partieeeesss!!!

KungFu - Cocktail-Party

Karin at one of our KungFu parties

Ben

Jeff and Meggan

Anja's planned Fairwell Party

Karin, Ben and hot(!) Shu!!!

Shu, Karin and me on our veranda!

Mucki, Dan and Volker (men gossips!)

GIRLS, I miss you!!!

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A specious picture of peace or finally a happy end? ;)

Another planned great girlie evening

Brisbane at night, great as always!

We had fun and alcohol! ;)

Dream-Team member No. 1 : Frau Doktor!! ;)

Dream-Team member No. 2 : das Maultäschle ;)

Dream-Team member No. 3 : the shy and innocent one ;)

Anja's (better) unplanned Fairwell Party
Just one comment to this party. Two of the highlights were the turning up of the police and finally the collective shower of us five housemates. I will present only the most innocent pics and keep the others. Don't even try and ask for them, this will destroy my prestige as an innocent shy girl. Thanks for your appreciation. ;)

Real love!!!

Don't worry, even the police men were laughing!

Impact of listening to austrian folk music in Australia

So far - So good

Still upright!! hihi

Non-Smoking - policy :)

...

I think I will stop here, there are still more than 100 pics left, which document this party. However, Anja and Karin have left Australia and I bravely go on with my PhD. First project is finished and another one will follow. Some days really suck here and the other are just great. I even meet good all friends again, like Stephane! It was great to see him again after 9 months. I found new friends as well, such as Lydie or Meggan. This world is crazy. Life is changing every day and is just amazing to be part of it. Take care of yourself!

Mel's wedding

It was my third wedding I went to in my long life so far, but my first australian one. It was a great wedding. I want to thank Mel and Cameron for this organization and for being not sooo kitchy. It was amazing. I have never seen sooo happy people, especially such a happy couple. Just this natural happiness. Here the proof:

Sorry Mel, but I have to say it: the bride and the groom

Me or Mel is dizzy? ;)

A traditional wedding cake!

A fresh married woman and me! :)

As I already mentioned this wedding was a big success. And I wish u all the best. I am sure you will make it through this tough life, as you already did the last couple of years.

I hope we can have some nice dinners with some nice conversations about our preferred philosophies, KungFu and StarWars!!! :) Enjoy your honey-moon!

girls trip

Before my two favourite female housemates will leave me alone here we organised a trip to Burleigh Heads and Purling Brook Falls. And? Yep, well done! We had a lot of fun. Here some impressions:

• Burleigh Heads:

Anja and Karin after the first 100m still in a good mood :)

... and after the next 100m :D

A tree and me

cooling down the feet after the walk. (we still have winter!)

• Best of All Lookout (south of Springbrook Nationalpark)
  

Full of vim after the picnic with selfmade "Klopse" to a view of northern New South Wales called "Best of All Lookout"

Passing the Antarctic beech forest, a remnant link to a past cooler climate

There it is! What can I say! What you see is the border between Queensland and New South Wales. I found this amazing!

The dominant mountain is the Mt Warning - the lava plug centre of the erosion caldera of the extinct Tweed Shield volcano.

It was really cold.

• Purling Brook Falls Circuit - a 4km walk through open Eucalypt forest of New England.
  

Back in the sun with the Purling Brook Falls in the background.

On the top of the waterfall - fantastic view

• Mt Tamborine - on the way home we tried to catch the lookout and we made it just on time for the most beautiful sunset
  

Beautiful isn't it? I mean the sun! ;)

The last one is the one I really like most!

Finally, we had a great day. I was happy to drive us home in Anja's car. Because I really miss driving a car! *sniff* I like her car, just the perfect size. I still need to make a pic of it. It is a Holden Barina, a copy of a Opel Corsa (with the same defects) ;) Unfortunately Anja and Karin are leaving soon. Anja will go to Norway after 5 years of Australia and Karin will finish her Work and Holiday trip in Australia. Then I will be alone in this house with 3 crazy guys!

I don't know if I should speak about work in my blog. I don't feel like it right now, so just ask me if you want to know more. I wish you all the best and please take care! Would be nice to hear from you from time to time. :)

Mel's Hen's-night

What a nice tradition! Melissa is getting married next Saturday! So, Lynn decided to do a traditional Hen's night to give Mel a proper fairwell of being a "free" woman. We went to a nice restaurant in West-End. Lot's of wine and delicious food.

Mel really excited! :) with Mhairi and Lynn

Kelly and Lynn

Mhairi and myself, yes, already quite tipsy, and? ;)

will be continued ...

Australia vs. Japan
3 : 1

PICS

Hi guys,
yep, I found time and all devices to upload some pics. After more then 6 weeks I should introduce you to my housemates and show you my new home for the next months.

Anja and Ben enjoying their meals in our living room. I have to say both of them are really nice cooks. Anja is an expert for green curry and Ben for BBQ (steaks etc.). I shouldn't forget to mention all the delicious salads made by Anja.
This is one of our usual tradition on evenings, sitting on the veranda, drinking red wine and having some cigarettes.

A common Aussie-BBQ. If you don't have one, you are a stranger! Aussie people love BBQs. You can find them in every park, where the government provides the gas !!!

Isn't he cute ;) The true master!

May I introduce you Mucki? I don't think I need to tell you where he is from. Just one hint. I heard it somewhere before, but it is hard to understand. ;)


After the two boys left for the weekend Anja and me attacked the rooms and cleaned a bit. Now I can show you the rooms as well. :)

That is our kitchen in a quite clean state! But you should see after some cooking was done. A battle field would be nothing compared to it :D !!!

