Week 16 - The Final Countdown

By the beginning of this week I felt an urgent need to study nearly the entire day and so I did with just a few scheduled breaks to improve my efficiency. Eventually Tuesday did come and I biked off to DTU for my signal processing exam. I had a 30 minute preparation period for a brief presentation on a section from the text book. However the first part of the exam was a presentation on the last report we had completed for the course. Then came the text book presentation. I had a week to prepare for the report presentation so that went smoothly though I was almost over the time limit. There could have been worse sections of the text book for me to present, but my main problem was that my presentation wasn't very organized. I still did well enough for my professor and the external examiner to give me a 10 out of 12 which I was told no more than five minutes after I stepped out. That kind of immediate feedback is not something that I have ever experienced at Purdue. Afterward I had lunch with Christoph from my intro-week group. I put in some time on the BCI report and then had dinner with some other people from Purdue that were visiting Maggie. They made chili and served it over rice and I brought cooked carrots. Later I Skyped with my mom. I had decided to make Swedish pancakes in the morning so I invited Maggie and her friends. My neighbors Carlos and Steffen also joined us. I studied some for my last exam (optical biosensors) by carefully reading through the journal articles I was to present. Later I reviewed the BCI report that we had put together before submitting it to our professor. I went into Copenhagen for my life group which ended up being short because there were only a few of us, but I got to say goodbye to those that were there. After a later night (and an early morning) I felt my biosensor presentation was complete and rehearsed well enough. The presentation and discussion that followed both went well even though I had trouble with a couple questions. I also received a 10 out of 12 (but you have to understand that the scale goes down to -3 and doesn't hit every number so this was sort of 13 out of 15, or a low A). After discussion about my future plans and the course I said goodbye to my professors. Then the most curious feeling came over me. It was the sense of freedom that came from the fact that I had (most likely) finished my academic career making way for my professional career. I just sat down and enjoyed that time to myself. I then had a late lunch with Abigail (whom I met through the Christian Center, but goes to DTU and lives in one of the containers of campus village) which was mostly chicken with rice. Now that my exams were over I had time to research the company and position I had an interview for on Friday. It was a decent interview from my perspective but I could tell before it was concluded that I didn't have enough experience with the FDA and patents. There was still some hope though so I intended to wait for a reply in the coming weeks. I was flying out on Sunday so I needed to pack and fortunately I had only come with one suitcase, but since I accumulated some things and wanted to bring some gift home I had to find new homes for the things I was leaving behind. Much of it (including a lot of food I couldn't possibly use up) went to my neighbors. I wasn't too busy to have some fun though because I prepared dinner with some of my neighbors and then we watched a movie called Chaos. I made hot chocolate for the occasion. Steffen made me Danish (similar to Swedish) pancakes in the morning and I said goodbye to him and Carlos. Since I had to leave the bike at the apartment (and because I couldn't easily take my suitcase on the bike) I walked to the bus stop. From there I took a couple buses and then the metro to get to the airport. I was quite early but I checked in my baggage soon after getting there and had lunch at a Burger King. I lost (or rather had to throw away) the jam I had in my carry-on because it was too much like liquid and larger than the allowed amount. I would have put it in my checked luggage if I hadn't been worried about being over the weight limit (even without the jam the luggage was about one pound over the limit, but the lady said it wasn't a problem). I still had some Danish currency and bought a few more gifts at a shop along the way to my terminal. That's where I finally met beck up with the group (Maggie and the friends that had visited her for the week). Boarding went smoothly and I met a Swedish couple I was seated next to. I think I did a pretty good job of incorporating variety into my flight because I pretty much rotated between reading, eating, sleeping, journaling, and talking. After a 9 hour flight we touched down safely in Chicago and I met up with one of my friends who was kind enough to pick me up. And thus my Danish adventure came to end, but it is simply the beginning of another.