Doctoral student (frozen) on the road - second chapter

This travel diary combines personal experiences with experiences related to science, such as presenting research at a scientific conference and summarizing particularly interesting lectures.

Warning: This travelogue combines personal experiences with science-related experiences, such as presenting research at a scientific conference and summarizing particularly interesting lectures. Since I arrived in Belgium one day before the conference started, most of the second (current) chapter is not directly about the science but more about my impressions of (frozen) Belgium and the shapely (and frozen) Belgian girls. Nevertheless, to create a continuity with the next day, I hope that the article will be published. Anyone who is only interested in pure science (if there is such a thing at all), is invited to read only the first five paragraphs and skip all the descriptions of my frozen roll through the streets of frozen Belgium. And also, the motif word in this chapter is K.P.A.

We ended the previous episode of 'Doctoral Student on the Road' in the Netherlands when our hero is waiting for his flight to Belgium, where he is supposed to give a lecture about his research at the XNUMXth Congress of Medical and Biomedical Engineering. Since our hero is me, I will continue the story in the first person.

I couldn't help but feel that the main problem I was facing was lecturing about my research topic. I usually don't have a problem standing in front of an audience, but I finished writing the article on the topic six months ago, and since then I have continued to research in other directions and I kind of forgot what exactly we did in that particular study. Since that was the case, it was clear to me that the first thing I needed to do was to re-read the article I had written and remember exactly what was going on there. In retrospect, and perhaps not surprisingly, it was not as simple as I expected.

You know how when you fall in love with someone (or someones, I guess), the object of your crush looks just perfect? To anyone watching from the sidelines, it is clear that she is not even close to perfect. She has the nose of a witch, the eyes of a swamp owl, and the teeth of a savannah barb. But in your eyes she is just perfect, because you are in love. Objective evidence is as far from you as Ehud Barak is from the office of Prime Minister.

I'm happy to say that when it comes to my love life, I'm very lucky and I fell in love with someone who is truly perfect, and I know she is even after a few good years with her. But apparently a similar phenomenon also exists in studies. After reading the article for the first time in six months, I realized that there is a big gap between the perfect article that I remembered in my mind, and the product of reality. I suddenly saw how tenuous the connection between the results and the conclusions is and how many experimental steps are still missing on the way to a true and complete proof of the claims in the article. In short, it's not good science - but what can I do when this piece of shit is mine and I have to defend it in front of a whole hall thirsty for blood-doctors. As they say: from here you can only improve, and by the next article I will already know better how to write and what to concentrate on.

After re-reading the article, I decided to occupy myself with all kinds of other things, such as homework in the course 'Experimental methods in microflow', in which I was able to calculate the weight of the column of water that can remain inside a straw before its weight overcomes the surface tension of the drop at the end of the straw. Not entirely interesting, but enough to keep me busy until the kirtus arrived at ten o'clock at night.

Only when I finished the ticketing process and handed my suitcase over to the flight attendants, was I allowed to enter the Holy of Holies of the airport - duty free. I'm using sanctimonious terms here, but the truth of the matter is that this was my overall feeling about the airport. It is an enormous complex - probably bigger than any cathedral built to date - that was built thanks to extraordinary achievements in architecture and material and mechanical engineering. In a certain way it can be said that this is a cathedral that showcases the achievements of science and engineering today.

And speaking of holiness, the take-off is a truly magical ceremony. Every time I get on a plane I ask for the seat by the window and spend the minutes before take off with my nose pressed against the window glass, and everyone tries to peek over my head and figure out what I'm staring at. The plane begins to move - tens of tons of composite materials move not by human muscles and whips like in the Egyptian and Greek seas, but by sophisticated engines powered by rocket fuel. How much we have progressed since those days!

The moment of take off symbolizes the point I admire the most in the whole trip, in every trip. Think about it: throughout history, humans have aspired to fly in the sky. We placed the angels - the closest to God - in the sky, together with the Garden of Eden. It was the most inaccessible place we could think of (Hell, on the other hand, is very easy to get to. You just have to dig a little in the garden). And today? The sky broke in all directions. Huge jumbo jets ferry people back and forth through the summit of the sky, without the need for the aura of a holy place or righteous platforms. We humans have succeeded in elevating ourselves, without needing the help of a patronizing, capricious and criss-crossing God. We reached this point, where the plane roars with several thousand horsepower and throws itself into the air, on our own merits. These are the thoughts that go through my head with every successful appearance, and the experience is strong enough to keep me satisfied until the end of the flight.
Or at least, that's what I always think, and then the food that the flight attendants serve comes.

