The TU/e campus is the first university campus which Wouter Duivesteijn (31) ever visited. When he was at secondary school, he came here to attend a Masterclass in the area of regression theory. He did not go and study in Eindhoven, though. He ended up in Utrecht, where he got cracking on Applied Computational Science. Now he has recently started at TU/e as Assistant Professor in the Data Mining group and from his rented room in Luna he looks out on his workroom in MetaForum. “Two steps away from my bed and I’m there.”

Before coming here, his scientific career successively took him to the universities of Leiden, Dortmund, Bristol and Ghent. “For my PhD in Leiden I did not move from Utrecht, but in all those other cities I would often rent a place via the university. In Dortmund and Ghent I had my own house. The city of Dortmund really only came alive when there was a football match during the weekend. The rent I pay in Luna for a room, some 750 euros, is what I paid in Ghent for a whole house. Then again, that is a different location.”

He has not gathered a lot of campus experience yet. “I moved last week and that took up most of my time. What I have noticed is that the whole block is full of different nationalities. I come across them in the lift. I still need to make contact with them. Which will be fun.”

He thinks it is ideal to see which way the wind blows for the next six months while looking for a house. “I’m going to do that together with my girl-friend, who is now still working at the university in Dortmund. So for the next few years that will involve driving up and down for both of us. Still, the 150 kilometers from Eindhoven is a shorter distance than the 300 from Ghent.”