Atleast a little bit of over one week in Mannheim is over. The appartment is nice as is the landlord who lives across the inner yard. Arrived to Mannheim on Saturday 1st of March and the flight was delayed as a thunderstorm had ripped through the geneal area of Frankfurt and Mannheim.
Patrick from work was on the same plane so I got a ride from him via a grocery store to the appartment. Thankfully he also translated some of the discussion between the landlord and me.
Getting to work on Monday proved eventful. Where does the bus to work leave from? So after some 2km of walking I finally got to the bus and to work.
After that it has mainly been routine. I work around 10 hours and get home dead tired.
On Tuesday this week I went from work to Frankfurt airport to get to Krakow. I carried around meine koffert that weighs about 17kg (thanks to Patrick and his washing machine it was full of clean clothes, now its mostly dirty clothes). After checking I noticed that I only have 45min to get to the gate and Frankfurt and its security checks.. Made it just in time. Through two security checks...
Getting to the plane proved to be some kind of bingo. The first plane the bus stopped at proved to be the wrong one after a lengthy discussion between the driver and the ground crew. The second plane followed the same pattern. Luckily it was the correct one. I had to ask the crew as I boarded the plane if it was going to Krakow. It did. The plane ride to Krakow was a bit bumpy as it was quite windy in the area. The guy sitting next to me stopped eating and held his tray and was looking nervous. Good thing he didn't freak out.
After a nice landing Krakow turned out to be more or less quite dark. Apparently street lights are an overrated thing in Poland. Got to the hotel ok and after loggin in to the net and talking with Ilari I hit bed.
The next day was mostly at work interviewing new candidates for our open position and following presentations given by other teams. I held a 10min presentation about my project that will now be one of the key areas we will be focusing on. In the evening we left for the outskirts of Krakow and a nice mansion in the middle of .. well actually nowhere. Evening program was dinner and wine and beer and wine and beer and .. Finally me and my co-worker go tired and went to the bar where we quite fast consumed (to one German guys suprise) a large number of Gin Tonics. Drunk I headed to bed.
The next day was mostly presentations about different projects and demonstrations of applications. In the evening we went to another building where we had dinner. After the dinner the bar was open. I remember having a contest with my boss's boss where we were competing with drinking shots. Remember leaving. Remember coming to room. Woke up in bed the next morning feeling awfully sick and tired. As did most of us.
The day continued in the same steps as the day before and at the end of the day people started to leave for the airport. In the evening we went out to central Krakow to some market square where we walked around and looked at all the small shops. After that it was dinner time with texmex food.
Me and some others decided to stay for one more night and left on Saturday morning after breakfast. At the airport we had a small lunch. After that it was check-in and through security. After an hour the plane arrived and we boarded it. Flight to Frankfurt was quite uneventful. Except that the butter was so hard that I broke my plastic knife on it :) Landing proved to be interesting as the pilot suddenly locked the wheels (atleast it felt like it) and started to turn right at a very hard speed. I think he landed to far in.
After a lengthy walk I found the transit station where I got my next ticket to Sweden. And I had to change terminals. Which ment a lot of walking. After half an hour or so I was at the gate and went to get something to eat. So while in Germany do as the Germans do. So I had a käsebretzel. Was good.
The plane to Sweden arrived and after a while they announced that it had a technical problem. Yay. It was soon fixed and we could board it. The plane was full and crowded. Didn't like it. Trip was boring and suprisingly the landing went ok. So now I'm at the hotel room at the airport waiting for tomorrow and the trip to Västerås.
Time to go to sleep.
