Emma

Birds of a feather flock together. But opposites attract! In Amsterdam, where I was doing my PhD, I got introduced to a new PhD student: Emma. We both recognised each other as birds of the same feather. But would we flock together, or would that department not be big enough for two somewhat loud, opiniated, and nerdy girls from Gelderland?

We flocked together. And then I finished my PhD, and went to Norway. She then finished her PhD, and went to Brussels. But that was only a short contract. She then found a next postdoc position in Reading. That's only ~3 hours away from Plymouth! So she came over for the weekend.

Over the last 3.5 years I had only seen her on her PhD defense. But she hadn't changed a thing! She arrived on Friday night, and we did some first catching up while slaughtering a bottle of wine. And we woke up to a beautiful day.

The Saturday we spent walking around on the Mount Edgecumbe Estate with some of our Plymouth PhD students, followed by a splendid dinner composed by our very own Rob. And on Sunday we went to Dartmoor, and had a pub lunch in Princetown. And then time was up.

Emma on the waterfront

 Put two nerds on a beach and they'll start taking pictures of things like sea weed

With Rob, Marta and Sam on Mount Edgecumbe 

We had splendid weather for a Dartmoor walk

Doing all that walking we hardly ever stopped talking. There's a lot to catch up about! What we are doing scientifically (we are nerds, after all), how we experience living in these different countries, what the news is about all our former colleagues, how we are doing in general... great! Especially when you live in a foreign country you can sometimes feel the lack of people you've known for a long time. And now I had one here for a whole weekend!