Getting into Swotvac now and it's pretty hard work. I had a bit of a break on Friday night though to go to the AusIMM Mining Ball. It was such a great night, lots of entertainment and delicious food. Plus my friend won the raffle :-). It was all raising money for the Royal Flying Doctors, so there were a bunch of pictures being auctioned too. So we had a heap of fun before starting study on the weekend.

I've been offered vacation work at Aurecon, so I'm really looking forward to starting there. The process wasn't too difficult, I just applied online, made a few phone calls and had an interview. I'll be working in the Community Development and Infrastructure sector, so it'll be interesting to see what sorts of projects are involved.

I've also been thinking a lot about my fourth year thesis. I'm interested in a project starting next year that models the transport of nutrients through groundwater flow. I've been talking to the Professor in charge, he seems really enthusiastic. So I'm hoping it all works out and I can get involved in that next year :-)

So we all survived those terrible mid-semesters :-). Not much else has been happening at uni, so I thought I'd put up a bit of chat about something I've been finding interesting in lectures. There's been a huge focus on runaway reactions and making sure reactors operate safely in two of my courses. Some of the stuff they talk about is pretty scary. I'll have a go at describing the one I found most shocking.

In the USA, there was a small chemical plant producing a fuel component in an exothermic reaction. Hydrogen was a product of the process. All they had to cool the reactor was a jacket filled with town water, pumped through a single pipe with no backup. So it clogged eventually and there was no alternative cooling system. The reactor got hotter, increasing the reaction rate. The outlet was too small to prevent pressure buildup and the hydrogen that was vented was sent straight into the surrounding atmosphere rather than into a backup tank. The reactor exploded and the surrounding hydrogen increased the size of the explosion. Several people were killed by the blast and the flying debris. Buildings hundreds of metres away were damaged.

It's hard to believe just how huge the consequences of poor engineering can be. Definitely motivates you to study! Especially when you think of all the amazing things good engineers can achieve :-)

Wow, what a full-on few weeks! I don't think I've ever been so stressed over mid-semester exams before! But we only have one left now and a week's break to prepare, so it shouldn't be too bad from now on. The CHESS (Chemical and Environmental Engineering Student Society) ball was on Friday, we had an amazing night. The main sponsor was Worley Parsons, so there were quite a few industry representatives from there, as well as from GHD and some other companies. Everyone looked amazing in suits and fancy dresses, plus the Chifley was a great venue! I've attached a pic with Mitch, Luke and Mitch's awesome hat :-)

We're three weeks into uni now and so far it's been a good semester. The lectures are interesting and challenging, so we've been kept on our toes. I'm struggling a bit with the background knowledge, having studied overseas last semester, but my friends have been lending me last semester's notes and explaining important points to me. I'm finding 'Open Channel Flow' particularly interesting, as well as 'Reaction Engineering'. Everyone's applying for vacation work at the moment, which may be a bit hard to get this year. Some of the top companies are only taking people with exceptional GPA's (I've heard of cutoffs as high as 6.5 out of 7), so everyone's been putting in heaps of effort to write really good applications. So, fingers crossed...

