Winter 2014

Delhi in winters is distinct from Delhi in any other season. This is the first winter I am home after skipping the entire season last year. Fog and dust swirl around. Flights are canceled, plans are disrupted. The sun is watery, filtering through clouds, promising warmth but not quite delivering. Still we chase it, through the window, in the balcony, while eating our meals outside.

Snapshots

It is dusty, so dusty outside, that no matter how many times I wash my hands, I can see (or imagine) a layer of dust coating them. I decide today is the day I venture out, the list of small tasks has grown and in a way, I am now itching for action.

Dilli 2014

Let the shenanigans begin (quietly).

The Winter of Listening by David Whyte

No one but me by the fire,

my hands burning

red in the palms while

the night wind carries

everything away outside.

All this petty worry

while the great cloak

of the sky grows dark

and intense

round every living thing.

What is precious

inside us does not

care to be known

by the mind

in ways that diminish

its presence.

What we strive for

in perfection

is not what turns us

into the lit angel

we desire,

what disturbs

and then nourishes

has everything

we need.

What we hate

in ourselves

is what we cannot know

in ourselves but

what is true to the pattern

does not need

to be explained.

Inside everyone

is a great shout of joy

waiting to be born.

Even with the summer

so far off

I feel it grown in me

now and ready

to arrive in the world.

All those years

listening to those

who had

nothing to say.

All those years

forgetting

how everything

has its own voice

to make

itself heard.

All those years

forgetting

how easily

you can belong

to everything

simply by listening.

And the slow

difficulty

of remembering

how everything

is born from

an opposite

and miraculous

otherness.

Silence and winter

has led me to that

otherness.

So let this winter

of listening

be enough

for the new life

I must call my own.

Dear Old Me and New Graduate Student

Being a graduate student is such a finite experience. If I could go back in time, and give myself advice, I would ask myself to outline my expectations from my graduate program. What do I expect from my classes? What do I hope to learn from my professors? What skills do I want to develop? What software should I learn? What should I be doing to advance my career? How do build my professional networks? What is it I want to be able to say when I leave graduate school? I would remind myself that after several years of work experience, I have useful things to contribute to many, if not all discussions, as well as much to learn.

Adulthood

I think of part of the joy of adulthood as finding those who calibrate at and around the same wavelengths at which you like to live your life. A line that I remind myself of, again and again, year after year, joy after disappointment, lifetimes after moments:

"No one saves us but ourselves. No one can and no one may. We ourselves must walk the path."

Buddha

Reprieves

The occasional, unexpected (but so, so needed) reprieves from things too important to be ignored, places that require presence of body and the brain, conversations that made being quiet impossible, have been the saving grace of this semester. A chunk of time here, an extended deadline there, calm moments on empty buses, and somehow the juggling becomes less frantic. Netflix has been replaced by my lifelong love for reading, and those little breaks to lose myself in a story well-told are wonderful and heartening. Learning to say no, and not letting the voice of guilt dictate all my decisions, is hard and yet so freeing. I would like to leave chastising by the wayside, but till that happens, forgiveness is a wonderful thing as well. I hope your Wednesday has been kind as well.

Tales from Bemidji

The lake booms, the ice cracking as we walk on it. It sounds like a gong, sometimes far, sometimes not too distant. It is breathtaking, it is quiet, almost surreal. It is peaceful, there is a restoring calm to the moments I spent on the lake. The winters, the snow, has grown on me. This was a break well-spent. I had reservations about leaving. The semester has been rough, and it felt wrong to leave. There are always too many things to do, even as I am teaching myself the art of saying no to the things I like, to avoid playing the busy game.

Failing and Flying by Jack Golbert

This was a good find, considering I have been thinking about what does it mean to fail, or rather when you know things can't work out a certain way, but there is a joy that is beyond hedonistic instant satisfaction, that you want from those moments. I hope you enjoy this:

Everyone forgets that Icarus also flew.

It's the same when love comes to an end,

or the marriage fails and people say

they knew it was a mistake, that everybody

said it would never work. That she was

old enough to know better. But anything

worth doing is worth doing badly.

Like being there by that summer ocean

on the other side of the island while

love was fading out of her, the stars

burning so extravagantly those nights that

anyone could tell you they would never last.

Every morning she was asleep in my bed

like a visitation, the gentleness in her

like antelope standing in the dawn mist.

Each afternoon I watched her coming back

through the hot stony field after swimming,

the sea light behind her and the huge sky

on the other side of that. Listened to her

while we ate lunch. How can they say

the marriage failed? Like the people who

came back from Provence (when it was Provence)

and said it was pretty but the food was greasy.

I believe Icarus was not failing as he fell,

but just coming to the end of his triumph.

Flashback to the summer of 2014

Imagine if you will, it is midnight on a Sunday, and I am sitting reading Agatha Christie novels with tears leaking from eyes as I continue to eat chili powder and drink copious amounts of water. It is a strange scene isn't it. Especially considering that the last hours leading up to Mondays (of madness usually) should involved such strange activities. It almost makes you think I am making it up. But I am not. This has been part of my evening and for so many reasons.

Links from the WWW

Here's two pieces on gender that I read today and would encourage you to as well.


http://www.slate.com/blogs/bad_astronomy/2014/11/17/casual_sexism_when_a_shirt_is_more_than_a_shirt.html

“So yeah, it’s just a shirt.

