Hannah went to a mutual friend (Selena) 's party in Auckland. I was invited too, but I (according to Hannah and Selena) am a grouchy old man who would rather stay at home! :P. Anyway, I stayed at home, did a whole bunch of writing, planning, and research for my experiment. In between writing for papers, and working on the experiments, I also managed to plan out my lecture for the Monday BIOSCI lab - Gene expression. Also Alfred introduced me to this website which host a lot of asian movies...so I did take a break here and there to watch a couple of kung-fu movies.
Sunday morning, I joined a group of volunteer divers from NZ Underwater Association, and Auckland Uni Underwater Club (AUUC) to do a couple of transect surveys around Waiheke. They picked me up on the AUUC club boat at Little Oneroa beach, and off we go taking turns to do underwater surveys in pairs. The purpose of this survey is to see whether it is feasible to propose a Marine Protected Area around Waiheke. We managed to carry out surveys on 6 out of the 15 stations before it got late, and everyone was tired. We decided we would stop for the day, carry on the next time. They dropped me off at the Little Oneora beach, and I was home, washed up and writing by 4pm! It was great to be diving even though it was very short dives (two dives, approximately 16mins each dive).
Life being a PhD student is hard... you kinda have to be constantly working!... if you are not working on your research/ experiment, you would be writing paper, grants applications. If not, you are reading scientific papers, or analysing your data! Thus, when one of my colleagues (who is thinking of applying for PhD) asked me, I told her you really need to know why you want a PhD if you decided to go this route. Do not do a PhD just because there is nothing else better to do! There are always time for fun as well. Just need to plan your time properly, and be discipline. I have a couple of goals this weekend. I stayed back, and finished them..now, I am going to watch a movie :) Good night.
I have noticed that PhD work is tough. I share my office with a PhD and she always sits 2 hours longer than me and even on the weekends. She's great help with my project too! Glad the weekend was still enjoyable :)
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