A Super Bouncy Ball

Well, I have been quite busy the last day or so, despite (or because of) limited internet access.

Let me begin by saying that I failed to mention yesterday about my first train ride. What an experience! I now understand why so many people have fallen in love with rail travel. I was a bit nervous when I got to the station since I had never been on the train before, but I quickly learned that, at least at Paris Gare de l'Est, it is more about finding somewhere to sit around and wait. Since they do not release the location of the trains until 20 minutes before they are scheduled to leave, and I was there 90 minutes early, I had plenty of time to stand and sit around, feeling cold in the 30-40 degree weather. I soon realized why so many people were standing huddled around the space heaters sticking out the floor at intervals near the boards. Once my train location was announced, I followed the herd to my car, and was suprised when there was no one there to greet me or ask for a ticket. So, I found my seat.

A few minutes later, a young Japanese boy started talking to me in French and pointing at my seat. It seems as though he wanted my seat. I simply said "English," and he told me I was in the wrong seat. Long story short, I was. You see, each seat had two numbers, one of them lit up. I had found the seat with my number (62), but it was not lit up, so it was actually seat 21. After this was explained to me, I sheepishly acknowledged my error and found my seat further down the car. Now, to my defense, as a first-time rider it is awfully confusing when each seat has two seat numbers.

Firmly settled in my real seat, I sat back and enjoyed my first experience. There is nothing quite like watching the scenery flash by at 150 miles per hour (or however fast they go). Do not get me wrong, I love driving, and flying is good too, but I may be converted after this first trip. After an hour or so, we were served lunch. I say "we," but I really me "everyone but me," and I am not making that up. Apparently they ran out of food just before they got to me, and the guy (train attendant?) simply walked away. I was confused, especially since I was literally the only one without food. Did I do something wrong? Was it because I was American? After a half hour or so, he came back to pick up the trash. He did not speak English very well, so I tried to ask him to the best I could about food. He told me they ran out and he might be able to get a roll or something. To be fair, he did eventually return with a full meal and some quite good tea. Still, I wonder why I did not get that food in the first place?

Four hours on the train passes surprisingly quickly, even when all your doing is listening to music (in particular Band of Brothers and Saving Private Ryan, apparently I was in a WWII reflective mood moving from France to Germany) and looking out the window. Before I realized it, we had arrived in Frankfurt.

Frankfurt Hbf is an interesting place, when you have an hour layover and there are about five benches in the entire station. Luckily, I was able to get a seat rather quickly, so I sat there and was intrigued by the people walking in and out. If I did not quite get French style, I certainly do not understand the Germans. Roughly half looked as if they were on their way to a metal concert. Another quarter were dressed in business attire. The rest looked as though they basically threw on whatever they found laying around their room. One thing is common: almost everybody wears black, or at best a dark gray. Now, I get wearing black, and am doing so as I type this, but it does not exactly add to the already dreary surroundings (perhaps that explains it?). Alas, around 45 minutes before my train was to depart the track number came up, so I started to head that way, if nothing else to get my blood flowing again (it was even colder here).

As I boarded the train, I saw an attendant and made sure it was the train stopping in Darmstadt. She said yes, then quizzically said "in 40 minutes?" I smiled, said yes, and took my seat. I forgot to mention about tickets. I was surprised that, on the train from Paris, they only asked for my ticket once, about 10 minutes after we left the station, and never asked for my passport. I was even more surprised that, even though it was only about a 20 minute trip, they never asked me for my ticket to Darmstadt. Oh well.

So, I got to Darmstadt, and I pretty much mentioned what happened after that. I had a hard time finding someone who could give me a map to the town, since they barely spoke any English (a recurring theme in this rather small town). After struggling with the whole no wifi thing, I decided to make my way to the town square to see if it was any better. Yes, there were more people there, and some stores, but the overall dreariness did not change. I understand that the town was heavily bombed by the Allies in WWII, and had to almost completely rebuild, but they did not have to get the worst Soviet "architects" to do so! I kid, of course, but it does not seem much different from what I imagine those Soviet industrial cities look like.

