My first day at work 上班的第一天

On my first day, I went into work, and then straight to the departmental retreat!

I wanted a break before I start work and I got it! The retreat was held at Ringberg Castle, about 70 km from Munich. The Castle is not the usual grand medieval type we tend to think about, but it’s still quite pretty. It sits on a hill and overlooks a lake (Tegernsee) surrounded by typical Bavarian villages. When the talks at the retreat become boring, at least there’s beautiful scenery to look at from the lecture room!

No, I don’t mean that the retreat was boring and useless. Just the opposite. I never realised that the department has its hands in everything from physics to biology, and I was quite dazzled at the technology they had at their disposal. But what amazed me more was that there were several things in life I could never run away from. I listened to yet another talk on Alzheimer’s disease, my PhD research topic, from one of our guests, and as he spoke, I could see the Introduction chapter of my thesis flashing back page by page in my mind … And during that talk, I was sitting next to the Chinese PhD student of the department – how could one not meet a Chinese person anywhere on Earth these days?

In his welcoming speech, my boss joked of an ‘Australian invasion’ of his department when introducing me to everyone else. Very soon I was found talking to the other two Australian guys. One of them had been only in Germany for a year, was a fresh PhD graduate and also from Melbourne. So in these respects we weren’t too different after all. Of course we chatted on the usual things like where we lived and studied. The next day he asked me whether I knew two of his primary schoolmates, and it so happened that they were both my secondary schoolmates! The world must be shrinking faster than ever.

There couldn’t have been a better way than this retreat to meet my future colleagues in a more relaxed environment, and no doubt that would make my life easier once I formally start work in the lab. I wished the retreat could go on longer, but of course my boss didn’t employ me for just going on the retreat! All right, I’m starting next Monday – Monday afternoon to be precise. Why Monday afternoon? That’s another story.

我上班的第一天並未埋首工作，而是跟實驗室同事去Retreat「避靜」。Retreat選址在離慕尼黑70公里的Ringberg城堡，現由研究所所屬的Max Planck學會擁有。其實那座城堡只是仿古，建築稱不上有甚麼古典氣派，但勝在環境優美，位處半山，可見四周雪山環抱着山腳的Tegernsee湖及村落，就算聽演講聽得悶時也可望着湖景分一下心。

我當然有專心聽演講。演講涉足多個範疇，由物理到生化研究都有，十分廣泛，而且談到很多尖端科技及研究課題，令我對實驗室工作更了解。

儘管來到新地方，有些東西還是躲也躲不了，好像其中一次演講便談及我的博士論文課題，令我回想起論文的每一個章節，而當時坐在我旁邊的，是一個來自大陸的博士生，大陸人可真無處不在！我的上司在開場白打趣說實驗室逐漸被澳洲人「入侵」，小息時跟那兩個澳洲同事交談，其中一人同樣來自墨爾本，剛博士畢業，而且來德國不足一年，所以談得投契一點。言談中大家談及在哪裡念書，後來他問我是否認識他小學的兩個同學，原來他們也是我的中學同窗。世界本來細小，現在更越縮越小！

這次retreat讓我可以在真正投入工作前認識不少新同事，以後溝通定會方便得多。當然retreat如果能再延長就更好，但我終歸總要開工，下星期一下午也要返回現實了！至於為甚麼是下午才上班？下回自有分說。