Bayes 2016

Earlier this week I was at the Bayes 2016 meeting, in lovely Leuven. Although I've been to Belgium quite a few times before, this was my first trip to Leuven $-$ somebody who used to work at UCL once told me that they didn't really like the place, which they said was boring and not-so-nice. So, when I got there I was expecting something totally different than the gorgeous cobbled-streets with lots of restaurants, buzzing with students. Of course, as I came to realise only later, she was talking about a different Leuven, of which I didn't really quite know... As it turns out, I didn't really know much about Belgium in general $-$ so over and above the scientific merits of the workshop, this has been a nice formative experience!

As for the more statsy-bits of the conference, as usual I really enjoyed it very much $-$ we always try to make a point of getting talks of high methodological level from both academia and industry, which in my opinion makes for a very nice three days! 

In addition, the social part of being at Bayes 20XX is also usually very attractive $-$ and this year has not disappointed. At the end of the first day of the conference, we had a beer-tasting tour $-$ as Emmanuel put it, that was really a study to find the maximum tolerated dose: we were there to determine at what point in the escalation of the beer alcohol percentage we would seriously need to stop (we passed 5% without problems, then worked our way to an 8% and then had to go for dinner after a 10%)...

Anyway, I think the programme was packed with very interesting talks and hopefully, we'll be soon able to upload the presentations! And next year we'll go to Albacete, where Virgilio will play host. In keeping with our grand tradition, several people have been ambushed and as a consequence we do have quite a few candidates to host the next edition in 2018...