the world says hello
Just applied for gradation. Whether or not I'll actually graduate is still left up for debate.
Also, I would like to say: Yiannis, you goddamn son of a bitch, you. I would say this to his face, except he said it to himself first.
Fucking hell, we grow up fast.
Monday
- Hate planes. Hate planes with a passion. I think I've gotten over my fear of planes 'cause I can step onto a plane without freaking out. I just hate them now. I suppose that's something of an improvement.
- Imagine stepping out of D.C, about thirty degrees at the time, then stepping into San Juan, where it's goddamn eighty degrees out.
- My taxi driver got lost on the way to the observatory. That was fun. We ended up on some really sketchy and secluded road going up the mountain, where we looked around and realized this would be a great place to get murdered by mountain people and never be found again. I learned how to say "scared" in Spanish. My taxi driver: "Tengo miedo. TENGO MIEDO."
- My lodgings are adorable. It's a little cottage-like place in the middle of nowhere, except it can house enough rooms for about thirty people, possibly more.
- Roommate is an adorable German post doc who studies planets around neutron stars. Talk about hardcore.
- Went to the conference for like an hour, where I met up with my not-supervisor, John.
- Went to the cafeteria by myself and made a friend in the meantime. He's a guy from China, whose name I recognized as one of the speakers for the conference. Something about radial velocities of planetary nebula and how he didn't have enough results to give a good presentation. Sucks. He's staying at the observatory too, so we walked back to the lodgings together.
- Freaked out to Laura. <3
Tuesday
- short day. Most of the talks go over my head. I wasn't even sure what notes to take down, so I just took down everything.
- Conference is a conglomeration of foreign accents. It's kind of awesome.
- There was a tour of the observatory afterwards. For those of you who don't know, the Arecibo Observatory is the world's largest radio telescope (soon to be beaten by China, who's in the process of making it even crazier). Here is a picture. You see that floating thing in the middle? That's about 500 feet above the dish. And guess who got to go on that?
- Met a post doc name Dave, who I think I need to get in touch with again for my research work. He's deathly afraid of heights. But of course, you can't go to Arecibo and pass up the chance to go on the freaking platform. So he went. Had to be coaxed to keep going by a construction worker most of the way.
- One of the people attending the conference had his wife and kid join the observatory tour. Talked with the wife a lot. She's a graphic artist who doesn't seem too happy with her job and kid. The kid is adorable, but seems exactly like Hylene. Cute at first sight, but soon you realize that she is a monster.
- Reception afterwards. Talked with some people from Goddard, including a guy who was apparently John's former advisor. Well, John. Thanks for telling me that. LOL.
- Reception included wine and free beer. Lots of beer. In fact, the lady was encouraging everyone to finish all the beer, but we didn't. Sat around with a bunch of post docs and grad students for a while, before we tried to go get dinner. Except the cafeteria closed early. Because Puerto Ricans like to get out of work as soon as they can.
Wednesday
- Talks from 9 am - 5 pm. Auck.
- Don't think anything exciting happened on this day. Hung out with post docs and grad students again. I guess that was inevitable. I'm the only undergraduate there. Everyone I talk to seems to be surprised by that. Not sure if that means I look older than I think I do or if everyone just assumes no undergraduate would be there.
Thursday
- Talks again for like forever. We took a group picture in front of the telescope. Skipped out on breaks to hang out at the gift shop. Because family demanded souvenirs. Also got a poster for Steffi because Arecibo is her number one Observatory to visit.
- John's been making more of an effort to hang out, or at least, come talk to me during breaks, which is nice of him. He's totally okay with the fact that I might not be going into astronomy as a career. Says it's a hell lot more competitive now, especially since NASA keeps cutting the budget.
- Went to a fancy restaurant by the sea. Live entertainment and outdoor dining. Holy crap. The minute I stepped in, there's a waitress offering me wine. Apparently, the wine is free. In fact, this whole dinner was free. And we even have a ticket giving us a free drink. Whenever your wineglass was low, a waitress would come over and refill it, sometimes without you noticing. Lost my roommate somewhere - I think she went to go recover from being carsick, so I hung out with a grad student named Shane. He made a very good drinking buddy. Our table slowly filled with the rest of the post docs grad students and a couple other people who liked to talk about where they'd visited. I ordered paella. Fucking delicious paella. There was shrimp and part of a lobster and mussels and clams and random pieces of fish. What the fuck. Dumped a quarter of it on Shane 'cause it was waaaay too much to eat. Ordered a pina colada with my free drink ticket 'cause you can't go to Puerto Rico and not have a pina colada. Dessert was an Irish Cream cheesecake that I also couldn't finish.
- Ride home was quiet. Sleepy from drinking and food. Told Sean, the british post doc, to make sure the taxi to the airport doesn't leave without me and vice versa. He thinks this is a great idea.
Friday
- Still hate planes. I had a whole row to myself, but I didn't take advantage of it because I was too busy trying to convince myself that the plane wasn't going to fall out of the sky. The logical part of me knew that wasn't going to happen anyway, but my brain still wouldn't shut up.
- Plane got delayed about three hours to due weather on the East Coast. Thanks, guys.
- Got lunch at the airport. Really tasty lunch. Some kind of grilled chicken sandwich and yucca fries that were dunked in garlic butter. It was amazing. I crave it now.
- Heard from other conference people going to the airport that John got totally wasted on Thursday. I have yet to bring this up with him. Hahaha.
- Hung out with Sean most of the time. It occurred to me that most out of states people would say "Washington" when they mean DC. Cue confusion for Americans.
- Sean is apparently going back to Arecibo a week later. Some kind of pulsars conference. We both think he should've stayed an extra week.
And that is the end of my travels. It feels weird not being surrounded by strangers anymore. They seem easier to talk to.
