Do you speak Whale?!

Breaking the silence

2008-11-16T18:58:00.004+10:00

Hello all!

Again, apologies for being so quiet on here..... It's amazing how time flies at the moment - you blink and next thing you know another 2 months have gone by!

To be honest, I'm just about over the emotional roller coaster ride of 2008 .... I really hope 2009 will be a little more steady and calm...

Of course it hasn't all been bad - actually it's been a lot more good than bad really!

The problem with the evil vollie (I mentioned in the last post) somehow sorted itself out, it seems. It just kind of disappeared into thin air and it seems that everybody just overreacted a bit at the first shock of hearing that story... Thank God is all I can say, that's a HUUUUUGE relief!

Everything has been going well with the PhD since that problem vanished - I finished my first field season without any more complications. And it was a pretty successful first season: 24 survey days, covering almost the entire Moreton Bay area, 57 sightings of bottlenose dolphins, I've identified 146 different dolphins based on photographs of their dorsal fins and managed to shoot (sorry, biopsy sample) 21 dolphins - which I think is pretty good for a first try!!

So at the moment I'm learning genetics! Have just extracted DNA from my samples and am about to start running PCRs etc... It's a steep learning curve and nowhere near as difficult as I had thought/feared.... It's true, it really is just like cooking - chop up your meat, add some ingredients, mix really well, stick it in the oven.... ;)

So yeah, work is great... which of course means...... if the work life is going well then the love life has to go downhill, right??

Kinda ironic how this year has really been like that... everything was going so wonderfully great in my personal life (house, car, friends and a man) when my PhD went into spectacular meltdown and almost blew up in my face... now that's all sorted out and the work life is going really well again and boom.... the other side falls apart. I guess you can't have it all.....

Well I'm not going to go into detail here.

But I will say that the last week has taught me one thing for sure (not that I didn't know this before but it was a pretty strong reminder): I am so lucky - I have so many amazing friends, the best friends in the world, all over the world actually :) I don't think anyone can be sad for very long with friends like you guys - I love you all, thanks!!!

Ina

xoxo

Still alive... sorta...

2008-09-03T09:12:00.004+10:00

Hi all!
Sorry, I realise I haven't updated this in months!
Well the last 2 months of my life have been a trip to say the least! It would take me hours to tell you everything that happened so I'm gonna try to boil it down to the essentials...

Well I've started fieldwork and that has just been a constant up and down! On the up-side, the weather has been fairly good, lots of dolphins, and biopsy sampling is actually a LOT of fun!!!
I still need a lot of practice, still missing a lot of shots, but I have collected 15 samples so far and I think that's a pretty good result for the first ~ 3 weeks of field time. On the down-side I've had a lot of issues with leaky boats (and a boat that can't turn left, kinda like Zoolander...) and I've had the volunteer from hell in July... Can't go into details there but after I thought I'd gotten rid of her, she's now back to haunt me with a vengance!!! You have NO idea.... it's actually quite serious and making my life hell at the moment, like I said, probably shouldn't give details on the internet... Just keep your fingers crossed for me that it'll all get sorted out!
At least my current volunteers are absolutely great, love them, they are a huge support and a big help in the field - and they are just good fun to be with which is very important when you spend that much time together. So big THANK YOU out to Ces, Irys and Tom!

Other than that, things have been really great lately (which is why it was such a shock when this huge issue came up ... just when you think everything is wonderful, something goes spectacularly wrong).
I've finally moved into my new place, now nicknamed "the Princess Pad" (because it's in Princess Street, not what you think ;)) and am absolutely loving it!!! Still waiting for bits of furniture to be delivered and for the phone and internet to be connected, but feeling very much at home already! Once I'm done with this field season (in about 2-3 weeks) I'll have time to start decorating, putting up pictures, etc, I can't wait for that!!!

For everyone that's in the general Brisbane area:
There will be a huge birthday / housewarming / end of first field season - party on September 26!!

Right, that's gonna have to do for a quick update... will upload some pics soon (don't have them on this computer at uni), but in the mean time, check out my facebook album with plenty of pics of the Princess Pad!

My House!

2008-06-28T14:24:00.004+10:00

As I mentioned in the last post, a while ago, I recently bought an apartment so I figured it was time to put some pictures up!!! It still looks a bit like a construction site but I think it's gonna be gorgeous once it's finished!!! Which should be in about 3 weeks time!! Fingers crossed!

Anyway, this is the apartment block,

"Samui Terraces" at 8 Princess Street, Fairfield, QLD:

And that's my place, unit 6, with the great big balcony and view over the backyard with some lovely big eucalypts! And car parking below!
This is the living room, balcony to the left, kitchen to the right
Balcony
Kitchen
My bedroom, with ensuite bath and walk-in closet (on the right edge of the pic) My bath, with bathtub - yay!

More pics will come soon as things get done...

Finally settling down?!

2008-05-31T20:47:00.003+10:00

Wow, I've just had the craziest, longest week ever... and it's not quite over yet!

My PhD is slowly coming together and July is fast approaching, which is when I am supposed to start field work.... aaaah.... so much to organise still!!! Boats to book, volunteers to recruit (woohoo, I get my own volunteers to boss around after being one of them for YEARS!!), equipment to buy, schedules to figure out, budgets to calculate... And then there's still the ongoing quest to get funding, writing the lit review, sorting out what the hell I'm doing when it comes to the genetics analysis...

And as if the PhD wasn't keeping me busy enough, I'm also currently having my parents visiting from Germany for 2 weeks to help me essentially sort out my new life (it's quite handy to have a dad who's in the real estate business himself and knows all the legal terms etc). So we've spent the last week looking at apartments, cars, insurances, loans ...... essentially running from one agent/office/bank to the next, I definitely reached a point of information overload!

But it's all slowly coming together, at least I have now bought my first ever car, a Toyota RAV4 which will hopefully reliably carry me, my 3 volunteers, and a bunch of field gear to and from the coast... So far I'm pretty happy with it anyway :). I took it (and my parents) for a nice drive up and around Mount Coot-tha today....

And I've also found an amazing little townhouse style apartment in Dutton Park, which I totally fell in love with at first sight, even though it's still in the last stages of construction (to be finished in 4-6 weeks). It has two storeys, 2 bedrooms (each with it's own bathroom and one with a walk-in closet!!) upstairs and a large kitchen and living area downstairs, plus a huge balcony overlooking the backyard which is nice and green with some gorgeous big old eucalypt trees lots of birds and apparently possums... It's also located about 5 minutes from the bridge which connects Dutton Park with the UQ campus across the river, so I can walk to uni in 15 minutes (or bike) - super convenient!! And also close to the pubs and lifestyle of West End and Southbank and right near the train station which takes me into the city centre in 5 minutes. But it's a much more quiet and residential neighbourhood than most of the suburbs around there, where I've been looking at apartments as well.

So yeah, I'm sooo happy we found this place (really lucky!)! We'll most likely finalise the deal with the developer on Monday or Tuesday and then I'll be a home owner!!! I can't wait to move in and live in my very own place!

Seriously, it feels like I'm finally starting the real life - no more living in student housing where I'm not allowed to put up a picture if I want to, no more moving from one country to the next.... my own car, my own place... I feel so grown up!!! ;)

Now all I need is a husband, a dog, a white fence and 2.4 children - haha!! Nah, no rush there!

Easter at the Gold Coast

2008-03-26T10:59:00.008+10:00

For the long Easter weekend, Gabi and I took 2 days off to get away and caught the train down to the Gold Coast!

We spent the entire Saturday at Wet 'n' Wild Water World, which is a massive outdoors water theme park, with lots of slides and other fun stuff. Just perfect for a big water baby like me :)

We had a blast splashing around, racing down slides, getting thrown around on a giant surfboard, perving on life guards (hehe) and relaxing by floating around in circles on big plastic tubes...

