Grad school in March

Today was both an illustrative and exceptional day.

Breakfast was my standard porridge of kidney beans, quinoa, and mixed frozen vegetables, with a Whole Foods avocado as a bonus and topped with nutritional year and Sriracha sauce. I got a large coffee on my way to my research design class at Trinity College, where my fellow PhD student Erica Rayment presented her research proposal on the effects of women members of parliament on parliamentary discourse and gender policies.

Then I spent the afternoon reading at Massey College, in the welcome and recently unusual company of my friend Aldea. Having come across a reference in a paper on fossil fuel divestment, I dashed across the snowy street to Robarts Library to pick up first one and then a trio of books on universities that divested from apartheid South Africa. I was pleased to see that more universities are divesting from fossil fuels.

At five, a large group of junior fellows assembled in the common room to toast the election of Benjamin Gillard as Don of Hall for next year. It included a few friends who are rarely seen around the college these days, a few also in their fifth and final year of the fellowship, and lots of those who have become fellows in the last few years.

I won’t be attending tonight’s intermediate Judo class because my wrist is still injured and painful, but there is a talk my friend Katerina organized on the “The Hype & Hope of Artificial Intelligence” and I have no shortage of thesis reading and writing to do in the lead up to my own presentation next Tuesday, hopefully with departmental approval and ethical clearance to follow soon after.

Author: Milan

In the spring of 2005, I graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in International Relations and a general focus in the area of environmental politics. In the fall of 2005, I began reading for an M.Phil in IR at Wadham College, Oxford. Outside school, I am very interested in photography, writing, and the outdoors. I am writing this blog to keep in touch with friends and family around the world, provide a more personal view of graduate student life in Oxford, and pass on some lessons I've learned here.

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