Go Team Work!

My research team and I are a few dates late with re-working our manuscript. But, it’s almost done and good to go.

I’m so nervous!!!

I keep looking over it again and again, making little tweaks here and there.

It’s not a guarantee that any journal will accept our work, but you never know unless you try.

Trying has already been such an incredible journey. Stressful yes, but incredible at the same time.

I’m very grateful to be working with my team. They are GREAT, and it is so much easier to work with a team rather than doing it alone. Actually, I wouldn’t have done this alone, because I wouldn’t know how!

Even though I’m the “Principal Investigator” of the project, I am also the most junior on my team. And I am taking their advice every step of the way.

I love it, because I love getting coached. I eat up any chance I encounter someone inspiring, who is willing to mentor me. I have had many wonderful mentors in my life, and I have always learned so much from them.

So I’m feeling very grateful right now. Very humbled, nervous, excited, happy, inspired. There’s so much running through my little brain and heart.

We are submitting the ‘script very soon, within the next few days. Eeeek!

Too Wound Up

I have been calming down about this publishing stuff, because really it doesn’t matter.

My research team has been working on the manuscript with me, and we are getting ready to submit it sometime this week. I was really stressed out because I found a mistake in my work (!), which was really embarrassing and upsetting to me personally. I thought I had disappointed my whole team, didn’t see how any of my work was publishable, and basically just got really dramatic about it.

I am super sensitive about my work. Don’t ask me why. It’s not like a book of soliloquies or anything, but rather a scientific report.  The mistake I found was a misinterpretation of the research (about something REALLY STUPID), and although it doesn’t change anything by simply deleting the 2 sentences, it was one of those sections that (I felt) made my paper interesting.

My gf, who I’ve been lamenting to about this, says to stop it. That I am getting way too carried away, that it was just a little mistake, and that scientific reports are not supposed to be interesting anyway. She hands me a tissue while she says this, because I have started crying.

Yep. That has been what I’ve been up to!

But, it is all behind me now. Seriously! I don’t care what happens anymore, and will leave the rest up to my team. Instead, I am going to Düsseldorf now to meet up with a bunch of fun girls. Also, tomorrow is a holiday and Martin has the day off!! FUN!

 

Trying not to be too stressed out

Things have been intense here with school.  I’m getting ready to submit my papers for publication, and it is a lot of work, not to mention a huge emotional rollercoaster.

I need to not take things so hard, but I keep getting caught up and stressing myself out unnecessarily. I knew being a grad student would be tough, especially for a non-academic-y person like me. But I didn’t think I would get this far either, which is why I am putting so much pressure on myself.

I will keep you posted on whether my work gets published or not. Fingers crossed.

On a more fun note, I started my new German classes in Düsseldorf and I love it. The thing is, I don’t think I’m going to learn much German, because almost everyone in the class speaks English fluently. We all speak in English before/during/after class.

It’s like Chinese school all over again!

When I was learning German here in Duisburg, no one else in my class could speak English. Some people said they could, but really they couldn’t. So we would converse only in German together, and even now we talk on the phone and hang out and speak only in German. It’s nuts, but it happens.

But in Düsseldorf, during the break of my first German class, I immediately went up to a girl and started with the German. She reminded me so much of someone I know and I am chatty so I wanted to tell her all about it in broken Deutsch. lol. She looked at me startled, asked me (in German) whether I wanted to go out for coffee with her, and we left the class.

That’s when the English broke out and she told me I scared her by speaking to her in German. She said no one else in the class does that and that she found it to be intense.

I am intense in grad school and in German class. Who knew!!

A question of research

Martin left for India 2 weeks ago, and will be there another 2 weeks or more. This is his longest work trip yet, and I miss him!

We considered bringing me along, and no doubt I wanted to go so badly. But I had too many deadlines to meet in March, and India just wasn’t in the cards for me. *sobs*

So now I am here by myself, and it’s pretty lonely.  At the same time, I have been SO productive so I guess the timing is right.

