A letter to a student

You seem like the kind of person who needs a reminder every once in a while. So I decided to write you this email restating the things we talked about so you can re-read it when you get intimidated and need to refocus.

It sounds like the transition from Community College to Uni and the much higher expectations was tough. I want to remind you that coming from community college absolutely does not make you lesser in any way.  From what I have seen, you are just as good, if not better than the undergrads I have seen in my lab and very capable of swimming with the big fish.

Don't be worried that you don't get concepts easily. All that matters is that you get them in the end and hopefully digest them, remember them, and can apply them to future problems in research. EVERYONE (minus a few outliers) here works very hard and it doesn't come easy. I am MUCH more interested in work ethic than genius-smarts as are my colleagues. And feeling stupid is part of being a researcher. I feel stupid every day (true!) Although it can sometimes get me down, this feeling is what drives me to learn, explore and be fascinated. Someone who talks over your head and makes you feel stupid isn't necessarily smarter, but it does mean two things: 1) they know something you don't (Good! Learn from them!) and 2) they are a bad teacher.

My reference letter has a huge weight with the admissions committee BUT it isn't a completely a done deal. If your marks or GRE scores are really low, the graduate school will balk. So do your best to get as good as marks and GRE score as you can get, focusing on doing best in the courses in the area you want to do research. If you start unhealhfully and unhelpfully obsessing about marks, STOP. Focus instead on the concepts. Do you know the concepts? Are you satisfied with your depth of understanding of them and your depth of knowledge?

Incidentally, do you know how I think of the GRE scores? I'm not so worried about your vocabulary and many of the other things it "measures", but it does tell me that you know how to study and work hard towards a goal. It's about the effort.

I can remember in my senior year my chem academic adviser looked at my schedule and in a thick Polish accent said "Are you crazy?!? You will look like a Raccoon!" Little did I know that I was the only undergrad honours student who didn't take an extra summer term or "Victory lap" semester to complete the program. I was getting up at 5:30 am every morning to madly finish lab reports and study and often worked late into the evenings. I lost weight too. It was just plain awful. I had to say no to my friends a lot and had to schedule in party time and relaxation time (Friday nights and Saturdays, all day- no guilt). But I did it. I survived and my marks were good enough to get me into grad school but, incidentally, not to get a scholarship. And my letters of rec were fantastic because my profs saw how hard I worked and how I asked questions because I wanted to KNOW and to make sure I really understood.

You have this wonderful program that is helping you with GRE classes and study habits. (Tip #1: Turn the phone and wifi off!) Take full advantage of what they have to offer. Come prepared.

I have seen you work in the lab. You are very good with your hands. You are determined to understand. You can work hard. You are observant. These are very good signs for success as a researcher. I'll be after you this fall if I don't get requests for reference letters popping up in my inbox!

The best of luck in the upcoming term!

Janet

To the Beach!

This morning Alex and I got up really early and headed to the shook to buy a big box of rugallah pastries to take to group meeting on Monday. Alex and I shared one on the way home. I know, I know, I shouldn't be feeding my kid sweets for breaky but they were still warm and fresh from the oven. How could we resist?

I would like you to notice my new "Trusty Travelling Skirt". The old one has been retired to "Trusty Gardening Skirt"

There are some strange things to be found in Yaffo.

Uh...20 shekels and you can't even spell Israel correctly?

We took the one hour bus to Tel Aviv and spent the day visiting the junk shops in Yaffo and on the beach. I was sorely disappointed by lunch. I had been craving a dish called Shakshooka for months and months. Think of a pan of tomato sauce with two eggs cracked in and cooked in the oven and served with crusty bread. When I had had it in the past, there was always goat cheese or some onther delicious melted cheese on top. Today's had weird spices, no cheese and featured mushrooms from a can. So disappointing. I'll just have to try and make it at home. 

After lunch we walked along the coast and stopped when we found a shady spot on the beach. Alex took a nap in the stroller and James and I relaxed on our one big towel. When Alex woke, we played in the sand and took dips in the sea.

This is not the kind of relaxing I would have done or enjoyed as much even a year and a half ago. I woudl have wanted to do more and see more, and felt like I was missing something. Somehow kids just slow you down. I guess you realize you can't do it all, so you just enjoy the few thing you do manage to do. All the same, as I was floating in the waves, I thought to myself that I am amazingly blessed to have a life where I can enjoy such things as swimming in the Mediterranean.

Picnic

I was looking through my old lab books for kiks and foud some interesting stuff from my first few weeks in ISrael. At the time, I didn't know what to make of the results. But a few years later I know so much more about the chemsitry of the materials I was working with and I want to look over that old stuff again to see if there is anything worthy in there.  I photocopied a few pages and ponder them again later. 

I also took a photocopy of the infamous reaction where I first go the nano-stars of David. I will use it a  teaching tool of how much detail should go into your experimental sections. ESPECIALLY when doing exploratory chemistry. I have a complete, but rather brief write up for the reaction and I paid for my brevity with a year of my life, trying to reproduce that beast.