After that it was on to Surfers Paradise to enjoy the Easter fireworks Saturday night and then spend Easter Sunday at the beach, relaxing!
It sure was nice to look at the ocean and remind myself again what it is I'm doing all this paperwork for at the moment ;)

All in all - a perfect weekend and not a bad way to spend Easter (even though there were no bunnies or eggs involved)...

More pretty pics of Brisbane

2008-03-26T10:40:00.003+10:00

Some more pics for you, this time during the day!

Some lovely pics of Brisbane at night!

2008-03-09T13:39:00.007+10:00

On Friday night, Gabi and I went out to Southbank (the parklands along the Brisbane river, opposite the city centre). We had a beautiful stroll through the parklands and along the artificial beach which is just gorgeous at night - felt like being in some expensive resort on a tropical island!!!

And afterwards we went for some salsa dancing on Little Stanley Street. It was heaps of fun, just a bunch of people who set up a stereo and just danced outdoors in a little square between the cafés and restaurants. It's every Friday night so I'm sure this won't be the last time for us... It's so great to salsa again, it's been a while!!! Brisbane seems to have a pretty big latin dancing scene, yay! I really want to get back into it and seeing some of these people dance... there's a lot still to learn for me!!!!

Apartment - inside :)

2008-03-04T20:37:00.004+10:00

Due to popular demand, here are some more pics of my apartment, this time the inside of it :)

The living room

The kitchen

The balcony

My bedroom

My New Apartment

2008-02-29T14:20:00.006+10:00

On Monday I finally got to move into my apartment in Taringa, a suburb south of Brisbane and close to the university. This is where I live now:

I really like the place! It's got a bedroom, a living room with attached kitchen area, bathroom, my own washing machine and a balcony. And it even has air conditioning! And it's in a great location, 1 minute from the train station to get into the city (10 minute train ride), as well as several bus stops close by to take the bus to uni.

Oh and did I mention we have a pool?! This is the view from my balcony....

I'm currently sharing the apartment with Gabi, my good friend from Germany. It's nice to have a flatmate!
So yeah, it's a great little place. I'll be staying here for the first semester, until early July, by which point I will hopefully have found a nice place of my own (not a fully furnished "student" apartment like this is!).

First Week in Australia

2008-02-20T12:44:00.004+10:00

Well here I am... at the University of Queensland, in Brisbane, Australia. To start a new PhD and a new life (kind of)!
The flight over was not too bad, except that we sat on the plane at Frankfurt airport for 3 hours waiting for de-icing and re-fueling to finish before we finally got on our way. Unfortunately that meant that I got to Singapore airport just in time to run from gate 21 to gate 18 and get straight onto my onward flight to Brisbane. No time for duty free shopping or wandering around and stretching legs. Oh well. Glad I didn't miss the connecting flight though! Other than that it was okay, Qantas is a pretty decent airline. Great inflight entertainment system and decent food.
Upon arrival in Brisbane on Friday morning (around 7am), I was picked up by my friend Liz, who's also studying at UQ, she's actually in the same lab as me, doing her PhD (on dugongs) with the same supervisor. But she started last year. I met her in New Zealand. It's a small world! Anyway, she's great and thankfully letting me stay at her place for the first week until I can move into my apartment next Monday.
So yeah, Friday morning, I arrived at 7, went home to Liz's for a shower and change, and then headed straight into uni for a first introductory lecture for new students. Then I met up with my supervisor, got a bunch of forms I need to fill in to get me started, and picked up keys to my very own office - woohoo! Well okay, I share it with 4 other postgraduate students but hey...
By about 2pm I was fading quickly and went home to relax for a while and kill some hours before going to bed at about 7pm - that's a reasonable time, right???

Saturday I returned to the airport in the morning to pick up Gabi (a good friend of mine from Germany, who's backpacking around Australia at the moment and just flew in from Melbourne). We wandered around the city of Brisbane for a bit and caught up on everything that's happened in the past 3 months.
Saturday night, Gabi, Liz and I went to see the Cat Empire live at Brisbane Riverstage. It was brilliant!! I didn't think their big Australian concerts would be as much fun as the little German ones but wow, I was way off there! It was a big outdoors venue, don't know how many people but i'd estimate maybe 5,000 or so. But they were all fairly spread out, drinking beer in the back, sitting around on the grass. Only the front part right at the stage was a bit packed.

We were in the back having a few drinks through the supporting acts and then went up to the front for the Empire so started out in about 15th row or so, but ended up working our way up to maybe 6th or 7th row.

And then we even got into second row for the last song ("Hello") because a lot of people left after the first encore.
And yeah, their show was even better than the ones I've seen so far - a lot more energy, plus they had 4 string players as well, the horns of course (made Gabi happy ;)) and a random dance routine by four dancers. It was awesome. The whole atmosphere was just great!

They played a lot more of the new album but still a fair few of the old favourites. Oh and I have new-found respect for the Wine Song. Never really liked that one that much but now that I've heard it life - wow it's a lot of fun... the whole audience swaying along and all :)

So all in all - it was AWESOME and a fantastic first night in Brisbane for me (well, technically second night but I'll just ignore the first night since I was in bed by 7pm).

Sunday we went for a trip up Mt Coot-tha (or whatever the spelling is) to enjoy the views of Brisbane and surroundings.

And then on Monday it was back to uni and to work for me. More introductory lectures (welcome lectures for international students) and lots of organisational stuff that needs to be done, like opening a bank account, filling in more forms for my enrolment and sorting out my scholarship money, meeting my supervisor to discuss funding applications and all that. There'll be more of that kinda stuff this whole week.
On the weekend I might be able to go out for a fieldtrip with the dugong researchers. That should be great - getting a first look at Moreton Bay, which is gonna be my study site too, and checking out what kinda work the dugong team does.

And then on Monday I can finally move into my apartment... looking forward to that!

So busy busy at the moment - I'll be really happy once this project is all up and running... that might take another month or two of paperwork though...

I've put some more pics of the Cat Empire concert up on Facebook so check them out!

I'm off again!!!

2008-02-14T01:47:00.003+10:00

Well, it took a bloody long time but here it is............

My VISA for Australia!!!!

I got it a week and a half ago (talk about last minute) and am now officially allowed to stay in Australia until 2012!!! Woohooo! :)

I'm flying out tonight, at 23:30 from Frankfurt to Brisbane (with a 3 hour stopover in Singapore). Flying with Qantas this time as it was the "cheapest" at such short notice (only booked the flight 2 or 3 weeks ago). So I will be arriving in Brisbane bright and early on Friday morning (the 15th), just in time for the Cat Empire concert on the 16th, yay! :)

I'll be staying with my friend Liz for the first 10 days and then moving into my apartment on the 25th. Which is where I'll be living until July - that gives me enough time to find a place of my own I really like.

On Monday (the 18th), Orientation week starts at UQ which will be the usual more or less useful/useless information sessions for new students (I'm particularly looking forward to the lecture on the Aussie way of life, entitled "Aussie Aussie Aussie Oy Oy Oy" hehe... that should be fun!) and the big parties that O-Weeks always entail.... it is definitely a bit weird to be a student and do all that stuff again (my last real O-Week was 6 years ago!)! But I'm sure I'll get right back into it! Although the Freshers are probably gonna seem veeeeery young...

Anyway, I'm off to finish packing and will be back with updates from the other side of the world soon!

Great news!

2007-12-22T21:24:00.000+10:00

Hey everyone!!!

I know, I've been terribly quiet on here lately. That's probably for the best - trust me, you wouldn't have liked to read my depressed whinging (which I seem to have done a lot of lately - ask my mom...). About how damn hard it is to get a job in my field and about certain university people keeping me waiting for a cruelly long time.

Well I'm happy to announce that all that is now over because as of two days ago, I officially hold a full scholarship to do my PhD at the University of Queensland, Brisbane!!! They are paying my entire tuition fees, health cover, plus an extra AU$ 20,000 per year for living expenses (that's € 1000 per month, not too bad ey?), for a duration of three years!!!

Weeeheee, I can't tell you how happy I am that everything is FINALLY sorted out (took bloody long enough too!)! Now I just need to get my visa and book a flight... and hopefully I'll be in Brisbane by mid-February to start my new life as a PhD student in Australia!! I can't wait!!

