Mucho work, then mucho vacation

I have so much to get done before I leave on vacation tomorrow. I have been having this huge problem getting my LabView "code" (that's a lose description of what actually looks like a computerized version of an electrical wiring schematic) from recording the actual frequencies I generate. This is very strange to me, because I know its recording the data SOMEWHERE in the twist of wires. I just can't talk the computer into showing me the data. I must accomplish this before I leave on an 8:40 a.m. flight tomorrow morning.

Dreams of couscous, sand dunes, and tall mountains

So, Morocco, here I come. I fly Lufthansa, through Frankfurt, leaving tomorrow at 8:40 a.m. and arriving in Casablanca at 12:30 (Of all the gin joints in all the towns in all the world, she walks into mine...) and then head strait to Marrakesh. Yeah! I fly back in the evening of October 31.

If I happen to find an internet connection, I will try to update from Morocco, but more than likely, you won't here from me for the next week (except for normal, old fashioned, postcards). I am so so so excited.. !!!

Kindred spirits

Sarah said to me (in email, or her diary, geesh, I can't remember) something about ditching the whole aerospace thing and going to work for a newspaper. I can totally relate. I think if it wasn't for the whole awe and mystery of the space program thing that still captivates me, I would totally become an old-fashioned newspaper reporter - there's something really rewarding about working under deadlines, knowing the real story about what is going on, and writing things that other people pay attention to. Its awesome. Right now, I am reading a book called Knowledge and Power about the history of the New York Times up to the late 60s, and prior to that I read Common Ground which contained a brief history of the Boston Globe (the book was really about integration of Boston during the 60s and 70s) - after reading both, the whole world of newspaper publishing seems even more interesting to me (if you've read either of these, I much favor the Boston Globe's "less professional" approach than the New York Times, if I had to choose). Maybe in another life, I will be an ace reporter (I think I am in general a very good in-the-trenches, story-idea kind of person), and Sarah can layout and edit my stories, so I definitely understand where she is coming from :)

To London for Harry Potter!

Irwin bought tickets to come visit (kind of)! Yeah. November is going to be a busy month. Now that I finally have work to do, I am taking mucho vacation time. I am going to go to England and meet up with Irwin November 16-19, and then a few days later, my mom is coming to visit me. Yippee! I love visiting, I love traveling, I love when people come visit.

If you make it to the end, there will be pictures, yeah! Oh yeah, and pardon my spelling errors in this one, for some reason I can't get my spell check to change to American English from Swiss-German. Crazy computers!

Moroccan Weather Report

Trip: T Minus 2 days

Destination: Marrakesh, Atlas Mountains, Sand Dunes of the Sahara

Predicted Low: 63 degrees F

Predicted High: 91 degrees F

Outlook: Sunny - Sunny - Sunny

Plans: To ride a camel; To buy funky earings; To eat good couscous; To return with a better tan than my boss who is on a vacation to Lebanon

The American Fortress in Bern

This morning, I rose bright and early (about 6 a.m.) to board a train for the U.S. Embassy in Bern (about 2 hours from here). You should be pleased to know that, with the efficient help of the Swiss police, America has managed to lock down our Swiss embassy safe and sound. (I can only hope our embassies in more turbulent countries are even half as secure).

To get to the embassy, I walked past a police line (what used to be a normal residential street is now fenced in to prevent road traffic), justifying my presence to at least 10 different officers. The last of which (who guards the door to the American-citizen enterence to the embassy) was very suspicious that I didn’t have my passport (I kept explaining, the reason I was there was to GET A PASSPORT since I lost mine.) Somehow my American-English to his American-English just wasn’t translating well (too much time talking to people who don’t speak American-English, on my part, perhaps?) – it was actually the poorest communication I have had with anyone since arriving here and we were both American.

Anyway, once I finally gained enterance (I had to leave EVERYTHING I owned with the guard, with the exception of my walet and my folder of ID’s and reports required to prove my citizenship), I found the consular officials very refreshing. They were so happy with the amount of documents I had - I must be the only person they have ever met who lost their passport and actually had everything they needed to acquire a new one – money, ID, birth certificate, Swiss identification, a copy of my old passport, and a federal employment record. I don’t know which helped me the most (the capitalist in me likes to think money, but I think it was probably the birth certificate).

