Spain: Part 2 - The hostel (and complaints about my university)

 This recount is also just less than 2 weeks since it occurred.

I've left the airport and lined up to get a taxi. Still confused at how the line works I get gestured at to walk in front of one taxi to go to the other side road to get in another taxi. So I get in, the driver only speaks Spanish, I show him where I'm going on my phone, all is well. The driver seems quite nice, he even turned off the meter for a bit when he took a wrong turn. He explained that the smell in the air is from an olive oil factory nearby via gestures,  the English word for "oil" and the Spanish word for "factory" - 'fabrica' - a word I actually remember from Duolingo! We take some very narrow streets and then a dirt road to the hostel I booked for this first night. I only booked 1 night here since it was cheap and the uni refused to pay my accommodation for 1 more night. Even though I found later they paid for a post-doc in my lab to have 6 nights instead of just 5. If you read some of my previous posts you could probably tell I was fed up with the admin, and just wanted the trip to be approved so I could go in the end. 

Anyway, I had to call the owner of the accommodation as there was no clear reception area. I was also using my normal mobile plan just on roaming, so everything was costing me money at this point. The guy comes out, shows me around, records my details, etc, he seemed nice and welcoming, at first.  The first thing I do is go have a shower, I felt so gross after almost 2 whole days on a plane or at an airport. I wasn't given a towel, and I didn't want to go and find the guy so I just used my t-shirt cause I really didn't care at this point. I just wanted to be clean, eat and sleep. Then I go to the kitchen where there was a vending machine with 2-minute/instant noodles. Then the guy approaches me making sure I can use the machine, yeah that's fine, but then he says I can cook it in this other room and not the main kitchen. I saw this other room previously and it was right near my dorm, so I thought sure why not. There I got offered any plates, cups, cutlery I needed and free bottled water to drink. I'm thinking, okay great maybe he just thought I wanted to be separate from all the young guys, I appeared to be the only female there at the time. Me being me I was still a bit sus, but I knew my exits, I had access to what I needed and some boiling hot noodles in broth, what more did I need, lol. 

Then he comes and sits with me while I'm eating, and trying to converse, with his limited English and my obvious lack of Spanish. Now I'm wondering, is this a cultural thing, or is this just because I'm a young female. He also starts to compliment me, now this is extra sus to me. Eventually, a lady comes by and it turns out she's the one I'm sharing with, and shes British so we can actually talk to each other. I was so thankful to see another female. She had to go make her dinner in the common kitchen, so I stayed where I was to finish my food then I was going to head to bed. While she's gone they guy and some other guy (similar age) come and sit with me again and talk Spanish with references to me but not actually talking with me, which was creepy. So I washed up my plates and said I'm going to leave them to their business and head to bed. 

The British lady soon joined me in the dorm, with a plate she had to take from the room I ate in, because it turns out there were no plates or cups in the common kitchen. Which was a bit unusual in my opinion. Then we get talking and it turns out her and the other guests never got offered anything that I did, so unfortunately it turns out the "niceness" was likely because I'm a young female thing. 

In the late morning after some sleep the British lady offers me a lift to the hotel that the uni booked, and I gladly accepted. I was able to check in before midday, and the place was lovely! So much nicer!

If there hadn't been another female there I probably would have locked myself in a room much earlier. But then I would also have to find a way to book a taxi to get out of there which would have been challenging too. I count myself very lucky that she was there, and could speak English, and offered to give me a lift! 

____________________________________________________________

Afterthoughts

I wouldn't have been in this situation if the uni would have just paid for one more nights accommodation. I even told them I was going a day early for medical reasons (migraine) and was completely dismissed. The administration staff I dealt with didn't even acknowledge my medical concerns and I was told "it's normal for our staff and students to arrive the day before and to arrive 2 days before is not permitted and has to be listed as "personal leave" in which the university will not cover any costs for. 

Sure I could have booked somewhere else, but I'm a full time student who earns less than the minimum wage. I already had to pay for another weeks accommodation myself as meetings with other academics at research facilities and university are also considered personal leave and not to be covered by the university. 

On top of all of this I could add that I'm autistic, from a low income family on welfare, and an inexperienced traveler, but should those factors even be important? Surely their staff and students health would be more important? Even if I didn't experience a foreign man trying to manipulate and take advantage that I was a young female tourist that didn't speak the language, why did the university give me such a hard time when I asked to go an extra day early for health reasons? Why do meetings with other researchers not count as work? I may not have been a 'victim' or abuse or assault, but I still feel like a victim as the university has taken advantage of me and put me in potential harms way.

Now that I have had time to reflect on everything, I feel quite angry with the university. 

Inconclusive results and more admin anxiety

I went to my physiotherapist today. They were forwarded the results from my CT scan. So, there is a narrowing of the bone surrounding one of my nerves, however, this nerve is not the one I have issues with. As the scan was only done on my neck this rules out the neck being the main cause for my increased neck/head pain and numbness in my pinky and ring finger. Overall this just means the overall cause is still assumed to be in my shoulder by my physio. The thing is, that most of my symptoms are in my head, neck, arm, and fingers, so those are the places that the other doctors generally look at. I generally don't notice the pain in my shoulder too much cause the other pains are so much worse.

___________________________________________________________________________________ 

On top of this my trip to Spain is STILL not approved. It's been sent back to me again, this time because a yes or now box was clicked wrong, and the travel agency the uni uses put a price in euros instead of AUD by accident. The fact both of these problems could have easily been corrected my the person who keeps sending this back to me, but I guess that doesn't matter... because I obviously need the excessive amounts of stress this one admin person keeps giving me. 

Even though some of the problems the admin person is sending this back to me are minor, I just cannot handle it anymore. Every time I see I have an email from them and that there is ANOTHER thing wrong, the anxiety is triggered. How do you keep going to work when there is a bureaucratic that triggers you with the most minor thing? 

