Wednesday, December 20, 2006

New concept

Today is a great day;-) and I'd like to present the new concept of my blog to you.

I realized that during the last few weeks visits to my blog have been relatively rare. I guess there is more than one reason for that: everybody is busy, you thought I stopped blogging after Mexico, I actually posted only few things etc.

Therefore I thought hard about how to go on and I came up with some really great ideas;-) which I like to present to you and which I will realize starting 1st January:
  • Starting every first Monday of a month and lasting for one week there will be the Paper Boat Challenge (PBC). That will be something interactive so I hope to motivate as many people as possible to participate. That should be really fun!
  • Some of you know I sometimes record my own music. I will present some of my songs to you and if you like you can tell me what you think about them.
  • I would like to keep presenting interesting facts about Mexico and Latin America.
  • The rest will be spontaneous: funny, serious, interesting... news about the world and my own life.

I hope you like the new concept and if I forgot something very important please let me know.

BTW, on the right-hand side bar (the blue one) you can find some new features. The new "Blog Archive" and "Topics" should make it easier to find previous posts. It would be nice if you would go to my "Friends Map" and put your pin on it. I haven't really tested it so please let me know if it doesn't work!


I guess that was it for the moment. See you in the new year (I guess there won't be any more posts this year) and be prepared for the first Paper Boat Challenge (1st January!!!).

Tuesday, December 19, 2006

Christmas everywhere

Last weekend I was in Hagen and Aachen. I went there to make sure they are ready for Christmas, too. Just kidding...

In Hagen I was to meet some of my fellow students. Oh my God, EX fellow students I should say to be precise. Unfortunately not too many actually came but we had a nice talk. The Christmas market in Hagen was more or less like every year and there were people who were already prepared for Christmas and others who better should skip this year;-) I talk about people who crossed the market swearing and looking very stressed.

Old Town Hall in Aachen

To Aachen I went because I had been there four years ago and had found it a very nice city. I hadn't much time to visit the important parts of it then. That's what I did now. I saw the Old Town Hall, the Cathedral, the Cathedral treasure and the Elisen well. And I found out that the museums there have quite strange opening times. Of course they have a Christmas market there. The people, however, are more friendly in Aachen. Honestly. For me Aachen is one of my favourite cities in Germany (not only because of the people).

Thursday, December 07, 2006

1 day after = 4 1/2 years after

From the previous post you know that yesterday was THE day. I had to defend my thesis. It started at 4pm and at 4:30 I had to leave the room for a few minutes (During the discussion of the professors). Probably you want to know how it was. Well, it could have been worse. Although I have to say my two professors managed to make me sweat;-) Afterwards they explained to me that their questions were meant to find out my limits because they hadn't found anything big to complain about in my thesis.


Now I can call myself "industrial engineer" and I'm not a student any more. My sister asked me how it feels and I had to say the only difference is that today I'm relieved while yesterday I was a bit nervous. The truth is that I don't feel different. Receiving my title yesterday wasn't really a surprise, was it? I worked for it 4 1/2 years (almost exactly 4 1/2 years ago I started my first internship which I needed to start my studies). So it just was the "last step".

But of course things will change. I hope I will have a job soon (you can ask me on Monday again) and I guess that will bring some changes anyway. I wonder if it means being free or the opposite. My friends who already finished their studies have their own philosophies...

Thanks to everybody who supported me during my studies (some may not even know they did). Thanks to all of you who thought of me yesterday, crossed their fingers and pressed their thumps...