Our beloved verande, famous for excessive parties and nice relaxing evenings.

The dinning room. Rarely used, because we eat most of the time on the veranda anyway.

Our Garden. Quiet and green, what else do you need?

And my little empire with my new monitor!! *FREU* and a queen size bed!! I missed such a bed for a long time, but finally I got one!!

A nice view to the moon from our veranda today evening.

feeling home

Here comes another summary of the last days. What's new? I told you that I joined the KungFu club 2 weeks ago. The numerous bruises are disappearing now, but today I ended up with a bleeding nose. That's life. I just hope that I don't need to get used to it. After the training we went to a Yum Cha ! That was really nice and we had a lot of nice food. Except the chicken feet, I skipt them. Look at this picture! I am not so choosy anymore than I used to be as a kid, but ...

... no way I eat this!!!

At our institute we have a student association called SIMBA. Last thursday we had the election for the new executive for the next 12 months. I got nominated as the treasurer, I accepted it and finally I won the elections. I hope I can do a good job and we will have a lot of fun.

We have some kind of Internet at home now. Still need some more longer cables and I need an external monitor and then I am back to civilisation ;) !

Ok, there is nothing more to say so far!

Have a nice day!

Sport is killing me

Hi guys,
after the first pay-day this week I decided as well to join the sport club here at UQ. There is a great offer of any kind of sport such as Rugby, Basketball, Soccer, Tennis (I heard we have more then 20 tennis-courts!), Swimming (heated open pool), Running, Rowing (must be inherited from UK ;) ), Gym, Fitness, Martial Arts and so on. After quitting running I decided to go for Martial Arts, i.e. you will find me three times a week fighting against other KungFu heros. I joined Ben yesterday for my first lesson. I wouldn't call it fun so far. It was more a general training for condition, so push-ups in four different versions, sit-ups with medicine ball and lot of arm work for two hours. The only thing I can move without pain today is my little toe. I have such a muscle ache, but this speeds me up to go on with this. I really need to do something for me and my body. Today I thought I would take it more easy and I could relax my body with some swimming. It worked fine, but after 10 lanes I got a cramp so I had to give up. :) Just too much sport at once. I am really looking forward to my KungFu lesson tomorrow. I think I will enjoy it. Unfortunately the Tai Chi - lessons are at the same time. This would be a nice quiet change. I wouldn't mind joining this as well.

Still no pics to upload, but I decided to take some pics tonight at least from the house, so you can imagine the area I live in. Ok, need to do some work again.

Have a nice weekend and don't forget: Today is Mother Day!!! :)
Take care!

Autumn

Three weeks back in Brissie'world. What happened so far? Don't blame me for no supply of any pics and interesting stories. Nothing exciting here! I just try to settle down. There still almost 3 years to come. :)
First maybe, I am back in my world of Perl, Proteins and Linux! Got my own DELL machine last weekend. I am not a big friend of RedHat, but I will try to fight. That's what my shaggy-hair-friends from Freising taught me! ;) I found the way back into the data I left in January, and I even think I understand them again. But now it is important to find the big question I want to answer during my PhD, or maybe I look for a lot of small ones. I am not sure yet. Conclusion is: reading papers! It is still exciting, but don't ask me after six months! The administration way is a miracle here. It works, it just takes its time. I am finally enrolled since yesterday and I got my student ID card. This is quite important here, because travelling becomes now cheap for me, half of the normal prices!!! Yeapeahhhh! I have to travel, because I am not living just around the corner of the office anymore. I actually take the bus every morning. This reminds me of the good old days in Cambridge. The earliest bus I can take is at 6:33am, so I arrive at the office around 7:20am. It is quite late for me. If you want to suggest to buy a bike, I am sure you haven't seen this region here before. The streets are fine and drivable, but it is extremely hilly here. I can give an example to (Ex)-Weihenstephaner: You remember the path from the BIZ to the Loewentorgebaeude? This I would have at least 10 times on my way to the IMB. I am not sure, if I really want this. I'll keep you up-to-date which way I will choose. I should mention that the bus station is just 50m from my house!
Yep, my house. Since more than one week I am living with three other crazy people in a nice Queenslander house in Chapel Hill. Chapel Hill is a quiet suburb of West-Brisbane. When I say quiet, I mean quiet, except Hannibal, our Possum! :) I overtook one room from Markus (from Tirol), a Postdoc at UQ. I live now together with Ben, an original Brissie studying International Relationship, Anja, funny Austrian girl, just finishing her PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at the Brain Institute ( I hope that's right!) and Markus (or Mucki) from Austria, second year PhD student here at the IMB. You might have noticed that I am learning two languages now, easy-going English with an australian accent and hardcore Austrian. :)
My room is still a bit empty, but I found an IKEA catalogue, so there must be an IKEA here. I am quite happy with the house, with the room and with the housemates! We have a huge veranda at the back side of the house. So almost every evening we sit outside with our wooly jumpers and covers, some glasses of whine and some menthol cigarettes. We have nice discussions about any issue you can imagine. That's fun! I really like it!

Anyway, why did I call it Autumn? Yep, we have autumn here, that means 12 degrees in the morning and only 26 over the day. So quite chilly in the evening! To be honest, I am bored to go on writing here without any pics and real action. I don't have proper internet at home yet (and I am still alive, hihi). But we are heavily working on it.

Hey guys, I keep you definitely up-to-date! Take care and hope to hear from you soon!

Jo