They amazingly printed me a new passport on the spot in a remarkable display of American effeciency (rare, but true) and I was back at work by 2 p.m. The office treated Americans wonderfully – while there was a huge line in the non-American visa application section, I was seen immediately but a very pleasant Swiss-American lady, who was a breath of fresh air to talk to (there aren’t many Americans around here, except for Tina, in case I haven’t mentioned that yet, and Tina is more of a valley-girl than I am).

It made me wonder why it takes up to 8 weeks to get a new passport in America. For future reference, if you need a passport in a rush, it might be worth going to the consulate office in Canada or Mexico, rather than mailing away for it. Not that I would encourage such irresponsible behavior as drinking several liters of beer at Oktoberfest and then having to miss a day of work to go get a new passport.

On Karen’s experiences

Karen, I can emphathize, it looks like you are actually having worse weather than Switzerland (actually, from what I hear of life in England, what I experienced here in the month of September only scratches the surfaces of English weather).

It also sounds like Karen is having her first experience as a member of the International Student Crowd. When I first arrived in Switzerland, I felt like I had to be on the constant defense about Bush’s policies regarding Kyoto Environmental Treaty, Missile Defense, and Biological Weapons Accords (2 out of 3 of those policies I DON’T AGREE WITH!), but somehow I get blamed anyway (its hard to explain to a Swiss person who gets to vote on every single law that America is not really a democracy). Lucky for you, right now, America’s battle against terrorism has won Bush some grudging international respect (I hear a lot of comments lately along the lines of "at least he has good advisors") putting his other policy indiscretions on the back burner.

As for Karen’s friend from Ghana, I can relate. Europeans are intellectually opposed to some (many) of Bush’s policies and America’s globalism, but nothing like the viciousness from the African contingent. We have quite a large population of students and refugees from Togo here. I have never heard anyone hate the French as much as the Togo-ese (?). Americans and the rest of the western world follow a close second in hatred to the French. They tried to explain the whole situation to me, mostly calmly, since this is actually one of the topics relatively out of the realm of my own education and reading (as I understand it, from my distinctly western bias): So, here's the issue, that after the colonial powers withdrew (the British, French, Spanish, and Dutch are the primary cited nationalities here), and then the western world began industrializing poor African nations, we basically left them like indentured servents. I.E. they owe western banks so much money that basically everything they produce gets sent away to us for free as part of the payment of debts that their parents or grandparents agreed too – while their own populace is living in squalor. And wth escalating problems (and high interest rates), anything they manage to produce just goes to pay the interest, and they aren’t even making a dent in their debts. There’s a fairly large movement among more liberated Europeans to get the banks to lower interests rates or all-together forgive the debts of some developing countries – apparently to a western bank the debt is as small as less than a percent of profit loss for them, whereas it is hundreds of times the gross national product of the countries. One person described it to me as a "death spiral," because no matter what happens, each year they sink further and further into debt.

Ok, with that said, I can see how some of the African refugees feel disenfranchised by the western world, but it still takes me aback how they are willing to target their anger at individual people. I guess when you can’t change the system, that’s all you can do. It just doesn’t feel the same as European’s intellectual (and unemotional) protests of the American system. Instead it is a very personal and vicious attack. I can’t even begin to advise how to deal with it, because everytime it happens it takes me aback. Actually the only other people who have been so personally insulting of Americans are the British (sorry Karen!). Whereas I will have a conversation about American politics on the intellectual level and describe what I agree or disagree with, whenever these more personal attacks happen, all I can do is fall back and defend my country – even if I don’t agree with our policies, it is HOME, and its hard to accept such viciousness is out there. I am told Indonesia is even more anti-Western world than Africa. Fortunately, I haven’t encountered that from my two Indonesian friends.

