Hi !

On the day that Obama has been inaugurated, I want to write my first message from the other side of the ocean since I have arrived in the US on January 4. Today was a big day for the US. In Washington more than 2 million people have attended the inauguration of Obama. It has become a true hype. Next to the Simpsons T-shirts and the shirts of the famous American football players, you can find all kinds of Obama stuff. One of the persons that showed me an appartment last week left for Washington the day afterwards because he didn't want to miss this historical moment. Unfortunately I had to work today so I missed most of the event. But in any case, it is a great moment and I hope he can fulfill the task of getting back on track the declining American economy.

Today was also an important day in another perspective. It was the first (and probably the last) day it snowed. This is not the weather I have been promissed ! I must admit I was laughing (just a little) across when it was extremely cold in Belgium 10 days ago. But right now, it is also cold here and we have had nights of minus 10 degrees celcius which is really cold for South Carolina. The good thing about it though is that you don't have to be much outside in the US. You drive in your car, park the car 30 meters from the entrance of the company, stay inside all day, leave the office in the evening, go in your car, drive somewhere where you park 10 meters from the entrance and go back inside. The weather doesn't have time to have effect on you. Probably that is also one of the reasons they invented the take-away pharmacies and drive-in ATM's here.

At first sight the US has given me the impression of being a country with a lot of contradictions. Some things are really nice, other things are quite frustrating. It is as if they made an exact copy of Europe, put it over here, and throughout the ages, the two worlds went their own way. That is why they don't play rugby over here, but American football. Also squash is not known here, racquetball is the sports they are familiar with. Also there are some words with other meanings than what you would expect. A duplex is a house/apartment that is adjacent to an identical house/apartment rather than an appartment with two floors in a higher complex. You don't go outside in your garden but in the yard. In the garden you grow vegatables. I am now also learning how to deal with the heating system and the washer. The heating system is operating with warm air coming through grills in the ceiling. So you need to switch on the 'fan' and the system starts pushing cold/warm air through the ceilings. So in the middle of the night you could be woken up by a noisy pressure coming from right above you. It is very hard to regulate. The washer is rather simple: you only have one big box so you pour in the detergent, softener (although you might need to handle in a different way, I am still learning :) and clothes in the same place, press warm-cold and the machine starts. One other funny thing is the online banking. At least they call it online banking. If you want to transfer money to another account, you process it online. What actually happens it that you give the order to your local bank, they write out a check (indeed, this prehistoric means of payment still exists over here) and transfer the money in that way to your counterparty.

So far, I haven't been able to meet a lot of new people or to visit places around. Reasons are especially work and the arranging of all practical things. Work has been quite challenging until now because of the workload. But also because Atlas Copco ASAP is building here the North American hub which is very interesting for me. 
The arranging of practical things involves applying for a credit card, a social security card, looking for housing, furniture, things for the car, cell phone, bills, batch,... But it is going pretty well. I have seen quite a lot of appartments so far and I have found something I like. We just need to sign the contract so I hope that works out well. I have been looking a lot for appartments in communities, the common way of living for the Americans over here. You have a central office, owning all appartments (might be a few hundreds) which they rent out. They offer services like a pool, fitness, tennis fields, and these kind of things. But the place I found is not like that, it is now owned by a community. It looks very cosy and is located in a nice area, close to the center of Charlotte and still in a very green area, close to parks. But actually nothing here looks like a city, there is green everywhere which is a very nice thing to have around. It is something we are not used to in Belgium. 

It is nice to have a car here so I am for sure planning to have some trips around once I have most of my things arranged. I hang out especially with a couple of colleagues which is nice. They are in the same situation as I am (foreigners) and Im sure we can do some trips together. I am also curious what the Charlotte social life has to offer once I moved over there.

So I think it has already been interesting for me so far and I experience lots of new things every day. My first real trip is planned on February 10 when I will go to Detroit for work.

Matthias