End of 2024 miscellaneous thoughts

MOOC

I finished the Introduction to Sustainability MOOC organised by The University of Helsinki. It is a text-heavy course, where the writing is convoluted at times. I still have to go through the references and read some of the papers.

Knowledge and ideas from the course I find useful in my understanding of sustainability:

Garden

We got a raised bed in a shared gardening area. The only gardening book I bought was De Makkelijke Moestuin 2.0. I got overwhelmed by the choice of tomato breeds. Bought some seeds, planted some seeds, got overwhelmed by the need for regular maintenance, neglected the garden.

I’m not very good at leaving the house. Even though the garden is super close to our place, I found it really difficult to “go to the garden” as an activity.

Now that I know this about myself, I’ll probably expand the edible things I grow indoors (it’s basil and a pepper plant right now). And in the future add balcony space or garden to my housing wishes.

Books read

  1. The Once and Future Witches by Alix E. Harrow
  2. Braiding Sweetgrass by Robin Wall Kimmerer
  3. The Invention of Nature by Andrea Wulf
  4. De grote tuin by Lola Randl
  5. The Song of Seven by Tonke Dragt
  6. De brief voor de Koning by Tonke Dragt
  7. The Ornithologist’s Field Guide to Love by India Holton
  8. Uprooted by Naomi Novik
  9. The Golem and the Jinni by Helene Wecker

Somehow all women authors. Most of these were read on the Kindle, three were physically borrowed from the library.

The last three I read in the span of two weeks while I was sick. I didn’t read the blurb of Ornithologist very closely, and was deeply disappointed that the birds were made up magical birds 😅 I didn’t doki-doki once throughout the bird book. I found the romance in bird book and uprooted weird, with bad chemistry. I’m in the Uprooted camp of “this romance is gross and made no sense”. I did find The Golem and the Jinni enjoyable though!

Job applications

I applied to 27 vacancies, didn’t hear back from 4. 2 were for PhDs, others were a mix of UX/service/product/experience research/design and innovation-related.

There’s a strong feeling of “my Dutch is not good enough” and “I didn’t study the right things for the things I want to do now”. This isn’t to throw shade on past-Lilian, she did the best with the information she had, as I do now with the information I have.

Time keeps moving forward :>

Things that made me feel a certain way

Changes in perspective

I didn’t like economics as a field in high school. But now in reflection perhaps I just didn’t like the neoclassical economics that was taught to me. It has become more apparent to me that the models/frameworks/theories that are taught are just one way to look at the world.

I am taught and evaluated on how to understand the world through specific lenses. It feels luxurious and unpragmatic to spend time thinking about the way I think about the world. And to do it eloquently in all the languages I want to speak. Baby’s first thoughts.

Imagine waking up one day and realising you’ve been wearing your pants inside out your whole entire life.

A6 Notebook

I started this year in weekly planner from an Taiwanese independent publisher. On the 21st of May I bought an A6 lined notebook from HEMA and have been bullet journaling in that since. I know dated planners don’t work for me, yet I bought one because it’s pretty and I’m stubborn.

I like the A6, I like that it’s lined. It doesn’t feel daunting to fill, and it captures a smaller period of time than the A5 dotted Leuchtturms I was using before.

To do’s for this blog