News and Views

I arrive in Copenhagen about 1:30 this afternoon. As I entered baggage claim, Gisele ran up and gave me a hug — she had arrived from Paris only about a half-hour earlier.

We took a taxi to the hotel, checked in, and went off on a walking tour of the city.

It’s a beautiful city, with a mixture of old and new. Nothing as old as you see in France — no thousand-year old cathedrals, or at least we didn’t see any.

There are lots of bicycles, but not like in China where that’s all people can afford. Here you get the feeling that people like to ride bikes because of the convenience and to enjoy the beautiful weather. It was about 70 degrees this afternoon with a pleasant cool breeze. And the bikes are almost never locked to anything. Usually they have simple spoke locks that prevent the bike from being ridden away, but in most US cities that wouldn’t last long, as teh whole bike would be tossed into a pickup truck. That doesn’t seem to happen here,

Restaurants are very expensive. A typical dinner would cost $50 per person, plus a 25% national tax on restaurant meals, so over $60. We managed to find a “cheap” place and had dinner for about $25 each. Fortunately we will be eating on the cruise ship for most of the rest of our meals.

We board the ship tomorrow afternoon.

Here we are in front of a cool statue/fountain.

I’m off in a couple of hours to meet Gisele in Copenhagen, where we board our cruise ship. I’ll try to post anything interesting or exciting.

I hope to be checking email periodically, but don’t know for sure when I will be able.

This weekend is pretty boring. It’s our only Saturday that doesn’t have like an excursion planned.

I played soccer with some Russians for like 45 minutes on a tiny field like fenced in with fake grass. It was weird but kind of fun. I’m kind of bored though, but at least it’s nice to have this time to myself, and not worry about having to be ready at a certain time for something.

A group of people from our program went to see Indiana Jones and asked whoever wants to come can, but I didn’t want to. First of all it’s like 300 rubles, and also it’s dubbed in Russian. So I don’t feel like spending that much just to listen to stuff I don’t understand.

Tomorrow is Sunday, and another day with nothing planned, so I’ll see if anyone else wants to take a walk or anything. I brought two books (one mine, and “The Audacity of Hope”) and I thought that would be fine but I finished my first one on Thursday so I’m kind of bored, but I might go read Obama’s on the beach.

My hotel is about 100 meters from the beach, but it’s not as good as it sounds. It’s disgusting. Like there is trash ALL over the beach. Like people don’t care too much about littering. And there is stuff from when they were demolishing buildings they just put the rubble on the beach because I guess it was cheaper than taking care of it. So there are like big pieces of concrete there. And tires and pieces of cars and stuff. But it’s still kind of pretty if you just don’t look down, because the sun is all pretty when it “sets” even though it doesn’t get dark, the sun goes below the horizon though. And we’re here on the Gulf so it’s nice.

Otherwise things are going well. Good to hear updates from you guys! Hope you’re having a nice, uneventful time.

I got an email from Derek. He wasn’t able to post to his blog yet, but I’ll put some excerpts here, edited to fit your screen and for grammar. (He was in a hurry with limited internet access.)

Hi Dad! Hi Mom!

I arrived here fine, my plane was a little late but it was okay.

On the first plane ride to Chicago, I overheard the people in the row in front of me asking the stewardess about how to get to the international terminal in Chicago because they had to go to St. Petersburg. So I mentioned I was going to Petersburg too, and we could go looking for it together. So her, her daughter and I went looking for it and found our gate etc. And I started talking to her daughter and it turned out she goes to Marcos. I thought wow what are the chances! And so when we were getting on the next flight to Warsaw, we looked at our seats and we were sitting next to each other. and was even more surprised when on the next plane from Warsaw to St. Pete, it turned out the three of us were together again. It was very eerie and weird, but nice to have someone that spoke English that was around my age to talk to.

Things definitely are different here. If it wasn’t for the nice people in my program, I would be very very homesick. The living conditions are awful by comparison to home, but not that bad for living. The shower is dirty and old, but there is hot water, and good pressure, so that is all I need. My roommate is from Philadelphia, and goes to a private college in Virginia. He was home-schooled. He is very nice, and I am lucky to have someone like him. He has made these past 24 hours much better. He hasn’t taken any Russian though, so I have to be our translator, as horrible as I am. People talk much much faster than I can mentally translate, so I have to always take a moment and figure out what they said, and then figure out how to say what I want to say, or just hope I get the general idea of what they say and nod my head.

When I got here, my roommate had not arrived yet, so I spent some time and got some food with someone that had taken the same van from the hotel to the airport as me (there were only us 2, since others weren’t getting in until later). I was depressed at first, because it is much worse than I had imagined, and I had romanticized it a lot. But after getting over the shock of how third world and dirty everything is (don’t drink the water!) I have started to enjoy things, and it is an adventure, from everything to ordering food, to not realizing I had gotten sparkling water until hours later when I opened it to brush my teeth.

Also, the driving is crazy here. As bad as China or worse. Pedestrians are an annoyance for drivers, and apparently no one has heard of a jaywalking law (there might not be any) so it’s just fend for yourself, unless you’re lucky enough to be near a crosswalk with a light.

