Here is a quick summary of my first few days in Australia. I left Minnesota on Saturday, Feb 1st for my long, long journey by air:

It has been very busy immediately since arriving here. I landed at the airport (after what felt like a very long journey--mostly as a result of having to change planes twice in seattle/los angeles) at 6:20am and went through customs. (I'll note that my characteristic streak of luck did not spare me on the flight...the plane had some malfunction with the emergency lights so all 13 hours of the overnight flight were as bright as day. I wore my hat over my face.). Customs used sniffer dogs, a cute little beagle in this case. Then I had to figure out how to contact the driver who was supposed to be picking me up. I ended up purchasing a cheap track phone at the airport with a couple hours worth of minutes (which the worker installed incorrectly resulting in my not actually being able to use the phone for two days and defeating the purpose of having a phone, ugh). I had to borrow a phone, but contacted the driver. A rather gruff and odd man, who asked me multiple times if I was sure I was Jamie Mosel. Maybe he was expecting a guy? Anyways, I had no real idea of how far the drive would be, only a rough idea of where the university is outside of Sydney. The drive must have been about 45 minutes to an hour. I was really nervous during the drive and perhaps a bit stunned by the whole process that it had taken to reach Australia.

When we reached the campus (in what I would describe and others have described as a "redneckish" town), the driver pulled up to the administrative building and said "here you go" and pointed to a back door which ended up being locked. He left, and I was standing outside of the building confused. Luckily, a grad student walked past outside and unlocked the door for me--although in a pinch I could have gone around the front once I figured it out. I literally stepped through the elevator doors and there was my host professor walking up the stairs. So that was a very fortuitous meeting. Literally five minutes later (after dumping all my luggage in the professor's office) I was pulled into the meeting of visiting international researchers. This was at 8am or so, which felt much later to me than to everyone else! I was still wearing my Olaf sweatshirt, jeans, and boots and it was 91 degrees. Ha. I told them I wanted to appear as Minnesotan as possible. We were all supposed to introduce ourselves and I had to go first. I felt intimidated by the end and uncertain of how to describe myself. There are perhaps ten visiting researchers, a mix of primarily established professors, as well as some post-docs. Boy do I feel inexperienced!! I tried to piece together "how exactly to I fit in here? I'm no professor, and no post-doc...I barely even know what research I'll be helping with!"

Afterwards, I was shown to the offices for bit, signed a few papers, then my host professor gave me a quick tour of the immense research sites they have here. Extremely sophisticated, extremely complex, extremely expensive. Then he offered all the visiting researchers to go out to lunch. Apparently Thai food is really popular here, so even though we are in a tiny town there was a Thai restaurant. After lunch (around 1:30) my professor handed me off to the Canadian married couple who I am staying with. It turns out that the room in the grad student house was given to an international student from England and so plans were re-arranged--this I learned in a whirlwind upon arrival.

The Canadians are very Canadian. And so extremely kind. They must be in their thirties. Ironically, they are both vegetarians and both run. So I am lucky, as I am both a vegetarian and a runner! And hopefully, maybe, one day I can go running with them. The woman, named Jen, apparently likes to trail run over hiking routes and has run a 50 mile race before!! She is also a fungi researcher at the Hawkesbury Institute for the Environment where I am. Here husband, Corey, is an airplane engineer. They live in a house that is in town and about a 20 minute walk from campus. Surprisingly, I was able to navigate my way back from campus without getting lost. Now THAT is an accomplishment. They have been very helpful!

The next day I came to campus for a 9am meeting and then to hear brief presentations by the researchers at 10am. After the presentations, my host professor originally said that I could head home to settle in a bit more--I think he is very busy this week and stretched for time, so I was glad for a chance not to bother him. But I told him that I am happy to help with any and all projects, and I had gathered during the meetings that all the visiting professors might need help. I also wanted to make sure that he knew that I wanted to work hard and didn't want to seem as though he needed to hesitate about putting me to work. Just at that moment a visiting professor from Texas wanted to install some infrared heat sensors (well, really, to put AA batteries in them and hang them from bungee cords tied to sticks over some potted peanuts...but that doesn't sound as sophisticated). I got to tag along instead of going home to settle in immediately. After it was done, I admitted that I have some experience with Li-Cors (photosynthetic gas exchange measuring machines...beasts, expensive, and complicated). The visiting professor saw this as an opportunity to sign me up for taking some measurements for him, and asked my host professor later about it. So I might be helping with that. Word spread quickly that I can run those machines, and so today from 9am to 5pm I helped another visiting prof from toronto/duke university to collect data. Light curves, specifically. I could pretend to explain to you what they are but...I'm not entirely certain myself. They are photosynthesis as a product of light over time, in a sense. Towards the end she asked me if I could also do the analysis~! I said of course (glad for a chance to learn), but informed her that she would have to show me how. So this evening I didn't get back to the house until after dark, about 8:30PM. So an 11 hour day? That's pretty good. I've made some 48 graphs in one day. I have no clear idea of how to describe them, other than that they show light and dark respiration in plants, so don't ask for now! We were doing the measurements on potted cotton plants grown in a greenhouse under elevated and ambient co2 and high/ambient temps.

