new home and some impressions from work and christchurch itself

It took me a while to save some time to write another blog. Lots of different things are happening over here...

First of all, I managed to decide on a flat or more accurate, on a house. The house itself is quite special and really nice equipped regarding furniture and stuff. Unfortunately its not a typical kiwi townhouse, because it has got a second floor and it might be a bit too tidy :-). Although it is typical kiwi in terms of statics... these bl*** kiwi houses are just build like paper houses. You can feel the cold coming through the wall and through the (one glassed, nod double or triple glassed like in Europe) windows. And my room sits just on top of two posts made out of steel. Just one side of the room is connected to the house and therefore it is quite unstable... 'luckily' the house is located 100m beside the railways... every time when the train passes, it feels like an earthquake! everything is shaking... :-)
Anyway, the flatmates are really nice and easygoing. Although they are just a 'bit' older than me (range from approx 30 to 45). So for one more time (as when I was in London) I am  the young chicken. But until now I really cant complain - its great living in that house.

At work, everything came a bit different than I expected it to come. I knew, my field of work will be something with machine control, but I did not expect that I will be integrated into testing that much. I was driving a scary big machine in my first week at work already. It is a machine which makes curbs (Randsteine) and gutters (Abflussrinnen) out of concrete while it is driving along the street. (see: http://www.gomaco.com/Resources/gt3600c_g.html  and  http://www.gomaco.com/Resources/photos/gt3600_01_06/graphic4.gif)
On the other hand I am 'just' involved in testing and not developing. But of course I can't really expect being involved in developing in my first internship. And I really need to say, that I feel comfortable being a tester at the first step. And not least, I still have to take full responsibility of the hole testing and reporting all the bugs.
So I really enjoy the diversified work, running a big machine, reporting bugs, learning new things about CAN-buses, see how such guidance systems are being developed, ...
And the people I work with are great, very helpful and focused, but not too serious and jocking as well.

Last weekend I was in the city and went to the botanic garden (its spring over here http://picasaweb.google.ch/chbischo/BotanicGarden) and to Sumner (a part of the city which is right at the beach http://picasaweb.google.ch/chbischo/Sumner ). It was really nice.

On Saturday night I went out with a german guy. He is doing an internship at Trimble as well. Fortunately the kiwis are not lazy folks at all... there was really something going on in the city, people everywhere on the street, and the bars and clubs were quite full. The very center of Christchurch is quite small, but the outgoing does't seems to be too bad, jipi :-)
One of my flatmates will take me to a club/bar next weekend to meet some of her friends...therefore I am really looking forward to meet some local kiwis... :-)