The best thing to come from Britain in the last 10 years is NOT the Spice Girls… its Harry Potter…

On a brighter note, it looks like I will be taking another trip to the dreary, happy, island of Britain: for the November 16 opening of Harry Potter – Irwin will hopefully be flying out to meet me, just for a long weekend. So, here we come, Karen, ready or not… Actually, I only expect to see Karen for a day or two of the 4 day excursion, since I know she will be hosting Brian at about the same time. I am hoping to convince Irwin to accompany me on a trip to Cantebury and Kent, since I have had my fill of London from visiting it two previous times - but I definitely will go see Cranfield to report to you what it is really like!

And to brighten this long drawn out, overly political entry

One of my friends posted a bunch of digital pictures of some of the intern events, so I wanted to repost them here..

Here is a picture of Baden taken from the catle ruins that sit on the highest hill in town (there is another castle on the opposing hill, but that has been turned into a resteraunt).

Here are two pictures of the castle tower taken from the base of the castle. There is something really European about constantly being in the shadow of a castle – its absolutely my favorite part of living in Baden!

Last week, a bunch of us went to Europapark (a pale imitation of Disney World). I’m the cool looking one in the black and white striped shirt in the middle. Nationalities represented in the picture: American, Canadian, Indian (the real Asian variety), Indian (the Canadian variety), Scottish, Swiss, German, Belgium, French, and English

And, finally, a month ago, I went to Lausanne’s Flugtag. That’s where crazy people built flying machines and crashed them off a cliff into the lake (details in this entry)

So I could own my Downeaster "Alexa"

And I go where the ocean is deep

There are giants out there in the canyons

And a good captain can't fall asleep...

Tell my wife I am trolling Atlantis

And I still have my hands on the wheel

Quite a night

Last night we had a birthday party at the Marien Heim (a.k.a. the nunnery) for Tina's birthday. We had everyone bring food from their home country, and there was a KILLER selection of food. The coolest thing was that we invited a lot of the "real" full-time engineers, and most of them came, it was really interesting to see them in a social setting (especially since they all brought beer or wine with them). Anyway, a few of the more entertaining points:

1. You have not lived until your boss demonstrates how to do a sambuca shot. In case you didn't know, this is alcohol that you light on fire, then stick the cup to your hand (with the pressure difference), and then suck out the flaming shot. Of course, this followed with a litany of really nerdy discussion on the thermodynamics of a sambuca shot.

2. Frau Schmidt (that's our nunnery landlord, we invited her to join us) introduced herself to our guests as "I'm the woman who keeps the men out." But at least she was having a good time (which means we won't be evicted for our party of 10 people growing to a party of 50).

4. I can now sing "Happy Birthday" in Dutch, German, French, Spanish, Italian, some sort of Indonesian dialect, and Russian.

T.G.I.F.

Nothing big planned this weekend. I might actually come into work to make up some time I will miss in Morocco (I leave on Wednesday!). Other than that, I will be conserving cash, going to the typical weekend parties, and sleeping a lot.

Cookie monsters

So, the utter irony of the Swiss chocolate industry is that last night I went to buy chocolate chips to bake cookies. And there were none. No Nestle chocolate chips. Despite the fact that Nestle is a SWISS company. I went to three grocery stores, but no luck at all. I managed to confirm with one of my co-workers, that, in fact, Nestle chocolate chips are made in Switzerland, but sold only in America. So I settled on a smaller, square, inferior shaped chocolate chip.

Anyway, I made a whole batch of cookies and brought them into work today. You would not believe the outpouring of affection from my co-workers. All morning, people have stopped in to say the following, "You made these?" "From scratch?" "They are so good, what brand are they... you made them? Wow! I mean it, amazining." "Can I have the recipe?" And when more people find out I made them, shock continues to ensue.

I tried to explain: 1. It is a really easy recipe, that even I couldn't ruin. 2. I do, after all, have a degree in rocket science, cookies are hardly enough to stump me.

But because people just don't bake things like that here its like a delicacy or something. I wonder what would happen if I brought in peanut butter and jelly sandwhiches - I bet I would get the same outpouring of emotion about such an "exotic" dish.

