From here and there

3 weeks in Zürich - time to write down some interesting facts before they start to feel normal and I forget about them!

Church bells. I've never been to a place where people would put so much effort into ringing the church bells. For example, there is a church a block away from my current student house and this is what happens every Sunday from 09:15-09:30 and 11:15-11:30.

Seriously, 15 minutes in a row! And it's beautiful but the first "patch" is just an hour too early. If you happen to walk on a street nearby a church during that time then it is impossible to have a conversation - happened yesterday so we were just smiling to each other for a few minutes after seeing that even shouting does not help. However, now I have a remedy to guarantee good morning sleep on Sundays: earplugs ;)

I know what's going on in tennis! This has never happened before!! And I even read news about tennis sometimes! I mean - it's a big thing here and people (even local foreigners) are talking about Swiss tennis players and Wawrinka winning the Australian Open etc. So I guess it's as impossible not to know anything about tennis here as being clueless about football in Italy...

Today we took a a Zürich city tour (http://www.freewalkzurich.ch/) with some fellow students here - which I higly recommend ;) Among other things we learned that Zürich is the 3rd city in the world in terms of the number fountains - after Rome and Kansas City(!). Also - that Zürich is, of course, one of the most expensive cities in the world - usually competing with London, Geneva and Oslo for the "title". The rental prices of the most expensive street in Zürich, the Bahnhofstrasse, are a secret but are thought to have quuiiite many zeros. However, the shops there - Louis Vuitton, Gucci, Chanel etc. - should not have problems paying it....

In addition, the German part of Switzerland is mostly protestant, unlike Austria. An example of the protestant church is St. Peter - which is architecturally rather modest but has the largest clock face in Europe (approx. 8.5 m in diameter) - even bigger than Big Ben in London:

In this image you can see the Grossmünster monastery and a beautiful view on the mountains. Grossmünster was a monastery for monks, which was competing for influence with the Fraumünster monastery for nuns just across the river Limmat during the middle ages. As far as I could understand, the ladys living in Fraumünster were very privileged and quite influential during the middle ages, and also taking important decisions about the city - and also their life style was not that religious... for example, during some period they could even get married!?!

Another view on the mountains and the bridge Münsterbrücke:

Winter in Switzerland? No. Until now it has only been snowing during one morning - in the evening of the same day it was already sunny and beautiful. Well, we're planning to go skiining in a few weeks so I might still see the snow! ;)

Getting an apartment in Zürich

This post was saved for the time when I can proudly say that I will not be living under one of the many bridges of Zürich in one month - after my contract in this student house ends.

So most of you have probably already heard that fining a place to stay in Zürich can be a struggle! I was scared by several persons that it will be hard to find an apartment and that everything is extremely expensive. Well - it is! Rent for a room in a shared apartment (with 2 or more people) in suburbs starts roughly from 600 CHF/month (a bit less that 500 EUR). A 2-room apartment close to the centre - starting from 2000 CHF/month (approx. 1600 EUR) etc. Some people can spend months before they find an appropriate place...

Surprisingly, I was quite lucky. After some notes from friends and my supervisor about the problems of finding an apartment in Zürich, I checked out more than 50 advertisements on 5 housing sites in the internet and sent out 12 different (!) application letters for apartments during one day + put an advertisement in the internet - saying that a nice estonian student is looking for a room in Zürich etc etc. In the end, I took a room in the third apartment I went to visit and sent "sorry, I already found an apartment"-letters to rest of the places. My future flatmates will be a German guy studying evnronmental engineering and a Swiss girl giving dancing lessons and studying physics. ;) The place is 20 minutes from work by tram and has a grocery store downstairs. Not familiar with other possible benefits yet.. 

