mainly helping my international mentor, Stefan Legl, install a vibrating coil magnetometer into our freezing chamber (what he calls "the fridge") and then using the thing to measure the "incommensurate spin" of our samples to help us see how the magnetization of the alloy changes under different conditions. (or something like that).
For some reason, I'm not worried about the Al Qaeda. What I'm most worried about is making a friendly impression on my advisor. We've kept in contact through email over the spring, but we've never actually spoken to each other. I don't know that much about him and my communication with him has stayed on the formal side, even to the point where I've wondered if sometimes I've worded my emails in a way that makes me sound rude. I feel that if he begins thinking I'm rude, then it will be an uphill battle for us to work more closely together. Oh well, we'll find out tomorrow! (well, after a 10 hour flight that begins tomorrow)

Flight tomorrow night

I leave for Stuttgart tomorrow! I get in Tuesday afternoon and will start working in the lab on Wednesday. I'm half excited, half nervous. On the news they reported that Al Qaeda is planning an attack on Americans in Germany, specifically in Stuttgart. It's a little unsettling, but at least it encourages me to speak more German and less English.

Ready for my trip!

I'm almost done packing and am looking forward to leaving for Marseille tomorrow AM. I'll arrive on Saturday and will start in the lab on Monday.
Cosby

To follow Angelica's example...

Next Sunday I leave for my summer of research in the Magnetic Resonance Center at the University of Queensland. I've finally found housing and I have my visa! Over the next week I'll be taking finals, moving out of my appartment and finishing my honors thesis. I'm a little nervous, but at the same time very excited about my upcoming adventure. I will be in Brisbane from May 15th through the end of July. Then I will be traveling around Australia for a week.

I hope everyone has a great summer!
RP

Hi

Hi everyone!

Juries, biochem final, MCAT...preparing for my trip to Paris will be in there somewhere. If anyone wants to meet up over a weekend or something, I will be in Paris from May 21st through July 27th and somewhere in Europe until Aug. 6th.

Good luck on your final exams and have a great summer!
~Angelica

2007 Fellows

It is 9.12 pm and I have just re-remembered how to add users to the blog. In the intervening year, Google has bought out blogger.com and so I now have to login with my gmail account. I decided to change the layout while I was at it. So we have Spring like colors now. I looked through the postings of last year and enjoyed them again. I hope all you 2007 IRES folks will have a wonderful summer and will let us share a bit of that through this blog.
And don't forget adding a few photos now and then!