Beck
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Posts posted by Beck
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I'm going to be biking everywhere, just as soon as I manage to find a bike. I'm also going to try keep up playing roller derby in my new town. I played sports through childhood and high school, but when I got to uni and everyone started going to the gym, I discovered that actually I'm kind of a poor self-motivator when it comes to working out. I never really managed to get set up with a gym buddy, which would probably help, but I'm REALLY GOOD about team sports. Something about the guilt of staying home and eating M&Ms when your whole team is relying on you to eat something that's recognisable as food and then turn up to practice.
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Yeah, I would buy from craigslist if I wasn't terrified of bed bugs. I guess a desk would be one thing, but I would never take anything upholstered from there.
And on the printer front, I can't stand inkjets. Get a good laserjet B&W and you will be good to go. I have one and in the past year I have spent $150.00 on a printer and toner plus paper. That is less than I would have paid for a school printing allotment. My inkjet used to run me at least $200.00 in printer cartridges a year alone.
+1 to both of these.
I bought my bed new and I'm intending to buy my desk chair new in the next week or so. Everything else can be second-hand.
I had a super-cheap Samsung laser printer that was awesome - so cheap to run.
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Well, getting a phone number turned out to be pretty painless. Just walked on into the T-mobile shop near my hotel and walked out ten minutes later with a functioning mobile - sweet! The girls at the counter had me try the sim card out before activating it without me asking, too. Easy. I just went with a prepaid thing to start, with the idea being to switch once I've figured out how my phone usage corresponds to the billing system (mostly this 'inbound calls matter' thing).
I'm actually almost disappointed that it didn't take longer. Waiting around for the six hours between when I had to check out of the hotel and when I have to report back to the airport for my next flight is BORING.
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Hmmm. I find all this really kinda strange. Band thing, no drama. But this only-works-with-two-carriers, only-works-on-contracts, no-prepaid-data thing is nuts.
I could understand - but still not like - the idea that a phone company could tell me I had to have a data plan if I had an iPhone that they were subsidising (it's true here, too), given that it's partly theirs until you finish paying it off. But I own mine outright! It's mine! I bought it, unlocked, from Apple! It's crazy to me that a phone company can tell me how to use it under those circumstances.
I'll be cut if I wind up with a choice between treating my iPhone like a super-expensive iPod and carting round a cheap phone, or spending a bomb on some OTT plan. Ugh.
Oh well - I guess I'll see how it all plays out next week.
Thanks to all for your help.
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Minutes are the number of minutes you use when you are on the phone. Let's say I had a phone convo with a friend that was 32 minutes and 30 seconds long, that would be 32.5 minutes. However, most phone companies have free nights and weekends at this point, so no matter how long you talk on the phone it doesn't count towards your monthly "minutes".
Dumb question time: is it just your outgoing calls that count towards your minutes? I had a weird conversation once with an American friend who was here and using a prepaid phone card, and she all but hung up on me because she was worried about running out the 'minutes'. Catch is, our call amounts are measured in $ and only charged to the person calling, and I'd called her, so it would've had no effect in Oz. Is that true there, too.
Hope this helps at least a little!Totally does! Thank you! I'm so over asking totally obvious questions.
I spent my whole afternoon setting up a webcam and teaching my parents how to use Skype, so hopefully the international calls can be kept to a reasonable level!
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So I'm getting on a plane to the States on Monday night (yowzers! I swear that just last week, the trip was still two months away!) and I'm starting to think about the list of things I need to sort out pretty fast on arrival. One of them is a cell phone. I'm coming into Texas (I'll be studying in Austin) via a week or so of travel, so right now my plan is to get a very cheap prepaid card when I arrive and buy myself a bit of time to figure out what will actually work for me longer-term, in terms of usage, budget, coverage in the area, etc.
However, I'm using the process of researching the first two as a way of putting off packing .. and I'm kinda lost and confused. Can someone give me a rundown of US Cell Phones For Dummies Australians? What's this 'minutes' thing?
And a related question - I'm bringing my non-carrier-locked iPhone with me - how prevalent is public wireless in the States? Would I get away without data on my phone, just relying on wireless? (And yup ... I know this is likely to be geographically dependent. But maybe somebody can give specific advice.)
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With respect, I think you're overthinking this one. I sent all mine still formatted as A4 or printed out on A4 paper (I'm Australian) and nobody raised an eyebrow - which is to say, I got into a bunch of schools with no worries. I also didn't weed out the Commonwealth spellings or remember to change the dates to US format. I did consider doing all those things, but only fleetingly; I figured I had much better things to focus on than paper sizes or getting rid of the extra u's, like making my writing sample awesome and chasing letters of recommendation. And as my flatmate put it, "If they even notice, they'll just think it's a charming colonial eccentricity".