And it’s just an ad.

It’s just a saying.

It’s just a TV show.

It’s just the Internet.

Yes, but you almost make as much as a man does.

It’s just a catcall.

It’s a compliment!

It’s just that boys will be boys.

It’s just that she’s a slut.

It’s just that your dress is too short.

It’s just that we want to know what you were wearing at the time, ma’am.

It’s just it’s just it’s just.

It’s just a death by a thousand cuts. No one cut does the deed. In the end, they all do."

http://www.livemint.com/Politics/llQdMpUC1fLMxKV04r2MCK/Genderbased-violence-is-an-epidemic-in-India-Kate-Gilmore.html

"You can’t talk about one in three women experiencing violence at least once in their lifetime, in intimate partner relationships, and say it is other than an epidemic. "

What does it mean to be a good man? A good man does not have to beat a woman, he seeks consent for sex, he wants his partner to have access to a nurse and a doctor during pregnancy, a good man wants his children to understand their bodies."

November, or that month when I forget my name

It is ironic, the caffeine that kicks in four hours too late after class, one hour too close to bedtime. It is unusual to feel this awake. At this point in the semester, I have occasionally forgotten my name, often the date, and continuously the reason why I am doing this. To feel awake is an unexpected gift, I am uncertain what to do with it.

The tundra lives and flourishes. Temperatures are in ghastly lows and breaking winter records of all times. Meanwhile, we swathe ourselves in coats and caps and leg warmers and gloves and scarves, till motion is almost impossible, and somehow we trudge on. Waiting at the bus stop is an exercise in patience. The snow is beautiful, especially by the street lights. There is something about the orange overhead glow that makes the streets look like they belong to a different era. Of course, there is something about slipping on ice that takes away the beauty from it.

ix by Wendell Berry

(Shared by a friend at school)

I go by a field where once

I cultivated a few poor crops.

It is now covered with young trees,

for the forest that belongs here

has come back and reclaimed its own.

And I think of all the effort

I have wasted and all the time,

and of how much joy I took

in that failed work and how much

it taught me. For in so failing

I learned something of my place,

something of myself, and now

I welcome back the trees.

You are not

Via the lovely  www.meaganrianne.tumblr.com/

"You are not the heaviness

sitting inside of you.

You are not the battlefield

where the bodies fall,

and you are not the sound of cannons

breaking the sky open.

You are what happens after the war.

The surviving.

The healing.

The rebuilding."

—Y.Z, For the Bad Nights

Internet Finds

Please go and check out the cartoon strips at the following link:

www.conniewonnie.com


Current favorites:

http://www.conniewonnie.com/2014/10/just-right-amount-of-tired.html

http://www.conniewonnie.com/2014/09/the-other-side-of-discomfort.html

Unclenching

Tiredness tells its own stories. Its vocabulary is vast, it knows how to reach the hidden crevices of your day. And night. Its running companion is often guilt, not a welcome friend, but never enough of a foe to be abandoned completely.

The steady, comforting bus ride to work. The walk to your desk. The gentle trickle of hot water into your mug. The polite nods and murmurs at faces not familiar enough to slow down for (and the shame of realizing you make that distinction). The exaggerated sip of your hot beverage of choice. Leaning back into your chair and being suddenly aware in that moment of the silence around you, the steady snowfall outside, the intense lighting surrounding you, almost lulling you into acquiescence for this sort of life.

Do you marvel at the slow uncoiling of your heart? Are you surprised, you who thought, it was all under control? Do you slowly feel the rushing of your blood slowing down? I sometimes look at my hands and wonder at the strangeness of it all.

The inescapable sigh in your voice, I hope you don't ignore it. The tug of gravity feels stronger, you imagine your swaying is somehow the earth's fault.

In the end, you shrug, realizing there is only so much you want to do. This is your one life. The chapter of tiredness deserves only so many words, so many pages. 

Unpeeling

Being involved with different student groups, both at my school and at the university, has helped me unpeel the complexity of the university's structure somewhat and understand why things happen the way they do. I am well into my second year at the university and a lot of my engagement has been around the graduate student experience, sometimes intersecting with internationalization and sometimes with other aspects.

I have so many thoughts on the subject and someday I hope to be able to reflect on this much more thoughtfully. But for now, here is, in no order, a list of things I have realized by choosing not to just be a recipient of the graduate student experience, but to shape it in some way:

Middle of the night

It is the beginning of the week but I am at the end of a long day (and my tether?). It is 1 am and I have just finished the 11th time I did a video for a Fellowship application, that at this moment, I am convinced I will not get. Needless to say, the sound of my own voice annoys me to no end, I think my face is uneven (!), the background was crumpled, you can catch my eyes when they look down at my notes, the tripod that I own for no real reason and lugged all around the world, broke the one time I could have used it. Several of the videos have me cussing loudly after I screw up a line or a word (note to self: remember to delete)

Whether this is the voice of exhaustion, rationality or just good ol' impostor syndrome doing its bit, I do not know, and frankly at 1 am, it is hard to separate things or care. I am surprised and overwhelmed and deluged by the sheer effort this semester is taking, not because too much is going in the now and here, but because as much, if not more is going on in the FUTURE. You know, the future that is around the corner, where new lives, directions, and winter-choices will be made (Minnesota, so much snow in November does not make things look good for you). The haste at which I am being swept along in this semester makes complete sense if I realize that I am living two lives, one right now and one in the future. 

