just through with my first lecture and it was cool! i don't know about other people, but i always feel empowered after speaking to a big crowd about a topic i actually know something about. teaching is a great experience! especially when the students drop by after the lecture to ask further questions and are actually interested in the subject covered in class. i missed that in the past few years, so it's great to catch up with it again.

and now i feel like a dinnerparty, and so it will be! soon.

so too keep up the tradition, i am continuosly stealing pictures from others, instead of getting my lazy ass in motion to take some pictures myself. so here is just one impression of lighthouse park with sunny weather.

if the weather turns better, we'll surely go hiking too. but as both hendrik and frank (the keepers of the digicams) are on a trip to whistler mountain, i won't be taking any new pictures. i signed up too late for the whistler trip, which is why dave and me are stranded here with most other social contacts gone for the weekend. on top of that, finger eleven sold out. bummer. but the guitar purchase (and some 'dinnerpartying' tonight) will make up for that.

and just now, the sun came out so i'm out of here. cheers!

workaholism is cool. or is it? yeah, real cool. that way i'll be able to tell stories like: 'and then we wrote that cool paper, you should have been there, totally spaced out dude. or the time i gave that awesome java tutorial! kinky stuff...'

bitter, isn't it? hoffentlich schneits bald!

so to relive myself of all this pain, i decided to post yet another picture of a partying gang. very good friends.

after the lecture on thursday, i myself will be attending the 'thursday night dinner club' for some food and drinks, to enter the weekend and let this 'work-all-day' attitude behind. but seriously, it's not that bad. i love to exaggerate (that is surely new to all those who know me). and it's over for today! the beanery and the pool table therein are waiting for me. some more chatting, a game of pool and a coffee before i 'hit the sack'.

hey oeli and alex, i'm still waiting for some pictures. bring them on!

we just got home from an easy night out, as the past few days were expensive and demanding to the body. i got an email from the coolest guy on the planet! he was gracious enough to attach one fabulous picture of him in action. if you don't know him yet, don't worry. he'll be famous anytime soon, so you'll hear more from him in the near future.

i should really be getting some sleep, but i just had to post that picture! here's to you, brock. the next beer i drink will be in your honour. and i promise to drink a 'few' beers with you at next years heinerfest!

g'night

just got done with work. 10pm, great. but if i want vacation on the weekend, thats what it's going to have to be. i just got a great picture from the boat tour of some friends of mine and would like to honour this by putting it up on my page. hope thats ok with you all.

it sure looks like you all had loads of fun. cool picture!

if anybody has some neat pictures of recent events, please scan and send them to me. i'd love to start archiving them on my page, so i can see what you all are up to from time to time.

feierabend.

the sun is gone! damn! i sure hope this doesn't mean the rain season is arriving. but it gives me more time to get some work done (and obviously update this webpage). i haven't taken any new pictures, due to time constraints, but i swapped some stuff off of hendrik, so all pictures today are courtesy of him. thanks!

first of all, a series of downtown images.

i'm sure i'll get some more cool downtown pictures during my stay here, so expect more to come. although i already posted some campus pictures, here are two more i thought were worth posting.

and to finish off the pictures for today, this is the coffee shop i am sure i will be spending quite a lot of time in in the next seven months.

nice place, eh?

on the 27th, i hold my first lecture on 'client-server-architectures' and 'java servlet technology' (for those of you, who know wtf that is). it'll be for 100 undergraduate students and take me about 90 minutes. not to mention the days of preparation. but i'm sure it'll be a great experience, as i haven't taught computer science related topics yet. i'll post how it went when it's over.

uni related topics have been stealing away most of my time in the past few days, so there isn't much more to write about. at least nothing of general interest. we're planning a hiking trip up squamish mountain this coming saturday, if the weather plays along, so i guess there will be no more major updates to this page until then. well, depending on what else happens here in the meanwhile. perhaps i'll get some shots of my room and post them.

now, i'll go get some coffee in the beanery and shoot some pool. bye.

