Highs and lows

It's the 4th July and it has been a strange few weeks in my world – good and bad. On a personal front, received some bad news from family abroad, which was a shock and unexpected even though quite a few of us here were aware of the situation. Also my younger cousin sister Sara is leaving home to go for her placement year up in Edinburgh, something which I have mixed feelings about. On the one hand, I’m really pleased that she got the placement as I could tell it was something that she really wanted and living away from home will be a good experience for her. But at the same time, I’m sort of sad to see her go as a) she’s so far from home b) I won’t get to see her as often and c) I’m an emotional fool, lol! Yet simultaneously my other cousin sister, Saba (Sara’s older sister) is at last nearing the end of her placement year and going back to university for the final year of her degree. And depending on which place I choose for uni next year, I can only be close to one of em’ – it’s like they can’t be in the same place at the same time, lol. Ah it’s a funny old world ain’t it?!

Which reminds me, on the academic front - I got my semester marks for my MSc and I’m on for a 1st providing I work at the same level or better. In terms of my research project, I’ve collected 2/3 of my data and I am steadily working towards completing data collection and analysis by the end of July thus leaving me with the month of August to write up my findings and submit my thesis on time (inshAllah). Everyone please start praying for me and sending me good vibes as I see plenty of sleepless nights ahead of me – eek! These past few weeks, I have also been attending interviews for further doctoral studies. As I write this so far all the places I applied to have interviewed me, I have actually been offered a few scholarships (mashAllah) with still a couple more places left to be interviewed for, which I’m hoping I’ll get – fingers crossed. I have to say all in all, it is excellent to be in a position where I get to pick and choose where I want to go for further studies as opposed to going somewhere that may not have been my initial choice. It has given me a confidence boost that I desperately needed since Aisha left, a time when I had seriously questioned my decision to become a medic.

Other general world stuff – I was sad to hear that Farrah Fawcett (of Charlie’s Angels fame) finally lost her battle with cancer and passed away. There was another celeb that also died (rather suddenly) – my tweet went something along the lines of “Err… Michael Jackson died?!” How unbelievable was that?! Despite his problematic personal life and even though I may not have been a fanatical fan, I did actually enjoy Michael Jackson’s music. Obviously it is sad when someone dies but I was surprised at the sheer number of people both at uni and home that were really shaken up by it. These past few days on Twitter, loads of celebs are being announced as dead - some of them clearly are not true. One of the hoaxes was that actor Jeff Goldblum had died whilst filming a scene in New Zealand. He wasn’t thankfully dead but still had to go on TV to deny his own death! (LOL!)

The sport has been good this summer. The twenty20 cricket was well played and a pleasant surprise and as I currently write this, it is the Wimbledon women’s final. Once again it’s both of the William’s sisters through to the final and although both Venus and Serena are excellent tennis players, I would like to see someone different in the finals for a change. I’m also looking forward to the Ashes test (cricket) starting in a week or so and will be lasting till August. I totally love the friendly rivalry between England and Australia and there are someone excellent players on both sides this year. I would be happy for either side to win and here’s hoping we get to see some entertaining games from both teams :)

Yep so that’s me up till now. Better get back to it and do some real work :P