As of last Friday, my 3rd semester is now officially over!!! I now have a bit of free time, sort of. I have to start preparing myself for my thesis. My aim is to defend in early 2013, so I need to hustle. A lot of my friends are aiming for a Summer or Autumn defense, and have already started on their projects. Eeek! But I am not as focussed so best I give myself more time.

Although I also can’t give myself too much time, because then I’ll fall out of it and won’t want to do it anymore. To me, academia is like an exercise in how to deal with extreme boredom. I learn a lot too, but I’m also capable of learning things in a non-boring way when outside of school. Just sayin’.

Anyway I don’t actually have a thesis topic yet, but before I go trying to frame out my own question,  I’m going to look for companies who have existing projects. This is like looking for a job but not all of them are paid. It also feels like I’m selling out a bit, since I am open to having a company dictate my research. But, realistically I also need to pay the billz. I can’t really monetize studying some research question that no one gives a fig about. And working with a company will at the very least, help me network in a place where I know no one. So, I am searching for a job-thesis and am pretty excited about it too. This is not to say that a project will fall into my lap, because it’s really hard to find . But I will try and see. If not, then I will figure something else out on my own.

I’ve just applied to one project for a topic I had thought of doing before I started this program. So fingers crossed that I’ll get it. I should find out soon!

Buying electronics that make life easier

Over the weekend, Martin and I ended up getting a 23″ monitor and it is SOOOOOOOOOOO much nicer to work on!

Like right now I have my law paper opened (maximized) right next to my browser, which of course was impossible to do on my little 10″ netbook. This will make reading and writing a lot easier, and I’m actually excited to work now. We also bought a full sized keyboard to go with it. Huge difference. Very very grateful.

Another over the weekend purchase was a food processor!! We bought it second hand, and we got it for really cheap, probably because the picture the seller posted was so bad. It was sold to us by a guy our age, who said he got it as a gift and moved it from place to place but never used it (was still in all original packaging), so finally put it up for sale. Him and his girlfriend looked so happy to sell it to us, and we were so happy to buy it. That’s why it’s so fun buying second hand.

We put the food processor to use almost immediately. I had been wanting one but decided not to bother, since it’s an extra device to schlepp around. I like to be a minimalist, but so many of my vegan recipes require a food processor, and I wanted to give it a try.

I made vegan cheese (like the kind you put over nachos) out of cashew nuts, and it tastes SOOO good. Had to hunt down this special nutritional yeast, which I found at a health food store near our flat! It gives a cheesy taste and I’m so glad I could find it. We also made ice cream out of frozen bananas and berries, and I’m relieved I can make my own pesto again and not have to rely on the store brands (most of which have added cheese).

Later I will use our new processor to make vegan ricotta cheese, which is made out of tofu, cauliflower, nutritional yeast, lemon juice, salt and pepper. I’ve made it before but didn’t use a food processor or the nutritional yeast, so I’m excited to see how it goes this time around. I use it for my vegan lasagna, and I know it’ll be amazing.

It’s really fun making vegan food! I thought I would find it overwhelming, but I researched some books and bought 2 vegan cook books with the amazon gift certificate my classmates gave me for my birthday, and the books have become a HUGE vegan support for me.

When I have more time, maybe I’ll turn this blog into a vegan in Germany food blog (as suggested by Steph!). That would be fun. But right now I have no time for taking pictures and dealing with uploading and all that. So, text it is!

Please help me with a topic!

Okay, so I’m having trouble with school.

I’m about to write my thesis, but before I get there, I have to produce 2 projects. The best use of effort is if I use these projects as a basis for a thesis.

Except I don’t really know what I want to write my thesis on. I chose classes based on which professors I liked and who I want to work with (medicine & law).

