Graduated

It's ir. Ewald now. Or Ewald M.S. for the non-Dutch ;)
After getting a 9 (out of 10) for my thesis project, I graduated almost 1 month ago for my masters just not cum laude/with honors. My thesis actually produced two publications so far, that are already accepted for conferences, and they expect me to still join in for a 3rd publication. Anw, we'll see where that goes. Currently I'm searching for a job. Primary area of search: Chicago/northern suburbs. Secondary: Netherlands (for a job until I find one in my primary area :) )

After graduation I took one week of vacation, to visit my friend, Julie, the friend same I visited 3 posts ago. Somehow that worked out, if you know what I mean. ;-) It was a wonderful week, it only lasted way to short!

The End

Well, not entirely the end. But today I will get on the plane, heading home again. My time here in Pittsburgh is done again, although the project I was here for, My master thesis project, is not over yet. Now I will continue back in the Netherlands for a bit. And then hopefully in June, I will realy be done; graduated with my masters degree. Now THAT will be the end of an era. And the START of a new one. New experiences will be waiting, new people to meet, new places to go,... I can hardly wait for that to start again.

Anyway, for now, I just packed my bags, and am waiting till it's time to head to the airport... Long flight.... Hope they have some good movies...

Well, I'll try to continue to keep you up to date this way, but for now, I'm off...

See you around!

Overdoing it

As many people who regularly talk with me know; I don't realy like Pittsburgh. I've been here now for over 5 months, and I still don't like the town; it's ugly, and it knows it. The prove is out there, in the form of Asian Ginko trees that will color the brightest yellow with fall (but are without leaves deep into spring), Japanese cherry trees, with their amazing blossom in the spring and Dutch Tulips for immediately thereafter, and they are very busy to turn a highly needed parking lot into yet another park. They are overdoing it; they try so many things, but don't fully engage into any one of them. Moreover, through the mixture of all these seperate attempts, they only seem to be able to emphasize that they are trying to cover-up, to hide the uglyness of the town. It's sad...
Hehe, besides, in dutch there is a saying, "even if a monkey wears a golden ring, it is and will be an ugly thing". Pittsburgh is much like that monkey... sorry people of Pittsburgh...

Anyway, I still have slightly over half a month to go, then I'll return to home again, back to the Netherlands, away from this place again. I don't think I'll miss it. Defenitely not the way I miss Japan... Awell, I'm off to bed now, another day's over again. See you around!

Walk down Memory Lane

Now 6 years ago, I was in the USA as freshmen for 9 months. That was at Barat College, Lake Forest, IL, and I had a great time there. I guess that kinda was the start of my wanderings around the world :)

So, now that I am back in the USA, I decided to go and visit my former college again....
I walked there via the bikepath from Lake Forest station to the Barat that I always used to take when I would go grocery shopping... It's about a 20 minute walk, and passed several places from where I still had memories. But it became even better when I arrived at Barat. Walking around campus revived memories long forgotten, and I refound memories long lost. Not many of the faculty was still there, but Sister Patsy and Michael Borouch were. Had a wonderful chat with them. Do you know how nice it is to walk back into a memory? I found out that day right there. Although that wasn't all. I was there one weekend, and my visit to Barat was only part of it. I also met up with a friend that I had managed to stay in touch with since. To see her again after almost 6 years was truly amazing...

Happy New Year

Another year has started. And I hope that the previous one was as good for you as it was for me, and this coming year even better.

I'm just back from Xmass break, which I spend with my family at my sisters place (again). But this time my parents drove me here by car. Much better than greyhound ;-)

Still not many photo's, like I said before, I'm not making many trips, and Pittsburgh is not that pretty on its own. But I hope you'll enjoy the ones I have. Also, after Japan, USA has very little amazing surprises, no blue apples or anything, which leaves me with very little to post here, sorry.
For now I'll just say: 'Till Next Time!

And one month down

Last weekend was Thanksgiving, which I spent with my sister & brother-in-law, and my youngest brother. Sorry, no photo's...

As I expected, I am busy with everything and nothing, not realy getting out of the house as much as I'd like maybe, although I have gone for a walk in a park nearby several times. hmmm, I don't think I ever took photo's there. I'll try to remember to bring my camera next time. I only don't know when that will be... It's getting colder every day, although we haven't made it to freezing yet. But I do think I saw a couple of snowflakes mixed in the rain today.

Oh, before I forget; only travel by Greyhound if you realy have to! going to my sisters place, we had to make a detour of an aditional 2 hours (on a 4 hour busride) just because they apperently do not keep an eye on the traffic, nor do they seem to know any other road than highways. And as for their resources... going back, I had a driver who maybe looked at the road 20% of the time, and a bus of which the engine kept shutting down, like every 5 minutes. oh, did I already mention we were passing through the mountains? It was an.... "interesting" experience. I might look into taking the train for Xmass...

One week here

Yesterday exactly, I am here in Pittsburgh already for a whole week. And a busy one it sure was. After a first night in a hotel, I have gotten me a (very partially furnished) appartment. It's bigger than what I had last year in Japan, but also more empty. Hehe, It wasn't even untill 2 days ago that I had a chair to sit on... But after a week running around I now have most necessairy things, although still no internet yet... I just hate answering machines >:(

Well, slowly I'm gathering the things to make this place enjoyable for the comming 6 months too, and as soon as I have internet I will start updating this page again. I don't think I will realy make as many as trips (and photo's for that matter) as in Japan, but I will try to post as often as possible.