A Borrowed Imagination

One of the problems with a love for reading is that every time something sad happens, something falls apart, you are left with all the possibilities that could have been. Not just possibilities from your imagination, but from the imagination of every author you ever read. You think to yourself, I would have worn two sweaters each day so as to not feel cold, I would have cycled to work, we would have taken walks on weekend, the house would have been full of books, compliments would have been saved for birthdays and anniversaries and so on.

Perhaps that's why I dwell so much. I think of what didn't happen (fact) and then I think about the millions of things that didn't happen (fiction), and now never will. And this of course leads to a journey million miles below the surface of the truth.

I wouldn't stop reading though. I couldn't stop. But sometimes I wish I had only my imagination to deal with. Or an off button. 

Rain by Jack Gilbert

Suddenly this defeat.

This rain.

The blues gone gray

And the browns gone gray

And yellow

A terrible amber.

In the cold streets

Your warm body.

In whatever room

Your warm body.

Among all the people

Your absence

The people who are always

Not you.

I have been easy with trees

Too long.

Too familiar with mountains.

Joy has been a habit.

Now

Suddenly

This rain.

Scatter

I sit here, waiting for the words that won't come. Magic becomes even more elusive on these busy days. It is difficult to see the beauty in a shelf neatly lined with lunchboxes and clothes laid out for the entire week, although I believe in the beauty of efficiency. My childhood self almost can't believe where we are at these days and the weeks are full of moments of redemption.  Winter is coming, to paraphrase Game of Thrones. It turns dark early, the last of the light starts filtering away at five pm, and sometimes it takes with it my will to be anywhere but home. So many exciting projects are underway, it almost explains my inclination to do nothing this evening.

International Collaborative Research Forum

On Friday, I was able to attend a conference on campus and I am very glad I did! It isn't very often that I walk out of a conference thinking that all of it was useful for me but I definitely had that feeling after this one. It was called International Collaborative Research Forum and was held the renovated and fabulous and majestic looking Northrop Auditorium. After the opening session, there were parallel sessions for everything and I attended the ones on grant writing, ethics in international collaboration and internationalization in graduate education. I enjoyed all of these, especially the last one, where in addition to the Dean of Graduate Education at U of M, there were people from Council of Graduate Schools and the National Science Foundation.

Too Many Names by Pablo Neruda

Mondays are meshed with Tuesdays

and the whole week with the whole year.

Time cannot be cut

with your exhausted scissors,

and all the names of the day

are washed out by the waters of night.

No one can claim the name of Pedro,

nobody is Rosa or Maria,

all of us are dust or sand,

all of us are rain under rain.

They have spoken to me of Venezuelas,

of Chiles and Paraguays;

I have no idea what they are saying.

I know only the skin of the earth

and I know it has no name.

When I lived amongst the roots

they pleased me more than flowers did,

and when I spoke to a stone

it rang like a bell.

It is so long, the spring

which goes on all winter.

Time lost its shoes.

A year lasts four centuries.

When I sleep every night,

what am I called or not called?

And when I wake, who am I

if I was not I while I slept?

This means to say that scarcely

have we landed into this life

than we come as if new-born;

let us not fill our mouths

with so many faltering names,

with so many sad formalities,

with so many pompous letters,

with so much of yours and mine,

with so much signing of papers.

I have a mind to confuse things,

unite them, make them new-born,

mix them up, undress them,

until all light in the world

has the oneness of the ocean,

a generous, vast wholeness,

a crackling, living fragrance.

Searchers

“I am one of the searchers. There are, I believe, millions of us. We are not unhappy, but neither are we really content. We continue to explore life, hoping to uncover its ultimate secret. We continue to explore ourselves, hoping to understand. We like to walk along the beach, we are drawn by the ocean, taken by its power, its unceasing motion, its mystery and unspeakable beauty. We like forests and mountains,, deserts and hidden rivers, and the lonely cities as well. Our sadness is as much a part of our lives as is our laughter. To share our sadness with one we love is perhaps as great a joy as we can know – unless it be to share our laughter.

We searchers are ambitious only for life itself, for everything beautiful it can provide. Most of all we love and want to be loved. We want to live in a relationship that will not impede our wandering, nor prevent our search, nor lock us in prison walls; that will take us for what little we have to give. We do not want to prove ourselves to another or compete for love.

For wanderers, dreamers, and lovers, for lonely men and women who dare to ask of life everything good and beautiful. It is for those who are too gentle to live among wolves.”

- James Kavanaugh, There are men too gentle to live among wolves

This is in the foreword of the book. There are many beautiful poems in it as well. While I read them in spurts between classes yesterday, I hope to return to it over the weekend.

Pumpkin carving

Much fun was had on Sunday and several hours spent in pumpkin carving. This was my very first pumpkin carving and if you notice that you are puzzled by one of the designs, just turn it upside down and you will see what it is (yes, I got the template upside down). We had kits, we scooped out the innards of the pumpkins, we drew and we carved. I think they look amazing and it was such a well-spent few hours, where we were able to (mostly) forget grad school. 

Diwali

A Diwali that was full of laughter, humor, love and life. Of friends and family. Of food and a shared love for Roohavza. Of unexpected sparklers and conversations. May your year and life be full of everything you wish.

