back from prague

So, I am back from prague and this week has been going great so far. The architecture and looks of prague were very cool. Our group visited the large castle on the hill in the city. One of the high points of the visit was climbing the 278 steps to the top of the cathedral. When we reached the top of the B.O. filled staircase, we had a gorgeous view of the Charles bridge and surrounding town. Joey, Sarah, and I had trouble getting back to our hostel, but luckily Kendall's hostel had extra room. On the way back, our group had sleeper cars. They were air-conditioned and I slept the whole 9 hours away.

Yesterday, the group took a visit to an experimental farm outside of Bonn. It reminded me a little of why I was considering vet shool for a while. My favorite part was seeing the fistulated cows. Even though the holes were sealed, it seemed weird that the cows didn't have major problems with infection. I got to look inside, and the cow stomachs were huge! That night we went out to the fair. It was comparable to a US carnival except that it was very large and there were makeshift beer halls playing 80's music. A bunch of our group danced and some Germans joined in. A few of us went on an extreme ride that made my eyes tear. It was tons of fun despite the tearing.

Today we went a heart and diabetes center. I enjoyed the lecture on MRI technology especially because I may try to join Dr. McDouggall's lab this semester. One of the lecturers showed us how the area in each of the sliced pictures of the heart ventricles could be added up to find the volume. This was cool because it connected with the disk method we learn in calculus. The volumes could then be used to spot mismatches.

Til later,
Chris Michael