So, time marches on relentlessly, weeks go by faster than I could have imagined and yet at the same time I sometimes find myself missing home comforts but that may be because the next time I go home will be Christmas and that’s always exciting.

Anyway it has been a rather uneventful week, even last weekend was comparatively calm- possibly the calm before the storm as we now have every weekend until the 19th Dec. filled up with stuff! I think I will take the opportunity to introduce some people as I feel I mention names randomly, although I think I’ve already explained quite a lot about them…

Rachel and Andrew live in Gustav Eiffel, the same as me, their rooms are in the same corridor, I am 118, Andrew is 116 and Rachel is 115- it has turned out to be very convenient for parties. They both go to uni in Glasgow and are studying medicinal chemistry, in fact by some amazing coincidence we work in the same building; in fact Andrew has just moved into the same office as me. It’s a good job we all get on so well otherwise it could be potentially disastrous.

Rob and Sarah our two other British friend both study Maths at Southampton Uni, they are the only ones doing French and Maths there, just like I am the only one doing Chemistry and French at Edinburgh, not many people take science and languages and I guess it draws a certain type of person as we are all creative- in our own ways, and slightly crazy!

We have lots of other friends too but I won’t talk about everyone as us five often find ourselves together. A lot of the people we’ve met this term will be leaving after Christmas which is sad because we’ve met some really great people- thank God for Facebook and the fact a lot of them are going to study in Antwerp- that’s practically a jaunt down the road (to Belgium but still…)

It’s snowing as I write this, and is very, very cold- and I though moving south meant better weather! No such luck apparently.

Work wise this week has been alright, I did two experiments which both worked (eventually) but neither of which made nice usable crystals so back to stage one there and then Lydie suggested I do some practical work based on my literature review which I am really excited about. I wanted to do this literature review to prepare for a potential PhD topic- if I am able to do one- and I didn’t think I’d be doing any real work on it for a long time but here I am, barely an amateur chemist getting to do something that genuinely fascinates me. Sometimes I have to admit Karma seems a fairly sound logic!

As always I enjoyed Japanese and I am sad that French classes will end soon because I won’t see my Japanese friend, Shusaku, I sit next to him in class and we always ending up laughing lots and the French teacher likes him so I seem to avoid some of her usual wrath. I’m not being overly sensitive about this- there is a genuine animosity towards English, English speakers and not because of their apparent ‘ignorance’, I don’t know what it is but it’s not pleasant and I have been surprised by the noticeable distaste. It is one of the few sour notes still lingering, maybe we should always talk in French?

Anyway, I’ll have to wrap this up I have assignments to be getting along with, my boyfriend is visiting me next week and were going to Paris next weekend but before that this weekend we’re off to Brugges, we have tried to learn some Flemish from Bert but to little avail- it’s very hard to pronounce but I can understand bits as it resembles both English and German. Still it’s going to be fun!

Anyway, what’s this week three? Can’t believe I’ll be home again in four weeks, it seems insane I’d better get working!

Until next time….

P.S I am aware that it is now Wednesday and that even by my standards this is hopelessly late… I’ve been busy in the lab so haven’t had a chance to get on line as, guess what? We still have no internet!