I finished my last reaction, cleaned off my desk and handed in my key. My old orange mug got washed and placed back up in the cupboard where I will hopefully find the next time I come.

On Thursday night, the lab hosted a picnic in the park for us. We were going to go to a restaurant, but with so many small kids, a picnic seemed like a much better idea. Remember, that with Army service, many of the graduate students are a three or so years older than you'd expect. And therefore they often start their families in graduate school.

We ordered takeout, and predictably the Israelis almost elusively ordered the hummus. We had hummus but also some sesame chicken strips. I am so honoured that everyone came and I was reminded how great my friends in Jerusalem are.

Alex enjoyed the chicken thoroughly and got orange sauce and hummus all over me and even put a big orange hand print on the back of Yeonadav's T-shirt. From the beginning of eating solids, we have been letting Alex feed himself and sticky hands are an unfortunate consequence.  Just notice in the video the clean looking kids and how nice and quietly they are sitting. Then notice my son: a complete mess who is constantly in motion.

And I love him for it.

David

Our friend David drove all the way from Rohovot to visit us after work on Wednesday. I am grateful to his wife Galia for looking after their two kids so he could come for a visit. It seems like yesterday we were going to their wedding and David was walking up to the hoopa with a big silly grin on his face.

Alex showed off his new trick for David which he had figurerd out only minutes before he arrived: clapping.

Blast from the past

This week has been a strange blast from the past. I have been working in my old lab and even getting into a lab coat to do some syntheses in my old fume hood. 

I find signs of me everywhere- my writing on the labels on the chemical shelves, my christmas card to the lab on the wall, my old lab books on the shelf and even… and I'm not proud of this…a drawer full of my neatly organized samples. 

When I went to make myself a cup of the nasty Nescafe Israelis love, my old orange mug was waiting for me in the kitchen. 

It has been a hoot freaking out people. Old lab mates, cleaning ladies, and students from other labs etc. have been coming across me in the hallways or in the lab unexpectedly. It is fun to see the surprise on their faces and our mutual delight at seeing each other again. 

My student will be here for the whole month and is getting going on experiments and working with Uri's students. Uri has been picking my brain about my opinions on some chemistry (his weak point) and I have been picking his brain about spectroscopy experiments (my weak point) and professor-fu (my big weak point). 

Uri has a start up company that has really grown since I was there from four to sixteen staff and a has a new shiny lab. I'd love to ask all sorts of questions about their technology, but of course that verboten. His staff, some of whom are my old labmates, just talk vaguely, smile and change the subject. 

Uri is equally curious and frustrated for another reason. His son is just finishing military service and we are not allowed to know what he does. Must be intelligence. When you ask Asaf about his service, he just smiles, talks vaguely and changes the subject.All the same, you can tell that Uri is extremely proud of his son, but dying of curiosity. 

While I've been at work, James and Alex have been hanging out and taking long walks though Jerusalem. A baby sitter, Erica, comes for a few hours everyday so James can tread water in his daily tsunami of emails. 

Alex loves the bustle of the market and the buskers of Ben Yehuda Street. He has been consuming an incredible amount of fresh fruit and no small number of pitas. His sleep patterns are all out of whack, but his late evenings mean we have been able to have nice long visits with old friends after work. 

Ben Gurion is happy to see me again

How do I even start? This used to be so easy. The mental blogging gears have certainly gained some rust.

But even then, how to I even start? How do I tell you about my winding, snaking story of the last three years and how the journey has brought me back to Jerusalem? I'm guess I'm not, since this blog is really all about my travels in Israel.

This time The Chicken and I are bringing an addition, thirteen month old Alexander who has already shown be he loves Israel by wolfing down ruggela pastries, grabbing the tub of Hummus out of my hands and putting it straight in his mouth, and smiling at all the strangers we meet.

As we drove into the city from the airport and then foraged for food, I was struck by how familiar and how comfortable and easy it all is. With no reservations, I thrust myself into the throng at the shook and get the works for tonight's feast. Although our old regular spot has been turned into a cell phone outlet, I still found what we needed, and even traded the gift of free organic onions with my purchase for cucumbers when I told the proprietor of the stall, in Hebrew, that "Onions don't like me".

 I also was struck by the memories that I had forgotten. The wackiness of it all and especially the smells: the fresh hallah bread, the fish alley in the market, the fruits and spices and the flowers.

James is amazed at my preparedness. Yes, our old cell phone still works, and yes, do call our friend Adam (number still programed in the phone) who lives just down the street from our rental apartment to see if we can borrow a corkscrew. And yes, I still have a very beat up ratty discount card for the grocery store.

We'll only be here for a week, but we will be cramming in as many memories as we can.

And cramming in fruit.

Did I mention it is skesek season?  My favorite Mystery Fruit?

I had to give up choir tonight and it almost put me in tears.

Untenured professors aren't allowed to have fun, I guess.