Just got back to America after a short stop in Wayanad. Had some great and inspiring conversations with organic farmers. Hope to post more reflections soon.
Archive for the ‘Grad school life’ Category
Vaille Nad (Paddy Land)
Posted in Grad school life, tagged Organic, Wayanad on 5 September 2009 | 1 Comment »
Palakkad??
Posted in Grad school life on 11 August 2009 | Leave a Comment »
Hmmm…my research seems to be taking me to some place far from the hills: Palakkad. Now how to get there in my three weeks left is another issue….
Language update
Posted in Grad school life, Malayalam, tagged Malayalam, Two worlds on 12 July 2009 | 3 Comments »
If you want to know the truth, I’ve hit a low in my Malayalam studies. I’ve mentioned before that Malayalam is a hard language to learn –but what really hit it home was my inability to read Kerala in Malayalam last week. Kerala, the birthplace of my parents. Kerala, the place whose [...]
Just turned in my first fellowship application
Posted in Grad school life, Malayalam, tagged Malayalam, Organic on 29 June 2009 | 1 Comment »
Now hopefully I can concentrate on memorizing the Malayalam alphabet? (Although I admit doing my own PhD research has been fun –I’ve been meeting a lot of people who have lots to say about organic farming here.)
Learning the Malayalam alphabet is hard
Posted in Grad school life, Malayalam, tagged Malayalam on 24 June 2009 | 1 Comment »
Even with the slight advantage of understanding simple conversation, I’m finding learning and memorizing the Malayalam alphabet to be quite challenging. There are 15 vowels, symbols for the vowels, 30 consonants, half consonants, double consonants, and clusters to memorize. Many of the sounds don’t even exist in English. I admit I am [...]
I’m still here
Posted in Grad school life, Malayalam, Sustainable agriculture, tagged Words on 12 September 2008 | Leave a Comment »
Apologies for not writing often. I have to admit that I have not made much progress on any Kerala research since last Spring. Grad school is eating up my time (and frying my brain) in other ways (oh, you know, oral exams, teaching, seminars, applications for funding, office hours, etc.)
I promise things will pick up [...]
