Student loans terrify me

Yesterday night I checked the balance of the student loan that I took from the government for my Bachelor's degree, and I was shocked to see that the final amount on the screen showed that I owed the government a thousand bucks more than the principal loan I initially took. And it took me by surprise because I had been religiously repaying the student loan beginning January this year, and the monthly amount that I repay is more than what I should pay because I wanted to clear my debts as soon as possible.

You see, before graduation, I was made to understand that we, students, would not need to pay the "interest" for the loan we took until the day we started repaying the loan. Also in my case, I had personally written to the relevant government department, informing them that I was in grad school and that I was unable to start repaying my student loan until I have graduated and started working. And I specifically said that would be in 2009.

I did not receive any reply from the said department, and I thought, "No news is good news."

Big mistake.

Apparently, once I graduated with my Bachelor's degree in 2004, my "beloved" government started charging me an interest of 50 bucks every month, regardless of whether I had started to repay my student loan.

Yesterday, I realized that I was smacked with a 50 bucks "interest" per month for those years that I should have started repaying the loan but didn't. That's a total of 48 months of 50 bucks each, added to my principal loan without me realizing it!

If you asked me again, no, I'm not going to take a student loan EVER again. I'd like to do a Ph.D. but if I had to take a loan to do it, I'd rather not do it. I have just spent the past 10 months paying the interest of my student loan, and my loan wasn't even a huge one to begin with. At the rate I am going, I'd probably still be repaying my student loan when I am 40 years old.

And that's very ridiculous.

My social circle is as big as a full-stop now

If there was one thing I wished my seniors had told me before I started my Master's, it would be that my social circle would be significantly reduced in size, and that I would lose more than 90% of my friends. But too bad, I had already hopped into the boat, so to speak, when I realized that. And what was even worse was that there wasn't anything I could do about it.

When we were doing our first degree in school, there was a whole classroom of us. We had classmates. And we had roommates. And if we didn't clicked enough with our classmates and/or roommates, we could always join other students from other classes. We could go out for lunch, dinner and supper with different groups of people. We had friends.

But upon graduation, the majority of us went back to where we came from and started looking for jobs. Many found jobs relevant to the degree they obtained, but that's another story for another day. For the most part, a lot of us found a job, settled down, and some even started a family! Out of a class of perhaps 40 students, only about 3-5 students decided to pursue a further degree. I need to mention that my school is a small school, with a total student enrollment of about 4,000.

I am not so much a social butterfly, but I do wish that I have more friends than I actually do. I don't like to eat alone but I don't seem to have a choice. One of my roommates is an undergrad (about 6 years my junior) and she hangs out with her bunch of friends, people whom I think are too young to be my friends. The other roommate, who is only 2-3 years my junior, always hangs out with her boyfriend and there's really no room I could squeeze myself into the picture.

These days, I hang out with a grad student 3 years my junior who happens to like to hang out with people older then herself, LOL. But because this junior is quite a social butterfly herself, she doesn't always have time for me--but I'm thankful for her, at least I am not totally friend-less.

If you are a graduate student, who do you hang out with? Do you hang out with fellow grad students, or do you hang out with undergrads? Or God forbids, professors? :)

Feeling better after chatting with a friend

Today seemed like a more bearable day compared to yesterday though I am not one step closer to getting into a program or a school. In fact, I think I am feeling a little better than yesterday because of a short conversation I had with a friend who went to Aussieland to do his Ph.D. early this year.

This friend of mine, he is really quite a character, and I mean it in a really nice way :) He is a very disciplined person when it comes to conducting his research, and when it comes to reading journals and writing papers or even his thesis. He doesn't spend all this time studying, neither is he always seen with a book but he always seems to find time to work on his project. Sometimes he sits in front of the TV and works on his computer at the same time, and I always wonder how he manages it.

So I was chatting with him this morning, and I told him that we (my former Advisor and myself) have been awarded a substantial grant that will enable us to conduct our field-based research for at least a year (which reminds me that I should check this out and confirm it later). He was pretty excited for me because he knew how much I wanted to do a Ph.D., and what I have gone through in the past one year to get to where I am now.

Anyway, he suggested that I try to get into a well-known school, instead of one that is so-so, since I now have my own funding to conduct my research. He even suggested applying to Harvard or Cambridge, but when I think of well-known schools, I don't think of Harvard or Cambridge because, seriously, do these schools even offer wildlife and conservation programs in the first place? I don't think so, LOL.

You see, the "thing" with me is that I'd rather get into a school that has researchers who know what I'd like to do, and understand the needs to do it. I'd rather go to a not-so-popular school because there are researchers who wouldn't mind getting dirty and all trying to track turtles in the river, compared to going to a popular school where the researchers are only interested in sitting in sterile, air-conditioned laboratories operating the DNA machine.

But he also suggested that I try to find Advisors in different schools and obtain a joint-degree, pretty much like a twinning program. And the more I think of this, the more I feel that it is possible. I mean, a Ph.D. project is supposed to be a "big thing" and big projects usually require more than just one Advisor.

So yeah, after chatting with this friend, I now have a clearer idea of where I should start looking. For a start, I will actually, seriously consider getting into a school in the US :)

My third (and hopefully final) attempt

I can't believe I have just started another blog to document my journey towards a Ph.D. The previous 2 WordPress.com blogs did not last very long, and I have absolutely no idea why. Thinking back, those 2 blogs failed probably because I was trying too hard to be anonymous that I have unconsciously taken away the joy of blogging. That must be it -- I did not enjoy blogging as much as I thought I would when I was starting those blogs because there was so much to write about but I was so limited to the kind of things I could write about without giving away bits of myself.

So now, I am now reverting back to Blogger, the first blogging platform that I used way back in 2005. And as ironic as it seems, I am really determined to make this blog last, as well as make THAT first step towards my Ph.D.

Wish me luck!