"Snow storm" on departure

Dear blog community,
its been almost a year since my last entry here. Now that I'm back to the US, I decided to continue blogging occasionally about my activities. I hope you enjoy reading and viewing the pictures. Please comment to make this a more rewarding exercise for me... ;-)

So... every journey starts with travelling. However, this start was not one of the best. In fact we had a mid March "snow storm" in Germany on the very same day I should have taken the flight. Well, there were about 10cm of new snow falling over night - one might think that a developed country used to this kind of climate is able to deal with that. It's not...

First, it took me more than 2 hours to get to the airport (which is usually a 20min ride). The freeway was just covered with snow and the traffic jams skyrocketed to 40+ km... Having arrived barely one hour before departure at the airport (!) I learned that all flights are suspended. The whole airport was closed down due to the weather conditions... Well, that could be an interesting day.

About 1h after the official boarding time, we were finally ushered into buses to get to the plane. Sitting in the plane for 15min... nothing happened. Finally, the captain told us that the runway is still closed until further notice... He kept repeating this about every 20 min until after 2 hours the first aircrafts could take off again. However, we were still waiting for a number in the de-icing sequence...

To cut the long story short:
- we never got that number
- the pilot canceled the flight (he would exceed the maximum duty time)
- took a cab back to Darmstadt
- had (at least!) a good sleep in my own bed (quite a few people actually had to sleep on the terminal floor)
- more than 800 out of 1200 flights got canceled
- I came back the next day to catch the same fligh

Finally, I happily arrived in Philly an I'm staying at the same cozy place as last time. I'm looking forward to an interesting and fruitful stay. I'll keep you updated.

Enjoy the picture series "flier and ice" ;-)

Gamblin' in Atlantic City

Last Sunday I went together with my land lord to Atlantic City. For those who don't now: Its something like a cheap version of Las Vegas on the east coast of the US. I was told that I should go there at least once to see this place... Well yeah.

We took some kind of casino bus there: You get the price of the bus ticket worth free credit in the casino. So the first thing we did was to waste the $25 in one of the slot machines. I can definitely not understand why people find this fun or exciting. You sit in this dull, dark place and get constantly annoyed by blinking lights an noisy machines. You hit some buttons and then the counter of you money goes either up or down... After five minutes I got already bored and felt an urge to leave... Luckily it doesn't take long to get rid of 25 bucks. At least I got 15 bucks back which almost paid for the lunch.

The lunch buffet was good, but not outstanding. Anyway, I only ate as much as I possibly could. :-) Then it was time to stroll along the famous board walk. Most of the casinos are situated directly at the beach. The board walk runs along between the beach and the buildings. Maybe it is nice to take a walk there in summer... with cold and windy weather it wasn't really fun. The overcast sky was not the perfect setting for taking pictures either. Well, you see the result.

The most interesting part was maybe the interior of some casinos. One had this Wild West theme from the outside and inside. That looked quite cool - kinda underwhelming though when you have already been to Las Vegas. Some of the places were not that glittering and shiny - rather run down and shabby.

All in all Atlantic City is probably a place where you don't have to go. It might be nice with great summer weather. But I still think that I can't quite get the hang of the casino business...

Princeton, New Jersey

Last weekend I've been visiting my friend in Princeton. I was invited (or I invited myself...) on a Siemens intern house party. It seems that they are doing those parties quite frequently. There was a huge bunch of people there in any case, so I didn't feel that I was out of place. Well lets start at the beginning...

I took the commuter train from Philly first to Trenton and then to Princeton. There is a direct Amtrak connection, too, but this is 4 times more expensive... Finally I managed to get there and I a was even picked up at the station. As public transport in US is highly developed, most interns have a car... We went to town first to have a hoagie (thats how they call sandwiches here) in famous Hoagie Haven (no typo). I got a Sanchez, which is a sandwich with chicken chop, fries, veggie and some greasy sauce. It was edible... you have to be adventurous if you try local specialties... Before the party started we had a stroll through the town and the campus. The town is basically one street with one restaurant after another. Apart from that there's not much to see.

The campus, however, is a different story. I can't even guess how big it is. We walked for quite a while and there was no apparent end. All the buildings look really fancy and old. Some look like castles, cathedrals or whatever mansion, but definitely not like university buildings. My friend said that especially at night it reminded her of Hogwarts. I guess she is right. Really impressive. On the Easter weekend I will go there again for a guided tour around campus. I hope that we will learn something about the history, the buildings and so on. Its always much more interesting if you hear the corresponding stories to a place.

The party was a kinda crazy thing. It was a house where a couple of (5?, 6?) Siemens interns are staying and they just transformed the place into a big party location. I think there were at least 50 to 60 people, mostly interns and Au-pairs (to make up for the girls ratio...). I guess this was the first opportunity where I talked to an actually American (one guy from Texas and one from New Jersey). So far I had only contact to internationals... (All my lab mates including the professors are non-natives). Hehe, it was fun talking about big cars and other American habits... Apparently even between NJ and TX there are big differences... :-) Apart from that I enjoyed myself, had a few beer (hard to get in Pennsylvania!) and mingled with people. I mean there is usually not much party going on in Villanova...