Asking for More by Sarah Manguso

I am not asking to suffer less.
I hope to be nearly crucified.
To live because I don't want to.

That hope, that sweet agent —
My best work is its work.
The horse I ride into Hell is my best horse
And bears its name.
So, friends, drink your cocktails and wear your hats.
Thank you for leaving me this whole world to go mad in.

I am not asking for mercy. I am asking for more.
I don't mind when no mercy comes
Or when it comes in the form of my mad self
Running at me. I am not asking for mercy.

www.cstone.net/~poems/askinman.htm

Doing ethnography right

For one of our classes, the prof sent us to go and observe people and make notes. Some excerpts from mine:

I was sitting next to D, who was writing rather intently.

"Jealous of D and D's focus. Why can't I be like that? Also, hand is cramping a lot. Maybe I am getting carpal tunnel? Note: Google exercises."

"Can see Prof. B in a meeting room. Last class was hilarious. Strategic mapping can be funny and useful apparently."

"Just saw M and B upstairs with a hawk eye view. Jealous of them now. Why didn't I think of this. Tried to make eye contact but think they are ignoring me."

"How are these people not noticing us creepily looking at them and making notes. This is why I am paranoid."

"Have never seen a grad student wearing sports shorts to school. Must be an undergrad thing."

"Admirable how blatantly everyone ignores 'This space is reserved for an event sign'. Go students and subversiveness."



I think I may need some practice before I get this right.

Happy Diwali

The thing with never leaving is that you never get to realize how the absence of everything you took for granted feels. I was laughing with a friend about how we both missed our first Fall seasons here. The intensity of moving and settling in took up so much brain space, that I completely missed the fact that the trees changed, that the color of the leaves had become absolutely dazzling, that the sky was in fact no longer a monotone, but an evolving palette of greens, reds, yellows and blues. I don't remember any of it. I don't remember the trees lining the sidewalks, on campus, on my way to school, in the park across my old house, it is a blank slate. I recall moving through the days heavily, almost as if underwater. I remember the effort it took to just function, simply be. I remember feeling alone, and most of all I remember feeling wrong. I felt I had done something wrong, I had become wrong. So much of this came out at moments I thought I had under control. I would call home, to chat, only to sob intensely and I remember the ache, both in me and across the screen. But the distant sparkle of lights can be seen underwater.

Personal by Tony Hoagland

Don’t take it personal, they said;

but I did, I took it all quite personal—

the breeze and the river and the color of the fields;

the price of grapefruit and stamps,

the wet hair of women in the rain—

And I cursed what hurt me

and I praised what gave me joy,

the most simple-minded of possible responses.

The government reminded me of my father,

with its deafness and its laws,

and the weather reminded me of my mom,

with her tropical squalls.

Enjoy it while you can, they said of Happiness

Think first, they said of Talk

Get over it, they said

at the School of Broken Hearts

but I couldn’t and I didn’t and I don’t

believe in the clean break;

I believe in the compound fracture

served with a sauce of dirty regret,

I believe in saying it all

and taking it all back

and saying it again for good measure

while the air fills up with I’m-Sorries

like wheeling birds

and the trees look seasick in the wind.

Oh life! Can you blame me

for making a scene?

You were that yellow caboose, the moon

disappearing over a ridge of cloud.

I was the dog, chained in some fool’s backyard;

barking and barking:

trying to convince everything else

to take it personal too.

 – Tony Hoagland

Homecoming 2014

Among other things, this week involved a tailgate before the Homecoming 2014 event. This was organized by the College of Education and Human Development, and they very graciously allowed Council of International Graduate Students (of which I am a board member), to invite students as well. The week has been lovely, full of Fall sun and leaves but Friday was a little chilly. The turnout was still fabulous as was the food, the hot cider and brownies and of course, the photo booth. I hadn't intended to walk in the Homecoming parade (I wasn't sure what it would involve), but I eventually I did do that and it was quite the experience. More in pictures: 

Toys and fun stuff at tables inside the tent

Goldy the Gopher

Being yourself

I have been thinking about what does it mean to be authentic (and reading as well). Not original, not unique, just authentic. I like the word authentic, it conveys weight and meaning to me. But honestly. I have stopped asking myself if I am authentic. At some level, I think many of us are plagued by the impostor syndrome. Especially as women. Some of the best people I know, I doubt they take themselves too seriously. They are very aware of how much they have left to learn, to do and this is despite being accomplished in so many ways (and good human beings as well).  I doubt if I remind myself to 'be more authentic', I'd achieve it.

Trainspotting

This is a post from when I was working. I used to travel a fair bit and unexpected things would often happen. In this post, I recount one of the more unusual adventures I had, while trying to board a train from a small town.

The interesting thing about my work is that a lot of interesting, unexpected things happen. Some of these are fun on the spot, for some I spot the fun much later. One of my recent train journeys is definitely something in which I saw the humor much later. Much, much later.

I had to board a Jan Shatabdi train early in the morning from this town in Punjab. I recall from previous attempts that I had to run for my coach in the train in the past because nothing is marked (unlike the Delhi platform where the train comes to stop at specific points for specific coaches). The coaches in trains are connected but I often get confused and so I always aim to board my coach. I had thought the confusion at the platform was bad. I was wrong. 

