Thursday, June 10, 2010
Ya bitte
Here’s my next blog… a little later then expected.
I had quite the eventful weekend and didn’t have time to write this until now. On Friday after work, some people and I meet to go to a concert… a high school concert. It turned out to be much better then I expected. It was at a monastery just outside of town and the set up was pretty much a beer garden. The people who I was with didn’t understand why I was so surprised about it, probably because I don’t think you’ll ever see a high school concert anything like that in Canada. It turned out to be a really fun time. Later on when I got back to my flat, I learned some German drinking games, and had the unpleasant experience of trying some home made alcohol.
On Saturday, I was in town and met a guy who was born in Germany, but brought up in Alberta, then moved back to Germany after school. Anyway, he invited me out to a party at his place a half hour out of town that night, and I figured I might as well with nothing better to do. I’ll have to skip the adventures of getting there as that would probably take up a whole blog in itself. So when I finally reach his place, I see that he lives on a absolutely giant piece of land his dad owns. He doesn’t really have a job, but does run a organic farm on the land, which I’m not so sure would be able to turn a profit. Anyways, they had a small man made lake there, so we ended up hanging around there all day. It seems like this guy is pretty serious about his parties, because half way through the day he asked a couple of us guys to give him a hand. So we get in the truck and go grab some serious speakers and a giant grill for the fire. He ended up having a bunch of people over and turned out to be a really fun time. One more thing about the night: I was offered some home made booze again, to which I quickly declined, but there was a bunch of guys there that were using it to blow fire. It was pretty neat, with the flames being probably five feet long!
The place where we stayed that night was really cool, almost like a large spa area turned into a small apartment. I realize it’s difficult to picture, but the kitchen was inside the drained out pool and the bedroom I slept in used to be a sauna. So the next morning, I had to get up early and get back to a BBQ that I said I would go to. With everyone still sleeping I had to head out and catch the bus back to Giessen. Little did I know that the bus doesn’t run on Sundays. So…. three hitchhiking rides and a little bit of walking later, I was back at my place. The BBQ was quite fun and I met some new people, including a guy from the US doing the same internship program here in Giessen. The rest of the day was spent recovering from the weekend.
Now back to the work aspect of my trip. The lab work I’ve been doing is much more then I expected… in a good way. I was expecting to be the coffee boy, but I’ve been carrying out many experiments. My PhD student will actually probably be getting his PhD before I leave here, so I’m actually performing the experiments he will hopefully be using for his first Post-Doctorate paper. So now that I’ve learned all the techniques and what not, he will be spending most of his time preparing for his PhD defense while I am doing the experiments. I should have some pictures on my next blog, as the set up I’m using is really interesting. Most of the guys in the lab are quite cool and it’s funny some of the things you see the equipement being used for. Like using the super cool refrigerator to cool down beers in no time, or putting a wet phone in a vacuum with some “water-absorbing” rocks to dry it out.
So I’ve been pretty busy for the last week, but when I get some more time, I’m going to try to learn some basic German with the Rosetta stone that my brother Vince gave to me. We’ll see how it goes.
Now some random things-
- I’ve been going running quite often lately, and usually through the forest near my flat. I was telling the people I live with about this and they started to tell me how the forest used to be a mine during WWII until it suffered some very very serious bombing. The next part I didn’t believe until they showed me an article, but many bombs are still there that haven’t detonated, so a bomb will randomly go off every year or so, and you can see some of the “creator’s” as you run through the forest.
- The beer and food here is heavenly
- I’m going to have 3 weeks to travel Europe at the end of my trip so if anyone had any suggestions on where to go, the advice would be very helpful!
- I might have said this in my last blog, but Giessen isn’t know for being that beautiful of a city now, because all the nice building that were here were completely destroyed during WWII.
- The town is litterally covered with over 60 nearly full size dinosaurs which is quite odd. I've talked about it with probably more then 10 locals, and no one seems to know why they're here. All I know is that some of them had to be moved in via helicopter.
I think that should be it for now, Ciao!
Thursday, June 3, 2010
Germany 1
Day off today! Meaning I have some time to write this thing. I’ll just start from when I got here until now.
I was picked up at the airport by the PhD student I will be working for and was on the autobahn shortly. I think the autobahn experience is quite self-explanatory but it is real cool to experience! I then moved into my room and went out shopping. The room is probably slightly larger then those at Lister residence at the UofAlberta, but it also includes a sink and a closet. I then share a lounge and kitchen with other “flat-mates”. Out of around 12 of us, only three of them are German (Although they all speak the language) and the rest are from all over the rest of the world. I’ve noticed many of the people here don’t seem as nice as back home initially, but once you get to even know someone briefly, they really want to help you, wither it be taking you shopping, bringing you with them to go out at night or just help making plans. It caught me somewhat by surprise, by I really like most of the people here. Then again, the town I’m living in is the most student dense city in Germany, with around 25,000 students and only 80,000 residents.
