The debut

So this is my debut. As a blogger, as a visitor in Japan and as participant of a scientific research project.

I just started up this blog page and I'm trying to figure out how it all works. But more important: I just arrived to Japan yesterday!

I should probably start at the beginning: For those who don't know it, I study nanotechnology at the University of copenhagen at my third year.
Since I started studying at the university I have wanted to become an exchange student. For several reasons the idea of going to Japan seamed very attractive to me.
In the summer 2006 I spoke with one of the professors (Niels) at my university, who told me that he could probably make a deal with one of the professors at a university in Tokyo. This got me very excited and I started taking care of all the formalities (which are quite a few) while the professors kept an email correspondance going.
Later on Niels and Robert (which is another professor at my university) decided that I should tag along their research trip to Japan here in Februrary. So here I am.

The purpose of this trip is to use a so called synchrotron which is located at a research institute called KEK. I will not bore you with all the technical details, but this equipment is really state-of-the art and there are only a handfull of these worldwide due to the expenses of building and maintaining them.

If you want to know what all the fuss is about, check out these links:
http://cmm.nbi.dk/
http://www.kek.jp/intra-e/index.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Synchrotron

Back to the story of the trip. We arrived yesterday (thursday) at 10 AM (+9 GMT) at Narita airport, where we took a bus directly to a smaller town called Tsukuba. There we were picked up by one of the professors who - to our amusement - drove a Volvo. The professor is called Shin-ichi Adachi and is a really nice guy. He drove us to the research institute and showed us around. This is a huge place (appr. 5 square km) containing its own dormatory, mini market and cafeteria.

There are so many peculiar things about this place. For example, when you enter the dormatory hall you have to put your shoes in a cabinet, and put on some plastic indoor shoes you are provided with. Also, they have vending machines for everything. At these machines you can buy everything from sodas or beers to cans of hot coffee. There is also a machine where you can buy french fries and other hot meals! I'm going to try it out sometime - and I will probably regret it.

There is so much more to tell, but I'm going to bed soon. The time is now 00:45 AM (I am still in the lab...*sigh*), and I have to get up urly tomorrow morning.

I will (hopefully) write another post tomorrow. Also, I hope to get some pictures going soon.


Good Night.

EDIT(Thursday): I have now added some pictures to my posts.