Gambling with Degrees
Coming to MIT with a master’s
How many master’s degrees is too many? It’s not a very common problem to have. Yet for some of us that have already completed a couple years of postgraduate education before coming to MIT, the question comes up. I must admit I hadn’t looked much at the course requirements for a PhD before applying. A […]
Bilingualism is a Feature, Not a Bug
Shifting perspective on my non-native English
If you are a non-native English speaker like me, have you ever felt that your English was not good enough? And worse, did you feel that your English would never be as good as a native speaker’s? I did. My native language is Mandarin Chinese, and while I learned English growing up in China […]
A Corridor full of Giants
My transition from a tiny college to MIT
If you told me in high school that I would go to MIT, I definitely wouldn’t have believed you. And if I had, I would have been terrified of the future. Although I certainly was not sheltered from most aspects of life, I would say that I was, to some extent, sheltered academically. I went […]
You Can’t Run Before You Walk
Navigating the initial stressful months at MIT
After completing my undergraduate studies in 2014, I began a slow-paced government job in India. As part of the job, I got a chance to explore the depth and widths of the country, with temperatures ranging from -10oC to 50oC. Overall it was an enriching experience, it taught me a lot about the practical aspects […]
Dressing for Battlefield Science
Fashion & being yourself while complying with laboratory safety
My first three years of grad school blur together as a haze of experiments and little else. Doing laundry every other week marked the passage of time. I would wash the same set of Gap Body shirts in every neutral color along with my three identical pairs of NYDJ jeans. At some point, I realized […]
