The weekend - first concert and Canadiana BBQ

On Saturday night was my first concert with the Scottish Ceilidh band. We were playing at this posh international school outside of Geneve for a retirement party. The band is pretty big and has a nice variety of instruments. This is also the first time I've played with a pick-up for my fiddle.

After the posing we took a silly picture but you can see I'm engrossed in conversation.

So here's the entire band playing, the leader is Nikita and he is standing up playing the accordion. It was a nice laid back band to play in and nice to finally play with an ensemble that can pick up on cues. Too bad I wasn't so good at picking up on the cue that only the accordion was playing the start of the tune and not the entire band...

We sat for the entire performance, which isn't my favorite when playing the fiddle. There wasn't much dancing at the beginning but once the alcohol was flowing the crowd was more enthusiastic. There was a break in the middle for catered snacks and true to form the band parked themselves at the food table...

And then the next day it was off to Geneve for Frank's goodbye BBQ, well, he was leaving and they were having a BBQ but it wasn't all big and official like.

Anyway, here I am at Frank's place before we walked to France (the long way through the bushes I might add). I am demonstrating to Frank the reactions of Canadian women to his acquired fresh attitudes towards girls.

It was a beautiful day, nice and warm and sunny. Frank is always good at mugging for the camera, I make an attempt.

The hat helps.

And then we walked to France for the BBQ. It was such a beautiful day for a walk!

The BBQ was a Canadian reunion!!! We talked about finding Kraft peanut butter, our favorite lines from Bon cop Bad cop and when someone opened a slice of that fake cheddar cheese to put on their burger (imported, along with relish) someone else identified it by the sound.

After the BBQ Frank and I walked back from France again, passing by this milk machine. It dispenses raw milk, 24/7 and apparently it moos whenever you buy a bottle.

We made it to the CERN campus by the time it was nice and dark and I got a personal tour of the ATLAS control room. We sat outside the control room at the visitors desk where they have some useless emergency buttons you can push that make lights flash and piss off everyone on shift inside.

I have to say, the control room is one of the few times where science actually looks kinda like it does in the movies. There were screens! And control desks with lots of computer monitors! And people working shift 24/7!

I caught the train back to Lausanne (which I keep calling Vancouver and confusing everyone around me) and this time I cycled home because I had just bought Frank's bike.

In the lab

I've been asked about my work in the lab, so here's some photo's from one of my really really long experiment days. How long? The buses stopped running when I left the lab and I had to walk home.

Anyway, here's a shot of good old Mr Akta, I'm purifying phage surface coat protein to test for my ability to modify it.

After the purification, then there's concentration and chemical modification! Now I'm upstairs on my messy bench. You can see more columns, lots of collection tubes. I am testing phage modification because we would like to change our protocol. Rather than working with the entire phage I am just working with one coat protein.

And during one of my hour incubations I grab some my dinner in the lab kitchen. An upgrade from Vancouver but not as pretty. However, we still have a view of the mountains and the lake unlike the parking lot at UBC.

Anyway, I stopped taking photos because it was more of the same thing and I was getting grumpy and tired. I got my protein in the freezer and then headed home but I had to walk. Stupid buses in Lausanne stop at midnight. Here's a shot as I walk down the highway looking back towards EPFL. I haven't walked home before, but I've had a few close calls.

And finally, what's missing in this picture? The oven. Someone asked me if I tried to start a fire in this oven. Hell, I didn't just try, I was successful. I had put plastic tips in the oven to dry and when we opened it later there was only a large candle sized flame inside the oven but a whole lot of stinky smoke from the melted plastic. The scariest thing was that the smoke detectors didn't go off. Anyway, apparently the ovens here have bad thermostats because they are so old and this one was removed.

Birthdays - sometimes you're just lucky

Sometimes, you're just lucky. I didn't really make plans for my birthday this year but somehow it all worked out nicely. I ran into Eva on the train having only met her once before. Ok, I'll change the story, Eva identified me on the train and had to remind me where we had met.... yeah, I'm bad that way.

Anyway, I mentioned my birthday and she mentioned dinner and so the plans were in motion.

First I worked in the lab making buffers. Good times. Then it was on a train to Geneve and the long trip into Meyrin where Frank is staying. I didn't bring my nice camera but took pictures with my fancy new cell phone.

For example this church. In Frank's directions he mentions he lives right before a church. However, he forgets to mention that first you pass by an additional two churches before you come to the church he lives before. Details details. If you are going to Frank's (in the next week or so), he lives after this church.

When I told his house mate it was my birthday (in French I might add) he pulled out a bottle of champagne. Who has champagne sitting around!?? Anyway, the four of us polished off the bottle.

The opening of this bottle of champagne was considerably less dramatic than the bottle in the lab. Maybe the roommate has more experience since he also has bottles of champagne on hand.

And then Frank and I went to France. I really need to learn that when Frank says it will take 45 minutes to get there, he means 45 min of solid hoofing it. I gots the long legs and all, but not long enough. We were heading to France to meet Eva for dinner and we were late...

However, check out this fantastic cake that she bought!! It was so shiny you could see your reflection on the frosting!

Frank is pointing out the chef.

And we sat around drinking wine, eating lasagna and enjoying cake and all in all having a fantastic dinner. Thanks so much Eva! You barely know me and you fed me a fantastic birthday dinner. I even blew out a candle. However, she had a violin and I had to play happy birthday to myself on it...

Sadly at the end of the evening I had to dine and dash as it was a long trip back to Lausanne. First Frank and I had to walk back from France because there were no more buses. Then we caught a bus at CERN, aka the LHC (large hardon collider). Then the trolley to the train station and then the train to Lausanne. I made all my connections but the buses had stopped running in Lausanne and I would have had to walk home. However, I was chatting with my labmate using google chat (new phone = awesome) and he came and picked me up at the train station!