However, in terms of Zürich, I am quite a frugal (=undemanding??) person - there are a loot of students living in shared apartments and people are changing there all the time - so it's quite easy to get one. On the other hand, if you want to rent a whole apartment for your own then you might have a bigger problem. The number of them is probably not as big and everything seems to be very official - renting is done through real estate companies, a looot of interested people attend each apartment visit and you need references from work to be selected by the company etc. For example, one of my formates was crashing on a friend's couch for 2 months before finding an apartment :) However, this is still a record of our lab!!! 

A small mandatory picture of the city view at night. And by the way, the lights in the air are nothing supernational (like I thought in the beginning...) - there's just a village or something in on a mountain. However, you can't blame an estonian for NOT considering the possibility of mountains... (familirize yourself with our geography: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suur_Munam%C3%A4gi).

And an foggy picture of what happens if the OV lab goes for a beer on Friday.

"Are you happy in Switzerland?"

This is a question I have asked from several foreign bachelor students here. What would you expect? One of the richest countries in the world, a beautiful city, very international so it should be easy to find friends.... But the answer is usually "hmmmmmmm weeellllll I don't know..." or "hhmmmmmm weeellllllll no". The main reason for that is the university system here - the one that makes Swiss universities to the best in Europe but is at the same time very harsh on students. On girl answered well - that she feels very successful to be here but is not happy.

I already touched this topic last week but a bit in more detail now: All the students that are taken to the university have to apply some qualifying exams after one year (seven if I remember correctly).
If you can't pass them during the first year you have a chance to try again next year. If you haven't passed all of them by the the end of second year - goodbye!
You fail one exam twice - goodbye.
You fail more than six exams during your bachelor's studies - goodbye.
So - you get really smart people from here but they're under constant pressure! It's so weird to see students working so hard after being in FInalnd! And also cool to see a greek and turkish person studying together and speaking fluent German with each other!
Well - goood luck for them!!!

A bit about the lab: The big boss of the group is called Olivier. Our lab manager is called Olivier. Today a new student arrived - called Olivier. In March we'll get a 4th one. Gonna be interesting!!! :D

I feel that I'm slowly becoming familiar with the project and the literature and the lab etc. And I'm feeling super motivated right now! And thiiiiiis close to having my own ideas for the project and experiments etc. There's just not enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do!!! - read papers, start some experiments, socialize with coworkers, attend courses/meetings etc... So everything is interesting :)

By the way, what place is this?

No! Zürich doesn't have an undergorund! It's a tram stop! :D The first undergorund one I have ever seen....

Then we went to a cool bar today with a new friend - it was huge ang cosy!!! Sorry, the picture is not the best - but you'll see it with your own eyes when you come to visit ;) As we didn't have CHF cash, the good thing was that you could pay with euros. The bad thing was that the exchange ratio was 1 CHF = 1 EURO. But well, the price of beer was still similar to prices in Finland

And to finish up: In this picture you can see an ugly construction site behind which is actually a beautiful river!!! And along this beautiful river are beautiful old-fashioned houses! And on top of those beautiful houses, the view is dominated by a beautiful big building - do you know what is the purpose of this building? What buildings are ususally put on top of a hill? ;) Churches? City halls?

Well, not in Zürich. This is the ETH polyterrasse - a university building! It's a big building that hosts, among other things, a university cafeteria and a fitness centre! From the terrace on top one has an amazing view on the city and it is a place where only the most important people are invited for gatherings by the university. Well, we were there once with fellow PhD candidates in September to celebrate the end of PhD interviews but already then we were advised to enjoy the view - because we would not see this place for yeeaarrsss, if ever! :D

The only idiot in Zürich wearing a reflector.

That would be me.


Seriously, noone is wearing a reflector! They don't even know what it is!!!

Today I rushed into our common kitchen after shopping and one guy from Turkey kindly noted "Hey, you have something hanging from your coat!". After explaining the purpose of the thing AND that it is required in Estonia by LAW - they still thought that it's strange! :D

Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule Zürich

aka my university - ETH Zürich.