One worry about the cookies, though

I must admit, though, I was worried about how they would turn out. Since I was using a recipe all in English units, whereas all our measuring cups are in metric. I certainly did not have the conversion from cups to liters or grams memorized (I am sure my high school chemistry teacher would be dismayed to here that)! So, I went on the sound mathematical and scientific principle: make it up. So, using a coffee cup as approximately 1 cup, I estimated a conversion to liters. I figured as long as I was consistant (so that everything was in the right proportion to the other ingredients), it would work. And it did. Yeah!

So, those are my cookie making exploits

Any questions? You can tell it was a boring day yesterday. But today promises to be better. We will have a thermoacoustics meeting (which is always quite a show... much more arguing goes on here than my previous jobs). And then tonight we are having an international potluck party for Tina's birthday (even the full-time engineers are coming, it should be a real experience).

And tomorrow, it looks like I will be taking most of the day off to trip into Bern since the Zurich consulate is STILL unopened. Sigh.

School integration, messy subject, unique perspective

I am reading one of the books my Aunt Mary sent me called Common Ground about the desegregation of Boston schools in the 1970s. A lot of the events remind me of larger versions of the arguments that still happen in Palm Beach schools regularly about desegregation (the schools there still weren't fully integrated when I graduated in '97).

Well, anyway, while reading, I recalled an office conversation we had here regarding the public school systems in Europe compared to America. I think I’ve debated this issue in circles with many Americans, but I’ve never really talked about it from a European perspective, and, once again, I was caught a little off guard by the perspective.

This conversation was started by Michel, a full-time research engineer, who moved here from America about 10 years ago (just so you know, for a change, I wasn’t instigating the political discourse). The Europeans I worked with were absolutely appalled at the way the schools in America worked - specifically that many states fund the school through local property taxes and the amount of dependence a public school has on community involvement. Though they think the latter is good, the school shouldn't be dependent on it. But the thing that really didn't make sense to them was funding schools through local taxation.

One of the Europeans told me it was "counterintuitive," because a bad neighborhood would only get worse from a bad school. Apparently here, the governments put the most money into schools in areas with more poverty or have lower testing scores in order to improve them so they are on par with the public schools in more affluent areas.

The thing that really caught me off guard, though, was the two of the three other Americans involved in the conversation did not realize that many public schools are funded through property taxes, nor did they realize that often times a school in a poorer neighborhood gets much less money than a school in a richer neighborhood (all I had to do was point out the difference between Atlantic High and Spanish River in Palm Beach to show a difference as clear as night and day).

Maybe tomorrow I will go on a diatribe about the differences between public housing and welfare here and there, but enough social commentary for one day.

'Dem Fightin' Mormoms

BYU won again last weekend, while GT suffered another disappointing loss in overtime. (I'm talking about college football, for the less enthusiastic of the crowd). Anyway, one of my co-workers just graduated from BYU, and he is rubbing in how they finally nudged ahead of us in the rankings (they are at 13 and we are at 25... last week we were one spot ahead of BYU...).

Sad, sad, sad. I thought this was going to be a good year for the Yellow Jackets.

My car.

Right now I have no car. Well, except for the beat up old (old for me.. certainly not old compared to some other cars I've seen) Toyota Tercel. It definitely needs to be replaced.

Drum roll please.

Hopefully, I will be purchasing a Yellow MR2 Toyota Spyder after I've been working at NASA for a couple of months and have enough money to begin payments on it... or I talk my dad into a long awaited graduation present (not likely). Anyway, here's a picture:

Career changes

While my experiment was running yesterday and I was bored (well, I mean, I guess I could've been working on something else, but instead, I was sitting there, staring blankly, as my computer took the data), I thought about all the other careers that could've, maybe, possibly made me happy (or maybe are potential for career changes in the future). The list included (but was not limited to): journalism (travel writing, maybe?), paelentology, archeology, astronomy, public policy analyst, bush pilot, trial law, movie special effects, tour guide, doctor.... Ok, well, you get the idea.

The humor in national service

In case you haven't heard me mention it before, Switzerland has a national service requirement. That is, every man between 18 and 45 years old is in the famed Swiss Army - they spend one weekend a month, and three weeks a year in training. So, there aren't many Swiss people here (I mean people I work with), so I haven't really gotten to ask many questions about how it worked.