MERRY CHRISTMAS to you all !!!!

Ina likes to...

2007-11-02T23:49:00.000+10:00

This is a little game.... you go to google and type in "(yourname) likes to" with the quotation marks. For example "John likes to". Hit search and write down the first 10 things (or sentences) it comes up with in the page summaries. Here are mine - okay it's 15, not 10, but I only got 15 in total anyway and some of the last 5 are the funniest ;)

1. In her free time, Ina likes to read and take long walks in the wilderness. [Okay, every once in a while...]

2. Ina likes to serve it with lemon curd and fresh raspberries, but a slice with a cup of tea in the afternoon is also just fine. [hehehe... serve what now?]

3. Ina likes to drink beer. [NOOOOO, beer? ME? Never! what a shocker]

4. Ina likes to cook food for her "friends"; her friends seem to consist entirely of stone faced women and flamboyantly gay men. [lol!]

5. I guess Ina likes to party a little harder than I do ; ). [Haha, loser! ;)]

6. When time permits Ina likes to keep active by playing volleyball or doing aerobic workouts. [eh, yeah, I should...]

7. Ina likes to have fun everywhere she goes. [hell yeah!]

8. Ina likes to make someone laugh with his jokes. Everyone around Ina will be fun when Ina becomes a fluent German speaker. [hahaha... yeah really must work on my German...]

9. ina likes to walk and run, run run.... [do I??]

10. Ina likes to take recipes that she knows really well and play with them. [recipes that I know really well? um...]

11. Ina likes to undress in front of a mirror and fantasize about Bass. [who - or what?? - is Bass???]

12. INA likes to dress like a little girl but if someone laughs at her she gets depressed... [exactly! STOP LAUGHING AT ME!!! ;)]

13. Ina likes to flirt and kiss [um, me?]

14. Arrived at 3pm and already its super-packed, or what ina likes to call it, Packol ! [will definitely start using that now... any suggestions on how to pronounce it? ;)]

15. ina likes to look directly toward the camera. She keeps a straight face most of the time, but eventually you'll see a smile begin to seep into view. [if anyone manages to track down a picture of me with a straight face, you get a cookie!]

Home Sweet Home

2007-10-15T23:54:00.000+10:00

Sometimes you don't realise how beautiful your home really is - instead you go travelling all over the world and rave about all those great places when really, what you have at home is not too shabby either!

So in that spirit, Gabi, Maren and I yesterday went for a late afternoon stroll up one of the seven mountains (Siebengebirge) to the ruins of the Löwenburg, an old fortress built sometime around 1200 or so, and enjoyed the beautiful autumn views of the surrounding mountains and the Rhine river valley! Right on our doorstep!!!

Oktoberfest 2007

2007-10-15T22:35:00.000+10:00

A bit late maybe, but I just realised that I never actually posted anything about Oktoberfest... I went there (to the real one, in Munich) for the second time in my life 2 weeks ago, with my Irish friend Ronan (who also went with me the first time around, 2 years ago) as well as Gabi and Maren. We had 3 great days there and met a lot of fun people... the weather was brilliant and it was PACKED this year, my god, so much more crowded than 2 years ago - you really had to get there early in the day to get a table. In particular the party tents (the Hacker and the Schottenhamel) were usually full by about noon!

We met up with Lachie (the brother of my good Aussie friend Anna) and his mate Chris:

Generally, there were a lot of Aussies at Oktoberfest this year! As a fellow beer-drinking nation, they were definitely enjoying it :) Here are some more of the random people we met:

During the few hours we spent outside the beer tents, we had fun at a random drum session at the feet of the Bavaria statue and of course we went on the odd ride as well... But I'm not gonna lie to you.... it was all about the beer, really, and plenty of it! :)

Ein Prosit der Gemütlichkeit!!

Back home in Germany

2007-10-08T00:55:00.000+10:00

Hey all!
Sorry, I've been a little quiet since I got back home to Germany about 2 weeks ago! I guess I've just been too busy socialising! ;)
I got home just in time for my birthday (26 - my god I'm getting old!) which of course gave me a reason to have a big party with a bunch of my friends in my basement! A great way to see them all again after being away for 6 weeks! And a fun party it was - until 6am.....
Thanks to everyone who was there! Danke Euch, ich hab Euch vermisst!!!

Moose Trip to the Island - Part 2: Victoria

2007-09-21T10:27:00.000+10:00

So on Sunday... all slightly hungover... we got back on the bus to head down to Victoria, with some stops along the way again of course. The first stop was Long Beach, where our driver went for a surf while we checked out the rainforest walk and the beach. Would have been nicer if it hadn't been drizzling the entire time but hey, at least the fresh air helped to get over the hangover...

Next stop was famous Cathedral Grove, a stand of 800-year-old huge Douglas fir trees - of course a good spot for a group photo!

After a very loooong drive we did get to Victoria that night and some of us even mustered the energy to go out for a pint after the lovely dinner at a Caribbean restaurant. We were rewarded with the experience of possibly one of the most random pubs on this continent - Big Bad John's:

The next day was free to explore Victoria, quite a gorgeous city really (with some very random fun stores like the Original Christmas Village ("bringing the German christmas to you" - Erzgebirge lässt grüssen!!)):

And then it was back onto the ferry and back to Vancouver on Monday afternoon!!!
All in all - great trip! Made some new friends and already miss them all!!!

Moose Trip to the Island - Part 1: Tofino

2007-09-21T10:01:00.000+10:00

It's my last day in Canada!!!! Eeeeek!!!! Yep, I'm flying home to Germany... not sure how I feel about that. I've had a fantastic time here, it's a truly amazing place and there are still so many things I wanted to see and do around here that I didn't get a chance to do! But then again, it might be a good time to leave since the weather is just starting to get pretty nasty, it has been getting colder and more rainy the last few days and is supposed to get worse, so I guess that's it for the outdoorsy activities anyway. So not a bad time to leave and I am actually really looking forward to getting home and seeing my family and friends again - celebrating my birthday at home for a change and then heading down to Oktoberfest in 2 weeks, woohoo!

But anyway, still gotta tell you guys about my 4 day trip over to Vancouver Island on the Moose Bus last weekend! For those of you that have never heard about it, the Moose Bus is a backpacker travel network, kinda like the OzExperience or the KiwiExperience in Australia and NZ, or the Contiki Tours in Europe I suppose... basically it's a bustrip that takes you to cool places and is catered for backpackers in the 18-35 age range, ie. there's a lot of partying involved ;)...
So I got on the bus Friday morning in Vancouver and well... turns out... 80 % of my fellow travellers were Aussies!!! Obviously that made me happy! :) All really nice people too, we all got along well from the start! So we left Vancouver and took the ferry over to Nanaimo and then headed for Tofino, stopping at some nice places along the way, such as the Little Qualicum Falls:

And Sproat Lake with it's famous petroglyphs (ancient carvings in the rock):
We made it to Tofino by early Friday evening and then had a whole free day there on the Saturday.
So a bunch of us Moose peeps went on a 7 hour trip with "Remote Passages" to the famous Hot Springs - we got all kitted out in Survival Suits (not very fashionable maybe but they keep you nice and warm! I want one!) and jumped into the RIB (Rigid Inflatable Boat - I love those, so much fun! I want one of those too! ;))...
... and checked out some marine wildlife along the way: more Steller Sea Lions...
... cute little sea otters...
... and - MORE HUMPBACK WHALES! Once again my hope to spot killer whales was disappointed. Didn't even get to see a grey whale either. Just more humpies, as if I hadn't seen enough of those last weekend! But I know, I shouldn't complain... and they did do some very cool lunge-feeding, see below:
And then of course we had 2 hours to frolic around in the hot springs! They really were beautiful (and definitely quite hot), although I have to say there were just too many tourists there, considering the pools are not actually very big at all!
We got back to Tofino that night and had a few beers of course, including some DUDE - probably the number 1 choice of beer for surfers the world over ;)
... and then we went out, to Tofino's only pub/bar/club, which was a somewhat strange place alright.... was nice to have some of my fellow Moosers there!
It was a fun night for sure!

