Happy birthday to my wonderful Erik! 🙂 And to Hung-Tzu, who is also wonderful, but not my special love! ;b
Okay, this is too much news for one day. I’m having a decently productive day, still not making good progress on my independent study assignment but catching up on everything else and dealing with my ankle (which is getting better), then I go to a fondue dinner for Hung-Tzu’s birthday, which is very fun and involves lots of food and getting to know new people. Then I get home, sort of stumping around on my ankle since it’s a little swollen, and I really, really have to use the bathroom, and there’s a big acceptance-type packet in my mailbox from the University of Chicago. Aaaah. Then I read it and they haven’t accepted me for the PhD program–they’ve referred me to the one-year masters program in social sciences and are offering me partial financial aid for that. Wow. Crazy. Then, as I’m talking to Erik on the phone about it, he asks whether the Mellon fellowship would be applicable to a masters program, and I don’t know so I go check the Mellon website. The website has all these broken links so I had to click around to find what I was looking for, but before I found that I discovered that the “2004 Semifinalist” button now says “2004 Finalist” so I had to freak out on the phone to Erik and brace myself for more news. Well, I’m a finalist! Ack! And the only finalist from Berkeley! They still need to cut more than forty people before the winners are announced… but I had just decided last week that there was no way I was going to get it. So now I have several Future things to think about/freak out about: a year in Chicago with partial funding, UCLA with no funding but possibly with the Mellon…
Like I said, this is way too much information for one night. My ankle and I are going to bed, and we will be happy to be there. Good night!
satsumabug.com | Lisa Hsia 
Congratulations on your achievments and the best luck for the upcoming:)
Proud of you as always,
Mama
Thank you. 🙂
yay!!
After the one year’s master program… can you move on and still get a phd and stuff? i do not know how all this works.
and the mellon fellowship does not apply for masters programs? keep us all up to date!! 😀 how exciting. and yes, we’re all very proud of you! *hugs*
~Shra
Re: yay!!
Thank you thank you. 🙂 Yes it’s all very surprising and interesting! I think probably the masters program is not a good idea because it would be so expensive, but we shall see…
Wowie zowie! That is awesome news – each step is an accomplishment in itself. Congratulations :).
Thank you. 🙂 It’s an important lesson to learn, and I keep trying to keep it in mind. Both the semifinalist and finalist status have done a lot to help keep things in perspective as the rejection letters come in. Professors and grad students have all told me repeatedly that applying to anything is more or less a crapshoot and I shouldn’t take it personally, but it’s still hard not to. So it’s nice to have something definite to show as evidence that I am indeed capable and qualified and deserving!
[…] route to Chicago You might remember that a month ago I was notified of my acceptance into the University of Chicago’s one-year Master of Arts […]