x + UCT = Δx

Thank fully not catching these 

Can the university you go to influence the person you are.... 
One of my crab colleagues is passionately anti-UCT (she's a UWC graduate). She says that UCT students think they are better than everyone else, that they start to use English instead of their home languages (even when they are talking to people of the same home language).  She added that even though they were promised that if you went to UCT you would definitely get a job (news to me!) yet she knows of UCT graduates that still don't have work - so UCT isn't "all that" after all. (She did add that she was pleasantly surprised to find that I was nice despite being a UCT graduate). 

For my part, I love UCT, it's history, its reputation. I decided (in all my 17 year old naivety) to go to UCT based on its reputation of having the best marine biology research center in the country (I am not sure if this is still true and it does not belittle the awesome work that is coming out of other institutions - I was 17 what did I know! - but I do count myself lucky to have been taught and supervised by some South African marine science legends - again, my opinion). 

This got me thinking about how I have changed since my 17 year old self stared, overwhelmed, as my folks drove away from me, leaving me at Tugwell alone, wondering if I had just made the biggest mistake in my little life... (I remember this feeling very distinctly, I remember feeling small and very very alone, and desperately wanting to shout to them to come back and take me home with them).  Now it is many, MANY years later (truly it isn't polite to ask how many) and, with my days at UCT being numbered, I can't imagine being anywhere else (this is self-evident given that all of my "leave" days from crab-catching have been spent at my UCT office, other than the one that was the science expo - my defense is that there is internet here).  

So, how have I changed... well, for one thing, I am unfortunately not as thin as I was back then, which is a shame, but I like to think that I like and appreciate my body more despite this. Sadly it doesn't necessarily mean I look after it better, there are still tins of sweetcorn in my cupboard and my fridge has wine in it more often than food. It does mean that I care more about the person that I am than what I look like - which is an important improvement but more likely to do with no longer being 17 than being at UCT. 

I do remember that when I first came to Cape Town I thought Capetonians had quite strong accents (I don't mean Hout Bay Harbour accents but it was either really posh "hot potato"/English colonialist accents or lazy surfers drawl). I don't notice this anymore (now that I think about it) which possibly means I have also picked up some Capetonian in my accent (in fact, people frequently comment on my accent and I generally tell them it is a JHB slowed down to Cape Town pace - unless I have wine, then it is hot potato city in an attempt to not slur! Or maybe I just talking funny!!) 

I find it difficult to identify other changes that are from having been to UCT as opposed to no longer being 17. (Besides knowing more about penguins and fish and intertidal critters) I consider myself to be open minded and liberal - but I think that was true when I was 17, if a little less defined. I do not consider myself to be a UCT snob, despite being proud of having been at UCT (is that contradictory?)  Of course there are times, (RECENTLY) that UCT has annoyed me dreadfully, and I have been very angry with it for some of their decisions/policies. I have wondered how things would be different if I had been to other institutions (I considered Rhodes at both Honours and Masters - and was really impressed with how quickly they responded when UCT admin left us hanging until the last minute which was part of the reason I was very tempted to go there.)  I have listened to friends gush about their post graduate experiences at other institutions and seen how they have changed in subtle ways from when they were at UCT.

  

We have pretty cool lawns close by,  but not on campus really
Also,  I am not sure why lawns are so important to me... hm

I have never been to another University, so it is difficult to have an outsiders perspective (well.... there was that time up in Pretoria, but I never really integrated with the UP culture, despite appreciating their lovely lawn (that no one else seemed to wiggled their toes in) and the very convenient and cheap Oom Gert's). I would be interested to hear your perspective, particularly if you have been to other Universities in addition to UCT   

Ultimately, I guess, any where you are is going to be as awesome or awful as you make it. If I could do everything over again, I wouldn't change anything, so that must be a good thing, right... Well... I wouldn't mind being the same weight I was when I was 17! 

(How nerdy is my title??)

Acknowledgements

My (very professional) thank you card

Hands down, this was my favourite part of my thesis writing. 
My official acknowledgements had to include a lot of official thank-yous about funding and was only slightly self indulgent. My fabulous sister wisely told me to reign in some of the gushing, but this is prime cheese territory and a totally self indulgent blog. 

You can not do a PhD alone, obviously, your supervisors are critical (even though they sometimes ignore you completely) but that's not what I am talking about (nor am I at all bitter - can you tell :) and at least I had three supervisors.)

