On grieving from a distance
Learning to speak the language of loss
“Can you make a short video for 爷爷? Just a few lines to cheer him up.” I received this text from my mother on the evening of October 12, 2020. My paternal grandpa (爷爷, pronounced “yeh yeh”) had been transferred to a hospital several months ago, and his prognosis wasn’t looking good. Thankfully, 爷爷 hadn’t […]
Miss to Mrs. to Dr.
How to plan a wedding in grad school
Congratulations! You’re engaged! Unfortunately, you’re a graduate student. People get married in all kinds of circumstances, but the graduate experience is unique, and you probably find yourself strapped for cash, time, and energy. I’m here to show you that it is possible to have a beautiful wedding despite all the obstacles we face as graduate […]
The right roomie for you
How asking the right questions can help you find your people
My freshman year of college, I lived in a dorm with five other girls and one bathroom. It could have been a disaster, but by a stroke of luck we lived together incredibly well. Not everyone had such a fortunate random draw—one friend from down the hall still talks about the “mold farm” her roommate […]
PhD parenting in a pandemic
Challenges and lessons learned from a tumultuous time in my life
When I first heard about SARS-CoV-2, my wife and I had just flown back to the U.S. from visiting her family in China. She was already in her second trimester of pregnancy and was concerned that the virus might spread to North America. At the time, I didn’t think too much of it. Evidently, her […]
Experimenting with love
Attempting to date as a PhD student in Biology
As far as bad dates went, this one was catastrophic. My date (we’ll call him “Brad”) was drunk, not just on his own ego, but also quite literally drunk. Though really, this was not my fault, as he had decided to come that way. As the waitress cleared our table, he swiveled around to look […]