Whale Watching off Telegraph Cove

2007-09-13T09:27:00.000+10:00

A bit late maybe but I figured before I head off for this weekend's trip over to the island, I better tell you about last weekend! Well Volker decided that since we (Chris, a fellow volunteer, and I) have been spending all our days in the office, listening to killer whale calls - it would be nice to take a weekend and go and actually see those animals in real life! So as a little "thank you" he took us on a trip to the small village of Telegraph Cove on northern Vancouver Island...
... where we jumped on BC's first whale watching vessel to look for some wildlife! This is Chris, Volker and I, a little cold but happy to be out on the water:

Aside from the amazingly beautiful scenery....

... we did see a bunch of marine mammals out there! There were lots and lots of Steller Sea Lions, not only hauled out on Stubbs Island...

... but also jumping around and foraging amongst hundreds of sea birds as well as some fellow mammals such as these Pacific White-Sided Dolphins:

We also briefly glimpsed some Dall's Porpoise - another new species for me:

And then there were the Humpback Whales .... about 10 different Humpback Whales in the area! They were just swimming along, or feeding with the dolphins and sea lions, or getting harrassed by cheeky "little" sea lions (only little by comparison...).

So all in all, it was a pretty successful trip as far as marine mammals were concerned... the only thing missing to make it perfect were... of course... the killer whales!!! Bloody hell, I came all the way to Canada, the number one place in the world for killer whales research, and I still don't manage to see one!!! I think I really am cursed when it comes to them - I'm always on the wrong boat, happen to be looking the wrong way, or am there on the wrong day! Here off Telegraph Cove, they have been spotting the resident killer whales every single day for the last couple of weeks, except of course for the one day that I was there. The day after we were there they actually saw transient killer whales (the less predictable, so less commonly spotted mammal-eating type), and the day before we were there.... wait for it.... they saw OFFSHORES!!! For those of you who don't know anything about killer whales, the offshores are a little known third type (in addition to the commonly seen resident fish eaters and the transient mammal eaters), that - as the name suggests - live pretty far offshore and are only ever seen very very rarely when they happen to come a bit closer to land. And when I'm there, we don't even spot a single bloody resident (the oh so predictable ones). Don't get me wrong, it was a fantastic trip none-the-less, but I'm starting to suspect that killer whales are these mythical creatures that don't actually exist in real life... they are just an invention by the researchers here (sorry Volker ;)) so they can make up some cool studies with really amazing results and make all the rest of us cetacean researchers jealous. ".... and we shall call them.... "KILLER WHALES".... yeah that sounds awesome!!! Oh and how about we make some of them hunt porpoises and seals, how exciting would that be...." yeah right....

Moving swiftly on to a completely different topic: after our great whale watching day on Saturday, we spent Sunday on a close by island in Alert Bay, home of the world's tallest totem pole: -->
Pretty cool, hey? It's 56.4m tall...

Also, they have a really good museum in Alert Bay with a huge collection of masks that are used by the First Nations people during their big feasts. It's really worth seeing if any of you ever happen to be in this neck of the woods.

Steller Sea Lions

2007-09-06T05:56:00.000+10:00

Yesterday evening, we had a work BBQ at UBC's Open Water Research Station. This is a facility where they keep three female Steller Sea Lions who are trained to perform certain research tasks. They are pretty lucky animals compared to the ones kept at the aquarium, because these guys actually get to go out for swims in the open water of the bay - mostly because for a lot of the diving physiology research the sea lions have to be diving in deeper water. But they are well trained enough to always return to the boat. Well almost always anyway... apparently every once in a while - usually during breeding season - one of the females just swims off and disappears...

So we got to meet the three sea lion ladies. This is Sitka, a fully grown female:

A wet, sloppy sea lion kiss for me...
Yummy fish...
They sure are big animals!
And lastly, Bonnie demonstrates the harness they wear when they are out in the open water - allows you to attach tags, depth meters and all sorts of other scientific equipment to them.

Kayaking / Camping in the Islands

2007-09-05T06:10:00.000+10:00

Hey all!

Well I'm back at work after an amazing long weekend which I spent kayaking and camping in the Southern Gulf Islands with Becca!
On Friday morning I took the ferry from Horseshoe Bay on the mainland over to Nanaimo on Vancouver Island.

In Nanaimo I caught up with Dusty, one of the theatre guys we had met 2 weeks ago in Vancouver. I got a backstage tour of the theatre he works in (as stage carpenter/ technician), and - as drunkenly promised 2 weeks ago - I got a ride on his Harley!! Okay, at 140 km/h on the highway, it's surely not the most comfortable way of traveling... but hell it is fun!!! And I can now say that I've taken a spin on a hog! Pretty cool, hey?

Later Becca caught up with us in Nanaimo and Dusty gave us a lift down to Victoria, stopping on the way to have dinner with Mike, another one of the theatre guys.

From Victoria, Becca and I took the ferry over to Mayne Island on Saturday morning and there we rented a double kayak and paddled down to Cabbage Island, a small uninhabited island that can only be reached by boat and has nothing on it aside from 6 campsites. It's about 15 km from Mayne to Cabbage Island and took us about 3 hours - pretty good time I reckon! It was definitely a workout, but quite enjoyable thanks to the lovely scenery around!

Still, we were quite happy when we were finally approaching Cabbage Island which is just on the other side of Tumbo Island, the one in this picture:
We found a gorgeous campsite on Cabbage, set up camp and were rewarded for the day's hard work with a lovely sunset:
The following morning I woke up around dawn. The tide was really far out and it was just one of those lovely quiet early morning moments you can only get when you're out camping in the middle of nowhere!
I watched the sun rise over America (these islands are really close to the Canada-USA border)...... and then saw some wild deer on the beach - they must have swum over from one of the bigger islands!
We had a great breakfast of french toast with homemade maple sirup, courtesy of our friendly fellow campers Larry and Dave, and then went for a ride with them in their RIB to look for whales (no we weren't just being lazy, we just wouldn't have had the time to do that by kayak since we still had to paddle the 3 hours back to Mayne and then catch the afternoon ferry back to Vancouver...):
Well we didn't find any killer whales (boooo!) but did see a few harbour porpoise, including this mother and calf pair...
... and a lot of seals just off East Point (Saturna Island):
So that was fun, in spite of the lack of orcas around, and we left Cabbage Island behind...... and kayaked back to Mayne Island where we returned our little green kayak and caught the afternoon ferry back to Vancouver. We were joined once again by Larry and Dave who had discovered a new favourite hobby of theirs the previous day: ferry surfing! They were surfing and jumping over the wake behind the ferry in their little motorboat - it was quite hilarious! Crazy Canadians!
We got back to Vancouver just in time to shower and have another yummy dinner at Rugby's before Becca had to be at the airport to fly home to England. I miss her already!!!