I eventually stopped for dinner at a Greek/Italian restaurant (I know, I know). The man barely spoke any English, but they did have an English menu, so that helped. I had the Sovlaki Special, two pork skewers, with a salad and tzatziki and rice. It was quite good, the pork was very tender and juicy. I also had a lighter German beer, that was also pretty good. After dinner I made my way back to my hotel, was able to speak haltingly on Skype with dad and later mom in the stairwell as people gave me funny looks, and eventually went to bed (which I should mention consists of a cover and a blanket not large enough to cover the bed, but I was warm enough after I turned the heat on in the room).

During breakfast this morning, I mentioned to the girl at the desk about the wifi not working upstairs. She said "that is not good," and explained that she would tell the owners but, since they live in Frankfurt, it may take until tomorrow to fix. I also was able to see on my iphone that the Rangers had beaten the Yankees 8-0 (!) and check up on a few things before heading to ESOC. To get there, I actually walked through the train station, taking a slight shortcut rather than finding a bridge over the tracks furthers down. My main contact at ESOC is the Mission Operations Director, meaning he is basically in charge of the operations side (control) of all missions currently in flight. This is quite the job! He is extremely nice, and began by sitting me down and showing me four powerpoints he had made up on ESA in general and the control centre in particular, all of which he copied onto my flash drive! He then took me on a tour of the computer centre, the main control room, and the various mission control rooms. I have to say that, aside from talking to the guys who work here, actually getting to walk into the sites and see them up close and personal is definitely the biggest perk of this research.

I mentioned to him that the men I had talked to at Headquarters and mentioned I should talk to a certain individual, so he was nice enough to call him up. Unfortunately this contact was getting ready to leave on a job this afternoon, but he was nice enough to sit down with me for 30 minutes or so and try to give me other contacts of people who could supplement him since he will not be around. Did I mention ESA people are extremely nice and helpful?

After this, my main contact invited me to lunch with a couple of guys who just happened to be here from NASA's JPL to talk about how ESOC runs (copiers). I blush to say that the lunch was in a private room with a waiter and everything. I further blush to admit that, since I was an invited guest, I did not have to pay for my delicious lunch of a half rosemary and lemon chicken, pommes frites (French fries), and a glass of red wine (I also had a green tea while the rest, in European fashion, had coffee or expressos). It was quite interesting to hear them talk in detail about the nitty-gritty of their work, like I was eaves-dropping on some relatively important international relations. My contact even convinced the JPL guys to give me their contact information (unlike the Europeans, they were very reluctant to do so).

I do have to mention that after lunch, since it was raining outside, my contact walked me back to his office through a series of underground walkways between buildings. I hope that was not a security secret. He then had me ushered to another meeting with two men who had worked for ESA at both Johnson Space Center and JPL, so they had intimate knowledge pertaining to my interests. Again, both were very nice and helpful. We had a good hour-long talk, after which one of them walked me over to the public relations people. The main lady was not there, and I finally found out why so many of the contacts people had been giving me were gone this week: it's a student holiday this week! So basically I came here at the worst possible week (other than, as one of them noted, the week between Christmas and New Years). That means my personal contacts will be limited this week, but at least I have so many emails of people to contact later.

The public relations lady that was there was nice enough to give me a bag full of copies of materials on ESOC. I gladly thanked her for these, all the while wondering about how I am going to get them back to the States. Well, I guess I will find a way. That about concluded my day. After walking back to my hotel, I grabbed my computer and am currently sitting in the breakfast area downstairs, drinking some more green tea, and pretending I am in a German cafe. I will probably try one of the German restaurants that my main contact told me about, so I can test out the local cuisine, such as it is. Tomorrow I am supposed to start in the centre library before bouncing around again in the afternoon between interviews. Hopefully they will be just as good.