We are on our own since yesterday (Saturday) since the time I got the hotel (about 16:45) until Monday at 16:15. So me and my roommate have just been going to the supermarket, and enjoying Russia.

I miss you guys, but I’m enjoying myself here. It is a wonderful experience. Please keep an eye on my bank account, because I have no clue how much money I’m withdrawing, since I withdraw in rubles, and don’t know the exchange rates or charges.

Sorry this is so unorganized. I have had so many thoughts and things to write about, that I’m just typing them as they come up.

I’m running out of time here (2 minutes left) so I should close this letter. I love you both very much! I am thankful that you let me take this trip, it is very un so far and quite an experience. Keep in touch through your blog, until I get a longer chance to get on the internet. I hope things at home are fine without me. How is apollo doing? I love you guys! Thank you!

We put Derek on a plane to Russia this morning, for his 5-week Study Abroad. He has a 2-1/2 hour layover in Chicago, then takes Polish Air (LOT) to Warsaw and then on to St. Petersburg. He arrives around 2:00 pm their time, around 3:00 am our time. I hope he waits a few hours before he calls to tell us he has arrived. But I hope he doesn’t wait too long!

I also hope he has a chance to keep his blog updated so we can all share vicariously in his adventure.

It already seems quiet around here, even though he would normally still be sleeping. We are going to miss him.

If you’re running AVG Virus Scanner, it’s probably been bugging you lately about upgrading to the newer version 8.0.

But if you clicked on the link, it tried to sell you the upgraded version.

There is still a free version available here. You have to confirm a couple of times that you really, really just want the free version, but it’s not hard to find from there.

There are reasons to upgrade, and reasons to wait. The new version has built-in spyware and rootkit scanning (two threats related to viruses). It’s good to have all your scanning integrated into one package, so that multiple scanners aren’t fighting over who gets to check a file first.

However, there have been a few bugs noted. In particular, I haven’t been able to get it working right on Mom’s computer yet.

So I recommend that you wait a week or 3 before you upgrade. And when you do, it’s probably a good idea to completely uninstall the old version first.

My old Kyocera PDA/phone is on it’s last legs. I can’t dial numbers from the keypad anymore, only from Contacts, so I bought a Samsung i760 smartphone this weekend.

Mostly I like it, and will probably keep it. The slide-out hardware keyboard is pretty nice. I liked Palm just fine, but I guess Windows Mobile has its advantages.

I think the iPhone is a little nicer in some ways. I thought about switching cell providers so I could get it, but considering that the whole family (including Mom) is on my Verizon account, it just didn’t make sense. I don’t think this phone lags much behind it, and in some ways is better.

I am now a member of the faculty at ASU (Arizona State University).

I’ve been helping my friend Les, who is a Professor of Biology, with some computer programming on some of his biology projects. He thought that as long as I was working for the university I might as well be on the faculty. He helped me apply, and we just heard that I was accepted.

An “Adjunct” faculty member isn’t really a big deal. Some adjuncts are professors and can teach classes, etc, but I will just be a lowly programmer/hike-assistant/helper. But I might get a little pay for my hours, and also have parking, library, bookstore and some other privileges.

And this doesn’t mean I will start cheering the Sun Devils!

Hey, I just realized that Derek is a student, and I am faculty. Hmmm. Wonder how I can take advantage of that…

Since Derek is going to be in Russia during June, Gisele and I thought it might be nice to take a trip at the same time, kind of a second or third honeymoon, maybe.

We have reservations for June 19 on a 10-day cruise that departs from Copenhagen, Denmark, and visits Sweden, Finland, Norway, Estonia, Poland and Russia. In fact, we will spend two days in St. Petersburg while Derek is there, so he can be our guide and interpreter.

The week before we go, Gisele will be in France, so we will just meet in Copenhagen.

Poor Devon has his new job and so will miss out on the travel this year. He said his job with “Spectra Sensors” is going very well and that he is enjoying it. I guess he’s doing lots of programming in Java, and using his physics training too.

Derek is near the end of his first year at ASU, looking forward to his trip to Russia.

Apollo is spoiled, whining if nobody plays with him at least once or twice a day. He gets to go for a bike ride at least twice a week, and visits the dog park once or twice too. He’s very good at fetching a ball, and an excellent catcher of scraps of food thrown his way. I guess he will stay with Derek’s girlfriend, Gabby, while we are gone. She has a large dog too, and the two of them enjoy playing together.

It was a disappointing year for Arizona basketball fans. It’s time to look at “next year”.

On the negative side, Jerryd Bayless has opted for the NBA draft. Probably wise, since he is projected to go in the first 10, with a few million dollar salary.

On the positive side, Lute Olson will be back (unless something else comes up!), and very interestingly the top high school player in the nation has committed to UA. He sounds like quite a player.

I haven’t heard what Budinger is planning to do, but I think he could benefit by another year. Hope he thinks so too.

I haven’t heard of any other new commits. There were rumors that the coaching problems had lost us some players, but I also read recently that this isn’t true.