So, anyway, there is this one guy, I mentioned him before. He's the real-Dilbert type engineer who I share the impedence lab. He's Swiss-French. He is your typical nerdy male engineer. I mean, we're talking a guy who looks at his feet when he is talking and practically asks permission to address you ("would it be ok, please, if I ask you a question"). The point is he's really timid. He's young thirties, thick glasses, kind of balding, really nice though. So he came down to the lab yesterday and said that he was going to be gone for his 3 weeks in the Army.

This really caught me off guard. Dilbert in the army?. I mean, the law is the law. Even nerdy, timid types join up. I figured his job would be something administrative or engineering or something calm. So, I asked him what he would do. He said (in a phrase full of stutters and shyness): First we will practice shooting guns at the target.... then, um, um, um, we will run and shoot at target... um, um, then we will through many grenades and they will explode.

This is one of those people who should NOT have access to grenades! I didn't laugh until he was well clear of the room. I guess its perfectly normal for a Swiss, but very strange thought for me that this man keeps a semi-automatic rifle in his home (all Swiss men are issued a rifle at the beginning of their service and keep it in their home with a locked box of bullets "to be used only in a national emergency").

You have to give the Swiss people credit though, for all their neutrality, there are certain regions of the mountains categorized as "defend to the last man," meaning they will not allow invaders to take the regions until every Swiss man dies defending it. I can't imagine America, especially in peace time (and Switzerland has had about 500 years of peace), agreeing to defend their country like that.

Logistical advice needed

For all the logistics-types in the crowd, I need help coordinating my move. My life. My car. Etc. for when I return to the U.S. Here's my situation:

I have a large amount of stuff in Florida (bed, books, other mementoes).

The rest of my stuff (kitchen table, school books, everything else from my four years at GT) is in Philadelphia.

My car is in Philadelphia, and it is titled and registered to my father there. It is in a garage and no longer insured.

My drivers' license is Florida.

I am moving to TX

NASA will only move my things from one location

Neither U-Haul nor Ryder will rent a van to someone under 25


And somehow I am trying to coordinate getting everything to Texas with the minimum amount of hassle, expense and headache. And also the minimum number of drives up and down the east cost.

Real roller coasters rather than emotional ones

I went to Europapark on Saturday, and I am not quite sure how to describe it. Let's start with: it was fun, but it was no Disney World. Of course, it DESPERATELY tried to be Disney World. Some examples: its mascot was a mouse; it had a sphere that looked suprisingly like the Epcot ball (only about half the size); it had a roller coaster called "EuroMir" (remenants of Space Mountain, anyone?); it divided up the park into different countries (like the embassies at Epcot); there were paintings of fairy tales characters everywhere.

Ok, with that said, it was fun. It was even more amusing going to the park with Europeans and Canadians who had really never been to a hard-core roller coaster park like Six Flags, and may have only been to Disney once, and never been to a Busch Gardens. Anyway, they were much more impressed than I was. I kept noticing little unprofessional things (like the fact that their "cast" members, you know the people dressed up, would eat at snack stands, half out of their costumes... Disney would never allow that!). But of course, I think America has had many more years to master the "art" of an amusement park.

And you know, after growing up on dinky Waldameer in Erie (oh, how I loved that place when I was a little kid!), I can see how Europapark would definitely count as impressive.

It was tons of fun. There were strange parts. For instance they had a GIANT (I am talking higher than any roller coaster) satellite dish looking object. It was labeled "Radio Telescope" on the map, but we couldn't figure out if they actually used it for that purpose or what. Every 20 minutes or so, it would rotate about 45 degrees from one position to another. Always the same two positions. But I don't really know anything about radio telescopy (except what I've read in Carl Sagan books), so maybe one of my astronomy friends can enlighten me.

As for the whole passport thing, hopefully the consulate will be open again today and I will go into Zurich to get a replacement. If not, I am going to plan a trip to Bern at the end of the week. I didn't have any problem going to and from Germany with my Swiss ID. I confirmed with the border police that the Swiss ID is acceptable at any of the borders with Switzerland to go back and forth, but I shouldn't try something like crossing from France to England with it or going back to America (well, duh!).

