I'm dreaming of a while Christmas

Just a short post to let you guys know that I'm still alive and having just survived my first "wintry" Christmas here in Dresden. "Wintry" in the loosest sense since it was snowing quite a bit for 2 weeks before Christmas, and then it stopped for Christmas week and most of the snow melted away. In fact Christmas started out quite bright and cheery (with sun! .... and there was much rejoicing among the people). So technically I didn't get to experience a white Christmas but a white pre-Christmas is still cool. And singing/listening to Christmas carols of snow and fireplace and warmth makes a bit of sense when you're not sweating under the good ol' Malaysian heat.

So to make up for this short post... pictures!!

 Heavy snow day outside my doorstep (street along my house).

 Walking through the park near the medical campus.

 An unnecessary walk through the street as I got off the wrong tram stop.

 Someone made a snowman right at the entrance of the 

 Centre of Regenerative Therapy and Diseases building. 

  Christmas tree decoration at the middle of a Christmas market

 Same decoration at night, and with more people

 

Closer look at a Christmas market. A popular item is the Glühwein, a warm 

spiced winethat helps to stave off the winter cold I suppose.

Hope you guys had a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!

Gehen nach die Stadt

Today I made a trip to town to get some supplies. And also to have a nice meal since I'll need to cook the whole day tomorrow as all the shops are closed on Sunday here.

So I took a tram to Pirnaischer Platz, which is like a plaza/kind-of-city-centre. I dunno really, I just saw a lot of shops and places while passing through in a tram.

I've passed by here previously, but only briefly to go to the Foreign Visitors Office to register my arrival in Germany.  A lot of trams and busses pass by here, and lots of tourists too I suppose. There's quite a number of shops and eateries around.

 
After having been here a week and a half, it's nice to be greeted with the sight of familiar food.

The little blue packet on the left is Europe's answer to our 'pop-pop' towels. You know, the scented damp tissue wrapped in plastic typically found in Chinese restaurants. Except that it's packed like a sterilised alcohol swab, smaller in size, stronger scent and only a polite inaudible tearing sound upon opening. I've seen them before when I was in Aberdeen, which I will make a blog post erm.. later.. :P

So I decided to try  the McRibs, which turns out to be like a slice of pork fillet with a dollop of meat/barbeque. Tastes alright, though the sauce can be a slightly overwhelming.

There's also a small section of McD, known as McCafethat sells coffee, pastries, and bubble tea! Yes, I kid you not. I think this is the next big thing in Dresden, at least. Incidentally I had passed quite a large Bubble Tea Original (hehe..) shop a couple of minutes away from McD.

This is the supposed plaza which gave rise to the name, I suppose. There's also a tiny row of open market stalls at the far end of the pic, selling mostly sausages, ice cream, coffee and knick-knacks.

ZOMG! Civilisation at last! An actual shopping complex! This is the first shopping complex I've seen in Europe that's comparable to the ones we have in Malaysia. There's quite a number of eateries too, will try them out next time.

As usual, you can check out a few more pics on my google+.

Auf wiedersehen!

Guten Tag!

Ok, so I still haven't posted bout my previous trip to Scotland, but that's gonna have to wait. 'Cos this post is THE update (in the loosest sense) of where I am.

Right now I'm in Dresden, Germany! To make it easier for you, I'm right here:

So what am I doing there? Well I'm currently a research assistant at the Max-Planck- Institut für Physik komplexer Systeme, aka Max-Planck Institute for the Physics of Complex Systems. No, my disdain and suckitude at physics since secondary school was not a cleverly-concealed latent ability. Which, by the way, most of the research here is comprised of biophysicists that do research like kinetics of cell movement, protein shapes etc aka the physics of living systems.

It's just that I'm tied to a research group leader, Dr. Michael Hiller, who has links to this institute and another Max-Planck Institute, i.e Molecular Cell Biology and Genetics. So for now I'm doing work here.

I just got here and work has already started piling up. Lots of new things to learn, considering that I'm shifting to a slightly different research area, which is more towards computational biology and comparative genomics (wait till I find a nice introductory video for it.). 

I'll update more stuff next time (*cough, ahem) such as how all this crazy stuff came together as well as my attachment/trip to UK, but for now here's a picture of the guesthouse (behind the institute) that I'm staying at for now.

p/s: The suitcase is mine and did not come with the room.

Tschüs!

pp/s: there are more photos in my Google+, though I'm not too sure if you can see them since I'm still kinda new to this.

Extreme!

Just a quick note to anyone skulking here that though I might be MIA from Malaysia, I'm still not dead. :)

Been really busy lately, getting things settled and there is not much time left I'll be here in Aberdeen! Still haven't gotten to really see this place much. Anyway I've got this long blog post on Aberdeen stuff, but it's still in the works.

Instead, lemme just tell you the most extreme weather I've ever encountered - today on 3rd April 2012 in Aberdeen!

So the last week has been unusually sunny, reaching almost 22 C (a record and unusual weather! gasped the locals).  The weather then turned back to cold and wet over the weekend, and today I woke up to around 0-1 C. No snow, just cold.

Then around noon it became really sunny, like probably around 9-10 am sunny in Malaysia, though still very cold. Such a paradox, I was sorta trembling near the stairs area (which has some open windows) and looked out to the sun shining.

Later around 4-5 pm I was in the lab and noticed that it was really cloudy, wind howling, and snowing! Seriously, that was my first time seeing actual snow. I ran to grab my phone, but alas the winds stopped and there was not much snow left - very fine and little to be captured on camera. :(

Anyway, I carried on around after 5 pm in the office and saw, guess what! The sun is out again. and shining brightly  probably like 6-7 pm sunny in Malaysia. And yet it was snowing just a moment ago!

Well I left the building around 6.40 pm and it was still bright and sunny outside, but yet still very chilly and strong winds. After a while, I felt some small specks on my hair, and looked around and lo, it was snowing! Really tiny though, just a few tiny specks on my coat that turned to water the moment I touched them. That was probably the biggest contrast I've experienced, touching specks of snow while standing under the evening sun!

Hopefully in my next post I will have worked up enough motivation and time to post the Aberdeen stuff. :P  And please, stop complaining about the weather in Malaysia! You ain't seen nothing till you go outside!

Fare thee well!

Just a quick note to inform everyone or anyone who still checks in here...

*crickets chirp*

I will be going off to Aberdeen for 3 months (25 Feb - 30 May) for an attachment project at the University of Aberdeen..

So uh.. see ya when I get back!