The very hard life of physicists

This week: workshop in bratislava.

i have to admit that i haven't had a glimpse on the city centre. prague was enough of "sightseeing" for quite a while. außerdem: ollas ans.

so i can only tell you about work. this post is mainly for my non-physicists friends. the others know.

what we do on such an occasion is mainly listening and (if you were able to follow the talks) discussing (in my case usually about the structure of spacetime and how to formulate this in a mathematical language).




8:30 in the morning on our way to bratislava. way to early to focus on computations. this is one way to torture your phd students.



my "phd-father" and parts of his group. thanks georg (in the middle) for taking photos!

lunch break: another word for discussion session
only difference: napkins serve as writing pad.




by the way: a return ticket vienna - bratislava incl. public transport is only 11 euro with. vorteilscard. so maybe we should go there once in a while. after all you can go to TESCO'S also in bratislava.

Prague. A résumé

Friday evening. I am back from my 11 day Prague school on renormalisation. Becchi was the lecturer. "The "B" from BRST".

So what can I tell you?

It is the epicentre for today's mass tourism. This is not exaggerated. It's still pretty cheap, especially cocktails, and food in general. So there's lots of youngsters. And lot's of retired people. They can get really rude. One couple tried to push me when trying to get into the tube. Can you believe this, a 70 year old guy pushing me aside??






Our arrival at the hostel. So it was Monday evening. Alex, me and four Croatian guys arrive and tell the lady at the reception our names. We expect rooms to be booked for us.

The lady says that she's got nothing free, least of all for 10 days. but she can give us a room for tonight (20 euro!!) . We take it of course. What else should we do?

The room hasn't been cleaned after the last person leaving. There were old cucumbers, beers, pickled cucumbers and other food lying around. It was really, really dirty. And I had real trouble to keep my countenance. i do pitty those erasmus students who have to live under such conditions for a year or so.

solution to that problem: that stupid cow had been highly incompetent. of course, there were rooms reserved for us. and they were clean. puuhh. that was a relive.





the very right tower was mine. hhmmm. plattenbautenwüste.





one of the best things in prague: TESCO'S. I haven't been to tesco's since i left swansea. open 0-24. gorgeous.

what more: the national gallery looks like a prison. also inside. and is not very exciting either.

what more? i don't know what the person responsible for busses in prague was thinking when deciding upon the following issue. they have this incredible noise when the doors close. some extremely loud, high tone warning you. i wonder how many heart attacks are caused by these alarm signals every day. too much stress in the morning is not good for you.



NB: This sign shows you the way to the museum of communism (which is not very interesting one should mention)

my wonderful trips through capitals of former european countries is not over: next week bratislava. i have never been there although it's only 50 km away from vienna. good thing: i can stay over night at my place. very good.


some other events "recently": my youngest sister finished her a-levels. at the moment she's boozing in turkey. great.

from prague with love

dobre den.

so there i am. prague. 11 days.

they put us into som building made with precast concrete slabs (you know those that have been built in eastern europe a lot). the hostel is full with erasmus students. makes me feel old. but that's a differerent story i can tell when i will upload some photos.

there isn't really anything to tell. somehow we try to fill the day with some activities (going to museums, etc. ). usual city trip so far.

there is a hell of a lot of tourists here. they all are verz ugly. in paris they tried at least in looking not too shabby, but here... zezeze.

pfffff

well.... some people have complained that I haven't been posting for quite a while. There is a reason for that: nothing, absolutely nothing has happened during the last five days or so. And what has happended before is something that cannot be put into words.

I have spent way too much time on getting up. There have been days when I barely managed to come to my office before noon. But on the other hand, the reasons preventing me from working too hard are strong. After all, spring is around. Why should I spend the day in a lecture hall without windows?

At the moment things in Vienna are pretty weird. At least among my friends. We feel something like contentment, is that the word i am looking for? i am talking about zufriedenheit, innere zufriedenheit. Yesterday I have been out with Michi and Karin. And usually we do this in order to complain about our miserable lives. But yesterday, we figured out that - at the moment - things could be actually really worse. One could even say that we are doing pretty fine. And you know, guys, for Viennese this is an extremely strong statement. We had nothing - really nothing - to complain about.

And I am telling you this only two weeks after my 25th birthday. ohhh, maybe i should say something about birthday celebrations. well. i wasn't partying too hard. getting old. we went to see a capoeira performance. unfortunately it was awfully crowded and i found out that capoeira angola looks like capoeira in slow motion. all in all not too thrilling. the rest of the evening we spent in fluc, where we met andi, as well. and that's it. i figured out that rumours in krems spread even faster than i could imagine.

One reason for these weird good feelings is of course the positive answer about the financing of my phd-project. Can you believe it? I will have an income for the upcoming two (eventually three if needed) years.

The worries about my future are fading as well. I think I will inscribe for a postgraduate programme from October on. International Relations, I guess. If other plans fail, I can apply for jobs at international organisations and do something good for man kind, hehe.

Smiles to everybody.... I think at the moment I can even share my contentment with the world.