Karen moment on Sunday

So, I slept until 11 a.m. on Sunday. Then I woke up, read my book for a couple hours (my current NON-EMOTIONAL read is about the history of race integration in Boston) and made myself a scrambled egg. Then I went back to sleep. At about 3 p.m., Tina knocked on my door. I was half asleep (you know, that lovely kind of mid-afternoon nap sleep) and still in my PJ's.

The look on her face was very similar to Karen in our freshman year before I trained her to accept the fact that sleeping in is my primary Sunday recreational activitiy. Anyway, for those of you who haven't had the "priveldge" of living with a morning person, this is a look of sympathy ("are you feeling ok?") combined with disgust ("how can you waste your whole day like that?") and a little bit of selfishness ("why are you sleeping instead of hanging out with me today?"). I told Tina not to worry about it, she would get used to me after a while (though it is definitely a rare Sunday when both of us are in town and not traveling).

T.G.I.F.

Its been a particularly long and stressful week at work, so I am really happy its Friday. I have mentioned before these "side tubes" we are using to add a second dimension to the acoustic experiments we do. Anyway, I finally had both the lab time and the equipment to assemble them. There. Assembled. The data acquisition system that I programmed worked.

Now, I go to my boss, the brilliant, experiencenced thermoacoustic guy, "So, boss, what now, what do I do with them?" And he doesn't really know the answer. So I have spent all week figuring out how to make sense of the results.

So, I will forget it all by going to an amusement park in Germany tomorrow (yes, I am traveling without my passport, hopefully I won't get turned back at the border, but I have my Swiss ID card, so it should be ok). Its called EuropaPark, its like a mini-Great Adventure (that's 6 Flags to those of you not from Philly-NJ region). All roller coasters, and actually fairly cheap since we are going in a group.

More bus ticket sagas

One of the full time engineers came into my office and related a scene he witnessed. Someone came running into the building chased by the bus ticket-checker, yelling "I don't have an ID, you can't give me a ticket!" and locked the guy out. Now there is a way to avoid a fine, even if it makes the company look bad! Of course, it makes the bus company look bad that they totally target the two lines that drive people to Altom to check tickets, I have never heard of them fining people on any other lines.

Stanford amuses me

I read Stanford's daily newspaper yesterday, because it is the start of Sarah's weekly column. Anyway, I was very amused. Why? Because their consensus editorial was about how "apathetic" students are. At Tech, apathy means that people don't protest housing's unfairness or the shaft of a professor often enough. At Stanford, apathy means there aren't enough protests to the bombing of Afgahnastan, there aren't enough peace rallies. This was followed by an article about how Stanford kicked ROTC off campus in protest to the Vietnam war and now won't allow them back because they discriminate against homosexuals.

Now. Back to Tech. My entire four years there, I saw almost not a single iota of political activism amongst the students. ROTC people are admired on campus. People are generally pro-war (patriotic, would be the word they would use) conservatives. The Technique would NEVER comment (except in the guise of an editorial by Christina or I, the token liberals) on anything liberal - let alone suggest that the students should be more politically active. I don't know if life at Stanford is becoming a shock to Sarah or not, her having grown up in the south and being fairly politically conservative (she may never admit that one), definitely used to being surrounded by the patriotism of being surrounded by a school full of people that will eventually work in the defense industry. But I find it a funny thought that she is surrounded by such a different mentality.

Emotional roller coasters

I sincerely appreciate all the books my Aunt Mary has sent me. I have never read more non-science fiction/fantasy in succession. I finished another one last night We were the Mullvoneys (by Joyce Carol Oates, and, yes, it was on Oprah's Book of the Month list). Anyway, once again it was another emotional roller coaster. I guess that's what makes the good, quality books that Aunt Mary reads, they are actually deep and engrossing. Instead of my usual shallow and entertaining. Onto the next thoughtful book...

An architect, an artist and an engineer were discussing whether it was better to spend time with the wife or a mistress.

The architect said he enjoyed time with his wife, building a solid foundation for an enduring relationship. The artist said he enjoyed time with his mistress, because of the passion and mystery he found there.



