Out of all the things, why a PhD?

"PhD is not a 9-to-5 job", said one of my senior professors during an informal conversation in his office. "It is a 24-hour commitment everyday. You are trying to tell a story which has not been told before. Sometimes, while you are just finishing the conclusion, you realize that someone else has already come out with it. And then, no one wants to listen to you, no matter how hard you worked."

The words put me in a state of alert, if not alarm. After the conversation, I was repeatedly asking myself "Why should I be doing this crazy, 24-hour thing if it could be so frustrating and unrewarding? Could I not work 9-to-5 in a consultancy, and make enough money to visit the world twice a year, on a cruise?" Out of all the things that I could do, why was I enrolled in a PhD program? And would I be able to stay on for 5 long years?

Answers are sometimes not so forthcoming, and you simply have to get on with the situation that you are in.

A couple of days later, I found myself deeply engrossed in preparation for the thermodynamics mid-term. The chapter was related to the variation of free energy of a substance. I was reading how a substance's free energy tries to minimize itself in spontaneous processes around us. While reading about the variation with respect to temperature, I tried imagining how things would be like if pressure was the variable. Using intuition and understanding, I got a relation which was written on the next page of the book. The small thing - seeing an same expression I had derived - gave me a unique sense of satisfaction, which comes when we understand something new, discover something new or realize something new.

This is a small start, and future is going to be full of unexplored opportunities.

Now I know why I am doing a PhD. It offers me unparallelled joy of understanding the world, which is personally much more precious to me than the 9-to-5 job.

Submitting the First Assignment

You come home from a tiring day, and find the refrigerator full of frozen chicken and beef, for there is a roommate with whom you share the apartment, and of course the refrigerator! Search for something vegetarian, and there's nothing except pulses which will take about 30 minutes of labour to cook.

You're very tired, but very-very hungry, so you will cook. And you will eat like an Ape from the pre-evolutionary era. And after the cooking-eating ordeal you just want to jump in to your bed when you realize that there is a crucial assignment - your first one- which must be submitted the next morning. So you HAVE to do it.

But wait, you can't just open up the task-sheet and write answers to the questions. You need to read the entire material first - which is like 20 pages of lecture notes and 100 pages of some xeroxed text-book. After more than 3 hours, you're yawning each breath. Forget about answering questions, you can barely read!

You decide to wake up early the next morning ( 5 'o clock ) and complete the work. So, at the opportune moment, you battle all desires of slumber with the strength that the professor's nightmare provided you. And if you're me, you will see the clock to realize that it's 7 already. Get, set, go! You scribble, then think, then cut, then scribble, and repeat, and calaculate, then manipulate, and keep repeating until you realize it's 9:10: a good 10 minutes since the class would have begun in your department building! So you skip the brush, and sprint to your class in nightclothes.

The professor stares, and then smiles. And just before you complete a breath and reciprocate his smile, he takes the paper from your hand and puts it in the assignment file.

Perhaps, he understands...

Assignments and a Chinese Girl

This is my first weekend at the new place. I was playing darts in the graduate lounge when a Chinese girl came and asked me "I... I... hav a few quest-uns. Can I ask you?"

Well, normally, if you're spending your first weekend in the US and a girl comes to talk to you in the graduate lounge, you should expect better things to happen soon. But if you're me, be prepared to be bombarded with questions from an assignment you don't remember to have received. And then, you must somehow pretend that you know, for the resputation of a lot of engineers and intellectuals from your country is at stake.

I said "I will surely answer this question, and the others that you have. But first, can you tell me something?"
"Sure", she said.
"When you see a girl and want to tell her she is looking pretty, how do you do that in Chinese?"
"What?"
I repeated my question, with a smile.
"Oh, you just say 'Nee khmm... pyom sham'."

I repeated what she said with a smile, and then again. She said thank you, and never asked me any further questions. :)

Before You Begin

They will tell you that PhD is about passion, about interest, about zeal, and about self-motivation. But if you're me, PhD is first about adjustment, and then anything else. A new place. New people. New culture.

First, it is about finding a home in a country you have never visited before. You wonder if you've really taken "the right place" or not... Was it better to stay off-campus or be on-campus?

Next, food. If you're one of those who don't care what they eat as long as they're not hungry, the beginnings are smooth. But well, if you're a foodie with a special liking for delicacies and spicy food, that is if you're me, food is your first test. You will see things that you've never seen before, in unknown colours, and you'd be asked to eat! Add to it the fact that you're a vegetarian in a land where even veggie burgers come with a slice of beef capped with a tomato piece... God save you! If you've found yourself a home and have adjusted to food, then you're allowed to start thinking about furnishing your place, getting to know the right stores etc...

Then comes the beginning of academic process. After numerous orientations about the varios co-curricular activities which you're never going to get time to attend, there will be a gathering in your department (hopefully!) where you are supposed to choose courses (and perhaps research). Each one has their own experiences. But if you're me, the chances are that the department will not allow you to take courses from 'other departments' (even if they match your research interests). Don't try to tell them that you've studied the same 'Thermydynamics' twice in your undergraduate curriculum, from the same book they're going to use for their graduate course. "This is only your first semester. You must take the fundamental courses being offered. Even doing a course again won't hurt. Will only deepen your understanding." Huh!

This is just a trailor... PhD is yet to begin!!!