So I couldn’t sleep earlier. Had a couple of things on my mind. I’ve just managed to get two tickets for the HSBC Rugby Sevens finals in Cape Town on the 10th… and good tickets at that, but I can’t go because I already have tickets for Majozi at Kirstenbosch. Also I’ve been to Sevens twice before so I’m feeling kinda meh about it anyway. While tossing and turning I decided to rather go to Majozi and donate the rugby tickets to my kids’ school to raffle off at their Food Fair happening on the 1st December.

Then I grappled with thoughts regarding one of my M students who is rather battling at the moment. She is making progress but very slowly. Her writing isn’t always coherent. I think the thoughts and ideas are in her head, but she battles to articulate them academically. That’s something I think all postgrad students – including myself, can relate to. So typically after reviewing just a few paragraphs, I’ll often send her work back to her to rewrite, after having made some changes myself but then eventually deciding it’s actually is her job – since she’s going to get awarded with the Masters Degree afterall.

I feel for her though. It’s an uncomfortable struggle because it’s been almost three years now and she still hasn’t hit the sweet spot. I think there is still hope. I firmly believe just a few more steps and it will come together for her, however I also think she is losing faith. The truth is, there is nothing I can do about that. It’s a fact of life, a philosophical stance I just started adopting but should have a long time ago actually…. sometimes things are just out of one’s control. It’s better to let it go. She has to decide to motivate herself. This is not my monkey to carry, so I am not going to try to hold on or control it.

So then I just tossed and turned thinking about nothing in particular for another few minutes before deciding bugger this, I might as well just get up and work for a bit. My own work has also been progressing – also slowly – but steadily. The end goal has increasingly been coming into focus. The past few weeks I’ve had really solid ideas, and this week it felt to me as if I made ‘first contact’ with what the final product of my work should look like.

I’ve been collecting all the bits and pieces, so tonight just before I attempted to go to bed the first time I printed a process flow of the pharmaceutical manfacturing process so that I could map my thoughts directly onto that printed page later. I’m glad I did, because as I sat down earlier I literally scribbled all the bits and pieces of information I had onto this page, and then used coloured pens to connect my thoughts. It was then that I started seeing what my model is going to look like 😍.

My supervisor will more than likely want to string me from my toes for openly blogging about my research findings, let alone posting this picture – but I’ll take my chances because I’m feeling rather stoked. And I’m pretty darn sure this makes very little sense to anyone but me in this very rudimentary format. I’m just so proud and happy it actually finally seems like ‘something’ that can work! Loads of work still ahead but let’s take this moment and say ‘Three cheers to perseverance’ Hip Hip hurray. Hip hip hurray ….and the last one Hurray! ☯️👏🏾🥂🍾

Yeah me gots to laugh. If I don’t laugh then I’ll probably become depressed, and hay nah, that ain’t gonna happen.

So I’m in Durban for a few days consulting with my supervisor. Landed at the airport armed with two bags of books, laptop, tablet, bare minimum clothes, wearing jeans and red chucks – no stilettos even though I’m here for work! 😱🤔😔 Hmmmmn …something about my mood and this trip.

Gosh, this PhD journey is a tough one but thankfully now and then, I’m blessed to be able to see the funny side. Like today, supervisor asked me why haven’t I finalised Chapter 1. This confused me. See I wrote Chapter 1, sent it to her over a year ago. She looked at it, made a few comments and basically told me it was crap. I made a few changes and I agreed, it actually was crap. Very crap. So I parked it temporarily.

The work wasn’t focused. In my defence, who on earth actually really knows that they doing when they start anything? (This is why I feel for my own masters students. Being a student myself makes me a little bit more compassionate when I work with them).

Anyway, I went on with rest of the work, have drafts of the next few chapters. I figured I would go back to Chapter 1 once I knew what I was doing

Today she says there was nothing significantly wrong with Chapter 1… I is “like what?” (There is though – biggish crater sized issues with my Chapter 1 – which I can fix but only now that I am more focussed and have a better understanding of the problem). But I was certainly not going to correct her. ….Smile and wave Private… Just smile and wave. 🐧 🐧 🐧 🐧 👋🏾 👋🏾

Fellow students out there, keep your faith. Don’t lose heart. Academia is an upside down place. There is a reason we started this in the first place. Sometimes, most of the time on the journey we forget why we even started – well I do. It’s a comfort though knowing that besides being challenging, ‘learning’ is an interesting space to be in. Some days enjoyable and stimulating, some days sad and downright bitterly lonely – especially if you doing research. But every now and then a day pops up which is just so incredibly funny. Cheers to those days!!!