Back in Australia! I arrived on Saturday morning after a 32 hour flight. The last couple of weeks were crazy, I had three big exams and so many beurocratic things to sort out! The first exam was for 'Management of Sustainable Development', which was the easiest because it was in English. Then, two days later, I had an exam for 'Technische Waermelehre I' (Technical Heat Transfer). I expected it to be really hard, since I'd already really struggled with the mid-semester and the work had become a lot more complex later in the semester, but it actually turned out to be fine. Even though the questions were a bit harder, the exam was a lot shorter so I didn't struggle so much with time. Plus the questions weren't as wordy as the ones in the mid-sem, so the language didn't give me too much trouble. The real killer was 'Thermodynamik II', which I had the next week. It's widely recognised among the students as the toughest course at TU and most of the other students were already in their masters program. Every semester 80% fail... So that one was really hard, but I managed to scrape through :). I ended up having a much more full on exam period than any of my German friends, since I had to follow the rules set by UQ, which are a lot more strict than at TU. If a TU student gets to the end of semester and feels a bit stressed, no problem, he can just decide not to sit half his exams. Students aren't enrolled in courses, they just apply for exams at the end of semester if they want to. The best bit is, courses are free and there's no minimum study load, so there are no consequences if you don't sit an exam except that your degree takes a bit longer. Of course, the result is that a three-year bachelor ends up taking five years... So you have to be self-motivated. Everything's very unofficial, when I took my academic transcript from TU into the UQ faculty office, they didn't believe it was real! Which is understandable, it's just a form I filled in online and printed myself, then had signed by an employee in the office for international students. But over there, that's all you get. The laid-back attitude is something I think I'll miss, as well as the huge variety of cultures. My roommates at college were all foreigners from countries including Egypt, Bulgaria, Poland, Nepal, China, Saudi Arabia, Chile, Czech Repulic... You get the idea. So yeah, it was an amazing experience, I'd really recommend an international exchange to anyone with an inclination towards adventure, challenge and heaps of fun :). Especially if you can speak a second language, studying in German was such a great opportunity for me to improve my language skills and challenge myself. At the same time, I'm happy to be back at UQ. This semester has started out well, my lecturers seem really good and the courses are interesting. I'm a bit scared of CIVL3140, it's following on from Fluid Dynamics last semester and I think the one I did in Berlin was a bit different to the UQ one, but the content seems interesting and I'm sure I'll be able to catch up. Anyway, that's probably enough for one post. Bis bald!

Getting really stressful over here! It's the last week of lectures, which is when most of the exams take place. There's no swotvac here, or a specific exam block. Because I'm leaving next week I've had to organise to do one exam early as an oral, but apart from that I'll just be sitting with the German students. There's a lot more freedom here because your not officially enrolled in subjects, only exams, so you can choose not to sit an exam if you don't feel ready for it. You can also re-sit if you fail a lot of the time, there are heaps of ways to work the system if you're lucky enough to be around long enough to organise yourself... This week I have Management of Sustainable Development and Technische Wärmelehre (it'll be tough) and next week Thermodynamik II (that's the oral). I also have to write a 25 page German assignment... So better get back to it!

Just enjoying another 4-day weekend in Berlin :-). This time it's a public holiday today (Monday). Not sure why... I've had to do a lot of study this weekend though, especially for Stroemungslehre (fluid dynamics), because the exam's in a few weeks. Everything that normally takes ages in Australia takes ages and ages and ages over here! For starters, it's really hard to understand the questions since I have to look up all the technical words and some aren't in either of my dictionaries. Same problem comes up when I try to read the textbook to answer the questions... And again when I try to write answers, but I need to use technical words to explain the equations. On the other hand, going through questions slowly gets you really thinking about the answers, so I think it's sticking pretty well :-).

On a non-engineering note, Karneval der Kulturen is on in Berlin at the moment. I was there yesterday for the parade; dancers, floats and costumes from all over the world were on display. Plus there was heaps of really delicious food. I heard that they're expecting one million visitors to the carneval over four days and I believe it after being there yesterday - streets and streets were packed with so many people you could barely walk. It's such a lively city, there's always something big going on.

Into week 5 of uni now and it's been pretty full on. I have my first exam in two weeks, but luckily it's for the one subject I'm taking in English and it shouldn't be too hard. I'm finding it pretty difficult to know what's going on and organise myself without blackboard etc. You get so used to that sort of thing, you forget what it's like to actually have to go out and find information that's not right under your nose. This week we have a 'Feiertag' (public holiday) on Thursday, which means a 4-day weekend for me :-). I managed to get Friday off. The problem is, it means I have massively long and strenuous days from Tuesday through to Thursday, but it's made a lot more bearable by the great people I've been meeting. Anyway, overall everything's been pretty much same-same since last time I posted. Bis dann!

I'm two weeks into semester now and I thought I'd try to make a bit of a comparison between TU in Berlin and UQ in Brisbane. The biggest difference I've noticed is the workload, the lectures I have here are all at least two hours long and there are plenty of them! A full time workload is five subjects rather than four and some have up to eight contact hours a week. The other big difference is the assessment - most subjects just have one big exam at the end that's worth 100% of your mark. Plus, uni's free over here so I guess they're not as well-funded, there are less small classes like tutorials. One thing that's really great at TU is that they realise students are poor! Not only is uni free, you can eat really cheaply in the mensa, the TU equivalent of the UQ refectory. Overall, my first impression of TU is that you really have to motivate yourself and learn independently. They don't always give you homework or assignments to work on, you just have to pull out a textbook. Forget lecture recordings and, for most subjects, prepared lecture slides. It's usually just a guy up the front writing on a blackboard. At first I found it hard to keep up, but now I'm glad because having to write everything down keeps me awake for the full two hours! Anyway, that's my comparison based on first impressions, to be continued as semester progresses...

