October 2009

My grandma turned 90 this year and as the years before we celebrated at my parents place in Spain. We went out for a very yummy lunch. Because I saw some Indian dishes on the menu, I asked the waiter about it and it turned out, that the chef is actually from india. So my grandma and I ordered curry dishes, while my parents went for Mediterranean fish.
The afternoon we spent together. I had prepared a little speech, recapitulating the years of her life. In order to prepare myself, I created a over 2 meters long time line, with all major events from our lifes and history. It is quite amazing how much can be packed into a single lifespan! In the evening we surprised her a little more by lighting a

December 2009

Towards the end of the year, there was the Christmas party of our institute. Every year the whole scientific staff spends a whole day together, visiting an interesting industry partner or some other entertaining venue. This year the organisers chose the ZKM | Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe which showed a very interesting exhibition, mixing technology of the past century with artistic aspects.
After the exhibition and a brief visit at the Christmas Market in Karlsruhe (where we had some local food and mulled wine), we went back to Darmstadt. At a local restaurant (3klang) we met with former colleagues and enjoyed a very tasty dinner while our professor recapitulated the past year, highlighting the achievements.

The holidays around Christmas I spent back at my home town Filderstadt with my family. I always enjoy seeing them, as we usually don’t meet too often over the year. The days were filled with tasty meals and nice talks in front of the fireplace (which we didn’t light, as it was warm enough and the fire light usually gets everyone tired ).
After the holidays I returned back to Darmstadt. The next day I picked up two friends and we drove to Berlin where we met up with some more friends to stay at a flat which yet another friend had left to us for the days around new years eve. In the capital, we went to a very interesting photo exhibition about the work of Don McCullin at the C/O Berlin, ate at a sweet little Italian place in Berlin Mitte and celebrated new years eve with a big crowd of CouchSurfers at Hostel/Bar/Club Belushi’s.

So far for 2009 … have a nice year 2010!
Tim