Lightly, go lightly

When I was a younger, sullen person, sulking a bit much at the world and all its travails, I was given a very good piece of advice once: to learn to be light and use humor. I don't think I have succeeded in all facets of my life but goodness knows, I try. I was looking at some old collections and came across these lines I had saved in a draft. I hope you enjoy them as well. 

“It’s dark because you are trying too hard.

Lightly child, lightly. Learn to do everything lightly.

Yes, feel lightly even though you’re feeling deeply.

Just lightly let things happen and lightly cope with them.

I was so preposterously serious in those days, such a humorless little prig.

Lightly, lightly – it’s the best advice ever given me.

When it comes to dying even. Nothing ponderous, or portentous, or emphatic.

No rhetoric, no tremolos,

no self conscious persona putting on its celebrated imitation of Christ or Little Nell.

And of course, no theology, no metaphysics.

Just the fact of dying and the fact of the clear light.

So throw away your baggage and go forward.

There are quicksands all about you, sucking at your feet,

trying to suck you down into fear and self-pity and despair.

That’s why you must walk so lightly.

Lightly my darling,

on tiptoes and no luggage,

not even a sponge bag,

completely unencumbered.”

~Aldous Huxley

Fall @ Twin Cities

Fall is beautiful here. I step out, I see the leaves changing color, I breathe in the crisp air. Mundane, daily tasks such as a walk to the bus stop, heading across campus, all of these have more beauty in them. I am trying several, small, new things in my life this year and one of them is to pause in the moment, because as I remind myself, this is my life. There is no waiting for life for when it will start. This is it, here and now.

Saturday mornings as I walk for a meeting for Council of International
Graduate Students (an organization I am really happy to be involved with)

A view of Coffman Memorial Union while waiting for the Campus Connector to
head to West Bank (our campus is divided into East and West Bank)

By the bus stop near my house. It is very close to the St. Paul
campus, which has a distinct layout and charm.

Stereotyping

Stereotyping is a common affliction. I think it is fair to say most of us stereotype and most of us are at the receiving end of stereotypes. The further you leave what I would call a 'home base' (and this may vary from colony, to city, to state, to country), the greater are chances of your being at the receiving end of a stereotype (and of your trying to understand the world by using stereotypes to simplify life). As an international student, I always knew this was something that was going to happen and that I was going to react to it, but I am still surprised by the variation and intensity of both the stereotyping and my reaction to it (as much as I am grateful for all the thoughtful and intelligent and kind people I meet).

Avatar ahoy!

Meet S. My grad school avatar. I have always had an interest in (not necessarily skills in) cartooning and I think this is a good and more productive way to deal with some of the realities of being in grad school. I am looking for help in learning how to sketch better, ideas for an occasional comic strip and suchlike. If you have suggestions or ideas, let me know. Have a great weekend! (You need to click on read more)

Notes from the Judd Fellowship Ceremony

This is my favorite picture :-).
A friend pointed out I have only one
 'funny pose'. Jazz hands.

The impetus to start this blog came when I was awarded the Judd Fellowship - it was one of the suggestions in an email sent out, and I am glad I followed through on the impulse. I am also glad for being able to keep the blog alive (mostly in spurts) after completing my summer field experience. My relative silence implies lots is going on: classes, assignments, tests, some confusing and annoying project selection processes, attending fitness classes at the gym and more.Yesterday was the Judd Fellowship ceremony, where university staff, winners, donors and friends of the fellowship came together at the McNamara Alumni Center (you know when an event is at McNamara, it is a little bit fancy!)

Winter is coming

Winter is coming. I wish it could wait a while. If winter is coming, it must mean the first month back has flown by fast. If winter is coming, it must mean Diwali, Thanksgiving and December holidays are also coming. It means the leaves will soon be replaced by intensely twinkling lights. It means that the blur of assignments, work, exams and proposals, of the weeks of hurriedly wrapped lunchboxes and hastily combed hair, have taken away a month and some of this year. If winter is coming, it means the end of 2014 will also come, and the earth and all of us will be older (except those who won't be). If winter is coming, then it makes me sad, because I just put the final shelf and blanket in my room, making sure the colors and coziness are always there to comfort me. How can winter be almost here, I haven't take enough naps in the sun, I haven't looked at the flowers and trees with the intensity I need to make them memories. I have so many books left to read. I have visits to plan. None of it matters (just as everything does). Winter is coming.

Picture updates

Work desk became much more fun

Dear Diary

Finally Target has journals that I love. Thankfully they are very expensive and so I am unlikely to be carrying these around anytime soon. But they fascinate me. 

Survival tips 101 (from a second year perspective)

This really is Dear Young Me sort of note to myself when I started grad school. But perhaps others can benefit from it as well!

• Learn to say no. There is always an organization, an activity, a party, an event that you want to get involved with or go to. But there is only so much time and so much sanity. Learn to say no (here's an interesting perspective on why saying no is important)

• If you are the kind of person who schedules things in (I often tend to plan for every hour, if not minute, of the day), pencil/type/whatever you prefer time in for yourself. It is a good reminder that you need to pause and pay attention to yourself.