I've just finished my first week of uni and it was hectic! The study load over here is huge, I have up to eight contact hours a week for each subject and I'm doing five. Plus they go through everything really, really fast. The subjects all seem like good matches with what I'd be studying in Australia, so I've been lucky there. Anyway, I'd better get back to studying, we'll see how this all pans out!

Starting uni tomorrow, not really sure what to expect other than a massive workload. It seems like we're the only exchange students here who have to do a full load at tub, it's 5 subjects that all look really huge. So it's going to be a challenge, but I'm still looking forward to trying something new. Plus hopefully meeting more Germans and improving my language skills.

Blogging from Berlin! I've been living in a college near Technische Universitaet Berlin for the last couple of weeks, taking German courses and settling in. This is the most amazing city. It's so huge and there are so many people everywhere. It's not unusual to go into a club at 6am, the parties go right through til 10am the next day. People from all over the world live in my college and take German lessons with me, so I've been making some cool friends, but it's been hard to actually meet German people. Hopefully when uni starts I'll meet some students from Berlin. It's been hard to try and work out which courses I should take, but I've got a pretty good idea now. I'm hoping to get these courses approved: 'Thermodynamik II' in place of 'Chemical Thermodynamics'; 'Stroemungslehre I' in place of 'Fluid Mechanics for Civil Engineers'; 'Management of Sustainable Development' (yay, a course in English!) in place of 'Introduction to Environmental Management' (a part B elective at UQ); 'Technische Waermungslehre' in place of 'Heat and Mass Transfer'. Then I need an extra subject to make up a full time load, but I haven't managed to find anything yet. Maybe a German course would be a good idea. So much organising goes into an exchange and it's always more complicated than you expect. I've been running around trying to get hold of people and handing in things for two weeks and I'm still not even properly registered at uni! Here you need health insurance waivers and things to even start the enrolment process. Plus, because uni's free here, there are fees for everything. I have to buy internet at college and at uni, it costs to wash your clothes and to use facilities like the music practise room. But it's all worth it, I'm having the best time and I'm super excited about starting uni in two weeks :-)

So, a lot has happened since my last post! I managed to get the exchange sorted and am now enjoying the perks that come with the challenge- my friend and I have been travelling around Europe for the last couple of weeks. We started off in Munich, then went to Koenigsleiten in Austria. Later we moved on to Prague and Cesky Krumlov in the Czech Repulic and now we're in Krakow, Poland. Austria was great, we did some skiing and enjoyed amazing views of the mountains from our apartment. The time in Prague was mostly spent visiting old castles and churches; the city has some amazing history. Cesky Krumlov is a sweet little village, there isn't a lot to do so we ended up just wandering around most of the time. We arrived in Krakow this morning and visited the beautiful old castle today. On Tuesday we head to Berlin and next week we start a 4-week intensive German course that will hopefully prepare us for studying in German. I still have to find out details about the subjects I'm hoping to take and may end up having to shuffle some things around. It's all been pretty complicated, but I think it should all work out. I guess time will tell!

Just got back from a few weeks away with the family and I'm back into the EWB vac work. Yesterday I finally managed to get through to a donor, as well as putting together a brochure for corporate partners containing heaps of fund-raising ideas. It also included a list of commemorative days that are relevant to EWB's philosophy, such as 'World Toilet Day', themed around sanitation in developing countries, and the 'International Day for the Eradication of Poverty'. So hopefully some of the companies that support EWB will do some fund-raising or raise awareness through various activities on some of the commemorative days. I'm also organising an exchange to Berlin, which will start in March. I'll be studying at Berlin Technical Uni, which has courses in science, architecture, I.T. and engineering. It's been pretty complicated trying to work everything out, but it should be worth it :-)