Friday, May 26, 2006
A Blog as Promised
Greetings all. I had debated during my first two weeks here whether to actually set up a blog or just settle on using email. At first, a blog seemed unnecessary as nothing particularly exciting happened in my day-to-day life. I went to work, took a walk, read a book, had a couple of beers at the bar… that’s about it. However, life has since spiced up a bit, and it seems much easier to relay my stories via a blog rather than emails. So even though it’s two weeks into my trip, I will start from the beginning, and catch everyone on my Geneva happenings.
Oh, before I get started, a side note: I discovered something rather bewildering while trying to sort out a good name for this blog. According to the thesaurus section of dictionary.com, the word news is synonymous with poop. The list of synonyms for news begins with words like account, advice, announcement, and then when you get to the Ps there’s poop. Who knew? Am I only the only person who didn’t know that poop was slang for a news story? I briefly considered naming my blog GENEVA POOP, but decided against it.
So I will know fast-forward you through the first week of my time in Geneva. The most notable part of my first day was the fact that my bedroom reeked of B.O. (and it still smells a little despite my best efforts to deodorize). I spent most of the first weekend terrified that the smell was stuck to me, alla Jerry and Elaine, and I desperately tried to find Febreeze. Apparently Febreeze is a phenomenon that has yet to hit Europe.
Moving on from my olfactory dilemma, I arrived on Thursday and didn’t start work until Monday, so the first few days I wandered around the city with some other Dukies. We spent most of our time marveling at the cost of everything. Much to my dismay chicken breasts at the grocery store cost about $12/lb; for readers who know me well, you realize how devastating this discovery was – no chicken for three months, ahhhhh. In an effort to save some money, we took a trip on Saturday to France to grocery shop (getting to France is a twenty minutes bus ride), but admittedly the savings on groceries didn’t really balance out the hassle of the bus and having to use Euros.
On Monday I started work, and discovered that beginning with me at CASIN was a group of 23 Afghan men, who would be training on multilateral negotiations for the next four weeks. For the first couple of days there presence had no real impact on my workday, except the need to cover my arms when I went into the training room (arms being a very scandalous part of the body). However, on Friday, the group was scheduled to take a trip to Bern to meet with the Swiss Foreign Ministry, and I was invited to go along. Apparently, removing the men from the office setting made them much chattier, and I found myself with a slew of new friends. I’ll leave the entire story of Friday to another entry, but let’s just say my life has been much more interesting since my excursion to Bern.
Oh, before I get started, a side note: I discovered something rather bewildering while trying to sort out a good name for this blog. According to the thesaurus section of dictionary.com, the word news is synonymous with poop. The list of synonyms for news begins with words like account, advice, announcement, and then when you get to the Ps there’s poop. Who knew? Am I only the only person who didn’t know that poop was slang for a news story? I briefly considered naming my blog GENEVA POOP, but decided against it.
So I will know fast-forward you through the first week of my time in Geneva. The most notable part of my first day was the fact that my bedroom reeked of B.O. (and it still smells a little despite my best efforts to deodorize). I spent most of the first weekend terrified that the smell was stuck to me, alla Jerry and Elaine, and I desperately tried to find Febreeze. Apparently Febreeze is a phenomenon that has yet to hit Europe.
Moving on from my olfactory dilemma, I arrived on Thursday and didn’t start work until Monday, so the first few days I wandered around the city with some other Dukies. We spent most of our time marveling at the cost of everything. Much to my dismay chicken breasts at the grocery store cost about $12/lb; for readers who know me well, you realize how devastating this discovery was – no chicken for three months, ahhhhh. In an effort to save some money, we took a trip on Saturday to France to grocery shop (getting to France is a twenty minutes bus ride), but admittedly the savings on groceries didn’t really balance out the hassle of the bus and having to use Euros.
On Monday I started work, and discovered that beginning with me at CASIN was a group of 23 Afghan men, who would be training on multilateral negotiations for the next four weeks. For the first couple of days there presence had no real impact on my workday, except the need to cover my arms when I went into the training room (arms being a very scandalous part of the body). However, on Friday, the group was scheduled to take a trip to Bern to meet with the Swiss Foreign Ministry, and I was invited to go along. Apparently, removing the men from the office setting made them much chattier, and I found myself with a slew of new friends. I’ll leave the entire story of Friday to another entry, but let’s just say my life has been much more interesting since my excursion to Bern.
# posted by Hoptrop : 2:15 PM
