Second semester
It's Tuesday night. Today I finished my final examination in molecular microbial pathogenesis, the sole consistent source of this semester's inundated Tuesday afternoons oozing with molecular knowledge and scientific insight. I was the last one knuckling under from the lab, where I rounded up my presentation for our two visiting scientists from London. I was walking to my goshiwon from my laboratory, behind which a small path in the woods lay, the darkness befallen yet seemingly it was early evening, and suddenly I felt a surge of accomplishment. This night marks the end of my second semester here in Chonnam.
My academic journey is halfway through, and I have learned so many things and ironically, I don't know so much about the molecular world. They say that's what grad students realize after taking their master's degree but I dare say, it is quite the opposite with life. For now I know, so many things about myself and my limitless capacity for love and the illusion of time. I have learned more about the tricks of obsession and the poisons of addiction, human nature and its dark emptiness, and the brightness of life even in the most mundane of chores.
I guess the most beautiful experiment in the world is the one you do with your life. It doesn't matter how many failures one endures, how many ATPs one expends in a day. It is in the risks we take, it is in the character that we have built, it is in the smiles we have made for those who walk with us. What matters is that we have lived each day, the proverbial seizing, and that we are in each present moment, aware and content.
My academic journey is halfway through, and I have learned so many things and ironically, I don't know so much about the molecular world. They say that's what grad students realize after taking their master's degree but I dare say, it is quite the opposite with life. For now I know, so many things about myself and my limitless capacity for love and the illusion of time. I have learned more about the tricks of obsession and the poisons of addiction, human nature and its dark emptiness, and the brightness of life even in the most mundane of chores.
I guess the most beautiful experiment in the world is the one you do with your life. It doesn't matter how many failures one endures, how many ATPs one expends in a day. It is in the risks we take, it is in the character that we have built, it is in the smiles we have made for those who walk with us. What matters is that we have lived each day, the proverbial seizing, and that we are in each present moment, aware and content.