IBJ, Mt. Saleve, Proofreading, Happy Birthday Max and Chloe!!!
IBJ. I spent more time researching and reading last week at work. I helped out with our biannual report, and learned a lot about our India country program in the process. I'm also learning a lot about our online resources while organizing files. I will contribute to our online resource, the country defense wiki, by researching and writing about the legal systems in Iraq and Afghanistan. I have also been helping our boss plan her trip later this week to Brussels to attend an international development conference focused on African, Caribbean, and Pacific States. Tomorrow, I am going to Paris for the day and will visit Skadden & Arp while I'm there. And, because of a gap between our communications interns leaving and our new interns arriving, I've been making updates to our website and stand ready to deploy Facebook/Twitter/etc. posts.
Mt. Saleve. I visited the very popular tourist attraction Mt. Saleve over the weekend, and went hiking up on the mountain. I plan to go back soon to hike all the way from the bottom with a group that meets weekly. There are incredible views of the alps towards the top, and a Buddhist temple on the peak. There are also opportunities to go hang gliding, and a lot of mountain bikers who are much more brave than I am... The pictures are from close to the peak.
Proofreading. When I volunteered to help a German student I had never met to proofread her Political Science Master's Thesis, I did not realize it would be almost 80 pages... I spent a lot of time on that over the weekend. I work with a lawyer from the U.K., and I had to ask him for help learning the U.K. grammar and style conventions. I did not initially realize I wouldn't be using "American" English, and it truly pained me to abandon the Oxford comma for this project. But, Marita's meeting with her thesis adviser went very well! We will have lunch together before her thesis defense next week.
Happy Birthday Maxwell and Chloé!!! I went to a birthday party for my friends from work, Max and Chloé. Max lives out in Miel, so it was quite a jaunt, but Alexia's family let me spend the night at her house since the busses to Annemass stop so early in the evening. Max's dad was a wonderful cook. I ate quite a lot despite going with Alexia and Sonia to a neighborhood party they had earlier in the evening. I also enjoyed the lovely local wine. Decent wine in France/Suisse is often cheaper than bottled water. I really appreciate how warm and welcoming everyone has been at my work place. I feel like I've lived here for a year!
