Frascati and Roma, Italy

What could be better than escaping the dreary winter German weather for a week in Frascati, Italy? I attended a PolInSAR conference (Polarimetric Interferometric Synthetic Aperture Radar for those who really want to know what I do…) at one of the two major European Space Agency headquarters. The week was quite intensive with lots of sitting in one room (we had some 3 hour marathon sessions without a break) but when that break finally came a little latte macchiato, cappuccino, or any other wonderful Italian coffee creation provided a delicious pick-me-up. My presentation went relatively well and I had a chance to meet a lot of legends in my field, which was a little intimidating but exciting.

Frascati is where the extremely wealthy people from Rome live. Check out this villa (I admit I sneaked onto the driveway to take this picture).


After the conference I had the weekend to spend in Rome. I met up with a friend to do some intense sight-seeing including the Vatican, Roman forum, Coliseum, and Palazza Venezia with lots of coffee and pizza breaks before more ruin-viewing.

St. Peter’s Square (i.e. Vatican). They’re a little late taking down the Christmas tree though.

The elite Swiss-guard with their cool uniforms. Just don't ask them to smile.

Roman forum




Palazza Venizia by day and night

Happy belated 2007

Please excuse my extremely belated new year’s wishes to everyone. I spent a very relaxing, much-needed two weeks in Calgary, Canada for Christmas with my family, friends and cat.

Happy new years from my family.

Saffron curled up in the smallest enclosed space he can find.

Typical big-sky Calgary sunrise from my kitchen window.

A visist to my artist friend Amy's studio to see her latest creations. She has a cool website too.

Porro Open, Barcelona

I played the Porro Open hat tournament in Barcelona in mid-October. For those who don’t play ultimate, a hat tournament is where the teams are “drawn out of a hat”, although in reality teams are chosen subjectively by the organizers. It can be difficult to get a spot in Porro because it’s so popular and is known for having a great theme party on the Saturday night, so I was really lucky to get in.

Playing on the beach in Spain was a great way to end the season and my team even ended up winning the tournament! The theme of the party this year was “Rubik’s Cube”, where you had to come dressed in the 6 colours of the Rubik’s cube. (And believe me, no one looks very good dressed in 6 different colours including orange, green and yellow together). At one point in the evening, your team is assigned a colour and after a series of manic trading, you are one unified, crazy melange of other people’s stuff, albeit in one colour (see before and after pictures of my team below).

Because I couldn’t find cheap flights on Friday night or Sunday I also took two days vacation to check out the bizarre but fascinating Dali museum in Figures and to see some of renowned Barcelona architect Gaudi’s colourful creations.

The beautiful beach at Castelldefels, just outside of Barcelona.

A hat tournament always has a mix of skill/experience levels. This was Anna’s first tournament and here she’s about to catch her first point in the endzone at a tournament ever.

Rubik’s Cube: before and after

Lalo about to spray our celebratory champagne into the crowd.

Dali Museum, Figures

Gaudi’s Apartment on Paseo de Gracia, Barcelona

Gaudi’s Parc Güell, Barcelona

Prague, Czech Republic

Dev and I had a great time exploring this beautiful (although overly touristy) medieval city. Everywhere you look there are towering dark turrets and buildings from the 10^th to 18^th century (or even the 21^st….I enjoyed Frank Gehry’s “Fred and Ginger” building as well). Charles’ bridge (Karluv most) was beautiful despite being packed with tourists, and I still remember some of the scenes from Mission Impossible which was shot there (the bridge also has a long and glorious history of people being thrown off it by slightly peeved monarchy). I had no idea that Good King Wenceslas was actually Czech (and still have no idea how to really pronounce his name…Czech is a very difficult language for Westerners) although I found it amusing that the plural is [sometimes] formed with the letter ‘y’, for instance “cigarety” for cigarettes.

Cramped night train on the way there:

Confusing house numbers (this is actually quite normal):

Fred and Ginger (supposed to resemble the famous Fred Rogers and Ginger Astaire dancing) by Frank Gehry:

A poster from the Communist-era that I saw in a museum. It's adverstising the Czech immitation of Coke (the terrible capitalist beverage). I think it looks more like Metamucil…

Oktoberfest, Munich

Dev (my brother) came for a visit to Munich during Oktoberfest and to play a hat tournament they have here every year. Last year I was completely out of it, having just arrived in Germany, but this year I got the full experience! Some points of interest:

• Oktoberfest runs for three weeks in September
• The beer “tents” are actually huge buildings (albeit temporary)
• No one in Munich calls it Oktoberfest. People say they’re going “auf die Wies’n” (literally means a grassy field, although any grass that was on the original site is long since dead after almost 200 years of partying [the first Oktoberfest was the king's wedding reception held in 1810])
• Only tourists go to Oktoberfest dressed normally. Real Müncheners wear the traditional "tracht" consisting of a dirndl for women and lederhosen for men. I found out that the equivalent of stuffing one's bra for men in Bavaria is adding inserts to make calves look more muscular. It's all in German, but check out the enhancements for sale at WadlWadl

Yusi (an amazing American ulti player) and I showing off our modest dirndls.


How the servers manage to keep to a smile on their faces is beyond me.

To prove that he was there, Dev hamming it up, although unfortunately all you can see of Frank is the upper half of his lederhosen.