slightly overcast weather, so i am finishing off some homework here at the faculty. yeah, i know it's sunday, but as the weather forecast for next week is superb, and i now have tuesdays and thursdays off (thanks to getting the game development course, which is fridays from 4-7pm), i prefer to do the work when the weather sucks. so why not update my webpage while i'm at it?

last weekend we went to jericho beach for a barbeque to get to know the other new graduate computer science students. very relaxing afternoon, after which we all dropped into 'koerners pub' in campus and had a few pitchers of 'pale ale', my favourite beer here.

jericho beach is just one of the many beaches around the bay area, but the one closest to the campus is wreck beach. we were there a few days ago for a nightly beach party, which i think i mentioned below (i'm not going to read through all that to verify). hendrik was there during the daytime once, to buy some cloth to decorate his wall, so here are his impressions.

as everything here is slowly going back to normal, i guess it's time for me to do so too. we are still talking and mourning over here, but general campus life is completely back to normal. and i think, it's a good idea to move on, as i am sure nobody will forget what happened any time soon.

the world trade center tragedy has dominated this past week, but there are still some stories of note i can post here.

• The story of the cocktail party is not as spectacular as i thought it might have been (which i think is good!). adrian (one of the second year graduate students here) told me, that i danced to a great 80's mix, including my beloved depeche mode, up till about 4am, when i just asked the host for the bedroom and passed out in her bed. then adrian called me a taxi and gave me some money to pay for it. sorry, no nasty girls stories or embarrassments in front of my profs :-)
• i got the 'video game development' course! and was i ever happy about that! as described below, i will be in a project group with five other game-freaks, designing an 'urban race game' (whatever that is) in the first term, and programming it in the second term. cool, cool, cool. we are three guys and three girls. yes, girls. i couldn't believe it, but girls like games and programming too. and no, they are not 'oversized' and 'weird looking', sorry to break the cliche.
• i spent about 200 german marks on interior design for my apartment. now i have posters of trainspotting, the simpsons, ghost in the shell, moby and akira on my walls. also, i bought a nice big tree for my room at the botanical garden here on campus. now all i need is a couch and some nicer carpet (and a big TV and some game consoles and, and and...) and all will be complete and ready for guests.
• we had our first 'quad' dinner on thursday, so i finally got to meet all four others who live with me in our big townhouse. the food was great, we had red wine and laughed a lot. nobody believed me, when i mentioned my age. they guessed me at 24. ha ha ha. right. wishful thinking (or maybe not!). they all want to organize some parties in our quad, so we seem to have similar interests. when i suggested, that the penalty for not doing the job on the 'cleaning plan' (yes, oeli, we have a cleaning plan!) should be a case of beer, the vote brought out a unanimous 'yes'. i am sure we'll have lots of fun.

all other classes i am taking are alson turning out to be very interesting, but also very time consuming. sucks a bit, as the weather here is still fantastic! sun and completely blue skies. a bit on the cold side with around 20 degrees celsius, but i am not complaining! the rain season starts soon, then i will complain.

weeks ago, i promised some more images from various events, so i will start off with a series from the harbour boat cruise, sunset. enjoy.

then later, as the party on board proceeded, it got a bit darker and cozier. beer was supplied in nice amounts and i remember feeling a bit dizzy. but that might have been from the waves, i think.

so much for that... but just a few more shots to come.

hendrik (yes, we have a german colony here) took some real nice pictures while visiting stanley park, so credit goes out to him for the following, great picture of the lions gate bridge.

now, i leave this computer terminal to just lay in the sun and read a non-computer-science book! next update will include some pictures from downtown vancouver. if i can swap the digicam off of hendrik or frank, i'll add some pictures of my little habitat. it sure is turning out to be comfortable.

expect next update beginning of next week (or tomorrow perhaps). bye.

a dark day in history.

everybody is going apeshit over what happened, courses are being cancelled, practically all people are sitting in front of TV's and i must admit that i am also quite shocked and don't really feel like adding trivialities to this page today so i won't.

more to come soon.