New York, New York

The conference in New York was fun. I was glad for the experience of presenting, but more so to meet MDP students from other universities (and learn about work they were doing, and make friends, and just chat). It was a low-stress event and I am grateful for that. The weather was lovely, I got to stay with some really kind folks and travel was mostly entertaining. Evenings were spent mostly at an outdoor restaurant close-by. Here are my two non-blurry pictures:

 

Walking back from the conference

At a panel. Fancy.

Recollections from Vietnam

This is an old post from Vietnam (forgive the present tense)

Internet

I will say that I am quite the Internet addict. I could list the many ways in which I am but I will save myself from your judgment. Instead let me tell you what happened when the Internet at our hotel died, died (unlike its regular collapses everyday, for which we call and request for a router reset much to the staff's bemusement). Apparently a power surge/lightning bolt/something had affected more than the router and it was out for the night. This was the eve of us leaving for a five day trip, in which we believed we would have little to no Internet. Meagan decided to go to the coffee shop before it closed in ten minutes to send out some emails and I followed her. I may have updated ALL of my social media with news of the upcoming Internet blackout. I was forced to sleep all night and couldn't check email as I tend to. I woke up at 5.30 am and was out of bed at 6 am (I cannot remember the last time that happened). I got ready and went to the coffee shop where I think I babbled I have ten minutes to access 'all of the Internet'. Even I will acknowledge this is a bit excessive, especially as nothing urgent was coming my way. But the icing on the cake was arriving at our hotel and discovering that the Internet is way better than the one in Hue. Eating crow for sure.

What I Wish I Had Known When I Started Grad School

I had two reactions when invited to be on a panel about what I wish I had known when I started graduate school - one of the sessions at the Welcome Week for new graduate students. First, why would anyone ask me and I probably shouldn’t go and next, I have enough material to write a book. Luckily (for everyone involved) I did not follow through on either impulse. On a more serious note, there are a lot of things I wish I had know when I started grad school. They would have made my personal life easier, my professional development process faster and my academic career more fulfilling at the very least. While answering questions on the panel, it seemed to me that it wasn’t very fair to the students who were on a waitlist for the orientation or couldn’t make it for a host of other reasons, to not have access to this information. I also thought having this online would allow more people to share their tips and tricks and more people to access these. Elise Madden who was also on the panel helped put this together. It is deliberately brief and concise, to make it useful and not overwhelming. I would love to add to this list - feel free to comment here or shoot me an email.

Why talk about gender?

One of the aspects I felt was most neglected in terms of preparing teams for fieldwork was addressing issues of gender, race and more. These are topics that make the best of us uncomfortable and I think it often seems that a classroom setting isn't the best to have an honest conversation. My definition of what an honest conversation is a moving, evolving one but in recent times I think of it as one where we are okay speaking about the 'bad thoughts' that we have. The idea should be to generate constructive counterpoints and of course, there needs to be a base in a desire to change. I guess I see little point in saying "I dislike so and so because they are such and such and I will believe this till I die."

Settling in

I finally dropped one class and am a little short of full credit. Waking up in the mornings is making my days much better, even though I'd much rather sleep. I still don't have a functional desk at school and that is a whole story in itself. One of the key lessons I am implementing this semester: learning to say no or leave things with grace. I look forward to time, the occasional cup of tea, the fragrance of incense from far away, the not-so-gentle sounds of Netflix in the background, just life which is not a blur. I talk about the future with everyone but who knows what is coming. Only the winters are certain. Here is some bric-a-brac from across the world.

Dragonflies from Vietnam

End of week 1

Grad school life is in full swing and it is a combination of classes and speed reading, work and multiple jobs, rushed grocery trips, setting up house, dealing with limited Internet access, believing that Fall = 14 degrees Celsius, and so much more. I am very excited about this semester especially because of two classes that I am taking: Population Methods and Qualitative Research. Both (especially the latter) seem intense and like they will require a lot of work but also like I will learn a lot, something I didn't feel about all my classes last semester. I am also terrified that I am juggling a lot and something will drop, but that is always there. I am also in the process of combining suggestions and thoughts on what people wish they had known when they started grad school - I think it will be a useful resource.

Here are my first takes at the start of this semester:

• Not being new definitely makes things feel easier. Everything, moving, starting school and classes, getting around, felt less challenging and for that I am glad.
• I always feel like a fraud/impostor on the first day of class. I am not saying I am the only one this happens to, but I try and catch myself when it starts.
• Sometimes being or even just feeling different makes me feel like I have to perform or (over)compensate a certain way and that can be tiring, not to mention simply not true to myself.
• I think being just a little bit uncomfortable is good for us - I am grateful for people who will say the things we don't really want to hear.

I have lots more floating in my head, fractured, sedimented, jagged thoughts from conversations and experiences from across the world. I discuss things with people I trust (not necessarily people who share my opinion though) and I will always be glad for the fact that we often conclude that we hope at the end, all of us try to be better human beings. 

I hope you are having a interesting week as well.

Glimpses from here and there

My favorite picture this week: napping in front of my school.

 

Look carefully. This is the shoe tree. When folks graduate, they throw
 their shoes up here. It creeps me out loads.