I went out for coffee and later supper+beers that day to meet some of the people I will be working with. My first morning on the job, I spent a good hour meeting people who’s names I stopped even trying to remember. But as we were making the rounds through the labs, I was invited to help dissect a very large clawed frog. After it was killed, I had to cut it open and take out the ovaries and lungs, as those are 2 of the most used structures in this study. I spent most of the rest of the day learning how to use most of the equipment, getting set up and preparing solutions.
Now a short description for those that needed to ask me what I’m working on.
Putting it simply, we are studying the effects of certain gaseous substances on the ion channels in our bodies. All the epithelial tissue in our bodies contain these Sodium channels, which help regulate fluid exchange between the bloodstream and “exposed” surface in placed like our lungs, stomach act By finding chemicals that will either increase or decrease these channels activity, we can change the rate at which the fluid is being pumped out of our lungs and back into our bloodstreams. Hopefully we can use this to treat diseases that either has too much fluid in the lungs or too little. The experimental side to this is that we take the “oocytes” from the frog’s ovaries, then inject them with bacteria we cloned that all have the exact same gene for increased expression of these channels. After this we will let them sit for a while, then treat them with the gas and then measure ion concentration rates inside and outside of the cell.
I realize the words I used might have sounded somewhat vague but I’m writing this with the intent that most of my family and friends can understand it. Another thing is that these “oocytes” we are working with are nearly the side of a period on the end of the sentence. Which makes my work, dealing with the injections, monitoring and what not very difficult. It is hard to explain but you do it all manually with the help of a microscope and manually controlled “injection needle machines”. Anyways, whoever let me in there was not thinking because most of this equipment is too expensive and fragile to have around someone like me. I’ll eventually take a picture of some of the labs to make it a little easier to understand.
Other then work I have got my Internet, room, bank account and all that stuff set up. I’ve met a bunch of students that go here and also some other interns who are funded by the same agency as me. Last night, a bunch of us went out for a drink, then ate and headed out to this Sports faculty party. It was much more exciting then I expected. There were definitely thousands of students there in one giant beer garden which had an outdoor dance floor/DJ, tons of beer and small sports set-ups everywhere. They had one activity where people would stack plastic beer cases in a single stack and climb up the stack as someone passed the next case to them. They were attached to a safety harness, which was tied to a small crane –looking thing so when the stack collapsed, they hung there. It was amazing seeing, a single stack over twenty feet high of foot x foot plastic cases and someone climbing on it. There were many other ones but this one stuck out. They all closed down before everyone got too drunk and decided to go for it. Anyway, the rest of the night included much beer drinking, meeting other people and seeing some sports displays earlier in the night.
After walking home when it got light out and stopping for a Kebab, I managed to sleep almost all day today. Other then a workout and laundry, I have been mostly nursing a hangover. I will try to write again during or after this weekend.
Ciao
- I’ll try to add some photos of my trips, but I should have an album up of my Spain trip on Facebook already.
I was picked up at the airport by the PhD student I will be working for and was on the autobahn shortly. I think the autobahn experience is quite self-explanatory but it is real cool to experience! I then moved into my room and went out shopping. The room is probably slightly larger then those at Lister residence at the UofAlberta, but it also includes a sink and a closet. I then share a lounge and kitchen with other “flat-mates”. Out of around 12 of us, only three of them are German (Although they all speak the language) and the rest are from all over the rest of the world. I’ve noticed many of the people here don’t seem as nice as back home initially, but once you get to even know someone briefly, they really want to help you, wither it be taking you shopping, bringing you with them to go out at night or just help making plans. It caught me somewhat by surprise, by I really like most of the people here. Then again, the town I’m living in is the most student dense city in Germany, with around 25,000 students and only 80,000 residents.
I went out for coffee and later supper+beers that day to meet some of the people I will be working with. My first morning on the job, I spent a good hour meeting people who’s names I stopped even trying to remember. But as we were making the rounds through the labs, I was invited to help dissect a very large clawed frog. After it was killed, I had to cut it open and take out the ovaries and lungs, as those are 2 of the most used structures in this study. I spent most of the rest of the day learning how to use most of the equipment, getting set up and preparing solutions.
Now a short description for those that needed to ask me what I’m working on.
Putting it simply, we are studying the effects of certain gaseous substances on the ion channels in our bodies. All the epithelial tissue in our bodies contain these Sodium channels, which help regulate fluid exchange between the bloodstream and “exposed” surface in placed like our lungs, stomach act By finding chemicals that will either increase or decrease these channels activity, we can change the rate at which the fluid is being pumped out of our lungs and back into our bloodstreams. Hopefully we can use this to treat diseases that either has too much fluid in the lungs or too little. The experimental side to this is that we take the “oocytes” from the frog’s ovaries, then inject them with bacteria we cloned that all have the exact same gene for increased expression of these channels. After this we will let them sit for a while, then treat them with the gas and then measure ion concentration rates inside and outside of the cell.
