Something About My Hub

Two months ago, I moved into my new prefab office. I was placed in Hub DB04, together with 5 other privileged post grad students. I use the word privileged here because we share the hub with our very own Dean and administrator who each has their own offices in the big room. Next to DB04 is DB02. That's where Yoda and Obi Wan are placed.

Despite being under close scrutiny of two jedi masters, I loved my new hub because 1.  I scored a nice window seat at the corner of the room and 2.  There are two printers in this hub which makes printing jobs very convenient. For several weeks, everything seemed perfect.

One day, one of my senior colleagues, Mr X, saw me at the cafe. We hadn’t seen each other for quite a while so we started talking. When he discovered that I was placed in DB04 he said “Wow. Together with J? How did you end up being in that hub?” I felt confused when he admired my good fortune, feeling a little smug but at the same time suspicious that it was too good to last.

“I don’t know. J decided on the placing. She was the one who put me there,” I said.

He raised one eyebrow, “Well, good on you Alice.”

A few days later, things started to change. More and more people began to occupy the other hubs and when this happened the frequency of visitors increased too. DB04 became the centre of attention cos that's where the admin office is. Heaps of students came to see the administrator regarding all sorts of matters such as  facilities, claims, building access, etc. Before long, I couldn’t focus on my thesis anymore.  The noise wasn’t so bad but I am easily distracted so the slightest interruption can disturb my train of thought.

Motivated by this issue, I decided to move to DB06, the hub next door. DB06 looks exactly like DB04, minus the two small offices for the Dean and administrator. It's also a bit further from Yoda and Obi Wan's hub so they can't peek to see what I'm doing. Hehe.

This time around, I scored a window spot at the right corner of the room. This suits me perfectly cos I love a window seat, be it on a plane or in an office. Every day, I come to work happy, eager to write thousands and thousands of words on the spreadsheet. I normally come in around 9.00 in the morning and leave by 12.25 to pick up Alden from school. I don't get a lot of work done in the span of 3 hours so when hubby comes home around 3.30pm, I'd continue my work at the office till 8 or 9 pm.

My research assistant normally comes with me in the morning

I love coming in after  4 or 5 cos the hub will be totally vacant by then. It's not that I don't like having people around. I just like having the freedom to do whatever the hell I please when I'm working. While writing my thesis, I can talk to myself out-loud, sit with crossed-legs, munch on a bag of chips noisily, surf social networking sites without guilt and scratch that terrible itch on my back without being discrete. That's what I call office bliss.

I am most productive between 4.30 to 7.00. When I say productive, I don't mean a flawless 10 pages of academic awesomeness. It means that within this period, I am able to produce something coherent and readable. 

My problem starts at 7.45 pm. Why? Because it gets dark by then and this changes the whole ambience of the room. My hub has a lot of tinted windows and when it gets dark these windows look like mirrors. It's so creepy. Have you seen a scene in a scary movie where  a timid heroine sees a reflection of a ghost in the window? That's what freaks me out.

The lighting sensor in this hub isn't helping either. The motion sensor light will only turn lights on when the room is occupied. When I'm moving around, the sensor recognizes thatsomeone's in the room. When I'm sitting quietly or when I'm just typing on my computer, the lights go off cos there's no movement. What happens then? I have to stand up and jump around like an idiot to get the light back on.

It's going to be Halloween soon and these past few days they've been showing sneak peeks of the scariest movies on TV. The last sneak preview I saw was The Grudge. Damnit! I should've changed the channel when I had the chance to. Now that I think of that, a creepy figment of my imagination is starting to get a hold of me. Just imagine tinted windows - reflection - the Akkkkkk sound- Ju-On - Scream 4. CREEPY! Thank God I have my rosary with me.

It's now 8.45 pm. I think I'll stop right here before the lights go off again. Happy Deepavali everyone.

Being a nomadic student

Before February 22nd, I used to have a study space at the College of Education. It was located on the fifth floor of the tower block, overlooking the college office and administration building. I loved coming in everyday because it was the only place I could focus on my work.

