Only two weeks remaining ...

... and I will be leaving Chapel Hill. Can't believe I already stayed here for three months already, unbelievable how time flies! I finally handed in my first draft for the scientific report, and will be doing some more lab work while waiting for the editing remarks.
So World Cup started and most people follow the games, although not showing as much enthusiasm as compared to Germany (guess that's to be expected).
Anyway, hope both teams (GER & USA) do well in tomorrow's games. Go German 11!

-Jan

P.S.: What you are seeing on the upper right corner is a cathode luminescence image of a zircon grain from one of the samples I work on. Ain't it nice zonation?

Of Montreal in town

Hello people,

This week I went to an alternative band concert in a club called Cat's Craddle, which is famous in North Carolina for hosting indipendent rock concerts (only alternative would be in Raleigh, capital city of NC). So that day it was Of Montreal who were performing, and man they did perform! It wasn't just music, they had some stage acts as well while playing music! For those of you who are not afraid of new styles of music this is definately something to look into, although I must admit hearing them life is about 1 thousand times better than on youtube or likewise. ;)
Anyway Of Montreal is kind of an dadaistic Indie-Popband form Athens (Georgia). They've been performing since 1997 and perform in this area almost once every year. After the show we even got the chance to talk to a few band members (and some fans, who like to dress up just like the band does).

Alright, I'll see you guys later!

-Jan

All kinds of stuff

Hello people,

how are you guys doing? It's been a while since my last entry. I apologize for getting a little bit sloppy in keeping you updated. Mainly it's because Iam really busy writing report and doing lab stuff right now, as well as runnning samples on the mass spec (really takes a lot of time just for some data, i'm telling you!) So what exiting things happened over the last few days?Well, lectures are over now and there was a HUGE graduation celebration at Drew's place (my advisor) with lots of food, beer and interesting conversations. On the photo photo on the right you can see the charming baby blue gradutations costumes people were to match UNC colors when they graduate (freshly baked geology bachelors!).
So Mitchell Hall (geology department) has been quite empty, which is quite nice for working. However there is summer school going on (this spanish teacher who has lectures right next the office I work in has kind of an annoying voice).
Besides work, my roommate Herbert and I were hanging out on Franklin Street a couple of times. Once we went to a comedy night in one of the bars called Jack Sprat Café which was a lot of fun. They also have an Irish pub there which is really awesome.
Last sunday we went for a some hiking to Eno River State Park, which is only a couple of miles away from Chapel Hill.

Long time ago Indians of the Eno, Shakori, and Occoneechee tribes, lived along the river when the first European explorers passed through. And somewhere around Durham there is a village where you can still find Native American people!
Alright, that is it for now I gotta do some more writing (it's a pain, but it must be done).

Love ya!

-Jan

Cheesecake! *yumyum*

Heya!

Ever since watching The Big Bang Theory (American TV show) I wanted to check out an actual Cheesecake factory, which are very popular throughout The States. So finally yesterday the moment had come to checkout the highly praised dessert of this branch. Since temperatures already indicate summer I went with a mango-lime cheesecake and guys, I have never ever tasted anything like this before! It was the most amazing cheesecake of my life! Two if not three thumps up! ;)
I don't know if any of you were watching the series but apparently they don't wear those costumes here which they do in the show (see picture), which was a minor drawback (just plain white and every person regardless of gender wore a tie!). Nevertheless the stylistic inconsistency did by no means spoil the experience. I really recommend the show, it's fabulous but you should definately watch it in English, as the German synchro clearly does not have the same vibe to it.

