La Vie Niçoise

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Yesterday was my first day at I3S, the research lab "Informatique Signaux et Systemes de Sophia Antipolis" out in Sophia Antipolis. Now Sophia Antipolis, the "Silicon Valley of the French Riviera" is a good 45 minute bus ride away, but we're talkin' coach-class comfy seats with those little elastic mesh pockets on the seat back in front of you to hold your water bottle. The stop bell is overhead, so it feels like you're calling the stewardess each time you approach your stop. Ding!
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So why the heck am I out in the land of valleys and hills? Well, I suppose I need to backtrack a little.

The 3rd year Computing Science program I'm taking requires a semester-long research project. There are various topics you can choose, from comparing the unix environments Gnome to KDE, to reporting on the state of the art in Bioinformatics, to PARTICIPATING IN A EUROPE-WIDE AUTONOMOUS UNDERWATER ROBOT COMPETITION. (btw the competition site is down)

Hel-lo, no brainer.

My part would be creating supporting software to guide the robot. The only thing is, there's 9 (nine!) students from my class working on the logiciel, which makes for an organizational nightmare. Plus, all the students are at la fac (university campus at nice), not all working together 45 minutes away with the team leaders at the research lab. Quelle horreur!

So, I took it upon myself to invade the salle de stagieres a couple times a week at the research lab and keep up the ties between Joao, the amazing computer engineering prof who's dedicated her life to underwater research like SAM, and Laure, the doctorate student who has the unfortunate task of being project manager to 5 teams of a gazillion students from 4 different programs.
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By the way, I always wondered what french people do with their 2 hour lunch breaks. Yesterday I found out. First, you eat at the Resto Universitaire (45 minutes). Then you trek back to the lab, grab some coffees, and seat yourself in the common area couches and chat. I had the oddest feeling of familiarity... oh yes wait! It's like the CSSS Common room, but without the laptops, and cappucino instead of Frutopia!

My goodness, I'm home. :)
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