On another interesting note, there are white cockatoos flocking in trees and in the skies like crows. And there are crows as well, but they sound ridiculous and nothing like normal crows. There are apparently deadly snakes everywhere to be found, as well as poisonous spiders. I have yet to see any, although apparently there is a lethal spider that lives under a bench in the backyard of the house and there was a giant snakeskin near the entrance to the greenhouse. Terrifying. The first day, as I mentioned, it was 91 degrees. But yesterday it rained and misted (of course), so the weather has cooled to the mind 60s and 70s. Not as cold as home, but a surprise.

Well, there you go. There's a bit of what's been going on here. I pretty much jumped straight into things! From the moment I stepped foot on campus! People kept asking me when I arrived if I was tired. Nope! I'm pretty resilient, I would say! I've been going to bed around 10pm and waking up around 7am. It still feels a little bit intimidating for me to know how under-qualified I am compared to all these experienced and established researchers. But I keep telling them: "I have the least experience, but the most time available! So ask me to help!" Unlike in Japan, that offer has been accepted wholeheartedly and I've so far been put to work with the short-term visiting profs. It will be interesting to see when and if and what sort of other work I will be given on the projects that I was originally proposed to work on (elevated co2 and eucalypts). The professor is extremely nice, though. Although so busy, constantly running here and there. So I hope eventually he will have more time for me but until then, or at least for a few days, I have been given lots to do.

It has been awhile since I've written anything. A shame, although nothing particularly exciting happened during the 4 months that I was back home. Of course it was wonderful to be with family again, and to be back in my beloved state of Minnesota. The fall I spent desperately trying to find some form of employment. This was a frustrating time--I was looking for any sort of job, from waitressing to retail. Now, I've always worked during the summers while in college, and always did work study during the school year. So I've had plenty of jobs and internships over the years. And I think my C.V. is not too shabby for all of that.  However, many of my jobs, experience and other qualifications are related to research. So a four year undergraduate degree with honors and a Fulbright doesn't really get you far in the work force. I applied over and over again for all manner of positions and only had three interviews, one of which wanted long term and not short term workers which ruled me out. I ended up applying to Brueggers Bagels and my experience working in the St. Olaf cafeteria my freshman year (and hopefully my charm during the interview, ha) got me a job offer on spot. After all the difficulty and stress of looking for work and the impending date of my hefty loan payments approaching, I instantly accepted the offer. Despite signing my soul over to sandwich-making, I felt at least a small measure of pride to have been hired on the spot, which the manager said he never did. Looking back, and seeing how cheaply I could be hired plus the fact that I have a bit more maturity than your average highschool employee, I see that economics perhaps had more to do with the offer than any characteristics on my part! So for approximately 3 months, I woke up often at 5am for 6am shifts and dolefully made bagel sandwiches. More often than not I was up and walking to work hours before the sun, and watched the stars in the cold, dark, beautiful sky.  Eventually I learned to be cashier as well. I also take some pride in how quickly and efficiently I was able to learn everything. In fact, I was darn good. It was incredibly stressful at first, with constant rushes of customers and lines out the door combined with early mornings. I had my share of rude or insulting guests, but also many others who were pleasant and polite. But once I got the hang of things, I could make everything move fairly smoothly and I was genuinely touched by the compliments I received from my managers as well as many customers. That helped to ease some of my frustrations that came with the job. And as I often remind myself, all experiences give new skills. My new skills include cracking 6 eggs in 8 seconds, as well as assembling a sandwich in less than fifteen. On a more serious level, I value the chance to improve my patience, my ability to multi-task, and keep my perspective grounded. I firmly believe that each and everyone should be required to work in food service at least once in their life. There were many times that I wanted to hand over my apron and cap to the customer and say, "now you try this out," time them, give them multiple custom orders, in order to give them an idea.  Ironically, the post-church crowds on Sundays were among the rudest. You may not even be aware of how rudely, impatiently, or unfairly you are treating those who prepare your meals (or provide many other services at other stores!). Don't take out your anger or frustrations or arrogance on the person in front of you. Take a deep breath and remember that they are a human being just like you! I appreciate the insight and although I already had food service experience, it was a refresher and reminder to make sure I treat each person with a smile both when I am a customer and when I am a worker.