Also I hear that the weather in Jena returned to being miserable again, hope that changes soon!
-Jan

The flavour of Germany

Hi Folks,

this Friday Herbert and I invited some people over to our place for the Combined German Food and Movie Night (fancy title, huh?). We had some potatoe salad (my first time trying to make one) and I was pleased to see that our guests liked it. :D Due to lack of Vienna sausages we had use hotdog-imposters and of course (!) mustard (an absolute must for a German potatoe salad *g*).
To complete the evening we watched a movie somewhat relating to my home country: Inglorious Basterds. It's a film by Quentin Tarentino, who is well known for his unique film plots and screenplay arrangements. His films tend to polarize people into one group loving his creation and another one that can absolutely get nothing out of his works. Since the German Nazi's were being protrayed as evil villians who would get what was coming to them at the end of the movie the audience felt quite pleased. Interestingly enough the actors were actually speaking German (with an American accent), which I think was interesting to watch.At the weekend nothing too much exciting happend, except that I went out with Herbert and a couple of his friends saturday night to watch a box fight in Raleigh. Always fun to meet new people during these occasions. Unfortunately I thereby missed the opportunity for a pool party but I guess there will be plenty more occasions for this!

That's it for the time being, I should really return to work now, only six weeks left!

-Jan

Anadarko Symposium

Hey people,

sorry for the lack of news, but unfortunately my computer became infected with an annoying virus, messing up my Windows system files during the removal. Not very easy to re setup your system with neither a CD-Rom drive nor a Windows CD but somehow I managed to restore an old system status. ;) So thankfully everything is back to normal now, enabeling me to give you a brief summary over the last recent activities.
As the title already implies, this post has something to do with a symposium which was held last Friday, and some of you might now be thinking "What on earth is this Anadarko thingy?" To clarify things, the UNC geological sciences department is hosting a yearly symposium along with the Anadarko Petrolium Coorporation, which in fact is one of the world’s largest independent oil and gas exploration and production companies. Every year in April, students and future PhDs are presenting their findings in a short presentation each. The fruitful collaboration exists six years already and will continue to go on at least a few years longer.
Afterwards around 20 geologists went to have some drinks and chit chat in one of Carrboros (small town within walking distance from Chapel Hill) notorius bars built on an old railway track (it's called The Station). We talked and laughed quite a lot, it was fun.
It would be really nice to have some equivalent in Jena as well, even though everyone was really busy because of all the preparations going on.

I'll catch you later!

-Jan

It's sunny!

Greetings everyone!

Though this might sound a bit cruel to all of you who suffer from long days and weeks of cold and unpleasand weather back in Germany, here in North Carolina it's the exact opposite. The 15 degrees difference in latitude between Jena (50° 56') and Chapel Hill (35° 54′ 22″) really makes a difference!
Most of the times it's sunny, and temperatures around day time are well above 20°C (or rather 70°F). So everyone is encouraged to go outside during free time to catch some tan and enjoy the warmth of the sunbeams. Flowers and trees are blossoming all over the place to the great displeasure of allergy sufferer who are having a hard time striving against the huge masses of pollen that float around these days. They cover almost everything, from the shoes and clothes you wear to cars and buildings and kind of look like an omnipresent dirty light green coating.

These Some pictures taken just recently. The first one is taken on campus showing a building near Mitchell Hall. The second one is part of South Rd. (my way to work), and last but not least my apartment.

That's it for now, stay tuned for more to come.

-Jan

Viva la México

Hi guys,

this is just to show you that fast food is NOT the only source of food, but in fact a lot of nice little restaurants can be found on Chapel Hill's Franklin Street. Herbert and I went to this Mexian Cafe called Bandido's and food as well as the atmosphere were both really nice! Herbert went for Buritos, I tried out Nacho's with Dip, very tasty! Even though no frozen magarethas were on the menu, I strongly consider going there again some time.

Bye, bye for now.