I realize the words I used might have sounded somewhat vague but I’m writing this with the intent that most of my family and friends can understand it. Another thing is that these “oocytes” we are working with are nearly the side of a period on the end of the sentence. Which makes my work, dealing with the injections, monitoring and what not very difficult. It is hard to explain but you do it all manually with the help of a microscope and manually controlled “injection needle machines”. Anyways, whoever let me in there was not thinking because most of this equipment is too expensive and fragile to have around someone like me. I’ll eventually take a picture of some of the labs to make it a little easier to understand.
Other then work I have got my Internet, room, bank account and all that stuff set up. I’ve met a bunch of students that go here and also some other interns who are funded by the same agency as me. Last night, a bunch of us went out for a drink, then ate and headed out to this Sports faculty party. It was much more exciting then I expected. There were definitely thousands of students there in one giant beer garden which had an outdoor dance floor/DJ, tons of beer and small sports set-ups everywhere. They had one activity where people would stack plastic beer cases in a single stack and climb up the stack as someone passed the next case to them. They were attached to a safety harness, which was tied to a small crane –looking thing so when the stack collapsed, they hung there. It was amazing seeing, a single stack over twenty feet high of foot x foot plastic cases and someone climbing on it. There were many other ones but this one stuck out. They all closed down before everyone got too drunk and decided to go for it. Anyway, the rest of the night included much beer drinking, meeting other people and seeing some sports displays earlier in the night.
After walking home when it got light out and stopping for a Kebab, I managed to sleep almost all day today. Other then a workout and laundry, I have been mostly nursing a hangover. I will try to write again during or after this weekend.
Ciao
- I’ll try to add some photos of my trips, but I should have an album up of my Spain trip on Facebook already.
Tuesday, June 1, 2010
Starting to blog again---- spain recap
Alright, I’m in Germany now, and am starting up this blog again, so I’m not emailing everyone separately with the same stories.
I flew in this yesterdat from Barcelona where my family and I went on a cyling trip around Spain for around two weeks. I will now make a weak attempt to briefly sum up that trip.
After a couple planes, some sleep and a lot of free beers, we arrived in Barcelona with all nine of our bikes intact. Although we only had two panniers (small bags that attach to your bike) each, we enjoyed our first day biking through Barcelona without them. After my bike’s pedal broke off within two minutes of getting on the bike, my dad and I were on our own for the rest of the day, which proved to be blast. Speeding through the city of Barcelona on these little bikes with the traffic was awesome. I got to see the beaches, some churches, and the Olympic stadium/park. It all surprised me right away to see how huge and rich the city was, I definitely underestimated Spain. At the end of our trip, I also went to the FC Barcelona soccer stadium, which is absolutely huge holding more then 100,000 people I think.
Now biking. Keep in mind, I had only ever ridden probably 50km on a road bike in my whole life before this trip, and we were going to average around 80km a day… through the Pyrenees mountains. Short story would just be that mine, along with Vince and Dave’s (my brothers) butts took a serious beating. I would strongly suggest you get used to sitting on a bike seat before going on a trip like this.
Biking seemed to be the perfect way to see Spain. You see landscapes that remind you of the dessert to the Rocky Mountains, and everything in between. After the first day, I think all of us understood that my dad’s plan for the trip was not to start slowly. His guidebook marked these trails at an advanced difficulty, but he didn’t bother to waste his time with such difficulties. Anyways, some of the harder days included a 20km climb, meaning for 20km, the only thing that changed was how steep the incline was. Others had the rare off road track or a wrong turn that just add onto the kms you have to bike.
Good parts included some of the placed we stayed in: beach towns, castles, small town hostels, and medieval villages. Thankfully we were treated to a nice places and some seriously good meals. Although the healthy indulgence in beers every night didn’t make the biking easier.
I managed to get my burn on early on in the trip and then accepted that sunscreen may actually be necessary.
Another thing that didn’t exactly work out was the fact that Steph and I, and especially Vince speak Spanish, but in the portion of Spain we were in, many people and things used the Catalonian language.
I’m already running out of time, but if I find some more time soon, I might write a little more on Spain. But all in all, the big group, large hills, fast downhill’s and beautiful country made it a very successful trip. Although probably not for everyone, I would strongly suggest something like this to other travelers and will probably explore countries this way again.
I got into Giessen, Germany today and it all looks awesome! The work i did my first day was awesome and the internship looks extremely promising. I’ll try to do another update and talk about the job when I get a chance.
Leave a comment if you there's anything you want to know or think I should talk about.
This blog has already taken too long so Ciao for now!
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