Being back

Being back is crazy. Just of a different kind. We are still wrapping up our second project (we had a two hour long presentation via Webex today). The paper with results from our original project got accepted at a Sustainable Development conference in New York and that's exciting stuff. But again it needs prep work. I've been on a couple of orientation panels at my school and the university and met lots of people. Tomorrow will be my first ever football game here (and tailgate) as long as the rain doesn't spoil our plans. This weekend is full of packing and moving. Classes seem intense this year with tons of reading and pre-work. The sun was out today and I took a nap outside school. And then another one back home. Naps continue to remain awesome. I am very excited about having proper furniture. Also, I miss home. I miss my folks. Sometimes it gets really quiet here (and it is surprising to me as I say that because in the past few days I have been trying to lower the noise and clamor of life).

The Worst Email Ever Written

This is fiction, made-up stuff

The worst email that was ever written was like a curse. No, scratch that, it was a curse. Once it was in your inbox, everything went awry. You sent your boss the email with those pictures meant for your boyfriend. You accidentally sent a copy of your bank statement to your mother. Who is usually not the best at email, but this one she managed to read this right away and called you ten times in a row. You think your brother may have a hand in this; he has never approved of what he calls your flighty ways and you can always imagine his self-righteous glee as he read your statement. 

Suggestions welcome

I am working on a piece to understand what motivates women to seek an international graduate education. I'd like to speak to both current and past students (who are studying/have studied outside their home country) and have a chat to learn more about why they made the choices they did. I'm starting to ask around and if you'd be interested in speaking with me or guiding me to someone, I'd greatly appreciate it! I'll be happy to give more details if required. Thanks.

My two bits on the Delhi Metro

Source:
http://respectwomen.co.in/life-of-a-woman-in-delhi-metro/

I vividly remember my first encounter with the Delhi Metro. It had been recently set up and made functional (especially the blue line which I was using) and I decided to use it to visit a book fair at Pragati Maidan. On the way there or back, I can’t remember clearly now, I recall sitting in a busy coach. A man was uncomfortably close to me and coming closer. I was younger then, and perhaps rash, so I gave him a few swift kicks to remind him that this was not okay. In retrospect my behavior is not very commendable either, but I forgive myself because I have let things slide in such cases more than I wish I had. This man started yelling brazenly ‘this lady is hitting me’ and it did not seem like if things escalated, anyone would help me out (notice the word rescue purposely not being used).

After that I stopped using the metro during rush hours and then pretty much all. I was hardly alone in feeling that unwarranted touching and ‘accidental’ brushing was going on during busy hours and otherwise. Soon the Delhi Metro launched a ladies compartment and I think it changed the face of the metro. I don’t think of transport as necessarily gender neutral. Especially not in India, where gender issues are a big problem. Traveling in crowded spaces for women means dealing with not just the regular annoyances of being cramped or pushed or having to board and deboard moving vehicles risking your life but also dealing regularly with the gropers and molesters. You have to pick your battles especially if travel is part of your daily routine. I don’t think you can spend all your traveling time fighting and possibly screaming and shouting. Especially when you know help is not always forthcoming.

Back (to the real world)

I am back in Minneapolis. Nowhere close to being settled, still have to shift houses and giant mattress that is the stuff my nightmares are made of. But I am back. It was a long, arduous journey, with stopovers at Frankfurt (reasonable) and Newark (delayed by 2-3 hours in addition to the 3 hour wait time. I had no watch or access to time and couldn't really tell. Which I think was for the best). It was a miserable trip, full of being sick and itchy-twitchy, hacking my lungs out and sneezing, and hallucinating. But who wants to hear about that. Or the fact that I love the world a little less after being in transit for 40 hours. Let me tell you about some of the other fun highlights:

Scored lots of free Internet at the Delhi airport by using sibling and sibling's friends phone numbers. Feel little guilty about extra customer representative calls they will get but since I was checked-in 3 hours in advance, needed some entertainment.

***

Reflections

I accept all the affection everyone is giving me at home with caution. Somehow, there is so much care and thoughtfulness, I am only a few minutes away from tears most of the time. I laugh to my family about my ability to cry-on-demand but it runs a little deeper than that. But I know that when I leave this bubble of familial love and foibles and hopes and hurts carried together for years, I will be back to my reality. Friends ask me to articulate my reluctance to give into my new life, to embrace it for what it is, and I am not able to do that well. I do enjoy it, it has made my world much richer and full of more hope and repair than it ever was. But I don't know if this is my eventual life. I am only just realizing that I am actually traveling through life. I used to wake up in Vietnam and realize with a surge of excitement, always tinged with incredulous wonder that this is my life, the one in which I get to explore.

***

Adulthood has meant making peace with occasionally cutting corners. There was a time when everything had to be just so (for me, for folks at home, in general in life). It was all full of discontent, irritation and the opposite of calm days. Now picking one’s battles feels like the right philosophy for life. Some things are more charming when worn out. I tell myself the smaller disasters, like the things I left behind or lost, are better than the bigger ones. Who is to know what is true.

***

Emails have in them so much power to affect  us. Just like letters did I suppose but I have never received an important message in my life via letters. I remind myself that even as I feel old (and remember dial-up modems with nostalgia tinged with relief at not having to use them any more), I am relatively young. I am happy to be in the 21^st century. Some people have other eras, decades they would like to go back to. None of that for me. In which world could I have traveled and built the life that I have now.

***

On some days, it feels incredibly hard to be away from home. I am not one for rose-tinting my view when looking at life or people. I have had strange conversations about how much I love my country where I have had to explain: I cannot be absolute in my affections, but to my mind that does not make them any less valid. But I remind myself of the moment I made the decision to leave, a beautiful light-filled Diwali evening, where I sat waiting and realizing that this could not be the life I will live any longer. Who is to say I chose rightly or not, only time will tell.