In addition to having a nice office, I also had a great  bunch of colleagues to work with. Every Tuesday, we'd gather at the lounge suite to catch up and talk about our work. These gatherings were therapeutic cos they gave me the consolation that I wasn't alone in this head-damaging journey.

One day, a violent earthquake struck Christchurch and caused significant damage to our campus buildings. This changed everything. The tower, where my office was located was deemed unsafe and labelled as a red zone area. Since all my data were still stuck in the room, I felt understandably suicidal.

Three weeks later, we were given access to enter the tower with a security team. We were told to retrieve important research materials and were briefed on the things to do should another earthquake strike. Since we were still having heaps of aftershocks then, we were given only 10  minutes to complete the mission.

Ready for the mission (Photo courtesy of Abdullah Nawi)

This is what I saw

A crack between two buildings (photo courtesy of Abdullah Nawi)

The post-grad lounge suite (photo courtesy of Abdullah Nawi)



My roomate's desk





My desk



My roomate Amir 

After seeing my office, I came to terms with reality. I had to find a new study space. My Dean suggested that I work at Otakaro 232. It's a  big computer lab equipped with over 20 Mac computers. At first, this seemed to be a perfect solution cos the room was not crowded. Somehow, in just a week, news about this room went viral on campus. The number of users multiplied, making the lab a not-so-condusive environment for writing.

You see, the lab was always full, so people tend to come early and sit on the same spot everyday. I always ended up sitting next to this  noisy-breather who snorted when he breathed. He didn't have a cold or anything. It's just the way he was programmed you know. Whenever he's around, my stress level went through the roof cos I couldn't concentrate on anything else.  I know what some of you are thinking. The problem is me, not him, right? But imagine this. Imagine the sound of someone whining and snorting while breathing....in and out...in and out..in and out.

Now amplify that a little. That's what I had to endure. Hearing that sound in a totally quiet roomdrives me insane. I couldn't very well ask him to stop breathing right? That would be murder. I had no choice but to move on.

Days later, I found a place called the Post-grad Hub. It's a TOTALLY QUIET ROOM catered specifically for thesis students.  I left my whiny lab partner and quickly found solace in the hub. Things were going well at first but after some time, more people came in to use the PCs. Not to write, but to  chat, check FB status and watch videos. 

One day, while I was writing a difficult Chapter 3, a group of students laughed out loud at something they saw on YouTube. Annoyed, I made the SHHHH sound to get them to shut up. They did, as I expected. I heaved a noisy sigh and continued writing. Moments later they started laughing again. I could feel the atomic bom inside me ticking.  I heaved another noisy sigh. This time longer and more dramatic.

But it didn't work. They were still HAHAHA-ing like hyenas.

That did it.

I marched to their table, pointed to the sign which said "THIS IS A QUIET ROOM!" and read it out loud. Everyone fell silent. I went back to my seat feeling all crappy inside. It totally ruined  my mood.

I soon realised that the hub wasn't such a quiet room after all. Despite having a sign that said For Thesis Students Only, all types of students came to use the space. After a month of working in the hub and shhhhh-ing ignorant pinheads, I was finally offered a temporary office space at Wairarapa.

This is what it looks like.

My research assistant

I am contented cos my new roomate, Abdullah, doesn't snort when he breathes or  make other irritating sounds that drive me insane.  My new office may not have a big desk or a printer or a lounge suite for Tuesday afternoon teas, but for the time being, it is enough. All I want is a little bit of peace and quiet.

*The moment I finished this draft, I got an email saying that I could move into a new office early September :)

Jack and Jill

I don't normally talk about work or people at work cos there's a thing called Office Etiquette and  one of  the commandments is Thou shall not gossip. People who break this common rule often get a lashing for being an idiot. But just for today, I'll make an exception. Not talking about my colleagues of course, just about  how certain people at work behave, in general. And since none of my colleagues know about the existence of this humble garden, I am going to throw caution to the wind and tell you a story about two people sharing an office. Nothing to do with me, mind you!*rolls eyes* These characters are totally fictional and they are not associated with anyone dead or alive. There. That's my disclaimer. Those of you working in a law firm (I'm looking right at you LW and CL) please advise and tell me if this is enough to keep me safe from future lawsuits. 