The Bridge and the Mountain

2007-08-28T04:48:00.001+10:00

After it started of cloudy and rainy, yesterday turned into a nice day afterall. When the sky started to clear around noon I decided to go ahead with my plan of touristy exploring which I almost threw overboard in the morning since it looked rather shitty then. So I took the bus north for my first stop at Capilano Suspension Bridge. As the name suggests, this is a huge suspension bridge across Capilano canyon. It was opened around 1890 from what I remember... and it's not scary at all for someone like me who's afraid of heights, of course not:

Well I made it across in spite of some scary wobbling going on... on the other side you are rewarded by nice boardwalks through a rainforest, including some up in the tree tops:
And a few pretty little forest lakes:

About 20 minutes further on from Capilano Bridge you get to another one of Vancouver's tourist attractions: Grouse Mountain! For a "bargain" of 32$ (the joys of touristy areas!!) you can take the cable car up to the top:
In winter this is a ski resort but in the summer there's some good hiking and some stuff to look at, including 2 Grizzly Bears that were found as orphaned cubs and are now held in an enclosure here:
Also you can hike all the way to the peak: Pass some deserted ski lifts on the way...
... and are rewarded with some amazing views of Vancouver and the surrounding area:
Oh yeah, and then there is the "World Famous Lumberjack Show":
... very random, that one! So after a nice dinner it was time for the gondola back down. Not a bad Sunday afterall!!! :)

Touristy Stuff

2007-08-25T12:50:00.000+10:00

It has been a tough day at the office... We managed to finally get the Matlab script we've been working on up and running: The program now gives me a spectrogram image of the call I'm analysing, asks me to select a section of background noise near it, then automatically calculates the strength of the signal, ie. how much louder the call is compared to the background noise. That allows me to select only clear enough calls for further analysis. It's quite cool what you can do with Matlab, really, with a bit of patience and trial and error programming (yes, I'm actually programming, hope you're reading this Markus!! ;))
Anyway, so since we got it all working really well this morning, we decided to take the rest of the day off and start weekend early: Volker took us (me and his other visiting student, Chris from Austria) to the Vancouver Aquarium. As you all know, I'm not a huge fan of aquariums and would never give them money but well, Volker wanted to introduce us to some of the scientists that work down there plus he got us in for free... Still felt a bit iffy watching those Belugas in their rather small tank - not so nice. Although it was cool to see the big male blow some perfect bubblerings under water. Then there was a pool with some Pacific Whitesided Dolphins which I'd never seen before so they were interesting to see from a marine mammal nerd point of view (they look really amazingly similar to the Dusky's I've been working with in New Zealand), but again, I'm not happy about seeing them in a pool!! At least I was pleasantly surprised to learn that they don't actually have Killer Whales on display here anymore - apparently they have finally learnt here that Orcas are probably the cetacean species least able to cope with captivity, mostly because they have such a tight social system in the wild. So not only are they being put in a small pool, but they're also taken away from their family (who they would normally spend their entire lives with) so they tend to get quite neurotic in captivity - I mean how would you feel?! Anyway, I was quite happy to leave the marine mammal section of the aquarium. The rest of it, I have to admit, is actually really really well done! There's a huge area for kids to explore and learn stuff about fish and other marine animals with interactive games, some really clever ones. Also I loved the jellyfish exhibit, where they have 4 tanks with moon jellies in each phase of their life, from tiiiiny little polyps to just as tiny little polyp buds floating around, to miniture versions of the final jelly medusa (we're talking 3-4 millimeters diameter - quite cute really!) to the final big moon jellies. Very cool. And some really pretty other jelly fish as well. So yeah, I did enjoy the non-mammal part of the aquarium very much. In the end we got a private tour around the sea lion research facility and got to meet (and feed) 3 of their trained female Steller sea lions that they study all sorts of physiological things on, like their respiration rates, dive times etc. Those sea lions are big animals, I tell you... compared to your average harbour seal anyway...

After the aquarium I figured I'll spend the rest of the afternoon in Stanley Park since I was there already (the aquarium is in the park). Now if any of you have been to Vancouver before, you'll know this, but I was blown away by how BIG this park is!!! I thought New York's Central Park was big but gosh it has nothing on Stanley Park! It's a full blown forest reserve right next to the downtown centre of a major city - you could get lost in there, wander around for a whole day and not see it all, it's crazy! I walked around for 2 hours and was just amazed... it's just amazing that they have managed to keep a park that size right there on part of that very limited space that downtown Vancouver has on the peninsula, without the city expanding into it.... walking through the forest you'd hardly know you're this close to a city of millions... You can tell, I'm very impressed and could go on for ages, but I think I better shut up and show you some pictures instead ;).... oh and I also saw a family of raccoons in there, yay!! See pics below...

Last Weekend

2007-08-23T12:09:00.001+10:00

I promised you guys the stories from last weekend (entitled "Becca and Ina's random nights out in Vancouver") - so here we go...

Friday night we started with a great dinner at a place called "Rugby" on Broadway - if you're ever in Vancouver, go there! It took us forever to decide what to get because everything sounded so yummy, so in the end we went for some fish dishes that were just fantastic! Actually, maybe that wasn't on Friday.... don't really remember what night we went to Rugby's but doesn't really matter - it's fabulous anyway!
On Friday I think we were wedging with some crap microwave food and pre-drinks at my place
for a while, before heading out to the downtown area of Vancouver. We had no idea where to go so we just went for the main street up (Granville) and walked along it to see what we could find. Well there were plenty of bars but all had huge line ups outside and considering it was already 11pm (yep it took us a while to get going that night) we didn't really feel like standing in line. So finally we found this pub on a corner - half empty, but no line - so we had some cider there. And some random shots I believe. Then wandered on a bit and ended up in a backpacker bar but were kicked out of that one about 15 minutes later for a fire alarm. The fire fighters showed up eating pizza and not really looking too worried so I'm guessing it was just a false alarm. At that point Becca met some people that she knew from her trip to Whistler a few days before so we tagged along with them to another place that only had a short line and where there was a dancefloor (yay!!). There was some dancing for a while and then things go slightly blurry in my memory (too much drink and not enough food). I do remember that there was a random guy wearing only his briefs (camouflage coloured) - don't ask me why he had taken his trousers off, I honestly have no idea - who ambushed Becca and me looking for some snogging.... we managed to get away, luckily... Anyway, it was a late night, we didn't get home till about 4am after the club had closed and Becca finally gotten rid of her Scottish (or Irish??) admirer... So naturally we passed out and didn't get out of bed until about noon so the big plans we had to do all sorts of fun touristy stuff on saturday kinda fell through.

We did manage to go for a nice walk around Granville Island on Saturday which helped a little to soothen the hangover and at about 3pm were capable of having a shandy at a little restaurant/bar with lovely views of Burrard Bridge and downtown Vancouver...

We decided to have a somewhat more quiet night that night so we could actually get up at a reasonable time on Sunday and go do some stuff. So we went to "Feenie's" for dinner (which was also very good, and there are some hot waiters working there ;)) - and then headed back to Granville Island to go see the "Theatresports" improv comedy show. That was really really good, so I will have to go back one of these days to catch their other show, "The Improvised Works of Bill Shakespeare"... As I said, we were planning a quiet night so the idea was to go home after the theatre... Well since we were about 20 minutes early for our show, we went next door to the "Backstage Lounge" for a quick drink, only to find out that they had a live SKA band playing!! Well you can't really go to sleep if there's live ska music, now can you??! So obviously we returned after the theatre for some dancing. Then we met a bunch of people that were all in town for a theatre conference (I think we were the only non-theatre people in the place) and they were all a lot of fun... so we drank and danced and laughed with them until they closed the bar on us.... and then we drank and laughed some more outside on the pier.... until we decided we were probably a bit loud so should go back to their hotel maybe.... which we did (after a de-tour by my place to pick up the remaining rum and gin) and next thing we knew, it was 7am when we decided to go home!!! These guys were just so much fun to talk to, very down to earth, artsy/rocker type guys in their 40s-50s and there was nothing at all sleezy or suggestive going on, which was really nice! Oh and one of them promised us a ride on his Harley across Vancouver Island in two weeks when we plan to go over there for the weekend!!!! Lets see if he actually comes through but he's the kinda guy that probably will be standing there with his bike when we get off the ferry so .... I'm not usually a fan of motorbikes but a free Harley ride across the island?? When all the other tourists get on the bus and I can say "See you in Tofino folks, my ride is over here...." hehehe, hell yeah! Dennis, if you're reading this, I bet you hate me now - SORRY! :-P
Didn't take any pics that night but here's the site where it all happened: The black building is the Backstage Lounge. And the pier we were standing on is right under that blue-white pavillion, under the Canadian flag:

So anyway, went to bed at about 7am on Sunday, didn't get up until about 2:30pm so, as you may have guessed, again no sightseeing for us.... We did however do a dinner cruise around the harbour that night which was lovely:
There you go, that was last weekend's fun stories... I feel the coming one will be more quiet without Becca here (she's gone off to tour around the Rockies / Banff area). But that's fine with me, could do with some time off the booze...