Thought for today

“It is often to the wary that the events in life are unexpected. Looser types—people who are not busy weighing and measuring every little thing—are used to accidents, coincidences, chance, things getting out of hand, things sneaking up on them. They are the happy children of life, to whom life happens for better or worse."

~ Laurie Colwin

The many everyday things of Hue

(Written a while back when in Hue, and now is as good a time to share it as any other)

It is easier to breathe here. It is hot, burning, lava-like and yet every once in a while there is a respite. Like the evenings. The occasional rainy days. The city is full of history, the streets full of bustle. Everyday brings something familiar and something new. I have fallen into a pattern, one that I will always associate with a happy summer. I know words and pictures will not do much justice to the experience. But I still try a combination of my favorite things: lists, words and pictures. 

The people selling lottery tickets, usually old. I was told it is considered unlucky to win as it splits families up over money.

A lottery ticket I bought.

Without Reservations by Alice Steinbach

Without Reservations is one of my favorite books. It blends language, cities, travel and reflection in a way that I tremendously enjoy. I don't remember how I came across the title, only that I was very grateful for having found it. During my stint in Vietnam, I found myself missing the book. It was an unusual feeling. I started re-reading it when I returned home and for the first time in my life made notes on a book, underlined text and committed the worst of all book-related sins, dogeared pages. I don't feel guilty though. This is one of the few books that I intend to take with me and there is so much in the book that I rather vainly believe reflects my life, that I am going to hang on to this copy for life. It also reminds me of my intent to search for (or start?) a book club that enjoys fiction. In brief it is the story of Alice Steinbach, a Pulitzer-prize winning journalist, who decides to take a year off from work and travel. She goes to Paris, London, Oxford and Italy and spends time there. She reminds me that to get second chances, one must first make mistakes. I can't offer much of a review, I am clearly biased. What I will leave you with are my favorite bits from the book. I hope you enjoy these as much as I did and they offer hope and comfort to you in the way they have to me:

Home (for now)

Leaving Vietnam was easier than I thought it would be. Leaving Hue city, not as much. By the end of my time there, I had a life, a routine I enjoyed and friends. Our work towards the end was chaotic but even so, the farewells felt difficult emotionally and were full of small kindnesses. Souvenirs and parties and gifts and trips and banana pancakes. We visited our ever-kind and gracious coffee lady (and maybe used an open window in her house to drop a gift when the coffee shop was shut), we said bye to people at the Indian restaurant, we had farewell parties with staff at CORENARM and with people at our hotel (Khach San Duong Sat). Spending time with a lovely three-year old Suri made everything a lot more fun.

The Goldfinch

I really, really enjoyed The Goldfinch by Donna Tartt. In a nutshell it is the story of a boy who loses his mother to a bomb blast at a museum. For some strange, unfathomable reason he steals a painting 'The Goldfinch' and the rest of the story is about his uprooted life, his obsession with the painting, love for a girl who was also at the same museum, his abiding friendship with Boris, an almost orphan and his work in the field of art. I love the way Donna Tartt uses words to create imagery; this was also the reason why I loved The Secret by her. Her use of language and themes is what kept me engrossed. The story has a missing memory that changes everything. It is unexpected and yet once this secret comes to light, everything changes. The characters including the protagonist, his friend Andy, his love Pippa, his unexpected savior Hobie, his friend and yet not quite Boris are well-etched out. The story feel surreal and yet believable. It is set in our world, the world of flights and bomb blasts, of online lives and the constant scavenger hunt for culture. It is his madness, his obsessiveness that makes him both easy and difficult to love. Towards the end he even says it himself, that perhaps he is incapable of living a normal, good life. This book taught me the phrase 'three sheets to the wind'. This is hardly a review but more of a strong endorsement. I find stories about people's lives, with all their details and imperfections and irrational traits, enthralling and if you do as well, then this is a great book to read.

Vacation

“What we want out of a vacation changes as we age. It changes from vacation to vacation. There was a time when it was all about culture for me. My idea of a real break was to stay in museums until my legs ached and then go stand in line to get tickets for an opera or a play. Later I became a disciple of relaxation and looked for words like beach and massage when making my plans. I found those little paper umbrellas that balanced on the side of rum drinks to be deeply charming then. Now I strive for transcendent invisibility and the chance to accomplish the things I can’t get done at home. But as I pack up my room at the Hotel Bel-Air, I think the best vacation is the one that relieves me of my own life for a while and then makes me long for it again."

Ann Patchett, “Do Not Disturb,” in This Is the Story of a Happy Marriage

On leaving

Saigon was exciting and bustling and full of making new friends, laughter and honest, spirit-fueled talks. It jarred a little after the quiet charm of Hue. I had forgotten how cities can sometimes tug and claw at you, how they demand attention. I walked, I explored, I marveled at the public spaces, had fancy coffees and missed the simplicity of ca phe sua in Hue, saw a water puppet show, saw the city from rooftops and balconies. I met people who were lovely and kind and felt like a harbor in the dark blanket that so much group work had settled on me. Now it is time to head home, for I am weary.

Water puppet show - fascinating

Outside the theater

Ben Thanh market