Hello Everybody, I've been in Gutianshan, China for about 2 1/2 weeks now doing an internship which is required by my program in Freiburg. Actually, the first part of the internship, as luck would have it, is helping preliminary data collection on phosphorous nutrient cycling in the subtropics here, which includes helping Maria gather information for her masters thesis. That is almost finishing and I will now go to another town called "Xingangshan" (say it as you will--"sheeng-ahng-shahn"), where I will be a mountain goat climbing up steep hills to look at trees on a plantation set for biodiversity experiments. Perhaps, this sounds like "blah, blah, blah," so I will comment on a few things about my experience in China: - They are louder than Brazilians... yes. The men scream and the women not so much. ... read more

Hello Everyone! Thanks for the comments and messages! So, I finished up a statistics class before the Holiday break and went to Norway between the 21 Dec and the 3 Jan. That trip was phenomenal! My second flight from Amsterdam was delayed and they set me up in the same hotel in order to take the following morning's flight. Then the vacation... I arrived and spent a couple of days soaking in the finer pleasures of life: cognac, hearty food and a blazing fire. I stayed most of the time at my uncle's house which sits on top of a hill, removed from the city but not from a good view of it as well as the surrounding forest. We talked about everything as the cozy environment demanded. Also, he has a wood shop in which ... read more