Right. As I was saying, this is a tale of two colleagues; Jack and Jill. Jack and Jill shares an office. Jack is a Mongolian whose English sounds a lot like Japanese and Jill is your all-Malaysian girl who finds it difficult to understand Jack's incoherent English. Despite the language barrier, they're cool with each other. Until recently.

When Jack first came, he hardly ever stayed in the office cos he had heaps of field work to do outside. After he's done with field work however, he started coming in more frequently. That's when Jill discovered Jack's real traits and one of them was his annoying eating habits. You see, Jack makes excruciatingly annoying sounds when he eats. It's like everything needs to be demonstrated and stressed in the eating process. Like if he eats a bag of chips with a can of coke, he'd rip the packet out-loud and munch and munch and munch on them like cookie monster would devour his cookies. Remember Sesame Street? Right. Because he's too hasty in his attempt to finish the chips, he often chokes on his food and in desperation, he would take a few big gulps of  Coca Cola to help move the food down. And then he burps. Out loud. Which is cool with Jill, if this was done during the lunch break or at the lounge suite where people have their lunches. But no. He just has to do it in the office - all the time.

Oh, by the way, Jill takes her wee baby to work every day. More about this later.

When he's done eating, he'd start making himself a cup of coffee at the pantry. He comes back from the pantry with his Nescafe, places the mug on the table (loudly) "THUD" and then stirs it with a spoon "TING TING TING" before he starts sipping on  it and making this sound SLURRRRRRPPPPPPPP...Ahhhh  Don't know what's with the ahhhh.., but he constantly does this when he's slurping on his coffee. It's like a finale to his extraordinary eating habits. When this happens, I, I mean Jill, just feels like shouting "Can you stop eating like a pig?" but for the sake of harmony, she normally keeps her mouth shut.

After a few sips and slurps, Jack gets on with his work. He takes out his files, puts them on the table THUD THUD THUD and starts typing on his keyboard, CLICK CLACK CLUCK CLICK CLACK CLUCK. This goes on for hours. It is as if he's playing mortal combat with his keyboard. It is traumatizing cos she can hardly hear herself think with that CLICK CLACK CLUCK CLICK and SLURRRRRRPPPPP Ahhhhh. This happens all the time.

Aside from that, Jill's baby also has a hard time having Jack around cos he always closes the door loudly with a bang. This startles the baby of course especially when she's sleeping. Baby starts crying and poor Jill has to stop whatever she's doing to comfort her. And Jack? Oh, he's oblivious to all this cos he's so caught up in his own little world. Being the kind and patient person that she is, Jill remains silent and drives herself crazy with imaginative murder plots.

One Sunday (about a month ago), Jill decided to go to the office to catch up on her work. As she was about to open the door to her room, she noticed that someone was inside. It was none other than Jack! What was he doing in the office on a Sunday? Jill peeked through the see-through window on the door and got the shock of her life. Jack was watching an adult entertainment site! How interesting. Jill knocked on the door 3 times before turning the knob. This of course pushed  the fella's panic button. Hehe. He quickly clicked the X button on the screen before turning to say "Hi". His face, pale white. Guess what happened next? Nothing of course. Jill just smiled knowingly and pretended like nothing happened. Poor Jack has to live with the fact that he will never know what Jill knows.
 

Since that incident, Jack has been conveniently occupied and doesn't go to the office on a regular basis anymore. When he does show up, it's usually in the late afternoon, when Jill's about to leave. Jack probably feels awkward being around Jill and deep down she does feel sorry for him. Well, only a little. Now that Jack can't annoy her with his eating habits, she can finally do her work in peace. Life is good again. 

 

The End.

The moral of the story? I'll leave that to you. :)