My Medicine Topic So Far…

I’m investigating how social media has impacted disaster medicine in the past decade, and use recent disasters (e.g. Japan hurricane) as case studies. Disaster medicine is medical response/treatment during a disaster. I actually just learned that, because I’ve been bouncing around topics like a crazy person right after I formally submitted my first working title.

My problem with this topic is that I’m not really excited about ‘disaster medicine’. Like I said, I just learned what it was. There are endless topics I could do, but what gets me most excited is incorporating social media somehow. I love what social media is doing to online conversations. I also think it’s a relevant and timely subject.

If you have any ideas about how I can incorporate social media with a health issue, please come to me ASAP!!!! It would really help. I have already exhausted my brain storming muscles on this, and need to solidify a topic SOON.

Now onto my Law Topic…

I’ve submitted 2 topics for consideration and both have been rejected as being too administrative. I need a topic that poses a problem, not just something I describe. Oops! I forgot. Law is not descriptive, it’s proscriptive. *sulk*

I have managed to narrow my law topic down to 2 choices. One is looking at the treaties involving intellectual patenting of FOOD and how that affects agriculture; Another is law + disaster medicine (since DM is also my medicine topic so far – but I obviously haven’t developed this too well in my head yet).

Both topics I find tricky (because I find law tricky in general – isn’t that why we have lawyers?) and am not that excited to start.

Anyway, if you’ve read this far, maybe you have some ideas? LET ME KNOW!

Starting My 2nd Year of Grad School

I finally started my semester, and I’m pretty excited about it. We’re choosing 2 courses that we’ll go further in depth in, and produce a report at the end of the semester.

The best is if we choose courses that we want to work with in our thesis, so that we can link the projects together with our thesis work.

So far I’m in medicine, law, and chemistry, but I may drop one. Or I may take all 3 but only write 2 reports.

I’m excited about it because this is the kind of learning I do well with. I like to read, write, and have advisors. I don’t do so well with the lectures and test writing, and my first year of grad school has been all about that.

It’s nice to have a change where I can actually learn well. I’m not even sure what my research topics will be yet, but I need to figure that out VERY SOON.

So, lots of work to do here.

Oh, and I also got my German driver’s license today. Watch out, Autobahn!

First Summer as a Grad Student

Yesterday and the day before, I spent ALL DAY at school. I was finishing up a GIS mapping assignment, that I had to be in the lab to do. It irritated me at first, because who wants to spend their last few days of summer doing work?

Okay yeah, I know not everyone is a student and they have to work all throughout the summer. But, they get paid and I do not, so I want my summer, damnit!

We had such a rough first year. When summer started, it wasn’t even a relief because we had so many assignments due. I don’t even remember how many (I don’t want to!) but I know that when my parents were here, I spent a big chunk of that time working instead of hanging out with them. Maybe a third of my summer was devoted to working, while the rest was filled with stressing about the work.

But, yesterday while I was in the lab (alone!) working on my assignment (on one of the nicest weather-days of the year!), it started to feel really good. I felt positive to be there – to be learning – and I was glad to be a grad student.

I’m not always happy about being a grad student. My bff and I alternate between who wants to drop out, and who encourages the other to stay.  Over and over again, we do this.

Currently I am in stay-mode. I also have my immigration appointment soon to renew my student visa. Let’s see whether they will let me stay!

If they do, then in a year from now, I will be defending my own thesis. Crazy!

 

 

I love you grad school

Oh wow, I can’t believe my school semester is starting again soon – in October!

This will be the last year of my Master’s and I’m already feeling sad about that.

Grad school has been a really good time for me. It’s been quite a challenging year, but I’ve learned so much and will remember this time with fondness for the rest of my life.

I have some goals for this coming year.

- I want to find a thesis topic that gets me really excited. I will practically be married to my thesis, so may as well marry a sexy one, know what I mean?

- I want to intern somewhere interesting.

- I want to apply for jobs in both Canada and Germany.

- I want to apply to funded PhD programs.

- I want to become fluent in German

So it’ll be a big year that will keep me busy, but in a good way.