Laura. Nuremberg
In which city were you born?
In Nuremberg.
And you live in Nuremberg?
Yes.
What do your parents do?
My mother studied architecture and she worked for a few years before I was born. My father is a software engineer.
Do you have brothers or sisters?
I have a smaller brother. He likes skateboarding. In the rest of the time he studies material science at a technical university in Nuremberg.
How did you decide to study physics?
That was not easy. At school I oriented myself along my friends, who were mostly girls. They thought that physics is stupid and math is stupid. Then I had a friend who liked informatics, so I took a lot of courses together with her and I thought that I may study computer science. In the end I didn’t know what to do. So I went to live in Canada for a year with another friend of mine. It was on a ferry to Newfoundland when I realized that this was the time to decide. Actually I was interested in physics and I wanted to learn more about it. So I just filled in the form for physics, it was very spontaneous.
On a ferry to Newfoundland?
Yes, and I think that it helped me to have a distance to friends, otherwise I would have decided to study something with them.
What did your friends decide to study?
The friend that I took courses with studies bioinformatics. It’s interesting but you cannot study it in Erlangen. She went to Jena. Other friends decided not to study.
They went on to work?
Yes.
How did you decide to go to Canada?
It was rather unspectacular. I had a friend who wanted to do it and she asked if somebody wanted to join. Me and another friend said that we were interested. Then my friend realized that she will not be 18 years old then and she is not allowed to apply for a working visa. So it was just the two of us. We had to decide during one week. I didn’t know what to study so it was not such a big decision.
I guess it makes sense to take a break after the school if you don’t know what you want to do. So you were finishing the school, you didn’t know what to do and you went to Canada for a year?
Actually we already decided before we finished school. But there were some problems in between. During my final exams I got encephalitis and I even had to spend one week in a hospital. I was sick for over a month, I guess, I couldn’t even stand up at some point. My friend already went to Canada. I rescheduled my flight until I was fine to fly.
The doctor told me that my brain will need some time to get back to normal. The illness actually affected my brain. He said that it will take time until I can concentrate and that I shouldn’t study anything too difficult.
I had problems with speaking. I was speaking very slowly (apparently). I couldn’t listen to people because I was still thinking about the last sentence while the people were already, maybe, 5 sentences ahead.
Did you get a tick bite?
Yes, Bavaria is a high danger zone.
I see, so while you were finishing the school you got encephalitis?
Yes, but I didn’t know at first. I just had headaches.
Did you finish the exams while you had encephalitis?
I finished the exams, but I didn’t know that I had encephalitis, I had headaches but they were not too bad. After I finished the exams I got really sick. I had to stay in bed and light was very painful. I closed all shutters. At some point my parents said that I should see a doctor. I could not stand up anymore, the doctor came to me and he said that I should go to a hospital.
That can be dangerous if you don’t get treated.
You can’t get treated because it’s a virus and you cannot take any medicine against it. So they just gave me painkillers in the hospital and watched me.
I guess if you already have it, there is not much you can do. It can be prevented with vaccination. Maybe early on one can also use immunoglobulin.
Yes, but I had it definitely at a late stage.
So you were speaking slowly.
And thinking slowly. When I started walking again, I thought that the cars were moving so fast. I couldn’t really follow with my brain. The first few weeks were exhausting.
You needed time to rest.
Yes, the first two semesters in physics are very hard. If I had to start right away, I guess, I would drop it because I thought that I was not smart enough.
You spent a year in Canada. What did you do there?
We didn’t have a plan first. We worked at a farm. There is a project called Woofing. You work at farms, you don’t get paid but you have place to live. We redesigned parts of a big garden of two women. They were very nice. They borrowed us bikes so we could do tours around Vancouver island. Then we decided to apply for jobs in a ski resort. We didn’t get any replies by email. We decided that we needed to go there in person, which worked out on the first try because we got the job that we wanted to get. They said that they had all positions filled, but then they also said that they don’t have enough women. So they accepted us.
What kind of job was that?
It’s called lifty: taking care of the lift and people using the lift. In the morning you start with shoveling the snow, making the lift ready. You have to do some technical checks, check the oil at least twice a day. During the day you have to watch the people. In case somebody falls, then you have to stop the lift.
Was it big cabins?
No, that ski resort had only chair lifts.
Did they also had pullies?
The t-bars. Yes, they had it for children. There you actually had to work more, because you had to show the children how to use the lift correctly.
Did you also ski there?
Yes, we had three days off and we had ski passes for free. Also during the shift days, usually they had too many lifties. So we had breaks. You could have a break for half an hour or an hour and go to ski. That was a lot of fun.
They paid you, right?
Yes, they actually paid us. It was not much, but in the end we even had 1000 dollars left. So it was not too bad. We did a road trip with my friend and two Canadians.
Where did you go?
To the US, San-Francisco, Yosemite, Grand Canyon, Las Vegas. Death Valley, Arches and so on. My favorite national park was Zion.
Is it where you have a canyon with a stream, where you can go along the canyon and partially you have to walk in the stream?
Yes, actually we took that. You get a diving suit because the water was very cold.
We were there in August. The water was reasonably warm. We could walk in it.
We were there in April.
I see. I guess then you have to walk in some suit. How long did you travel?
I think it was four weeks. I completely lost track of time. Then we traveled for one more month in Canada.
When you decide to go to a university, do you have an entrance exam?
No, not for physics. Anyone can study physics.
But you need to have a document about finishing school, “Abitur”?
Yes, there is also what is called NC, numerous clauses, it’s a passing grade – you need to be above the grade. Maybe there is one for physics but it’s probably very low.
Is it some grade from Abitur?
Yes, it’s the average grade that you get.
For all subjects?
Yes for all subjects. If you want to study medicine, you need to have 1.0 or something like that. Maybe 1.1.
1 is the highest, right, so you should have 1 for most of your subjects. What were your most favorite and least favorite subjects in school?
Most favorite: sports, sciences.
In Germany, do you have a separation: chemistry, physics, math, biology – these are different subject?
Yes, we had a teacher for every subject.
And the least favorite?
Music – we had a very strict teacher there. This is where I got the worst grades.
These grades also count in the average?
No, it didn’t count, because you can quit after the 10th grade, and I was sure to quit music.
So only the subjects in the last two years count?
Yes.
What do you do in music classes? Is it theory?
Yes, theory and also some history.
What kind of sports did you do in school?
In the last two years you can choose what kind of sports you do. I chose athletics, swimming, and volleyball. You train in smaller groups.
Do you do different sports each week. Is it like clubs?
No, it is by semester. In one semester, for example, you can take swimming. At the end you get a grade.
So each semester you can choose which sport you want to do. Then you can continue or do something else?
I also did swimming and athletics in a sports club.
Outside of school, right?
Yes, but when I started studying in the university I kind of stopped athletics. It was too much. My sports club was in Nuremberg. I would have to leave Erlangen very early to be in time for training. Also my athletics trainer became very ambitious and wanted me to train more.