So yup, it was a good birthday this year because there were so many generous people. Thanks!

Clash of the Titans (and the sexes)

On Friday I made the trip out to Geneve to watch Clash of the Titans with Frank. Horray for summer blockbusters! Ok, this one was meh, but the big monsters were fun and come on, flying horse.

We were discussing gender roles as we made our way to the line. The movie was starting soon and we weren't sure if we were going to make it in time.

I said, "sorry I'm late, I wonder if we could have sped this up if you had gotten the tickets earlier instead of waiting for me"

"I think it would have taken more time if I came in, bought the tickets and then come out to the trolley station and tried to find you"

"Yeah, then it's starting to become more complicated".

"Well, I guess you could have found your own way over the movie theatre"

"Sure, but I'm a girl, I can't handle moving around in 3D in the mall and plus, I can't read maps"

*pause*

"Yeah, that's true. I'm better at math too" *pause* "and science" *pause* "hell, I'm just better".

"Thanks Frank, now that we are firmly ensconced in the 50's, you're buying my ticket right?"

So yup, Clash of the Titans was decent but not fantastic and then I caught the train back to Lausanne.

In further news, I just became the proud owner of a lovely HTC Desire smartphone running Android. The linux part is important, man this is a beautiful piece of tech.

Also, Guyere is the chedder cheese of Switzerland. That is all.

New phone and birthday tiramisu

Well, I have succumbed to a cell phone gadget. For years my working theory has been 'as cheap as possible' but now I have a fancy new one with internet. While testing it out I have a boring picture of the lab....

And here is where I spend my mornings, waiting to catch the metro. I wouldn't want you to think that everything in Switzerland is Heidi-esque landscapes.

Coffee time in the lab:

And once again that fantastic view outside of my window. In the background are the sheep. This picture is looking back towards Lausanne, the lake is on the right.

Some more coffee time. Clearly the camera will be forcefully removed from me shortly by my labmates if I continue with my obsession...

To celebrate, we have a bottle of champagne. The bottle was passed around to various labmates, none of whom wanted to open it when the cork finally popped...

Attempt number 2

Attempt number 3

And finally, in a style mimicked around the globe, we drink afternoon champagne from plastic cups in the lab kitchen. Yup, this is exactly how we did it in Vancouver too.

Sion

On Sunday evening after dinner I took the train to Sion, just to look around. I hate Sunday's in Switzerland, everything is closed but I took this as a chance to wander around a new town.

Anyway, I'm now rather blasé about the Swiss countryside now, but since I had finally remembered to bring my camera, here's some photos as the scenery rushed past.

What's out of focus in the front are grape vines.

Wandering around the town of Sion was really nice. I hadn't expected it to be so pretty. It is full of narrow winding streets between tall buildings. The place was also empty.

And of course there was the standard no car downtown.

And up on two hills overlooking the town were two old stone buildings. Here's the church part of one of them.

I climbed up the hill to watch the sun set over the town and man was it really pretty.

I think this is one of my most favorite pictures that I've taken in a while.

Off those stairs to the right is a cliff. Yup, no the nanny state here! This seemed to be one of the hangouts for the youth of the town. One kid tried to bum a smoke from me and another was climbing on the rocks and walls.

And then when it was dark I caught the train back. It was a very pretty town but the climbing has really exacerbated my cough which has now moved quite deep into my chest.

First hike of the season

Monday's weather was pretty fantastic and I headed out to Geneve to hike with Frank. We climbed to the top of the 2nd highest peak in the Jura range. It is two meters shorter than the peak next to it but that one is ugly and covered in trees to the top. We took the bus to the village of Thoire in France and man was this place was picturesque. The total elevation gain was 1200m, I haven't done too many hikes over 1000m in a day and this felt unexpectedly easy. Of course, it was the first hike of the season and the first hour I was wondering why the hell I was hiking at all.

We headed up through the village and into the forest. It started out as an oak forest, then pine and then my favorite into the alpine.

I love walking through the snow, it's easy going and so pretty.

Poor Frank didn't have any sunblock...

At the top was a giant cross (this is Switzerland after all). The photo is taken from the side hence the reason it doesn't look very cross like.

Looking back we could see lake Geneve and even still make out the jet d'leau.

Easter

So, a rather uninspiring Easter this year. And they don't even have those sugary cream eggs which I can console myself with! At least it hasn't been raining the entire weekend.

I did make it to the cantonal museum (canton = province but in miniature scale, hmm, probably not by the metric of population though...). The museum was ok, more like a library of items rather than a coherent set of displays. However, as it was the first Saturday of the month it was free and therefore well worth the investment. They had some human fetuses on display which was a bit unexpected. In Canada when there were plasticized fetuses they had warning signs. Here there were two 5 month old ones and some younger ones and they looked pretty real to me floating around in formaldehyde next to the rat, fish and I can't remember what other fetuses.

Also in the zoology section of the museum were several biological 'monstrosities'. Mainly conjoined kittens, lambs and calves. They had the hides and the skeletons and it was an impressive collection. They also had the head of a goat which had two normal horns, but then on the end of a normal looking floppy ear was a third fully developed horn. I didn't think to bring my camera, I was running around town doing my desperate shopping. I still haven't found brown sugar. The evening ended with some fondue and a bit too much wine.

Today I worked in the lab and walked around town a lot. I had been told about squat toilets in europe but never saw one all summer. However, today along the Lausanne waterfront... well, there they were. My very first squat toilet. Well, I came to europe for the skiing (check) and the culture. Fetuses, mutant calves and squat toilets horray!