This past week has been the rollercoaster of ups and downs, full of challenges, trials, and outright fun that the Saltire Foundation had said our internships would be. It’s been what folk of a slightly older generation would call “character building stuff” – a phrase which I believe I now understand.

Monday (of week 4) saw a slight misunderstanding, and lack of communication, with my landlord end in a night with no furniture. Sufficed to say I was not amused, but I made light of the situation by pretending I was camping. Survival guides weren’t necessary on this occasion but I’ve made a mental note to strap myself to a chair and endure Ray Mears’ daytime show – just in case I need to live off mosquitoes, moths, and herbs from window boxes in the future. I could even find myself a quirky squirrel friend, feed him coffee, name him “Wilson”, and then proceed to make a nuisance of myself pretending I’m Tom Hanks. Or I’ll just go to a hotel or something sensible like that...

Come morning though everything was settled by Saltire and Fresenius. Sarah and Joni dealt very quickly with the situation (thank you both!), as did Andrea and Inge here in Germany.  I was stunned at how much everyone wanted to help – further enforcing this idea that I’m not “just an intern” (a phrase I’ve seen so many others use) but that I’m part of the company. My Global Scot, Dr Brown, personally oversaw the arrangements just to make sure I was taken care of – despite her ridiculously busy schedule and work load. In the end I was invited to stay at a colleague’s house on Tuesday night before moving to a new flat in Bad Homburg on Wednesday. I now have my own kitchen, en-suite bathroom, and view, and it’s all within a 15 min walk to work. After living here for a week I can safely say that life doesn’t get much better than this!

At work, my project has progressed further this past week but has now reached a point where more new ideas have to be implemented into the system. What’s great is that a lot of these ideas are my own – showing that senior figures in a huge company such as Fresenius are willing to listen, take these thoughts on board, and then let me run with them. I feel I’m making an important contribution to a major project, and earning the respect of my colleagues, all within such a short time frame. As far as I know, very few (if any) engineering internships offer this same level of responsibility and input to a student who’s just finished their penultimate year of university. These new ideas do, however, present a challenge – I have to test them all. This means learning new skills, using new parts and new equipment. It’s always much harder than I think to create the idea I had on paper in the real world, but the experience is priceless – preparing me for future projects I may have. Oh, and did I mention all the software is in German? Yeah ... that’s a slight hiccup.

Wednesday’s badminton was yet another night of good fun. Sebastian and I saw off our fearsome opponents to win out the match 22-20 and 21-18. This may not have been the wisest of moves though ... my supervisor was one of the losers. Yes Sascha, losers. If he reads this blog then saying that is pretty much equivalent to shocking a lion with a cattle prod. I expect my work may soon come under more scrutiny until a rematch is played.

The weekend saw early rises and the first use of my magical rail ticket! Kayaking was the activity of the day on Saturday which took place around a nature reserve on the Rhine. The route was 22 km of spectacular scenery with trees lining the river, clear blue skies, and water like glass. Sebastian kindly loaned me one of his kayaks before acting as tour guide on our 6 hour journey by the end of which I was thoroughly exhausted! Sunday started with a 5.30 am alarm (to think such a time exists ...) for me to go to Strasbourg for the day. I felt like a zombie crossed with a gorilla – my knuckles dragging along the ground because my arms were too sore to hold the weight! It really is no wonder why the cat downstairs bolted when it saw me. One coffee and some homemade cake I’d been given from Karin (Seb’s wife) fixed me right up though and I spent a great day walking around Strasbourg with another Saltire intern, Rhona. We saw the sights, visited “La Petite France” and soaked up as much culture as the time allowed. Of course this included stops for plenty of French cuisine and ice cream!

And so ends my week 4. I hope everyone else is doing well. Thank you for reading!

Catch you again soon,
Iain