2009 Space Odessey

I'm now approaching the 48 hour mark here in Vienna. The place is gorgeous - it's like I'm living in a giant music box. The only drawback to Vienna is the Vienna International Centre, a.k.a. the UN complex, a.k.a. the place I'll be working in for the next three and a half months. The VIC, as folks around here call it, looks as though it was built by the Jetsons. What makes the place even worse is that it houses the UN's space initatives, so not only does everything look "futuristic" (as one imagined the future to look in 1975), but every hallway has replicas of the solar system, rockets, and/or posters commemorating "2007 - International Year of the Heliosphere."

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And I got my UN login today! And my first assignment! I'm officially a real unpaid intern. This feels great. I don't really know a whole lot about what my assignment entails, other than that I need to write a proposal to a bunch of donor nations requesting (pleading?) that they donate money to the UNODC's rule of law projects going on in Afghanistan. I also get to meet the heads of the Afghan police force next week, as they'll be coming to UNODC to get training on how to build an effective criminal justice system.