The engineer said, "I like both."



"Both?"



Engineer: "Yeah. If you have a wife and a mistress, they will each assume you are spending time with the other woman, and you can go to the lab and get some work done."

Going to the movies

I went to the movies last night to see America's Sweathearts. Advertisement count:

3 cigarette ads (one obviously targeted at teenagers)

2 alcohol ads

3 automobile ads

2 cell phone ads (one obviously targeted at pre-teens)

Then there's the whole movie ettiquette thing. I sat down in me (assigned) seat, even though the theatre was mostly empty. About 10 minutes later, a couple came and sat down RIGHT next to me. I mean, we had a whole row to spread out in, but they, total strangers, sat down next to me. Then they proceeded to make out. I mean, hard core screwing around.

So, during intermission, I moved seats, same aisle, just away from the over-zealous couple. Well, when they came back, they just came and sat down next to me again. This time, the making out was to a minimum, but the girl (who was EXTREMELY large) kept leaning over into my chair. It was all and all a very uncomfortable experience, and the movie wasn't even that good.

Passport and anthrax sagas

Thank you for all your concerned e-mails about my passport. It will be fine. Level-heads prevailed at the Bern Embassy, and they said if I don't need a passport for a few weeks, that it was fine for me to wait until the Zurich Consulate reopened. They can make a new passport the same day I request it. So, that problem is mostly solved if the Zurich Consulate reopens soon.

While I'm at it, I was surfing the embassy web page. Our Ambassador is so funny. I mean, you know they give these plum service positions as political favors. And this one is so clear its funny. He's a southern boy (went to school in Tennessee and eventually ended up in Texas) and then became involved in the oil industry (that's where he met Bush Jr., who "wasn't famous" at the time.. hard to believe you wouldn't be famous as the son of the head of the CIA or the vice president). Anyway, when he invested in the Astros, he hired Bush Jr. to manage the team. Then, when Bush Jr. became president, he did the fundraising for the Inagural Ball. And now, he's settled into a stint as Ambassador to Switzerland. Despite this all, I think when I go to the consulate, I am going to inquire about meeting him or having tea with him or something (on behalf of the 4 American praktikants at Alstom).

I would also like to thank you all for your concerned emails about the anthrax scare in Boca Raton. Yes, that's where I went to high school and where my mother lives. But I assure you, my mother is a lawyer and does NOT work for the tabloid newspaper that had the anthrax breakout, so she is safe. And remember, Boca is a huge place (maybe 60,000 people), and there is only 3 confirmed cases of anthrax there. Not bad odds, if you ask me.

To the optimist, the glass is half full. To the pessimist, the glass is half empty. To the engineer, the glass is twice as big as it needs to be.

Lovely days

The month of October is shaping up to be much better than the month of September was. We've had two strait weeks of decent weather, and today is already looking beautiful. To top that all off, the leaves are all changing color and they are so pretty. Now, Atlanta always had pretty falls, but the leaves almost universally turned yellow, then red. I think its because Atlanta is almost universally operating under drought conditions (which means the leaves don't get as pretty).

Anyway, here, there is no drought problem. Thus, there is a huge array of colors. The normal yellow, reds, and oranges, to an almost florescent pink on some vines. And then a crisp, cool, blue sky to set it all off. Yeah! I love the sun and I love the autumn. It might be many more years before I experience it again since I will be living in Houston for a while.

Passport dilemnas

So, the Zurich consulate is still closed. So, I am contemplating going to Bern. Bern is in Switzerland (JEN!) and it is about a 2 hour and 20 CHF train ride, meaning I would miss a whole day of work, rather than about a quarter of a day to go to Zurich. Anyway, I finally got a less panicked human being on the phone, and she told me it was a same day service to get a new passport, so if I don't need to leave the country for a few weeks (which I don't, at least, until I go to Morocco on October 24), then I might as well wait for Zurich to reopen.

My Onion horoscope read this week:

You are starting to find yourself more and more obsessed with people who, unlike yourself, actually do things.


I will refrain from commenting.