It was a cool weekend and I had a lot of fun there. Thanks for inviting me! :-)

Sorry I dont have any pics this time. Me and the weather were not in the right mood... I captured the posing goose in Philly.

New York City

Hey gals and guys. I still owe you the posing about my one-day trip to New York last Sunday. I appointed with a friend from Darmstadt and some of her friends to meet there and have a relaxed day. The plan was more like hanging out in nice places, chat and have some coffee and beer. :-) I guess there will be another time to go to NY for a proper sight seeing trip.

The trip there by bus was quite smooth and for $25 return you can't complain. The day started of quite grey and foggy (not as sunny and warm as in the forecast...). So after finally having found each other in Manhattan we got a coffee. It was really great to talk to friends and peers again. I mean my colleagues in the lab a very nice, but the are all much older than me and are married and have kids and so... In that way it was quite refreshing. :-)

We continued with a walk across the Brooklyn bridge, where you usually have a great view of Manhattan. Well not quite when its foggy... Anyway it was cool. After that we got a bit lost in the subway... erhmm... but we finally found the restaurant where another guy was already waiting for a long time... The place was called "Fette Sau" ("fat pig") :-) and they were supposed to sell German-style food. Not sure if it was very German, but the had big chunks of delicious meat. Yummy.

Finally the sun came out and we enjoyed the afternoon in a park and watch some guys playing soft ball. We ended the day in a great roof top bar close to the Empire State Building with an amazing view! Now it was really warm and sunny - awesome! Funny thing: They fired their electric heating device on full throttle. "Can you switch it off?" - "No its not possible." I guess electricity is still too cheap here...

Before I took my bus back to Philly I walked across Times Square (I guess you have to do that some time...). But I donno, all these people, touts, cars and flickering light were making me quite sick. I was glad when I left it behind me - heading for some smaller hidden squares in the neighbourhood. The ride back was fine and sharply on time - perfect!

Conclusion? I haven't seen much of NY, but it was a great day anyways! The highlight was definitely the view and atmosphere in the roof top bar. I'll come back to see Central Park, Ground Zero and other places!

Spring

Slowly you can see it, feel it, hear it... spring is approaching. This week we had some really nice and warm days here. Temperatures topping around 20 °C, a lot of sunshine and blue sky. Its amazing how quickly the students here change to summer attire. When I was still wearing my winter jacket they were out in shorts an T-shirt. Well, weather is a state of mind. :-D

Yesterday evening I set out with my camera to capture a bit of the early spring in the soft evening light. Unfortunately it was a bit hazy so the light wasn't perfect. Anyway the campus has some really beautiful spots and it will probably looking even nicer when the trees and shrubs get green. But well - see for yourself. I hope this time the images are sharper. I think last time I screwed something up with the resizing.

Philly Down Town

Hey, its already my second weekend in then land of opportunity. So it was about time to do some proper sight seeing. And thats what I did... on Saturday at about 9am I took light rail in the Eastern direction. After another short subway ride I had the whole day to explore Philadelphia. There is actually quite a lot to see. However, covering so many places on my feet was quite tough. At the end of the quite chilly day I felt rather sore...

I started on the Delaware river and than made my way through one of the oldest parts to the Independence National Historic Park. This was the place were the Declaration of Independence and the fist Constitution were signed. On top of that Philadelphia served for 10 years as capital of the newly formed United States. I had great tour through Independence Hall, the (reconstructed) building where theses documents were actually discussed and signed. Very interesting - you could almost feel the historic atmosphere there.

I continued through China town (less impressive) to the City hall, with the statue of William Penn on the roof top. What I really like about the city were the many pieces of (street) art that are displayed everywhere. Philly apparently has a very lively artist's community and you can see this when you walk around with open eyes.

My favorite place in this regard was definitely "Philadelphia's Magic Gardens", which feature a huge labyrinth designed by the local mosaic artist Isaiah Zagar. The dimensions were just huge! And every tiny corner is covered with a piece of tile, mirror, plates, bicycle wheels or whatever you could imaging. Everything adds up to a overall WOW-experience. I found it a bit hard to capture. I hope you get at least a rough impression of the genial piece of art.

The day ended with an 100% original Philly Cheesesteak at Jim's: "No trip to Philadelphia is complete without trying the cheesesteak, Philly's most famous homegrown food, a sandwich made of a fresh roll filled with grilled shaved beef and cheese (as well as onions, mushrooms, and other optional sides). " (wiki) It sounds kinda strange, and definitely looks so, but its actually quite tasty. And the place was super popular - I had to queue for about half an hour.

This was a full day of new experiences and a lot of walking. That's why I didn't have the energy to join on of the St. Paddie's day parties. But nonetheless, I enjoyed it and I will come back. I mean I still have to see the 'Rocky' stairs and statue at the Museum of Art! And Philly is a cool place with a special atmosphere you don't find in many big cities.

(Argh, including the images is quite a pain. I have to find a better solution for that.)