brrrrr. nasty hangover. was at a real fun cocktail party last night, but i'm not good at drinking cocktails. i woke up this morning with all my clothes on and a rather blurred vision of what had happened after 2am. i remember taking a taxi home (at 5am), but as i still had all my money in my wallet, i really wonder who payed. frank and the others left earlier, so they couldn't tell me if i goofed off once again. but not to worry, as all the people from the computer science department (including the profs) were at the party, i'm sure someone will be able to tell me on monday. tune in to this channel soon for an update on this topic. it it might be fun and totally embarassing! and no, we didn't have the camera with us. thank god.

if i were fit, i'd finally post the harbour boat cruise pictures. but right now, my stomache and head are requesting that i take it slow and get a good nights sleep. but i will get those pictures up soon, promise. i'm sure some other people in germany are feeling hungover too, as i believe loni and florians diplom party was last night? am i right? needless to ask if you guys and girls had a good time. wish i could have been there.

i didn't get into the video game development course, yet. there are 35 applicants for only 10 positions in the course. i sent my application and will be notified by coming wednesday. please friends, wish me luck, i really want this course!

and not to forget: happy birthday toto! and no, i will not post that cool picture you sent me on this webpage (not unless i get a lot of requests to do so :-)

good night

john, you were right!

we went to see the indycar race in downtown vancouver. to save money, we just stood on the fences around the track, so don't expect to much of the images. i tried to get some pictures of the people surrounding the track, as they were quite inventive and were also sitting in front of a movie poster starring one of my best friends, markus mueller.

after the race, we just strolled through parts of the city. me constantly pointing the camera a things. i think i got a few good shots.

well, today is a national holiday here (labour day), but after an afternoon of barbeque and shopping downtown, i guess i could also get some more stuff up on this page of mine.

friday i moved in to the student dorm, fairview crescent, but i still feel a bit out of place, like i did at mikes place, but only at first. so i know, that within a few days i will feel like home again. my roommates are a bit, well, not so communicative. i don't even know the girls name, who lives in the room right next to me, as she only leaves her room to leave the apartment, and then only sighs a silent 'hi'. we're only five, not six as i had stated earlier, and it's three girls and two guys. the other girls are ali (don't know where she is from, but she is asian) and charlotte from france. the living room still looks like a dump, as the students living here last winter session (up to april 2001) really abandoned the place! the fridge is full of old, old food and the icebox also has seen better days. guess we'll have a day of cleaning ahead of us, which is ok, as my lectures don't start till next week. on the positive side, there are loads of friendly people in the dorm and we are socializing heavily. most of them are either german or australian, but they are all eager to meet new people and exchange experiences. like a black market for stories of various flavors.

and there's a big pub on campus, serving cheap beer. i can't complain.

my new job starts tomorrow. i got a job teaching software engineering to fourth year undergraduates. preparing and evaluating the tutorials for approximately 40-50 students will keep me occupied about nine hours per week and i get 23 canadian dollars per hour (1 can$ = 1,50 DM). again, i can't complain. this will help me tremendously, as i am really burning money. so much to do and so many cool things to buy. aaarrrghhh! i am way beyond my budget, so the job on campus is a gooood thing!

i promised some more campus impressions, so here they are. first off, my working environment.

i haven't taken any pictures of the interior, but they will follow as soon as i have a real geeky picture of me at the computer. or perhaps even me in the classroom, harassed by undergrads who are bored of my lectures.

this next series is of the two main libraries on campus. they stand just across from each other on main mall and form a crass (yes, they use this word here) contrast. tomes of wisdom. i got the keys and can fossick within.

the wealth of books within these two buildings is simply overwhelming. as mentioned before, the libraries are on main mall, just like the computer science department. so the following (and last) series is walking up and down main mall. computer science is in the south, but walking up north reveals a sight, which could not be captured by a digicam. nevertheless, see for yourself.

we went on a harbour cruise last thursday and partied the welcome party on friday. both good fun, but i'm not used to the ale just yet. saturday was spent in a post-traumatic daze and i haven't gotten around to posting the pictures of the cruise just yet. perhaps later today or sometime else this week.

tomorrow i apply for a phone in my room, so expect to see the phone nr. on this page soon. but please consider the nine hours difference between germany and north americas west coast, otherwise you will have to listen to some stupid answering machine.

one more beer at the pub before i dive back in to worklife. cheers!