.***I actually realised as I wrote that, it probably sounds odd to people not so familiar with research. Generally, as is the nature with research, you learning all the time. So when you start whatever you write will look like rubbish by the time you finish your final chapter. This because you know more after actually doing some research! But you need to start somewhere. Sounds oxymoronic I know. My truth though there is no person that I know, who did not go back to make changes to their Chapter 1 after they finished writing the final chapter. It’s just the way it is.

“Don’t it always seem to go, that you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone. They paved paradise and put up a parking lot”

I am simply loving this Counting Crows song. Playing it on repeat. We have just finished our first week of exams at CPUT – successfully! Thank you Jesus. True story,a few weeks ago I really did not think we would be able to salvage any of the 2016 academic year. Small mercy. As last week transpired, we all waited with baited breath. Everyone in flight mode on stand-by. I traded my high heels for flat shoes this week. Some colleagues used public transport to come to work – not wanting to risk their cars being burnt by student protesters, if unrest flared up again. As Monday became Friday the uneasy peace settled. With every exam that was written we started breathing easier. I think we actually, yes might actually just get through this.

We would be fools to believe that we are not going to still feel seriously severe repercussions due to the extensive and violent #FeesMustFall protests. For now the violence has dissipated and we left with trying to put the pieces together again. But it will be years to recover completely. I do not think we can even start counting all the hidden costs.

As we were preparing for exam, security was a giant concern – not only for staff but for students too. Someone hit the nail on the head amidst the uncertainty during our preparations when the comment was made, “Now after the protests, CPUT does not even have the money to hire special security to ensure safety during exams“. Because of the protests, the ultimate reason for the very existence of the university was compromised. Short sighted gains for long term impact. Yes they paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

A week and a half ago I was really angry. CPUT is historically the poor cousin of all the universities in the Western Cape. Yet a quick google search will reveal some sterling minds and work have come from CPUT – Fsati is one example. See: http://www.cput.ac.za/blogs/fsati/

But sadly in the past two months, the overriding impression that has been made in my mind is that there are a  number of CPUT students who want to cripple their own university. In one podcast of a student mass meeting I heard, a CPUT student leader was telling his followers that they should go as far as even disrupting essential services, namely Tygerberg Hospital when it was discovered that the hospital granted permission for exams to take place on their premises. Admittedly I have remind myself, to convince myself that this radical sentiment characterizes the minority of CPUT students. I’m not incredibly proud, but will also admit that in my seething anger last week, a part of me wished, and felt that justice would be served if the university could no longer operate at all. What if there was no CPUT… and then what? Little by little they were breaking CPUT down. I don’t think they stopped for a moment to think they were going too far.

I guess we could say they are just students – they don’t know better. I do however feel that each one of us has a voice inside of us that tells us, if you have something valuable then treat it with appreciation darn it. Value it! There might be justifiable reasons why you feel things are not going your way, however you need to value what you have. Don’t take it for granted. Perhaps the students will still learn. Hopefully they have already learnt. Hopefully CPUT has learnt. They should have taken a harder line with the students from the beginning. But what is done is done.

And so the unrelenting human spirit continues. We pick ourselves up, we dust ourselves off. For some more difficult than others, but we have no choice but to take all those broken pieces and start again. Marking underway, exams underway, and we start planning again.  Next year will be tough, but it will be a new year – a chance for a fresh start. I’m proud to be part of CPUT. 

Then lastly I have some happy news to share. I will explain details in my next blog. Because the details have not yet been finalised, I cannot say too much as yet. But I can say that it is related to the PhD, and it is really big news. It will entail a great deal of input and sacrifice from me, but if all goes well it is another blessing that humbles me and makes me say out loud, Our Father is faithful. Having a meeting tomorrow at 14:00, so I might post about it next week or the week after.