Not a good time to lose your passport

So, I lost (or had stolen, along with 30 DM) my passport in the beer tents at Oktoberfest on Saturday. I discovered it was missing just before we got to the Swiss border. It was no big deal since I have a Swiss Residence/ID card that admitted me back into the country.

On Monday, I calmly called our singular consulate official in Zürich. Since I still have the following forms of ID: Birth Certificate, Drivers License, Swiss ID, NASA ID, Student ID, etc. I wasn't really worried about my ability to identify myself.

Unfortunately the consulate was closed on both Swiss and American holidays. Since I knew it was not a Swiss holiday, I scanned my brain to figure out what possible American holiday it could be... Columbus Day. Have you ever met an American that gets Columbus Day off of work??

So, I called again today, to get an answering machine message saying the consulate in Zurich has been closed indefinitely, as America is in a state of war. Did I mention the consulate in Zurich is one person plus a secretary? They are in a little office in a big office building. There aren't American flags everywhere. Definitely not a terrorist target, as a bomb would potentially kill exactly 2 Americans (if they were at work, not home celebrating some obscure U.S. holiday). Not very high profile.

Then, I called the embassy in Bern, which is remaining open, and had a very interesting phone conversation with a very panicked woman. Now, if I were an embassy official in some developing-world Islamic country with a known propensity for terrorism (maybe Israel, or UAE, or Iran, or something), I would be panicked. I would not be panicked as an American in SWITZERLAND!

With that said, the phone conversation went as follows:

Becca: Hello, I am living outside of Zurich right now, and I have lost my passport over the weekend. Since the consulate there is closed I wanted to call you and ask you when it would be reopened, or if I should come to Bern to get it replaced?

Embassy: [panicked voice] We just found out 5 minutes ago about Zurich and Geneva being closed. I don't know when they will reopen. You need to come to Bern NOW to replace your passport. Did you here me? Come NOW! [sidebar: the State Department is telling Americans NOT to travel and to avoid unnecessary movement. Bern is not exactly next door].

Becca: I am not traveling for about 2 weeks. Do you think I should wait a couple of days and see if Zurich reopens? [I know they often replace passports overnight for people who have to fly somewhere immediately, so I wasn't worried]

Embassy: This is no small thing! America is at war! It takes a long time to replace a passport. Come to Bern NOW!

At this point, I gave up. Getting on a train to Bern right now would be immensely stupid, especially if the embassy is in a crazy panick, they aren't going to have time to do paperwork for me today. I will try talking to them again tomorrow.

As for the logic of closing the consulates, this seems really stupid to me. I know I don't know the whole situation, but you would think that if America is in a crisis situation, that perhaps it would be best to keep your officials and government offices open to help deal with the crisis, field phone calls, etc.

I understand that we all need to be cautious right now. But do you think panicking is the best approach? But reading the papers, talking to family, etc. makes it seem like there are lots of panicky people out there. Its very frustrating.

Read Karen's journal for her description of our Swiss adventures last week.

The Germans really know beer

If you want to read this portion of the entry, well, email me, so I can censor it before sending it on.

The Germans really know how to drive

We rented a van to take us from Zurich to Munich. Anyway, the AutoBahn is a wonderful thing. We were cruising along about 150 kph (that's about 80 mph). We were being passed by cars going almost double that speed. I have never ever seen people drive so fast. I don't think I could've done it.

The Germans really know engineering

On Sunday while the others went to explore Munich (I have been there before, so I didn't want to do a massive day of tourism), I went to the Deutches Museum. The Deutches Museum is this HUGE science museum - think about it like the Louvre of science. Anyway, they just had halls and halls of airplanes and cars and trains and about every type of technology (from ceramics to the printing press). The aviation hall alone put the Air and Space Smithsonian to shame. I have never been to such an incredible museum!

Sarah put an entry on her page that I remembered from somewhere, and then I figured out. It was in a speech attributed to Kurt Vonnegut, but was actually an imaginary commencement speech written by a columnist at the Chicago Tribune. I like it, so I figured I'd post it (hit previous for my other entery today). I actually remember hearing this set to music once, but I have never actually found it when I searched for it.

'Ladies and gentlemen of the class of '97:
Wear sunscreen.