-Jan

Shoping in The States

Hi there,

I'm runnig samples on the mass spectrometer at the moment. Since it is taking them forever to produce trustworthy results, I just quickly want to share some experience on the topic shopping.
There are quite a few grocery stores around here, one of the most prominent ones is Harris Teeter (I go there almost all the time). Interestingly enough not only the variety of products is huge, bur also the sizes they have there. Family sized packages all over the place! And i guess that anyone who loves fast food would love to put up a tent at the cooling shelfs they have there.
Once I went to a mall with Herbert in order to get some new clothes. You would not believe the selection of sizes they have there until you witness them with your own eyes. About 75% of the clothes are L/XL or even larger! The limit is not 2XL, not 3XL but 4XL! I should definitely try one of these on and take a picture some time. ;)
The sizes of the buildes of course correspond to their content:
Okay, sample runs complete. Guess I can call it a day for now. See ya!

-Jan

Duke wins NCAA Tournament

Hello people!

This years America's basketball college league season has come to an end yesterday in a final clash between The Blue Devils (Duke University, Durham) and the Bulldogs from Butler University (Indianapolis). Everyone around here wanted Duke to loose, since they are the number one rival for UNC (the RWE to FCCJ if you want). It was a really close game, but in the end the Blue devils won by a 2 point lead and as soon as the tail lamp went on of the Bullogs tried a three pointer from the middle line, unfortunately only hitting the rim of the basket and the game was over. [59:61]
So the devils reign again and most of the people at the UNC are really unhappy about that, even though the trophy is staying inside North Carolina.

That's it for now, I'll catch you later.

-Jan

Come visit my apartment!

Hello fellows,

as there have been multiple requests about sharing some images of the place I live in, here are a few pictures of the 22 Hamilton Road building. As you can see in the picture on the bottom left, it's a pretty standard american bungalow mansion, with one living room, a kitchen, bath and 1 bedroom for each inhabitant. My roommate, Herbert, is a very sociable afro-american barber, who helps me out a lot and proofs to be a very good friend. He's also a basketball fanatic just like everyone else in this place. The house is situated in a residential area called Glen Lennox which is about 3 bus stops away from campus.
My room (bottom right) may seem a little spartan, but it's fully adequate for my purposes. It includes a fully functional bed of an adequate size, two chairs, a mixture of a desk and a bench and even an old TV (which I hardly ever use because of the bad picture quality)!

So this is the place I live in, hope you like the pictures and if you are eager to see more feel free to leave a comment or message me via ICQ/Email/StudiVZ/facebook/whatever works. ;)

Take care,

-Jan

Chapel Hill - The place to be

Dear readers,

for starters, I'd like to give you a small round tour of the place that I am currently staying at: Chapel Hill.
About 55.000 people live in this town, at least half of them associated with the university. The settlement basically consists of a farreaching combined campus + hospital area at the centre and residential areas spread around it. The cultural and social centre (comparable to Jena's Wagner Gasse) is Franklin Street. The broad majority of the people around here is very friendly, liberal and open minded (prjudices about southern states at least here are at absolutely arbitrary). Also there is a lot of cultural diversity, as there are many international students enrolled at the University of Carolina (UNC). The two main attractions on campus are the Bell Tower (picture to the right) and the Old Well.
Of course there are fastfood restaurants and grocery stores all over the place, and many of the american residences (my apartment included) look just like in a storybook. One thing that's kind of annoying is that busses are the only means of public transport but won't drive as frequently as compared to Jena. In return the shops here are open almost all the time, even on sundays, which is very convenient! Another ting I really like about this place is the weather! I practically left winter behind me when departing from Germany to be greeted by heart-warming sunbeams when arriving in Chapel Hill.

People around here are absolutely crazy about basketball! Currently the national championship called NCAA (college league) is being broadcasted in nearly every public building in this area. North Carolina is well known for it's top-notch basketball teams, especially the Tar Heels which is the basketball team of the UNC. Last year's team even won the national tournament, but unfortunately this year the entire season was one major fiasco.


The picture to the right shows a building where I'll certainly spend most of the time during my stay in the US doing geochronology research. It's the geological department on campus called Mitchel Hall. It's a decent mixture of laboratories, work spaces and classrooms, although I still wonder why the latter is open during lessons. More bits of information on this topic are sure to come!

That's it for now. I'll catch you later.

-Jan