Sleep Deprivation is Changing Me for the Worst

When you spend the first weeks of the school year being sleep deprived and overextended, everything that happens suddenly turns into a drastic situation. Plus, senior year is tough!

been sleepy since freshman year

College is rough, as evidenced by my many previous posts ranting about the ups and downs, busyness and stress that comes along with trying to be and do everything in a short 4 year span.

But here we are, in senior year, because somehow I made it through. And honestly, I'm ready to leave already. 😅It's more complicated than that though.

On Adult Friendships

Moving on from high school and being at university has me thinking a lot about adult friendships. My friendships no longer fit into a mold, and that’s both wonderful and scary. 

With friends at Pigeon Point, Tobago

Last week, I took a #GirlsTrip to Tobago with 4 friends from secondary school. It was a much-needed, long-awaited trip, but in the days leading up I was more nervous and agitated than excited. I hadn’t seen these girls in over 6 months, including my long time bestie from high school whom I’ve officially known for just over 10 years. Our relationships hadn’t been the same since we'd graduated, and it’s been interesting navigating these changes. Like everything else in high school, friendships were molded by the structure and routine of school. We had classes together, ate lunch together, studied together and went out on weekends or during school breaks. There was always a time and a place for friendship, and leaving school suddenly left me in a place where I had to re-evaluate the meaning of friendship, and the time and effort that they take. My friendships no longer fit into a mold, which is both wonderful and scary, and worth thinking about.

10 Weeks of Research, 10 Lessons Learnt

Posing with poster

Research. Such a loaded word, and quite frankly, a word that would have scared me a year ago. So this summer, when I finally had my first "research" experience, the fulfillment wasn’t so much about the theory of the research itself, but all the lessons that came with switching from student-mode to work-mode. Here are some notes that I took over 10 weeks.

1. Firstly, I had to get over my own version of imposter syndrome, and remind myself that I deserved to be where I was. After being accepted to do HBREX (the Human Biology Research Exploration program), I felt like I’d suddenly attained something that had felt unattainable only one year before. And I felt like I couldn’t possibly be qualified for this.

My Black Wedding Dress (A Celebration of Blackness)

Convention, Perception, and the Symbolism of the Color Black

screenshotted from Spotify

I'm listening to Chronixx's album Chronology which my Jamaican friend recommended to me. Chronixx is a Jamaican reggae artist for those who don't know, and I didn't know much about his music before. But this new reggae album is uplifting with its social commentary and personal narrative. Take a listen. You're probably wondering what this has to do with a wedding dress - don't worry, I'm getting to that.

The first song that popped up when I pulled up Chronology on Spotify was Black is Beautiful. Coincidence? I think not. He sings, "they never told us that black is beautiful". I'm taking "they" to be Western mainstream culture, but it could just as easily apply to someone or something else.

Maleficent rocking her black ensemble. Great
movie though (Source: http://movies.disney.com/maleficent)

So aside from the very obvious denouncement of dark skin in the dark days of slavery, it's no secret that both then and now, in Western pop culture (literature, art, the works), the color black has been associated with being evil/darkness and other countless negative things. You don't even need to google it. Just think of popular sayings like blackmail, blacklist, black sheep, and the fact that Maleficent and half of those evil witches in Disney movies wear black capes. Then there's this unforgettable image of my soul becoming "black" when I sin, which has stayed with me from childhood. Religious or not, it's a poignant image. Meanwhile, white is associated with purity and goodness and cleanliness. A lot of other religious references come to mind here, like baptism, and weddings, confirmation, doves...but why?

A Note on Nobility

Am I trying to be a hero? Is that a bad thing?

I'm writing this because the other day I met someone at a house gathering and we did the usual chit-chat/small talk, “where are you from?”, and “what are you studying” and eventually, “what do you want to do after? Do you plan on returning home?”

To the End of Sophomore Year

(Aka The Great Settling of Sophomore Year)

I wish I’d written myself a letter at the beginning of this year so I could compare how I felt then to how I feel now. I didn’t - but I did journal a lot at that time. And I remember journalling during Summer ’16 about how excited I was about sophomore year and obsessively listing all the reasons that sophomore year was going to be the bomb.com.

Long story short, it wasn’t. And if I could write a letter to my past self, there are a couple things I’d like to say. Leggo.

I am Shannon

On the afternoon of Monday December 5th, 20-year-old Shannon Banfield left her work office in Port-of-Spain, the bustling capital of Trinidad & Tobago. She called her mother to say that she was stopping by a couple stores downtown before taking transportation to return home.

She never reached home.

The Great Unsettling of Sophomore Year

    My second year at Stanford is in full swing, and I’m feeling more unsettled than ever. In fact, I’m outright struggling to feel at peace here.

It comes as a shock to me more than anything, because I thought that surely, after weathering the ups and downs of freshman year, I’d be well-adjusted and ready to tackle sophomore year like a boss, without a hitch. I’d hit the ground running and stay running for the entire year because I had so much energy and excitement building up in me after three months of rejuvenation and spirit-restoration back in sweet T&T.

Wrong.

So, so wrong.

Nothing is as picture-perfect as it seems

Should I become a doctor?

This is the million-dollar question I've been trying to answer.

This requires so much venting. Because my thoughts, aspirations and plans are back into overdrive. Not quite back to square one, but now I am contemplating.

Contemplating whether or not I actually want to (or should!) be a doctor.

University sure as heck isn’t natural, but it’s necessary

When everything around you is new, who or what do you turn to?

Ready to take on the uni scene!

New room. New culture. New climate. New classes. New people. New routine. New teachers. New friends (no friends?). New traditions. New social events. New activities. There's one word that encompasses all this: university.

Weeks 1-5 were peachy. I felt well adjusted, ready to take on this new experience like a boss. And I felt I was handling it really well. And I felt proud of myself for that. Was I missing home? Naw. Was I missing my family and friends and way of life? Not really. This was new, and exciting, and everyone here is so supportive and welcoming and all the experiences have been great so far. Have I ever felt left out? Nope. Lonely? A bit. But that might have a lot to do with my introversion, not the lack of people.