My writing sample was a very pared-down version of my undergraduate Honours thesis, which was about the same size as your Masters one (a little shorter). I cut it down to about 8,000 words, which came in at 21 pages 1.5 spaced, including bibliography. Worked fine.
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Make sure you book your flight all the way to Texas on the same ticket, so it counts as international the whole way. Most airlines will still allow you 2 checked bags for international Australia-USA, but within the USA you have to pay for ALL checked baggage - unless you're on a domestic leg of an international ticket.
Don't take too much hand luggage because the US has quite strict regulations and security, especially through LAX (the security for domestic flights through LAX is more intense than international flights through Sydney or Melbourne).
Don't pack too much - with the current exchange rate, many things are cheaper in the USA (electronics, cosmetics, jeans, etc). Happy shopping!
As in, they'll weigh hand luggage? I've never had that happen anywhere (but equally never flown to the States before) and my handbag full of books always weighs a tonne.
My biggest concern is getting sporting equipment over there that would be tough and expensive to replace (skates and a bike). Plus books that I'm emotionally attached to.
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I put "self" on mine (am also on a full ride from my school) and got my visa with no problems.
My interview literally went like this:
"What are you doing your Masters in?"
"Women's studies"
"What was your Bachelors in?"
"Women's studies"
"Have you been on an F-1 visa before?"
"Nope"
"And who is paying for your-- oh, I see you have a scholarship. Right, well, we'll get these documents out to you in two days; you just head down to the cashier's desk and pay the issuance fee."
Painless!
- dant.gwyrdd and kaykaykay
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I'm going to UT-Austin to do my Masters in the Centre for Women's and Gender Studies, but my TAship is in the English department. So I'm on an incoming English grads mailing list that's buzzing with introductions, but no idea about who's in my cohort in the CWGS. It's ... a little weird, actually. But cool. Such varied interests and backgrounds.
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Again, I'm not living there yet, but as far as I can tell from craigslist and message boards you'll be hard pressed to find an August 1st lease until late June/early July. When are you planning on moving? You might have better luck looking if you moved into a summer sublet in June or July. Then you could lock down a place for August. That's what I would do, except that my job is a one-year contract that isn't up until the week before school starts.
The program I'm admitted to (Community & Regional Planning) just sent out a list of summer sublets from current students in the School of Architecture. A lot of them look really great. If you're interested, give me your email address, and I would be happy to forward it to you.
I'll send you a message
I'm just filled with paranoia that renting in America works differently to renting in Australia.
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That's awesome, thanks! I've done similar stuff here in Oz, so would be open to doing it there, too.
Still thinking about my bike, though ... my mind is boggling thinking about moving for two years with two bags.
Can anyone give an idea of what the rental market is like in Austin? Do I need to start looking NOW?
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I'm also headed to Austin on a $13k stipend ... kinda nervous.
I know the town is bike-friendly ... can someone give insight on how easy it is actually laying hands on a cheap bike? I've got a great commuter here that I picked up cheap and looks much worse than it is (ie, it's got a good frame and good-to-great parts, so it's a dream to ride but it's three shades of fluorescent and looks like it's not worth stealing). I'm kinda kicking around the idea of boxing it up and bringing it over, since there are some airlines where sporting equipment won't destroy my luggage allowance. I figure this has the advantage of knowing that I'll get there and immediately be mobile and able to explore much greater areas than on foot, but might not be worthwhile if it's super-easy to get something equivalent.
Thoughts?
(I'll probably have many more questions about many different things ... this is just the one I'm worried about today).
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I'm moving from Australia to Texas ... freaked out doesn't begin to cover it right now, but the reality of it all is just starting to hit. Headed to Austin.
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I'm not waitlisted for positions, but I am in limbo on funding and not that optimistic. I went 0/6 on the PhD programmes I applied for, but two of them offered MA positions instead - one is totally unfunded (not going) and the second is talking about trying to find me a TAship, but time is running out before the decision deadline.
The other offer I'm sitting on is an MA in gender studies that I'm wildly excited about, but funding guaranteed only for the second year ("we'll do everything we can to find you a TAship when you arrive"). I'm waiting as long as I can, in the hope that a miracle occurs, but who knows what'll happen. If I lived in the States I'd go for it, but I have to prove I can cover the costs of a year of study before I can get a visa.
Sigh. I would genuinely rather have struck out across the board than be in this position, where I'm staring down the barrel of declining offers (and postponing dreams, and various other melodramatic things) because of money. It's depressing as hell.
