A lovely visit

Friday the 7th AK (my girlfriend) came all the way from Australia to visit me. She is an exchange student at Australian National University in Canberra, and she has been there since the beginning of July. She stayed here for a week, and it was so good to see her again. Being more than two months since she had left for Australia, we had really missed each other.
We hung out all week, though I had to go to the lab during the daytime, and we even managed to do a one day trip to Boston on Thursday (where I had a day off).





Boston is a great city. Even though we only went for a day, it felt like we got a pretty good overall impression. Besides getting a glimpse of every part of the inner city, we also accomplished to check out Harvard University (which actually looked at bit like good 'ol Brown). Of course Boston has a lot more to offer than what can be seen in one day. And since it's only an hour away from here, the city has definitely not seen the last of me.



Anyway, AK and I went back from Boston in the evening, completely worn down by all the walking. We spend the rest of out time enjoying the company of each other, until she left last Saturday. It was pretty hard to say goodbye again, knowing that we would have to wait three more months to see each other again.

The lab

EDIT: I've just added some photos.

Sorry about not updating this thing sooner, but I've been really busy. Since so much has happened, I will divide my writing into several posts. This one is about the work.

Last weeks Tuesday I started working at the lab. I met the professor and the two Ph.D's I am going to be working with. They were very kind to me and showed me around the lab. I don't think I have seen a lab this packed with stuff before.



In the middle of the lab is a huge table where the femtosecond laser pulses* are generated and modified. This part of the setup takes up most of the space, and is very hard to describe without getting into details.
At the end of the setup is placed a vacuum chamber where liquid mercury can be pumped through. A parabola mirror is placed such that the laser is focused in the middle of the chamber creating a small plasma. This plasma excites the mercury jet, creating a pulsed 'hard'** X-ray beam.



This last part of the setup we have been working with since I started. There are lots of technial difficulties in order for everything to work together, and therefore the setup is constantly altered.

So far, I have mostly followed the others in the lab trying to understand what goes on in there. Even though it's all still a bit confusing to me, I'm beginning to understand more and more, and I have slowly begun to do smaller things for myself. I'm looking forward to the day when I'm able to operate the equipment without supervision from the others, but it will probably be a while from now.

*For those of you who don't know what this stuff is all about, I have created a short description of the project in the bar on the right side of the page. Since I am still trying to learn this myself, there will probably be lots of errors and missing links in the beginning, but I will try to update and correct it as my knowledge increases.

**An X-ray beam with a relative high energy is said to be 'hard'. This originates from the fact that thin sheets of metal are sometimes used to absorp the photons with low energy, thus creating a high-pass energy filter.

Finally everything worked out - I'm in the states!

I have just bought myself a laptop, so now I'm finally able to update this thing.

Much have happened since my last post. The secretary finally sent me the documents I needed, so I ordered another airline ticket for the 1st of september. I spent the last week packing down our appartment and waiting for my visa. I got it friday the 31th. Very typical for this whole process. I should probably consider writing a book about all this bureaucratic mess I've been through, but I don't think I have the skills to spice up 350 pages of 'then I sent the paper back to the secretary once again, this time signed in purple ink by every one of my oddly aged cousins as required by American federal law'. I mean no disrespect to the American country, because I know that it is probably a lot harder to get into Denmark as a foreigner. It was just so frustrating to be kept at home because of bureaucracy, when I just really wanted to go.

In spite of all the trouble and postponing, I was actually able to make my plane saturday morning. I said goodbye to the family and flew across the atlantic. I was a bit nervous when I got to the american visa check, but the paperwork seemed to be in order, so they let me in no questions asked. Saturday evening I landed at Providence airport at 6:30, where I grabbed a cab to and headed for the auxillary house I was supposted to live in. I had to stroll a bit around campus (which fortunately was nearby), before finding the place to pick up my key. The campus seemed very nice. Actually it was not far from what I had imagined (and from what you see in American College movies).



EDIT(sunday, sept 16): I have just added some photos of the city and where I live. Be sure to check out my Flickr account.


When I got back to my room, I unpacked my stuff and wandered about what to do to keep myself from falling asleep too early (I was six hours ahead and I had barely slept for 24 hours). I went down to the kitchen where I met one of the other residents of the house. It turned out that she and her boyfriend were meeting up with some friends to go to a student bar. They instantly asked me if I wanted to come along, and I did. The timing could not have been better. I had a really great time, I met a lot of nice people and I managed to stay up until 2 AM.

I spent most of my sunday strolling around trying to get to know the neighborhood. The city is really nice. It's comparable to the danish city Århus in size but more metropolitan with skyscrabers and stuff. Brown and RISD (Rhode Island School for design) has got their own part of the city, 'College Hill', and it's apparent that they are of great importance to the city aswell as the entire state. (Rhode Island is the second smallest state in the country, but still...)
When I got back from my sightseeing trip, I hooked up with the guys from the day before to play some poker. I had a great time, and thanks to the internet, our humor was similar in many ways.

Monday was 'Labor day' and therefore the University was closed. I spent the day preparing for my first day at the lab and I also bought me a cell phone. (I actually only needed the sim card but you can't just get that so I had to buy some crappy motorola.) Anyway, I've got a local number now, so you can write me an email if you need it.

Right now I'm sitting at the local coffee shop trying to stay awake (even though it's only 10:30). Tomorrow I will hopefully write something about the laboratory and what I will be doing there etc. It's all very exciting and I'm sure that I will eventually understand what is actually happening in there.

Good bye for now. I hope to get some comments from some of you. Danish aswell as english.