Probably one of the most important and exciting occasions for scientists are international conferences. Sure, it's fun sitting around doing research and chatting to your office mates, but nothing beats finding out what everyone else from all over the world is doing! If you're lucky, you might even find a few people where you feel qualified to actually discuss their work with them, rather than just take their conclusions at face value. And if you're super lucky, you might find some people who can do the same for your research (here's where you hope that you haven't been barking up the wrong tree for the past few months!).
Naturally, seeing as you could hold an international conference anywhere in the world, one tends not to choose ugly places for them, so I do have some small tourism anecdotes. One part of learning to be a PhD student has been to realise that just because I am at a conference doesn't mean that every microsecond of my time has to be focussed on me and my project. It is very important to relax, wander around, look at posters on things you have no idea about, and generally chill out. This helps avoid feelings of demoralisation when you realise how little of the time you actually spend presenting your own work and/or 'networking' with new and influential people. One has to realise that a conference will usually never provide the exact answer to that problem that's been bugging you for the last month, but nonetheless, it can still give you a bunch of ideas, usually about stuff you hadn't even started thinking about yet...
Florence in late August was hot, but no hotter than Vienna, so it was just about possible to explore. I only spent one day checking out the city, and even then I rushed back for the poster sessions, so most landmarks were experienced only from the outside. Florence is a beautiful, but therefore reasonably full city. I wouldn't say it reaches Prague-like levels of tourism congestion, but it is on the way. This means that those seeking authentic italian experiences that do not come from the architecture might have to look further afield. Nonetheless, the food is great, even if the menu is often in English, and so's the ice cream! Though I was surprised to note that true italian fruit icecream seems to be more fruit than cream.
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| Zhang Huan + Florence.... |
Of course the highlight is the insanely detailed Cathedral in the centre, clad in 3 different colours of stone with a massive dome on top. The whole of the town centre is littered with ancient mansions from ludicrously rich people from the 16th century, which you can look at if you don't mind getting run over by mopeds cos you're not looking where you're going... The second highlight was rather a serendipitous find. On a hill overlooking the city I discovered an exhibition of vast, buddhist inspired sculptures by Chinese artist Zhang Huan. The juxtaposition of giant buddha heads and the Florence skyline was unexpected, but therefore all the more entertaining.
A few pictorial highlights can be obtained from the usual location by carrying out the usual clicking operation!
Der Tom
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