The missing 2020-2022

October 3, 2022

It is been a while since I last wrote a blog. A lot of things has happened between now and then and I just want to share some chronicles here.

First of all, I am now a fifth year Ph.D. student! Woo! Still sane. Thanks to my husband, three cats, twenty aquarium fish, and hundreds of house and garden plants

(Louie and Luna)

Of course, covid-19 happened and it forever changed how students interact with school, and vice versa. Our lab got shut down sometimes in 2020 and it took almost 6 months before our lab normally operates again. This significantly impacts my research progress. I almost feel like I lost a year of time there. I was supposed to go to Peru with Bronwen one more time before my Ph.D. but I don't think it will happen anymore. I also felt disconnected from my department. I felt like I don't know how to interact with people in person anymore when we were first allowed to go back to school. (I am better now though.)

Now I mostly work remotely from home. I go to the lab 1-3 times a week. I also got to work from Thailand early 2022 for 1.5 months. It was nice because I could not visited them during covid-19. Zoom is so cool in my opinion because it allows me to connect with my professors, lab members, and students without being there in person. However, it also has some downsides - It is harder to concentrate on the speaker during lectures and talks since you can literally browse internet without people know haha. (Don't tell my professor!)

Our lab group is big now! We have 2 postdocs, 3 grad students, 1 lab managers, and a few undergrads! I still remember when I was the only grad student in my lab group.

I got to participate in many groups and events. Some of them were very cool! I got to help organize graduate student lunches with colloquium speakers, help organize the prospective weekend, work with various department-university level committees including DEI committee, teaching center, and university strategic planning focusing on climate change and environmental issues committee.

I could write this post forever, but let's just stop here. To sum, a lot of things has happened both good and bad, but I think I am doing well so far. Let's hope I will power through til the end of my Ph.D.