Might be crossing a different Rubicon

Change of plans? Maybe. I'm at a loss.


I can't believe I'm actually drinking coffee right now and planning not to sleep just to do some researching (yahoo-ing, I typed on the yahoo search bar) on "isolation and purification of bioactive compounds from marine organisms". This is ludicrous defined! I thought of how ludicrous it is just now that I had to stop my searching (I'm only on the 6th page, item #1 of all search results: 51/38,200 results. Uh-oh. Sheez, I'm not planning on looking through all those! Maybe I should stop at page 6 while I still can.) and take time to blog about it.


It has been a long time since I last did this kind of academic routine. And my facebook status?

"can I really say goodbye to bum days??"

What what what? Starting yesterday, life's giving me merely three days (Friday, Saturday, Sunday) to savor my freedom. Since I left my last job (which was mid-December of last year), I have been ultimately on a holiday-freeday-happyday mode, however you may call it. (That includes learning the German language and how to play the violin.) Might be hard to get it out of my system...but, bring it on! It's just that things turned out to happen so abruptly -- almost shocked me to death! Here's how...

July 7, Tuesday
- received an email from Matet that there's a job post at the Marine Science Institute for university researcher position

July 8, Wednesday
- thinking time...

July 9, Thursday
- finally sent an email of application to Dr. Gisela Concepcion
- received a reply from Dr. Concepcion telling me to see her Friday morning at her office
- started to research on the Philippines PharmaSeas Drug Discovery Project

July 10, Friday
- got interviewed by Dr. C. for I think less than 2 minutes, with asking my general weighted average (GWA) as the highlight of the "interview". Here's a paraphrased summary of our dialogue.

Dr. C. : You're Raphlin?

Me : Yes, Ma'am.

Dr. C. : Yes, ok. Here's Maria. She'll show you around and tell you the things you need to know. Ok, so what's your grade? <-- totally unexpected killer question!!

Me : (Ano daw?! Anong tanong? Grade? Oo, grade daw. So GWA? Oo yata. Ah wait...ah ok. Ngayon ko ba kelangang sagutin? Andami kayang tao dito...si Sir Gino, si Sir Louie, at kung sinu-sino pang di ko kilala. Capital O-M-G! Ang alam ko ambaba ng GWA ko eh...ano nga? Ang alam ko nasa recommendation letter ko yun from Ma'am Amor...wait...ah ok.)

Me : Ma'am, GWA is *.*

Dr. C. : Ah ok, pasado naman. Ok when can you start? If possible, sana ASAP.

Me : Ok, Ma'am. I can start on Monday. (Shoot! Sure ba 'ako?! Bahala na.)

Practically, it took me about 10 seconds to answer the killer question.


Now I'm thinking if my getting that job was matter-of-factly and deliberately thought over by Dr. C. I guess not. Who knows? She might just have been preoccupied by a lot of things that day. I really wanted to tell her that I don't have enough experience in bioassays and stuff and ask her if that's fine. Not a chance. It's really weird that I'm hoping for a reverse of fate that would disqualify me for the job. Feeling the pressure of having two of our chemistry instructors as workmates and considering how big (!!!) the project is, I can't help but be browbeaten. Ok, so I'm chickening out and all, yes. Nonetheless, I have to constantly remind myself and accept the fact that "Hey Raph, this is the next level, this isn't high school nor college anymore." You have to STEP UP! As Melai puts it,

"Wala ng madali sa mundo."

In reality, my problem may just be a grain of sand in a sandbox-sized problems of the world and I may be overanalyzing things here, but that's the most rational thing I can think of to simply say to myself, in a consoling manner,

"You can do it!"

...and frankly,

"C'mon, get out of the box, coward!"

I figured that I am probably scared of falling short of people's expectations. More often than not, I'd rather not try at all than fail. I'm just not cut out for the saying,

"It’s better to try and fail than to have never tried at all."

Passing by Papemelroti, this one struck me bull's eye,

"Everybody makes mistakes. That's why they put erasers on pencils."
-The Simpsons

So much for the quotable quotes, I should get back to business. I'm crossing my fingers for this different Rubicon I'm trying to cross.