Arrival in Brisbane

I have arrived in Brisbane along this whirlwind tour of various parts of Australia! My seminar went well at UNSW this morning and it was really nice to speak with Vicki Chen about the work that they are doing in Sydney. The UNSW lab facilities are very impressive and they certainly have much more of a focus on commercial systems and membrane preparation than we do in Austin. I met several of the students in the group and enjoyed lunch with Pierre Le-Clech and a few students. The University seemed nice, but unfortunately, I didn't get much of a chance to see it as I was tied down with my luggage for the day.

After the seminar, I camped out in one of the post-doc offices at UNSW until I finally got sick of sitting around. Then, I had the incredibly stupid idea of trying to walk from UNSW to the Sydney airport (this is about a 10 minute ride by car). This was almost as dumb as the time I decided that I would try to walk from UT's main campus to Pickle on an 80 degree day (that ended shortly after it started when I hoped on a bus along the way). Anyhow, for some stupid reason, I took off walking down the street toward the airport. Mind you, I had no map and no directions as to how to get there (at least I knew where I was going when I tried to walk to Pickle). I had a rough idea as to where the airport was and I guess I just figured that I would walk toward the city and hope to find signs or something like that. Luckily for me, my common sense kicked back in after walking a few miles dragging my luggage behind me. It was relatively easy to flag down a taxi (since I stayed on main roads) and so I finished the trip to the airport that way.

I had a bunch of time to kill at the airport. Looking back on it, I could have done some things differently (in terms of setting the schedule for the day) that would have made things easier and more streamlined. In any case, everything worked out just fine. I managed to write a few abstracts and I started the tedious process of compiling my expense report for my entire 10-week trip. There aren't too many expenses, but there are several things. By far, the taxi expenses will be the most tedious to compile. In any case, it was good to get that started...

The flight to Brisbane was nice. We were on a Boeing 767 and I got lucky and had a whole exit row to myself. The flight was only an hour and 15 minutes long, but they still served drinks and a snack. I had complimentary white wine and chips and salsa to enjoy during my flight (coming back to the U.S. domestic airlines is going to be tough after experiencing what air travel is like in other countries). I did a little bit of work on the plane and, before I knew it, we were getting ready to land.

The weather in Brisbane was not good. It was pouring rain and the plane actually went into a small skid right after touchdown (the pilot and co-pilot recovered quickly). The taxi ride to the hotel was interesting as I had a crazy Australian taxi driver who loved to talk. He was telling me several stories and just kept going on and on. I couldn't understand everything he was saying because he had some sort of speech impediment (in addition to a very strong Aussie accent). But, it was still funny and it made the ride more enjoyable. I'm checked into the hotel now and I am getting ready for bed. Tomorrow should be a big day of exploring Brisbane!