Given that this is a blog about how to survive a PhD - let's be clear - I would not have survived (or at least finished the thing - twice) without my support network. Without a doubt all my family and friends kept me sane or at least made allowances for my insanity. They have made sure I would eat real food when funding was low or when I was just too busy to deal with that myself, and they did it without making me feel bad, they would just subtly invite me (frequently!) to dinner or donate their excess Harvest of Hope (a cool initiative) veggies to me. And one special person put together an especially fabulous care package of food to get me through printing and final edits on the day before thesis hand-in #1!

Yes, I took the cable car!!

My friends have also patiently guided me through statistics and R (even late at night in the last minute) or avoided their own (substantial) piles of work helping me figure out elliptical Fourier analysis (which I feel awful about because I didn't end up putting it in the thesis) and elephant-eating theory. They have read chapters and pretended that my topic was interesting when I blabbed on about it incessantly. And on the flip side of that, they avoided talking about too, which is sometimes also required and appreciated. They have given me hugs and not judged me for my ugly cries and forgiven me for missing out many social activities in the frequent (recurring) PhD lock-down periods. 

If you want to survive your PhD, don't take these gems in your life for granted, and I hope that all of my friends know how much I appreciate them. If you are new in town when you are starting your PhD, I really recommend that you are brave and put yourself out there. There is at least one nerdy friendly person in each department that will invite you to social gatherings where you can meet people. 

Hopefully your department has communal tea time or social gatherings (particularly useful if there is free wine), or if not, suggest it (frequently - or offer to organise it and then people will definitely get to know you!) I hate having to mingle and make small talk, but trust me, you will be grateful that you have friends to do crazy things like offer to read chapters or listen to your rants or get you out of your office and computer-hunched posture by suggesting a random walk to the other end of campus and back. They will also make sure that you are alive and haven't been eaten by Alsatians if you haven't been in the office a couple of days or will send you home if you haven't left the office in a couple of days. 

I am not going to even mention how awesome and supportive and generous and wonderful my family are (because obviously I have the best family in the world) but I am going to say (again) that when I handed in my PhD, I was just overwhelmed by the number of people that sent me well-wishes. I realised how many people were supporting me and it kind of made all the work worth it... almost... the red cape will do the rest!!! :) 

Happy Dance

I'm not going to lie, I was expecting the worst. I was picturing how I'd have to spend years explaining that, no, in fact, I do not have a PhD. I was trying to imagine how to put a positive spin on it in my CV. I've even had whiny conversations about: "what if" to which my sister replied "you won't be the first person in the world not to get their PhD". This is true. And I know that the people that love me, would love me the same amount with or without a PhD after my name, and I would after all still have an MSc, and those that know me, know I worked hard and no one can take that away from me...

And then, on the lucky 7th of October, I got an email that meant I wouldn't have to delete myself from social media and become a hermit in some cold country where no one would think to look for me! (Because even when you know that people will still love you, the sympathetic head tilts can still make you want to run away). 

I got my PhD!!!!!!

To set the scene: We had just finishing the first haul of the crab trap for the day, and I checked my phone for the time and saw that there was email. It was from the DDB (who should really write happy emails in pink and rainbows not with big bold bits highlighted in red as though I am in trouble!) I literally folded on to the side of the jetty and when my colleague asked how the catch had been I started to cry! I sent a Whatsapp to my family and my mom called in tears, and then my sister called in tears, and then I posted it to Facebook and had this sudden attack of doubt - did I misunderstand the email? I sent it to my sister for confirmation and luckily I hadn't just embarrassed myself in a horribly public way! 

I've had such an overwhelming outpouring of love and support and tears and relief that I'm just, well, overwhelmed and a tiny bit shell shocked. I'm so grateful for how genuinely supportive so many people have been about my grumpiness, stress, wine and whining. You know who you are and you are rock stars of my heart - all of you!!! (An "acknowledgements" blog is in pipeline). My phone's battery has not been up to the challenge of coping with the messages, Facebook posts and phone calls. 

And soon, I will get to wear that silly pouffy hat and awesome red cape and the drink the bottle of fancy wine I have been saving "just in case" for far too long, and maybe I'll have to drink some bubbles while in a whimsical frame of mind because (with a few extra wrinkles)...

 I SURVIVED!!!!!!

(I do have some few corrections to make that have to be done before the 24th November so I can graduate on the 20th December this year - eekkkkkkk graduation excitement!!!!! - but I think they are totally manageable and actually there are only 5 things I have to change, 4 of which could be done in less than an hour. One is the slightly ridiculous typo of "tichness" instead of "richness" - one has to wonder how these typos sneak in)