The first week is almost over and there has been almost NO time to work - everything is about going from one paperwork institution to another one - but at least these obligations are almost done now. I also received a working computer and could even configure it to print out papers with the help of our IT guy - so I'm officcially integrated into the system now ;)

About my office - there are two thinkg I can't believe about it:
1) how big it is and
2) how quiet it is!!!
Seriously, without exaggerating, the room is huge and hosts at 20 PhD students. But it is so quiet that I almost whispern talking to the girl sitting next to me - because otherwise I feel like yelling! So it's a huge transition from our B607 where 7 people could make the noise for the whole B6 floor! It's great for concentrating but it's just so... quiet! :D (Btw, Oliver, my future colleague, if you happen to read this then don't worry, you're going to be in the talkative post-doc office!)

And here is a (not the best quality) photo from my office window:

The new workmates are still really cool! I know it even better now than a few days ago! But still need to get to know them a lot! For example, remembering the faces and names would be a good start. So that situations like yesterday wouldn't repeat themselves: I asked a guy from the lab, whether he's also in our group and he was like "Duh, I'm sitting behind your supervisor" - but in a nice way! :D

Until now, my labwork has been limited to making a few buffers. However, from as much as I have seen the lab seems really well organized (I'm not talking about the mess on researchers' desks but about the organization on a higher level - chemicals, storage room etc.). And it's organized in a really... relaxed way! I don't know how to explain it.... Well okay, an example: We - me and a new post-doc - were demonstrated  that our liquid nitrogen tank is full by pouring some liquid nitrogen on the floor. :D (but of course, we also told about the safety issues, using gloves etc. as well)

Only during the past few days have I actually understood how big is the ETH. There a sooo many buildings all around the city. Most of the buildings look spectacular in comparison to Estonian or Finnish architecture - but it's just the normal style here.

I've been talking to some ETH students in our student house and found out that the exams are starting in 2 weeks. And what do you think all the students are doing? They are STUDYING! From morning until the evening - in our house and also in the working building. Apparently, if you fail an exam twice then you're free to pack your things and go home - forever! So studying is being taken somewhat more seriously here than in Finland :)

And to finish for today - a picture from the walk from the immigration office to public transport office:

Have a good evening, everybody :)

By the way, I canged the blog settings so that everyone can comment now (don't need to be a member here).

What next? Zürich it is!

The first 24 hours have passed - surprise-surprise - extremely quickly. 

The trip to become a step closer to a "real scientist" started with a personal fanclub at the Tallinn Airport: 

After some 8 hours of travelling, I finally happily arrived to Zürich. Well, maybe, not happily as such, more like "Omg! Am I really here!?!?" It will probably take some time to get used to the fact that I'll not join people for lunch in Mikro and will not go to Forte every time there is something to celebrate.

Probably, the first question from many of you: Where will you livee??? 

My hostel for the first night was in the "red district" of Zürich (on a street called "Langstrasse") which was still surprisingly nice. The locals said that it's kind of becoming the fashionable artistic place - like Kreuzberg in Berlin - but not quite there yet. In the next morning I moved to a new student accommodation (probably for youngsters because offers breakfast and dinner - life is soooo easy like this! hihi). My new room (until mid-February) looks like this: 

The building is walking distance from the centre and also only 5 mins from the university. This is going to be a comfortable first month here ^^

The first day at work was paperwork and some more paperwork. On the other hand, I didn't get much done but felt like doing something all the time - bank account, sim card for phone... The lab members seem really cool and I can't wait to feel at home with them! Tomorrow I will try to start with some labwork, even making buffers would be a good start.

The first impressions about Zürich... For example, coffee cup seems to accompany almost everything. The woman who helped me to open a bank account sipped coffee every once in a while and the guy showing us some university stuff also carried his cup with him... I don't know whether it means that Swiss people drink a lot of coffee or they just don't leave things undone despite having a coffee (break) :D

Oh, and I had never before run into "bicycle trees"!? Funny things...

Today is the last day to wish happy new year - so happy and a successful new year to everyone! :)