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It's not just grants they are waiting to hear about. They're also waiting to hear how much the university plans to award them in teaching funds. Often, that isn't set until the upcoming year's budget is finalized and budgets don't typically coincide with the academic calendar (many run July 1 to June 30). And, given the current fiscal situation, universities are frequently revising their budgets to deal with decreased funds given to them by the state, lower endowments, and increased financial aid for students.
If my current department waited until they knew how many RA and TA positions they would have available to extend offers, we wouldn't accept anyone until the first week of August, and they'd start their jobs about a week later. And, to be perfectly honest, we do admit people without funding for precisely this reason. Frequently, the university gives our department more tuition dollars than they originally said so that TAs can be hired to lead sections for gen ed courses. As a result, we end up extending funding to people that have already decided to come in the first week of August. So, while I see your point jeanne, I think it's important to keep in mind all the things that are in flux in a university aside from graduate admissions.
This is the situation I'm in: I'm getting unfunded offers with the assurance that departments "will do everything we can" or "consider it likely" they can find me a TA or RA position in early August or "when I arrive". It's a chance I'd probably be willing to take if I were moving across the country, but I'm international -- I have to supply proof of income (from that trust fund I don't have?) or a job when I apply for my visa, which means I need to have that position lined up inside school decision deadlines or I'll have to turn them down. It's a pretty sucky situation.
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Hi Danielle,
I'm the one that got notified of my admission by the immigration folks in student services ... I had a pretty clear, but informal, indication that I would be admitted during my phone interview. I'm still surprised that I didn't hear from the department formally last week and before the admin people got involved, but I'll follow up with them next week.
I did check later and saw that my status had changed on the website, too. It's the same page where you can check whether all your documentation arrived - they put a blue box up top saying "Congratulations, you've been admitted".
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I know they're sending out letters next week--acceptance and rejection. . . so I'm not sure what the e-mail business is about. CONFUSED!
My rejection email says: "Please consider the attachment as your official letter, no further documentation will be sent."
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I got a rejection letter today. I hope you all fared better than I did.
R
I got accepted to the MA today, which I figure means a rejection from the PhD stream, but I've received no notification on that one.
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I'm in Australia, so interviewing over the phone. I sent them an email asking what time they counted as 'evening', since the later it gets there, the more civilised the hour gets here, but I'm pretty sure I'll be talking to them at some ungodly first-thing-in-the-morning time. Haven't heard anything back.
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Anyone else interviewing with UT-Austin?
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Watching Doctor Who - and Torchwood - start to finish was one of my main coping mechanisms too. Then I broke my laptop (again - only just got it back). So I'm restlessly reading the titles of every book on my shelves hoping something new materialises. Or that I remember which book I used my Christmas book voucher as a bookmark in, so I can hit the shops after work tomorrow and buy something THICK to get me through the weekend.
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I'm applying from Japan, and the only thing that I find disappointing about the time difference is that when I wake up and see nothing in my email, like now, I know there is next to no point in checking it at all for the rest of the day. I would rather be awake while the adcoms are, so I can check my email everyday, all day. It gets a little boring seeing nothing day in day out in the morning and knowing it will be like that for the next 24 hours, my time.
YES. I'm in Australia and it's exactly like that. I had today off work, so I stayed up late in the hope that something might arrive before I went to bed (1am my time = 9am at the school I'm hoping to hear back from soon). At least the fact that 9am my time is 5pm their time means that I can check my email when I get to work in the hope that something might have arrived while I was on the bus.
Really my iPhone rationale is dead in the water when you consider the time differences. "I need an iPhone so I can, um, check my email all the time to find out if I got into grad school! That's really important!" Of course, I didn't do the maths on timezones before I got the thing ... just as well I like it anyhow.
What's your schedule look like?
in Officially Grads
Posted
I have three seminars, each of three hours, and one of them has an associated film screening. The seminars are Monday afternoon, Tuesday morning, Tuesday afternoon; film screening is Thursday evening.
Then I have TAing responsibilities - attending lectures for an hour first thing on Monday, Wednesday and Friday, and leading two discussion sections (an hour each) on Monday mornings. I also hold three office hours a week, split into two 90 minute blocks, which I've set last thing on Wednesday evening and first thing on Thursday morning. My idea was basically to try and get into as regular a daily pattern as possible, since left to my own devices, I will happily stay up til 3am and then sleep til noon. I knew that if I didn't give myself an unnegotiable commitment (one where I'm accountable to someone other than myself) on Thursday mornings, I would do nothing and then throw off my sleep patterns for Friday, and it would all spiral out of hand.
This is for an MA programme in Women's Studies and I TA in the English department. I am learning all about American literature! My undergraduate English-overview course, ten years ago, focussed on Australian and British, and the American stuff I have done has been contemporary (my background is cultural studies and critical theory, which is kind of a present-ist field in a lot of ways).