Vancouver Pics

2007-08-21T10:34:00.000+10:00

Hey all!
Well it has been a busy first week in Vancouver for me!!!
Got in on Tuesday, started work on Wednesday and on Wednesday evening, Becca arrived from England so of course we spent the evenings and the weekend together and got up to all sorts of craziness...
Well first, here are a few random pics of Vancouver:

It's quite pretty, really, and the weather has been really good most of the time!
Work is really cool too, Volker (my boss) is very nice - am actually going to a barbeque at his place tonight to meet some more uni people. My job here is to analyze killer whale calls. In a nutshell, we're trying to show whether transient killer whales, who hunt mammals such as seals or porpoises call less and more quietly than resident killer whales who eat fish (salmon mostly) which can't hear them anyway so they can call as loud as they want and not warn their prey. So I'm spending my days at the computer, measuring the source level of these transient calls. It's quite interesting and I'm learning heaps about MATLAB, a useful little computer program - but I won't bore you by going into any more detail...
You'll probably find my stories of my first weekend partying in Vancouver with Becca much more interesting... there definitely are some random stories to tell there... But that will have to wait till next time cause I'm done with work for today and going home now!

Vancouver... and the joys of travelling...

2007-08-15T04:45:00.000+10:00

Yesterday I arrived in Vancouver after a lovely 1.5 hour flight from Calgary with gorgeous views of the Rocky Mountains...

I moved into my home away from home for the next 5 weeks, a small but cozy one-room apartment with balcony about halfway between downtown Vancouver and the University of British Columbia where I'll be working.
I've also met my boss Volker who is really nice and have had a look around my neighbourhood - it's really beautiful here, especially since it's hot and sunny out!! So I really enjoyed my first day here in Vancouver.

Unfortunately the same cannot be said about my first night.... went to bed early to be well rested for my first day of work, only to wake up at about 1am because my hand was itching like crazy.... I kinda knew what was coming at that point, after my Airlie Beach experience earlier this year.... and sure enough, when I turned the light on and gave my mattress a thorough inspection I found this lovely little guy:

A f***ing bed bug - AGAIN!!!! Why me??? Aaaaaaah.... So I went down to reception and got to move to a different room (at 1:30am, how fun) - where I actually slept reasonably well after a while of lying there paranoid and feeling itchy all over my body... Then this morning I threw all my clothes that had come into contact with the bed into the laundry right away and sorted out that I could stay in this new room and yeah all of that made me about an hour late for my first day of work - brilliant! But Volker was very understanding about the bed bug situation, apparently that seems to be a common problem here lately!

Anyway, am at work now so should better get back to familiarising myself with MATLAB - the two of us will become best buddies over the next few weeks, I fear...
Will give you more details about my work in a few days when I've gotten the hang of things!

White Water Rafting and Hiking

2007-08-14T09:18:00.001+10:00

I'm back from a weekend of outdoorsy fun in the Rocky Mountains!!

On Saturday morning, Tara, two friends of her's (Lynn and Pam) and I drove across the border into BC where we went rafting with Wildwater Adventures on the Kicking Horse River. It was a great 1.5 hour trip through 14 grade 4-5 rapids. We had heaps of fun and got quite wet (4°C mountain river water... brrrrr) but managed not to fall out or flip the boat or anything like that. It was awesome!
After that we drove on to Lake Louise:

And then on to Banff where Tara, Pam and I spent the night.
After an interesting night out in Banff (strange little mountain town overrun with tourists) we hit the "C Level Cirque"-Trail for 3 hours of hiking up and back down part of Cascade mountain. It was a gorgeous trail through the woods that eventually leads up to a rocky plateau kind of area with amazing views.
Once we got out of the woods and onto the rocky area we sat down for a muesli bar lunch and were quickly joined by some very nosy and very cute chipmunks :)
I could have sat there and watched them for hours but we still had the climb to the top ahead of us:
And then of course the long way back down.....
It was a really nice hike and just felt good to be out in the fresh mountain air and getting some exercise!!
Afterwards Tara and I went back to Banff and did the number 1 tourist thing to do there: Take the Gondola up the mountain for some more amazing views of Banff:
So now I'm back in Calgary for one more night and tomorrow morning it's on to Vancouver to finally do some work again!!

Cowboys and Stewardesses (sorry, flight attendants!)

2007-08-11T09:07:00.000+10:00

Okay so here's my Calgary nightlife review!

It all started off a bit slow last night... We went to the Ranchman first, which is a huge country bar - you probably all know how I feel about country so I was a little worried about this, but it actually was a really fun place! A bunch of cowboys, a mechanical bull, free shots for us (ladies night!) and a big dance floor... Well at least I can see how it can be lots of fun on a busy night cause it was a little empty last night. I guess Thursday nights are not big for going out here. So we had a few drinks there - I sampled a local beer called Grasshopper and was pleasantly surprised - and then moved on to a Newfy Bar. Well that was the plan anyway, Tara wanted to show me a place where all the Newfoundlanders in the area go, which apparently is worth checking out as a cultural experience.... So we parked in a parking lot a little down the road and then discovered that the bar was actually closed (Thursday nights really aren't good). When we got back to the car and were contemplating where to try next, this other car pulls up next to us with two guys in it that were not exactly bad looking... So naturally we informed them that this bar was closed and asked where they were heading and after a little chat we all went to an Irish pub downtown together and spent the rest of the evening there. It was a good place, good drinks and live music and actually somewhat full of people and we had a really fun conversation with these two guys that turned out to be flight attendants!! I know what you're all thinking now, but no, they were not gay! Actually Tara tells everyone that they were construction workers cause that's what they are doing at the moment and she thinks that sounds a lot more manly ;). But I'm sticking with the flight attendant story (which is what they're trained in and have been doing for years) because that's way more interesting and a first for me ;). I can honestly say I've never met a male flight attendant before (well other than when they were serving me on the plane obviously) and I definitely have never seen one before that wasn't flamingly gay.... So anyway, what started a bit slow turned into quite a fun night and I have to say, there's definitely no shortage of good-looking guys in Calgary! I really like this city! :)
No photos of last night, sorry, but maybe I'll get some tonight.

Tomorrow we're heading a few hours outside of Calgary to go white water rafting (YAY!) and then spend the rest of the weekend in Banff, doing some hiking and such. So it'll be a few days before I get around to updating you guys again but I'm sure you'll survive :).
Have a good weekend!!

Calgary

2007-08-10T02:29:00.000+10:00

I'm in love!

I have only been here for a day (and a grey, rainy day, too!) but already Calgary has jumped onto my list of my 10 favourite cities in the world!!

1. London, UK
2. Köln (Cologne), Germany - I've gotta show a little bit of patriotism, right?!
3. Melbourne, Australia
4. Firenze (Florence), Italy
5. Barcelona, Spain
6. Venezia (Venice), Italy
7. Calgary, Canada
8. Brisbane, Australia

Okay, so it's just 8 actually. Can't think of any others that really stood out from the crowd. Maybe Vancouver will join this list in the next month, we'll see!

Anyway, back to Calgary - maybe it's just the contrast to New York that makes me really appreciate this city. Calgary is a big (and growing) city too, but it's nowhere near as dirty, loud, crowded and hectic as New York. It's right by a river, which has that gorgeous turquoise colour that only Canadian rivers can have (looks a bit grey in the pic because of the crap weather but in sunlight it must be gorgeous):

Then there's this mall right downtown, called Stephen Avenue, which is a pedestrian street lined with really cute Canadian heritage buildings:

And last but not least, there's Prince Island in the river, just off the downtown area of Calgary, which is a gorgeous park to wander around in, with lots of different coloured squirrels:

I really enjoyed walking around the city and Prince Island for a few hours today even though it was grey and hazy and looked like it was gonna rain again any minute now (it didn't though)! I can only imagine how lovely this place must be when the sun is shining!

