The Texas Presentation

Thursday, I gave a presentation to my lab group. It had been my professor's idea a couple of weeks ago; faced with a group meeting and no presentation, he suggested that “Melody tell us about her university and home.” It's a really good thing I enjoy being in front of people. I started crafting a PowerPoint presentation that was to be about ten to fifteen minutes long.

On Monday, I learned that most presentations were in the 20- to 30-minute range, even 45 minutes. So I started frantically adding the information I'd left out as I feared it was too much.

My professor, who is, I think, the equivalent of the “cool parents,” had informed me that my friends should come. He had also mentioned food, and I decided to make nachos. There a few different definitions of these; what we did is bake tortilla chips with {fake shredded} cheddar cheese on top. Then we topped it off with lettuce, tomatoes, and avocados. Also, I found pickled jalepeno slices! Now that I write this, I think we may have left out the sour cream.

Oops.

Anyway. We had nachos. Thomas, Jesse {a UT friend visiting us from the Netherlands}, and the Opinionated Romanian came to help me cook. And all of our group that could come, came to my presentation. I talked about the six flags and Tex-Mex and American football and the Eyes of Texas the Petawatt laser. Link here.

I'd been working on the presentation for a couple weeks, but, like I said, was in emergency lengthening mode by the time Wednesday came around. Not only that, but after Wednesday's lunch, my laptop decided to stage a dramatic death scene {the sound of ruined ball bearings in your fan are not pretty}. I spent the rest of the day acquiring a desktop from my lab that they'd meant to give me anyway. I did not work on my presentation until that evening in Miquela's room on Miquela's laptop {thanks, Miquela!}.

I was nervous for the talk, not because of the talking, but because I had no idea if people even wanted to hear what I had to say. But I didn't have much time to worry as I made solar cells, cooked nachos, and managed technical difficulties due to not being able to use my own laptop.

And then I was standing there, in front of a group of about 30 people {lab mates and Texas friends}. They knocked on the tables {or bookshelves, or counters} for me and for the Texas friends I introduced.

Time to start. I had intended on a longer introduction, but, having had no time to practice anything further than what I already knew without thinking, I just went for it. "Ich heiße Melody Valadez," I said, "und ich studiere Physik an The University of Texas. Mein Deutsch ist nicht so schön, so I will speak in English."

More congratulatory knocking broke forth. I was not expecting it; I hadn't done it to show off my German {there is very little to show off; even when I do know the right words, my accent is horrible} but to honor my hosts who are so frequently forced into a tongue not their own whenever I'm around. Their unexpected praise melted my heart.

The talk went well. They thought "The Eyes of Texas" could be compared to the NSA {there is very little American news here, but discussion of the NSA's recently exposed practices is prevalent}. And everyone liked the nachos, even though we forgot the sour cream. Also, they want to try fried butter.

I ended the talk with a video of us dropping a watermelon off the roof of RLM. And everyone knocked again.

Julius has alluded to this in a previous post, but it bears elaboration: the people in my lab have been beyond welcoming. They have been, every one of them, so kind. They invite me to group events, they take the time to answer my questions and draw diagrams, they joke with me, they tolerate my dislike of beer, and they sat through {and applauded} an almost 40-minute talk on Texas. They have truly and unconditionally welcomed me into the family. They've shown me such honor and kindness by including me, by speaking English when it would be easier to speak German, by popping into the kitchen to show me their burnt orange shoes, by helping me translate an entire slide dedicated to tex-mex ingredients. These are the people of Germany, y'all.

{If you are wondering about my computer, it has decided that it was entirely too dramatic and that all the death agonies were premature. I've had no problems with it since Thursday evening, but I am being careful not to overtax its poor ball bearings.}