Hamburg photos

I have spent the last week sorting and organizing the photos from our roadtrip. If you wish to view them, here is the link, http://picasaweb.google.com/judesj/HamburgBest. Hopefully more photos to follow soon.

Part 3 of 3 (Another Dutch Haircut)

For weeks I've been complaining about what a pain my hair is, how it gets in my face while riding and running, how it gets frizzy when it rains (which is every day), how messy my floor gets from it shedding, etc. So today I joined Diego (Columbia) for a trip to the hair salon (he has been here for four years and is the only person I know who actually had a hairdresser to recommend).

There were no “before” pictures taken today (see Part 1 for a picture taken yesterday), but Diego is the one to thank for the “during” photo (and Maruschka for cutting my hair). The strange “after” picture is a self portrait (after a dozen tries, this one, unfortunately, was the best). I got to keep my hair, but I don't know if it is long enough to donate or if it will just end up sitting on my dresser until I move out. I have to say, the lonely ponytail is pretty cool.

Part 2 of 3 (Figo)

We started a new module this week, engineering economics and modeling. As luck would have it, our modeling professor has the body of a model. Since Monday, all the girls have been talking about him. We have been warned about him, but I have to say, it’s a lot easier to stay awake in his class than in engineering economics. I tried to take a stealthy picture in class, and this is the best that I managed to come up with. Unfortunately, tomorrow is our last class with him...unless I take a GIS course in the spring...hmmmmm...

Part 1 of 3 (Lichtjesavond)

Last night was Lichtjesavond (I think it literally translates as "evening of lights"). As one of our social cultural officers wrote in an email, "Every year in December Delft celebrates its 'Dark Days before Christmas'. It starts with lighting the Christmas tree on "Lichtjes-evening", Tuesday 12 December. This evening the City of Delft will give out a very pleasant atmosphere and there will be lots of activities: Santa Claus will be there, music, choirs .... Charles Dickens will revive."

It was, as usual windy and rainy, but exactly what was promised, though we never found the free hot chocolate. We spent about two hours roaming around town, looking at shops at the Christmas market, watching children ice skate, and finally hanging out in the bar with some Gluhwine (the Dutch version was spiked a bit more than the German version we had over the weekend).

Hamburg (by the numbers)

Where to begin? There were eight people from seven countries, who had known each other for only six weeks, decided to drive five hundred kilometers four (fore? for) three days and two nights in Hamburg, Germany, in one cozy car. Yeah, that car was really a bit too small. But we survived.

Exams finished last Thursday, so Friday night at dinner at Imraan's (South Africa), Giorgia (Italy), Alejandro (Columbia), Maria (Spain) and I finalized our road trip plans for the three day weekend with Rosy (Serbia), Elena (Spain), and Bin (India). On Friday morning we took the train to Rotterdam and trekked through the rain to rent our car (there were none available in Delft) and proceeded to spend 10 hours on the road. Our directions were alright, but one wrong turnoff added an extra hour and we seemed to take our time on the multiple coffee breaks. When we arrived in Hamburg it took us almost an hour to find out hostel, which was the only place in town with bed space for eight. Bin was fortunate enough to stay in the room with the five girls, because Imraan and Alejandro were placed in a boy’s dorm with a snorer and barely got an hour of sleep on Friday night. Anyway, after we had checked into the hostel, we went to St. Pauli, which is noted as the night club area, but seemed more like bachelor party meets red light lite with some drunken underage teens. But we were lead to a tasty German restaurant that served nothing but pork (it was called Schweinske) then drank at a posh bar and walked back to the hostel at around 3AM.

Our hostel was located on the Elbe, right across the river for Hamburg's port. We had an amazing view (though I'm sure that every English speaker there was bored by the breakfast conversation of the three port engineers among the rest of us nerds). While meeting for breakfast at 8:30AM the girls found out about how horrible the boys dorm was and promised that they would not have to stay there again. We broke that promise very shortly. We got kicked out of the hostel at 10AM and phoned around for places to stay, only to find out (after much begging) that they did have eight beds available, a room of five for the girls and three beds in a dorm for the boys.

We spent Saturday walking the city and visiting the Christmas market. German Christmas markets are amazing. There are so many people, including us, willing to suffer the cold for a glass of mulled wine (Gluhwine) and a sausage (not to mention the meat on a stick, fried potatoes, waffles, candies and chestnuts). After a quick nap we headed to the Schanzenviertel neighborhood for a drink then an amazing dinner at Le Sepia, a Portuguese restaurant. I love how Europeans eat, it's so lively and always an event. In the US people tend to keep to themselves, but there we got serenaded by a Spanish guitar player and met some Sicilians. We finished our night, once again at 3AM, at a club which seemed like a former dormitory.