And tonight I will sample the Calgary nightlife and get back to you with my review in the next few days... :)

Sex and the City - Tour of New York!

2007-08-09T07:47:00.001+10:00

On my last afternoon in New York yesterday, I couldn't resist doing the 3.5 hour Sex and the City Tour... And I'm glad I did it cause it was SO MUCH FUN! We spent most of the time on the bus driving past around 40 locations from the show and watching the corresponding scenes on the bus tv screens, with some fun background infos from our guide. We also made several stops along the way where we got off the bus.

So here are some of the sites we saw:

The Plaza - where Big has his engagement party...

The Paris cinema where Carrie goes on her date with the city and sees "Joy for two" for one...

The church where Samantha meets the sexy priest...

Pleasure Chest......

...... where you can buy LOTS of different vibrators, including of course "the Rabbit"

Pastis (front left) - where Carrie had a date with Alexandre Petrovski and the Soho House (in the back) where Samantha fakes an English accent to get entry to the fabulous rooftop pool...

The door to Sam's apartment in the Meatpacking District

The hatch that Sam fell into when Smith tried to hold her hand...

The restaurant where Carrie runs into Aiden and his parents

The playground where Miranda takes Bradie and trips over the pram when Steve and Debbie show up

Steve's bar "Scout" (in real live O'Nieals).....

.....where we had Cosmopolitans - of course!Sushi Samba - where Samantha throws her Dirty Martini at Richard Wright, the Dirty Bastard!

Eleven Madison - where Carrie and Big meet for lunch and he tells her that he's engaged!

And of course.... The steps to Carrie's apartment in Perry Street

More New York Impressions

2007-08-09T07:24:00.001+10:00

Some more pictures from my next day in New York:

Grand Central Station & Chrysler Building

Grand Central Station

Empire State Building

Ground Zero - site of the World Trade Center. It's quite amazing to see that huge open space in the middle of a city that is otherwise so crowded, and to know what happened here....

The Statue of Liberty - seen from Battery Park

The Peace Sphere - a sculpture symbolising Peace, that had been in the World Trade Center for decades before 9/11. It was damaged but recovered from the rubble and now stands in Battery Park

New York, New York

2007-08-06T22:55:00.000+10:00

Well I've made the first step of my trip, got into New York JFK around noon on Saturday, and after the longest immigrations queue EVER (took over an hour before it was my turn to hand over my passport, get my picture and fingerprints taken and get interrogated whether I'm really sure that I'm definitely not going to plan any terrorist attack on America while I'm here - after that queue I wasn't so sure anymore... ;)) I got picked up by Allison, my former roommate from Miami and was on my way to Manhattan! Alli has an awesome apartment on 20th St and 7th Ave which is really close to everything (and has a view of the Empire State Building)! So it's great to be able to stay with her!!! We also met up with my brother who happens to be in the city as well for a few days!

After a first drive around the city on the way back from the airport and a bit of relaxing and catching up with Allison, we went out on Saturday night to see the Broadway musical Hairspray! It was really fun with catchy 60's music, colourful outfits, good jokes and some really great stage settings!

Then yesterday we spent several hours walking all over Manhattan, from Central Park down 5th Avenue, past Rockefeller Centre and Times Square, to Union Square and Madison Square Park where the cool Flatiron Building is and around Greenwich Village and to the famous Magnolia Bakery where we had to stand in line for about 40 mins in the heat just to buy some cupcakes!!! They are good cupcakes though....

All in all I must say, there's lots of cool stuff to see and do here (and some great shopping which I shall explore more today), but I could not possibly spend more than a few days in this city, let alone live here..... It is unbelievably dirty (even for a big city) and run down and there's garbage lying around at every corner and oh my god, the SMELL is just horrendous (probably not helped by the fact that it's around 30°C hot at the moment... I'm not a huge fan of big cities in general but this one is worse than most I've seen for dirt and smell and bad air. So yeah, I'm really enjoying the time here, but I won't be very sorry to leave on Wednesday - can't wait for hiking around the Canadian mountains with Tara next weekend, that'll be just what my lung needs after 5 days here...

Anyway, time to go explore some more!!

Applications are finally DONE! (for now anyway)

2007-07-31T19:35:00.001+10:00

Hey all!

I've been a bit quiet lately. That's because I've been really busy with those stupid applications for the PhD and funding. It's just been getting so frustrating!!! Basically, most of the applications for research funding (from places like SeaWorld, the Australian government, the port authorities, etc) were due around June so I've had them in for a while. By now I've heard back from them and guess what, they don't want to fund me because I don't have a 3-year-scholarship yet which would guarantee that my tuition and living expenses are paid for (and that way they could be sure I'm not gonna run out of money after 1 year and drop the whole project). BUT the application deadline for that scholarship is not until August so how on Earth am I supposed to already have a scholarship at this stage???? Of course I'm applying for it but I'm guessing I won't find out until some time in Sept-Oct the earliest! So DUH of course I don't have a scholarship yet, and that's why they denied my funding requests. I can tell you, the whole begging for money business is SO FRUSTRATING!

So now it seems like the whole plan depends on whether I get this 3-year-scholarship or not. Because if not, apparently I also won't be able to get any other funding later. No pressure at all! Well I found another scholarship from a German foundation which would pay 1400 € a month for 2 years so that's at least a pretty good back-up if I don't get the Australian one. Well both of those scholarship applications, as well as the PhD application for the university were due today and tomorrow so that's what I've been working on for the last few weeks, to make them as good as possible so that I have a good shot at that scholarship.... it's just that there's a lot of competition for it. But I've finally got them all finished and sent off yesterday - PHEW thank god. Now it's just wait, keep fingers crossed and hope for the best that I get the 3-year-scholarship or if not, then at least the other one. If I do, then I can go back to looking for research funding (hopefully there will be some organisations that have deadlines around this time of year too and not only in the summer).

If I don't get it, then I'm basically screwed. That would pretty much be the end of that PhD plan. So as a Plan B, I'm intending to do really really good work at this job in Canada starting 2 weeks from today, and make a really good impression with the guy I work for and then talk to him whether maybe he might have an opening for a PhD in his research group.... It wouldn't be Australia but hey, working with killer whale acoustics has always been my dream so from the work point of view that would be a MUCH more interesting PhD so it's definitely a good Plan B even if it doesn't take me back to Australia.

So once again, it is all up in the air - where I'll be next year and what I'll be doing there.... who knows. Sometimes I wish I had a "normal" life like most of my friends, where I could go to work every morning, GET PAID (that must be nice!), come home to a lovely man, plan my wedding and how many kids I want to have, buy a house because I know I'll actually still be in the same country next year....
Oh well, I still have the tiny glimmer of hope that my life will sort itself out eventually! :)

Summer has finally returned!!

2007-07-16T18:33:00.000+10:00

Yay, the sun has finally come out again after about a month of continuous rain and crappy weather!!! Of course we all immediately converged on Tinka's garden yesterday to chill in the sun with some cold beers and punch and play in the pool and throw some meat on the barbie! We really have a tough life ;)! Now all we need is a soccer world cup and life would be perfect!! :) I think everyone in Germany would agree that last year was the best summer in history - gorgeous weather coupled with the world cup and the excitement that gripped the whole country for a few months... Seems like this year everyone tends to sit in the sun with their beer and think "Hmm, a Germany - Argentina game would be great right now"... Oh well, can't have it all! That was a fun time though:

Other than chilling in the sun, I'm still working on my PhD application which I need to send off in the next 2 weeks. I've got most of the stuff together now, just the research proposal needs some more editing. And once I'm done with that, it's off to CANADA in 3 weeks!! I can't wait!! Although it would be nice if I knew I had a place to stay in Vancouver... was supposed to house-sit for someone but that fell through so now I'm a bit stranded... Problem is that it's high season in Vancouver and lots of things are already booked plus everything is quite expensive. And all the people I know around there live a bit too far from the university so staying with any of them would mean a 2-3 hour commute every day... Oh well, I'll find something in the end, it's just something else to keep me occupied for a while, hunting for a place to stay for 5 and a half weeks in Vancouver....... so if anyone knows anything - LET ME KNOW! :)

Last week's shenanigans - continued

2007-07-12T00:49:00.000+10:00

On Saturday we went to the Rheinkultur, a huge, free festival, featuring mostly German bands in the Rheinaue (the park along the banks of the Rhein river) in Bonn. It was celebrating it's 25th year with a record number of almost 200,000 people there!!! And the hugely popular German hip-hop band Die Fantastischen 4 was playing as headliners (who apparently were celebrating their own birthday as their very first live show ever had been that very day 18 years ago)! We had a great day there, especially since the sun finally came out again after about 3 weeks of continuous rain... maybe there is a festival god afterall... ;)

Sunday was a day off that we spent bludging in front of the TV with some Sex and the City DVDs and then Monday, Anna's last night here, we went out again, this time to Carpe Noctem, another fun club in Bonn. Then yesterday I took her back to the airport (Frankfurt Hahn, in the middle of NOWHERE, thanks to stupid Ryanair), and now I've returned to the more quiet life of writing research proposals and funding requests....