Also, I would like to say: Yiannis, you goddamn son of a bitch, you. I would say this to his face, except he said it to himself first.
Fucking hell, we grow up fast.
Monday
- Hate planes. Hate planes with a passion. I think I've gotten over my fear of planes 'cause I can step onto a plane without freaking out. I just hate them now. I suppose that's something of an improvement.
- Imagine stepping out of D.C, about thirty degrees at the time, then stepping into San Juan, where it's goddamn eighty degrees out.
- My taxi driver got lost on the way to the observatory. That was fun. We ended up on some really sketchy and secluded road going up the mountain, where we looked around and realized this would be a great place to get murdered by mountain people and never be found again. I learned how to say "scared" in Spanish. My taxi driver: "Tengo miedo. TENGO MIEDO."
- My lodgings are adorable. It's a little cottage-like place in the middle of nowhere, except it can house enough rooms for about thirty people, possibly more.
- Roommate is an adorable German post doc who studies planets around neutron stars. Talk about hardcore.
- Went to the conference for like an hour, where I met up with my not-supervisor, John.
- Went to the cafeteria by myself and made a friend in the meantime. He's a guy from China, whose name I recognized as one of the speakers for the conference. Something about radial velocities of planetary nebula and how he didn't have enough results to give a good presentation. Sucks. He's staying at the observatory too, so we walked back to the lodgings together.
- Freaked out to Laura. <3
Tuesday
- short day. Most of the talks go over my head. I wasn't even sure what notes to take down, so I just took down everything.
- Conference is a conglomeration of foreign accents. It's kind of awesome.
- There was a tour of the observatory afterwards. For those of you who don't know, the Arecibo Observatory is the world's largest radio telescope (soon to be beaten by China, who's in the process of making it even crazier). Here is a picture. You see that floating thing in the middle? That's about 500 feet above the dish. And guess who got to go on that?
- Met a post doc name Dave, who I think I need to get in touch with again for my research work. He's deathly afraid of heights. But of course, you can't go to Arecibo and pass up the chance to go on the freaking platform. So he went. Had to be coaxed to keep going by a construction worker most of the way.
- One of the people attending the conference had his wife and kid join the observatory tour. Talked with the wife a lot. She's a graphic artist who doesn't seem too happy with her job and kid. The kid is adorable, but seems exactly like Hylene. Cute at first sight, but soon you realize that she is a monster.
- Reception afterwards. Talked with some people from Goddard, including a guy who was apparently John's former advisor. Well, John. Thanks for telling me that. LOL.
- Reception included wine and free beer. Lots of beer. In fact, the lady was encouraging everyone to finish all the beer, but we didn't. Sat around with a bunch of post docs and grad students for a while, before we tried to go get dinner. Except the cafeteria closed early. Because Puerto Ricans like to get out of work as soon as they can.
Wednesday
- Talks from 9 am - 5 pm. Auck.
- Don't think anything exciting happened on this day. Hung out with post docs and grad students again. I guess that was inevitable. I'm the only undergraduate there. Everyone I talk to seems to be surprised by that. Not sure if that means I look older than I think I do or if everyone just assumes no undergraduate would be there.
Thursday
- Talks again for like forever. We took a group picture in front of the telescope. Skipped out on breaks to hang out at the gift shop. Because family demanded souvenirs. Also got a poster for Steffi because Arecibo is her number one Observatory to visit.
- John's been making more of an effort to hang out, or at least, come talk to me during breaks, which is nice of him. He's totally okay with the fact that I might not be going into astronomy as a career. Says it's a hell lot more competitive now, especially since NASA keeps cutting the budget.
- Went to a fancy restaurant by the sea. Live entertainment and outdoor dining. Holy crap. The minute I stepped in, there's a waitress offering me wine. Apparently, the wine is free. In fact, this whole dinner was free. And we even have a ticket giving us a free drink. Whenever your wineglass was low, a waitress would come over and refill it, sometimes without you noticing. Lost my roommate somewhere - I think she went to go recover from being carsick, so I hung out with a grad student named Shane. He made a very good drinking buddy. Our table slowly filled with the rest of the post docs grad students and a couple other people who liked to talk about where they'd visited. I ordered paella. Fucking delicious paella. There was shrimp and part of a lobster and mussels and clams and random pieces of fish. What the fuck. Dumped a quarter of it on Shane 'cause it was waaaay too much to eat. Ordered a pina colada with my free drink ticket 'cause you can't go to Puerto Rico and not have a pina colada. Dessert was an Irish Cream cheesecake that I also couldn't finish.
- Ride home was quiet. Sleepy from drinking and food. Told Sean, the british post doc, to make sure the taxi to the airport doesn't leave without me and vice versa. He thinks this is a great idea.
Friday
- Still hate planes. I had a whole row to myself, but I didn't take advantage of it because I was too busy trying to convince myself that the plane wasn't going to fall out of the sky. The logical part of me knew that wasn't going to happen anyway, but my brain still wouldn't shut up.
- Plane got delayed about three hours to due weather on the East Coast. Thanks, guys.
- Got lunch at the airport. Really tasty lunch. Some kind of grilled chicken sandwich and yucca fries that were dunked in garlic butter. It was amazing. I crave it now.
- Heard from other conference people going to the airport that John got totally wasted on Thursday. I have yet to bring this up with him. Hahaha.
- Hung out with Sean most of the time. It occurred to me that most out of states people would say "Washington" when they mean DC. Cue confusion for Americans.
- Sean is apparently going back to Arecibo a week later. Some kind of pulsars conference. We both think he should've stayed an extra week.
And that is the end of my travels. It feels weird not being surrounded by strangers anymore. They seem easier to talk to.