The boys suffered with minimal sleep that night as well. We found out in the morning that they shared a room with an arguing German couple (which seemed unfair b/c we were told that the dorms were not coed and would have preferred a room for all eight of us, but we took what we could get). I need to add an extra sentence here so the pictures don't run into each other.

So Sunday was once again spent at another Christmas market with a race back to the hostel to meet Rosy and Giorgia, who we lost in the crowd (running wasn't a good idea, my leg muscle was still sore so I ended up getting a piggy back ride from Alejandro for part of the way back). But we got on the road at 1:30PM and were back in Delft at 8:30PM, thoroughly exhausted from our brief weekend. Photos to follow shortly.

Oh, and I found my French cheese (roule)!

No Hot Water

The power went out today, at about 11:50AM. I thought it was just the circuit breaker in the dorm, but no, the whole city of Delft lost power for a good 15 minutes. But I didn't know that at the time, but I had my suspicions. A few minutes after the power was cut, deafening sirens rang out, not unlike the ones that the City of Chicago tests at 10AM on Tuesday. There is no water, the taps are sputtering. Great, I thought, something big is going on and I'm worrying that my milk will spoil.

So a few minutes later the power is on. Also, it turns out that in The Netherlands, they test their sirens at noon on the first Monday of every month. But there is still no water. At around 1PM we have water, but only the cold tap works. It is now 8PM and still, no hot water. This is a problem.

It is a problem because I pulled a muscle in my thigh playing soccer yesterday. The school has a team, which consists of all guys except for me. Last week I managed to hold my own, but this week I was a complete wimp and sat on the sidelines for all but the first 20 minutes. I think I didn't stretch properly (I guess my 20 minute ride over in the wind and rain didn’t count). Anyway, the gym had only ice packs, no heat packs. We couldn't find anything at three stores (Mijail (Ecuador) also pulled a muscle while playing), so as we slowly rode home in defeat, we decided that warm towels would be best. And they were, I felt great after a long hot shower.

Today my leg is still sore. After experimenting with foreign remedies, I finally found some warming balm at a drugstore. I now smell like menthol and camphor. The only way to heat some towels would be on the stove, and all my dishes are dirty. I now distrust the quality of the water because there was a pressure drop that could have lead to contamination (I’m studying without even realizing it). So there is no way I'm taking a cold shower. Hopefully this will be mitigated tomorrow morning before exams.

Excursion

Yesterday was a long day. I was at school at 7AM for our field trip to Leidsche Rijn, a city adjacent to Utrecht. Field trip sounds so junior high, excursion is a SAT word. But gone are the days of the pink card that needs to be signed by every teacher at least one week in advance (Jones, that was for you). We drove for an hour to this new town that was supposed to be designed as a sustainable city. It wasn't. We received a lecture from the head of the Department of Water Management, followed by a Q&A session. He seemed to imply that the city was self sustainable in its water use, but in actuality it was just that the canals recirculated their own water. Each question that the class asked we learned more about how typical the design was. Drinking water was piped in from Utrecht, wastewater was piped back, and there were no water reuse or conservation measures. The only thing even relatively new was the fact that they varied their canal levels by up to one meter (like a standard detention pond).

Actually, during the field trip we got to see the “stabilized fog” that another professor had been talking about in a previous class. Except the “g” in Dutch is pronounced like a throaty “ch” so when the Dutch say “fog” it sounds like an inappropriate word in English. So the highlight of the excursion was Orgilt (Mongolia), Helga (Honduras), Loreen (The Philippines) and I giggling like school children while talking about the “fog” (and the “sheet” flow, where the “ee” sounds like an “i”).

Anyway, we then spent an hour (in the cold) roaming the streets of the development before returning to Delft for lunch. We were supposed to eat in Utrecht, but that fell through. I would have liked to see the city, but it's alright that we didn't because I was able to go to the market in Delft were I got some eggs and potatoes and some beautiful roses.

After lunch was a discussion about what we learned from the field trip (even the professor was a bit disappointed) followed by a presentation from a gentleman who works for Waternet, the company that manages the water in Amsterdam. That was cool. We learned about the pumping stations and the locks for the canals and how they regulate the levels. But the biggest epiphany was the fact that The Netherlands is just one large cut and fill equation. The Dutch reclaim land from the sea and lakes, but also remove land in some areas to make new lakes and canals. It's like they are constantly redecorating their country, moving water like people rearrange pictures.

I managed to finish my 12 hour day by attending a modern dance class. It was so much fun. I thought it was just a workshop, but the instructor (our head IT guy) said that he was coordinating a performance in June when the school celebrates its 50th anniversary. I never though of myself as a dancer, but that would be cool.

Exams are next Tuesday and Thursday, so I will be studying this weekend.