Well, not going into the details of the horror. The flight went smoothly, except for a certain section towards the end where we entered a storm area over Brussels and the plane started pretending to be a kangaroo. We were thrown so hard that my butt lifted off the chair at a certain point and only the belt was holding me in place (apparently you should really fasten the belt when the little light comes on). But no big deal, I always wanted to ride a kangaroo and until now I haven't been able to.

Upon landing, I discovered to my delight that with me on the plane was another student from the Technion (whose identity we will not reveal for privacy reasons) who had also come to present her work at the conference. We found the train together and took a photo of the ticket man who looked suspiciously like an elderly parakeet, and a man sitting in the corner who looked even more suspiciously like Mr. Wednesday from Neil Gaiman's American Gods. In short, we enjoyed ourselves and tried to distract ourselves from one fact that continued to bother us tirelessly: we were slowly freezing cold.

Because you understand, dear readers, the temperature that night reached minus three degrees Celsius and at this stage you don't even have a runny nose because it freezes inside the nostrils. The whole time on the train I had trouble understanding why they don't turn on the air conditioning and heat the train from the inside. When we arrived at the Antwerp Central Station and got off the train, I realized that there was actually heating on the train, about ten degrees Celsius, which is like Central Africa for the Belgians. The train station was around four degrees Celsius - the temperature of a refrigerator inside. At this point I had already put on three layers, a hat, socks and gloves and I was still cold. Out of the corner of my eye, I saw Belgian women walking with shorts that reach above the knee, talking to each other quietly. cold? is it cold It's badass!

And so, while trying to pretend to be a dwarf polar bear with a brown sock hat, I left the train station building to the street and was shocked to learn that the train station was also actually air-conditioned. The rain washed down the street, the winds blew like there was no tomorrow, and the sun still hadn't risen even though it was already seven in the morning. I didn't have a thermometer, but as I already mentioned from the forecast, the temperature was around minus three degrees Celsius. And of course, there were shapely Belgian women in shorts on the street as well. These girls must be drinking anti-freeze vehicle additive every morning, otherwise I just don't get it. What the hell are they made of?

I glanced at the map I had printed in advance, and realized that I had to walk two kilometers in pouring rain from above and from the sides with a suitcase on wheels and a shy tiny umbrella. And if that wasn't enough, right at that point Lafi started screaming in his bag that he didn't have any more batteries, that he needed electricity urgently, that he wasn't responsible for what he would do if a single drop of rain touched him and that he was really cold and wanted to go home. I'd open the case and shut him up, but that's not smart when God is pissing on you from above.

Despite everything, I kept a happy soul, with a cheerful whistle that emanated from a cloud of breath vapor. And believe it or not - it paid off. After exactly half a minute of walking I saw the bright red sign of Hotel Florida, my temporary and pre-booked home in Antwerp. I have no idea how it happened, because according to the map I should have gone much, much further. Maybe the hotel was moved. Maybe they moved the station. At that time I didn't care anymore. The suitcase made a whoosh on the sidewalk as I ran to the shelter of the hotel, dodging over puddles and ignoring poor Lafi who was scared for his life with all the shaking. I burst through the hotel door and stood stunned in front of a father, mother and two toddlers, who were going out on the street in clothes I wouldn't go to the beach with. I panted to them that it was cold outside, but they just looked at me strangely and went out into the frost. I never saw you again.

The receptionist took one look at me and understood the business. I was afraid I would have to wait until noon before they would let me in, but she gave me the key right away. I went up to the room, took a bath (more on baths in the next chapters), fell into bed and fell asleep for two whole hours. And there was evening and there was morning, one day.

In the next article we will continue and tell about my travels around Antwerp, about my first snow experience, about the amazing entrecote I found on the street, about huge carnivorous plants and about my first meeting (to be held on Sunday at noon) with the distinguished congress community.