PTSD

Down and out in BNC city

Since both E and I are fond of lists and since I paid an exhorbitant amount for Internet access, here's another one:

1. Evening of last day started well--managed to get noticed as the postgraduate student who suggested a book to Lord of Constructivists at the last BNC session. He actually wrote down the name of the book, took on my comments about the books he was using (which I'm not too fond of) and seemed like a generally lovely person. For the last panel of the day, it was extremely well-attended and I realised (a bit too late in the BNC) that BigNameFolks aren't as scary as they appear.

2. Since TUWSNBN crowd had left, managed to inveigle my way into hanging out with other postgrad students and went and had Afghan food for the first time in my life.
Better than fish tacos, for sure. Actually, they didn't have much fish in the Afghan restaurant. As is usual in postgrad student guff, discussed Carl Schmitt, poverty, potential jobs, The Constructivist Manifesto (which was apparently written in between sessions at a past BNC by this lot), poverty and Foucault. Yes, poverty was a recurring topic. I guess Schmitt was the odd one out?

3. Got excellent comments about second presentation. Was complimented on the execution of said presentation and am now contemplating trying to turn it into part of the dissertation. Have to think about that. Good comments made up for the two hours spent traipsing around suburban areas of BNC city on Friday morning, looking for Kinko's to print presentation stuff. BNC hotel didn't have a colour printer. Or, if they did, it was inaccessible to BNC attendees. Kinko's person was partly Irish so managed to get colour copies printed for very cheap (yes, the Irish mafia apparently has connections).

4. That takes me to my final point for now and to the title of this post: For some reason, my bank card has stopped working. So, no place to stay tonight (am planning on staking a corner at the local airport since my flight leaves at 6.45am tomorrow). No idea why bank card is not working. Did I do the sensible thing, you ask and save money? No, I spent $3 out of my remaining cash in getting Internet access for 30 mins and then going online to blog and check out footy and other news. Figured I can get something to eat and spend the rest of my cash in taking the bus to the airport.

Overall, very happy about BNC. Now, back to dissertating--assuming I survive today and the flight(s) to DC.

posted by Priya @ 3:21 PM