Experiences

Over the last week, I've had several experiences that I'd like to share with you.

1.  Pizza!  Pizza is available EVERYWHERE in this town: most sit-down restaurants (if it's not called pizza, it's called flammkuchen), something similar in the bakeries, and at every kebap house.  We have an Italian friend who refuses to call most pizza here in Jena pizza (he's cool with it if they call it flammkuchen however), but will bestow the honor at two places in town.  First, there is a small Italian restaurant that opened in Jena shortly after Jason and I arrived in town.  It's on Wagnergasse, and if you read Jason's post, you've seen pictures of this quaint little street.  All the food here is authentic (several of the waiters have trouble speaking German since they just arrived from Italy) and tasty, but I expected that from a small little Italian joint.  The second place our Italian friend calls "real pizza" is a totally different ballgame.  Literally, there are balls... bowling balls.  That's right, the best authentic Italian pizza in town is at the bowling alley.  And it's huge... the diameter of this pizza is half a meter (though when it came out, it seemed closer to a meter) and quite tasty.  Luckily, you really have to work for your pizza, so you don't feel as guilty about eating so much of it.  And by work, I mean walk.  No trams or buses go this far out of town, and not many people have cars, so you end up walking and walking and walking to get there.  But the pizza is well worth it.  So, if you want to try real pizza if you come visit us, bring your walking shoes! :)

2.  Interviews.  My interviews were last week, and I'm now beginning to decompress.  Tuesday lasted from 8:30am until 9:30pm.  It was exhausting.  We started out with all twenty applicants giving presentations, and let me tell you how much all the students (current and applicants) liked my presentation simply because it was so different from everything else people were presenting on (I was applying for a chemical ecology program). The afternoon consisted of professors giving a short overview of their labs, then we toured several of the buildings connected to the program (and even got to see the house where Ernst Haeckel lived), and finally, we had dinner at the botanical gardens.  They were beautiful, and we mingled with current students who had been paired with the applicants based on interests.  So that was fun, but again, exhausting to be on show for 13 hours.  I walked home from the botanical gardens, but on the way noticed my favorite kebap house was open, so I stopped in to purchase a beer to take home with me.  I was able to unwind by watching an episode of Veronica Mars, and then prepared for the next day... one on one interviews with the faculty.  Day 2 was much more mild.  My first interview went very well, and the second one went poorly, but it taught me a lot about who I want to work for and what field I eventually want to work in.  So overall, a decent experience.  Thursday, interview 2, day 1 went well.  We didn't start until 1:30pm and I was home by 10:30pm.  We again ate dinner at the botanical gardens, but instead of meeting with current students, we met with the faculty so we could arrange our own interviews.  I met with the first prof I interviewed with during interview 1 (the nice one) and we arranged to meet the next morning at 9:30.  We spent the morning discussing how he can defend me to the other faculty members (basically, every single faculty member has to agree on every single person who gets accepted, so it's no easy feat to accept a girl to a molecular biology program who has no molecular biology experience).  I'll find out today about the results from Interview 2, and the results from Interview 1 on Friday.  Of course the prof I want to work with has other money, so it's still possible for me to get rejected from both programs and still get a PhD position, but that all depends on how he wants to spend the money.

3.  Movies!  Jason and I went to the movies last night!  We saw District 9 (Jason's choice, obviously) in English!  Interestingly, the subtitles when the aliens were speaking were in German, so we did miss part of the movie, but it also kinda added to the suspense.  Of course, when a word did pop up on the screen that I recognized, I was quite excited (pardon my French... err German, but here's my example: Scheisse!)  The movies here are a different experience from the US.  Similarly, the movie theater seemed quite beat up (stains on the carpet, dingy walls, etc), but that's where the similarities ended.  We walked up to the counter, ordered our tickets, and were expecting to hear the price next... but that is not what the cashier said.  Instead, she asked us where in the movie theater we'd like to sit (What??).  We pointed to the map, paid for our tickets (that came complete with row and number for our seats) and then went upstairs to the theaters and concession stand.  The concession stand hand the familiar popcorn and combo deals, but closer inspection of the combos revealed a chips and salsa combo (now, I've had chips with yellow cheese sauce, but not salsa) and the drink that came with it was a beer!  I'd heard such things existed, and Jason has been saying for years that US theaters should serve beer, but it was exciting to actually see it (and partake).   We walked up another flight of stairs to get to our theater and had to wait outside until the previous movie (Up!) finished.  When we were allowed in, our jaws dropped.  It was so clean and the seats were SO very comfortable.  Plush even!  I don't think I'll be able to watch the Harry Potter 7 movie at midnight for fear of falling asleep (and no, I don't know when it comes out or even if it shows at midnight here).  Overall, going to the movies is not cheap here, but definitely an enjoyable experience.  Yay!  Julie and Julia is showing in English tomorrow at 4:45, and I'm definitely going to try to make it!