Last week's shenanigans

2007-07-11T23:53:00.000+10:00

Hi all!
So my party twin has returned home to Sweden and I am recovering from a week of dancing, drinking and all sorts of fun and games! I think I'm getting old - 4 nights of partying in a week was not uncommon at all back in my Townsville days and I still managed to go to classes during the day, get all assignments done in time, write paper after paper and get decent grades! And now, after one week, I feel like I need another week to recover, and we didn't even do much during the days!! Ah well, it was worth it though: SO MUCH FUN!!! :-D

We started off with the infamous N8Schicht on Wednesday night: a small, dirty and smelly club in Bonn that plays the same shitty 70s, 80s, and 90s songs every Wednesday night and you can really only handle the whole experience by getting drunk (which thankfully is quite easy thanks to the 4€ bottles of horrible cheap sparkling wine....) - but for some reason it's always great fun and we keep coming back.... kinda like "Bullies" in Townsville (the OLD Bullies that is, before the make-over!!)...

Then on Friday night we had a Cocktail Party at my place which turned into the best party of the year, so far, in my humble opinion anyway :)
About 20 of my friends turned up and we made full use of the bar, I can tell you that much....

I believe the Drunkest Person of the Night - Award goes to Maren! Well done you! ;) Although really she wasn't that far ahead of everyone else....

I just have to say: I LOVE MY FRIENDS!!!!
THANKS to all of you who came - it was a brilliant night!
Ihr seid die Besten, danke danke danke!!!

And just so everyone knows: There will have to be a repeat the weekend after my birthday (Sept 25) so mark your calendars!

The Party Twins reunite again!

2007-07-03T23:24:00.000+10:00

Yay, my Swedish party twin Anna is coming to visit tomorrow! As most of you probably know, she was my best friend back in our Townsville days and we were always seen out dancing and getting up to all sorts of mischief together. So after a while people started refering to us as "The Party Twins". Here at the dive club's Hippie Pub Crawl in 2003 (and yes my tongue is blue...):

But, in spite of all the time we spent NOT studying, we still managed to graduate in 2004:

Since then we've caught up in Sweden and Germany a few times, including for Karneval earlier this year:

So yeah, tomorrow she's coming down for a week so that should be good fun! :)
We have a cocktail party planned for Friday and I'm sure there'll be another one or two nights out as well, doing what we do best... :)

Canada Flights

2007-06-29T21:01:00.001+10:00

Yay, I finally booked my flights to Canada!!!

I'll be flying to New York first on August 4th to visit Allison, my old roomie from back in the Miami days (2000-2002) - that was us back then:

It's already been almost 2 years again since I last saw her so it'll be great to catch up and also spend some time in NYC...

Then on August 8th I'm flying on to Calgary to catch up with Tara - a good friend from uni in Townsville who I also haven't seen since 2 years ago when she came to visit me at home in Germany and survived a classic Wednesday night at the infamous N8Schicht (bad cheap bubbly and all) with a bunch of my friends:

So yay, can't wait to see her again either!!

And then it's on to Vancouver on the 14th of August to work on killer whale acoustics for ~6 weeks (and also see Jody and Nick again who I worked with in Kaikoura, New Zealand for a month in 2006 - yay!).

It's brilliant to have friends all over the world!! Although it does make scheduling flights slightly more difficult when you have to factor in several stops on the way to catch up with everyone you know on that continent! ;)

Keeping busy otherwise

2007-06-27T20:29:00.002+10:00

What else am I doing when I'm not writing funding applications for the PhD?

Well I'm also working on getting a second publication out of my Masters thesis. My first one was published earlier this year in the Journal of the Marine Biological Association of the UK (JMBA) and can be found online here (hope the link works). So I hope to follow up with another one sometime soon.

Other than that I have plans to go to Canada (Vancouver) in August for about 6-7 weeks to work for a killer whale project there. My job will be to analyse orca acoustic data on the computer - should be really fun and I'm sure I'll be learning loads! So I'm really looking forward to that! I'll be coming back to Germany in time for my birthday (and Oktoberfest ;)) - and then we'll see what happens. Hopefully by then I'll know more about my PhD applications.

PhD plans

2007-06-27T20:10:00.000+10:00

Latest update:
At the moment I'm at home in Germany for a while. I got back from Australia in February where I was working for 5 months at a dolphin research project in Monkey Mia, Shark Bay, Western Australia. After that I travelled around a litte to catch up with old friends, and I also stopped by the University of Queensland in Brisbane to talk to people about a possible PhD project. That was very successful, I found 2-3 professors who are interested in (co-)supervising me and setting up a project with me so if all goes well I should be able to start my PhD down there in January/February 2008.
Basically our project will be a baseline study of the bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus) in Moreton Bay (just off Brisbane) and it will hopefully be the start of a long-term study. We'll be focusing on the foraging ecology and population structure of the dolphins there. In a nutshell: The bottlenose dolphin population in the bay seems to be separated into sub-groups by their foraging strategy. Some of the dolphins feed on the discards behind prawn trawling ships while others don't. And then there's also a few dolphins who get hand-fed by tourists at a resort on one of the islands. So I'll be looking at these groupings more closely, using genetics to find out whether there really is such a partitioning happening, whether those groups are genetically different, whether maybe it is certain family-lines that feed behind trawlers, ie. certain dolphin mom's that teach this practice to their calves... Also we'll be looking at how the different groups use the Bay (ie. where they can be found), how they are impacted by human activities, and there'll probably also be an acoustics part to the study where we're looking at differences in the acoustic behaviour between the different groups.

So yeah basically we're just trying to get an idea of how many dolphins live in the bay, whether there are distinct sub-groups and how they interact with each other and with humans. I think it's gonna be a good study, it sounds really exciting anyway! :) But, as with all research, it all depends on actually having the funding to do what you want to do so at the moment I'm using my free time at home to write research proposals and requests for funding. And there's also all the paperwork that goes with the application for the university and trying to get a scholarship to pay for my tuition fees (which are quite ridiculously high for international students). So keep your fingers crossed everyone that we'll find some people that want to give us money to study these animals!

What am I doing here??

2007-06-27T19:57:00.000+10:00

Hi all!

I figured maybe it was time I got into the whole blogging business... Well so far I've always sent out those huge mass emails to keep all my friends and family updated (because they are scattered all over the world). But I don't really want to spam your inboxes too much so I figured if I keep a blog instead, I can update it whenever there's something to tell and you guys can go and check what I'm up to whenever you feel like it. So basically, I don't want to force all those random stories about my latest antics on you anymore but if you're interested you can come here and read them! :) Plus I can post photos right here to go with the stories.

So I hope that makes everyone happy and I'll try to update this thing somewhat regularly, at least if there's something exciting to tell! Oh and I'm not quite sure how all this works yet so bear with me while I get a hang of all the formatting options and all that!

Love,
Ina