During this time, I was also stressed and busy attempting to find potential advisors who might accept me into forest ecology/science graduate programs. It has been a long, difficult, and disheartening road. I have spoken to at least ten professors (though I estimate 15 or more) at at least 5 different programs, all of whom informed me that while I was a qualified candidate who might do well in their lab, they would not be accepting any graduate students due to lack of funding. How many emails have I written over the months, describing my experience and hopes for research, only to receive a few sentences back thanking me but turning me curtly away. If I am honest, it has angered and confused me. Now, I am a humble person. I try not to brag about myself. But I do know my own worth, and I do know the caliber of my experiences. If anything, I am OVER-qualified for a masters program, and well-qualified for a PhD program. While I do not doubt that there are many others with considerable experience, I know with certainty that I rank among them. I have often expressed my frustration with the system of our society wherein an individual can know the course they wish to pursue. They can have all the will and ambition in the world, and have decided what they would like to do--and yet, in the end, the decision is never actually their own. Others--panels, admissions committees, managers, potential funding decisions etc.-- are always at the helm.Where you get your education, where you can get funding, where you are hired, so many things in life are chosen by others, and frequently others who scarcely know you. My future has, and can be, dictated by the simple stroke of a pen, by someone far away who has never met me in person. And yet they are dictating in a very real way, the direction of my life. So, needless to say, I have been discouraged. I have come close to giving up, to admitting that my will has been defeated. My family, likely, knows how hard I have tried over the past months and the past year to find a program. When I think back to this time last year, I had just barely learned that I was accepted into a masters program at Yale. Shortly thereafter, I would learn that I could not accept, because I would not be able to meet their extremely high tuition costs and they would not provide further (or even close to sufficient) funding. I feel that my time is being wasted. I feel that I am growing older and that I am running out of time to get started. I feel that I am losing motivation. Science has always been a struggle for me, even if I enjoy so much about what I get to learn. It has been so tempting to admit defeat and to give in to the lure that has always pulled at me to become an illustrator, or to become a historian. These interests are a strong part of me, that I have set to the background (though NEVER abandoned) because I feel that right now, in this world, what is most important is for me to learn how to protect the earth. History and art can do so much to help, but I must also have the authority of science. Not because "science" is in any way superior to other forms of knowledge. All disciplines are intertwined, merely lens for the same sight. Yet because of the nature of politics in the United States and many other countries, I know that my hopes for protecting this earth, my reasons, my explanations, these will not be heard by the masses or by governments without the backing of "science" (and even then, scientists are largely ignored!). I want to combine all disciplines that I can in order to protect our earth. Science will give me the authority, history will give me the context and the grounding, and art will help the expression. There are so many ways my interests combine, and can become far more powerful together than separate. However, there is a certain trajectory that I feel will bring them together most effectively. And that involves graduate school in ecology/science. From there I will draw in history, always carry art with me, and hopefully pull in some legal experience as well. I will be heard.

Anyways, my frustrations concerning graduate school have not been resolved. But I am hoping that I will be accepted somewhere, by some whim of some professor. Because here is something about me that you must know: if you give me an opportunity, I will multiply that gift tenfold. I will work as hard as I can, out of gratitude and dedication. It takes only a chance. For this reason, I am everyday grateful to the chance that Fulbright gifted to me.  And now, I will tell you about another opportunity, for which I am both astounded, humbled, and so very, very grateful. As you might know, after declining at Yale, I got in touch with a climate change professor from Australia who had visited Hokkaido University while I was there. Amazingly, he has written me into a grant and now I am a Visiting Fellow at the University of Western Sydney Hawkesbury Institute of the Environment. My air fare and room and board are entirely covered, and for three months I will be assisting in climate change related plant ecology research. I cannot begin to express my gratitude to this professor, who has provided this opportunity to me out of his own generosity to give young researchers a chance.