Don't worry, this same person wanted me to lie to another department in the institute to save the uni money. I don't know what to make of this. Me being honest to this other department got me another email from this person and an in person talk about how they were contacted about what the university policy is. 

I don't want to be a part of this institute anymore, who cares that it has some of the top researchers in my field in Australia, this one admin person is causing me so much anxiety that I am feeling so stressed that I can barely regulate my emotions. I'm not going to "beat around the bush" When I can't regulate my emotions I hurt my self, it's as simple as that. I have the urge to self harm, even just to feel a moment of relief from what this person has been causing me this past 2 months. 

Don't read this as "OMG she's going to self harm". I have amazing restraint when it comes to a lot of things in my life, and my logical mind often outweighs any emotions that may be trying to take over. I also need you as a reader to remember that self-harm does NOT equal suicidal (see infographic at the end of this post). I have multiple strategies I use to help regulate my emotions, they are just super triggered after so much trouble over this same issue. 

My supervisor has never had one of their students have as much trouble as I have been having with admin before. Even they don't understand why they are being so pedantic. I am not going over budget, I received a grant that has bought more money to the uni that I have spent. I always end up spending less that my original estimated quote, and I have never spent / tried to get reimbursed an expense that is not work related. I pay the transaction fees myself for uni related expenses, and I'm even paying for my own accommodation for days that as far as my supervisor is concerned are work days. 

Bah, I can't spend anymore time on thinking about this, until the next email comes I am going to attempt to actually spend my PhD doing actual research for a change!

Exhaustion

I'm so sleepy lately. I've made it into the university campus this week for three days, which is in some ways amazing considering how sleepy I am.

Monday - I had to pull over on the way in because I was my eyes were getting very heavy on the road. 

Tuesday - I was driving to my gym from uni at the end of the day and had a micro sleep on the road, luckily my tire scraping along the gutter was enough to wake me up.

Wednesday (Today) - I tried to get public transport into uni because I'm so tired, and because I have a meeting in the city tonight. I drove down to my local train station, the commuter car park was full, I drove around all the surrounding streets for about 10 minutes, no parking there either. I ended up having to drive all the way into uni again otherwise I wouldn't get here in time to make it to a meeting I want to go to in person. 

The thing is I'm not sleeping any more or less than I have been for ages, I am just overall exhausted. The past few nights I've been getting 7-8 hours of sleep each night, and not even waking up during the early hours for a change. I'm physically breaking again., which leads to increased symptoms of depression and anxiety of course.

The past few days haven't been too bad. Saturday night I had a mini-date with my partner and that went really well. It made me feel really good. The next day I did a wildlife party, and it was great to be with the animals again. I wasn't sleepy on this day, even with all of the driving, it was a good day. 

Anyway, back to today. All the emotional turmoil that has been plaguing me since July last year is resurfacing again. Just when I thought I was getting through it (yet again) it is back. These emotions physically make my chest/heart feel heavy. I should probably get back to journaling more regularly. When I'm having good days I generally don't feel like journaling, I always seem to leave it for when I feel crappy. Maybe that's not the best method.

As for my PhD, I still don't really know what I'm doing, not having met with my supervisor in several weeks probably doesn't help, but parts of me really doesnt want to either. Still working through my image analysis and planning for a field trip next month.  I am really looking forward to having time off. If it ever gets approved...

Gym and bureaucracy

It's been 5 weeks! I finally got back to gym last night. The past 5 weeks I've either been away, sick, or cramping. Finally I was able to get back to Body Balance last night. I forgot what a buzz I can get after going to the gym. More often than not, it is definitely a mood booster for me. I even woke up with my abs hurting a little bit :) Which means I was exercising right :) Hehe. 

I'm finally back at uni today. Albeit, I didn't get in until like 12:30, at least I got here right? I've been working in the lab today, downloading lots of data and packing up my branches I had set up for measurements the past week. I got into the lab and it was 28 degrees Celsius again, I swear the people here must be trying to kill me. I set it back down to 22 deg C, but with in an hour or so it reverted to 28 deg C again. I think I've changed it so it will revert back to 22 deg C if it is changed temporarily. Why would someone set it to 28 deg C to begin with? No where in the world is that comfortable indoor working conditions. No wonder my branches dried up so fast! If it changes back again any time soon, I am going to have to complain to someone. I have no idea who, everything at my current uni is assumed knowledge and most of what I have found out I have had to learn either via making mistakes or asking people several times directly. 

This university is very laid back in some ways, which is kind of nice, but it definitely needs more structure for me. But then on the other hand to get any form of approval for expenses or field trips you have to submit the same forms at least two times to different offices/people for approval. Why must I complete the same paperwork twice? It is so inefficient. Whilst at my previous university it was harder to get permission because of risk assessments, and they even failed to enroll me properly once, it was much more organised and straight forward. I would know what else I needed to do to get approval. Where I am currently, I ask the finance team what approval I need and they don't tell me. Instead the next week I get another email asking me why I haven't got approval, and I have to ask them again what the second approval is that I need. 

Let's get back to a happier topic - gym! Hopefully, I can get back into the habit of regularly going again. I would love to be able to go 3-4 times a week, but let's aim for once a week for now. Some time in the past few weeks I even looked up doing some capoeira classes, however, there were no beginner adult classes anywhere near my home or my work place. Perhaps I should try and pick up Body Combat or Body Pump to get my heart rate up some more. Again, they will be additional classes to my Body Balance that I need to get back into doing first. At least with Body Balance I generally do get severe migraine symptoms afterwards. That's one of the reasons I quit Body Combat, which I really enjoyed. Perhaps now I am seeing a physio and remedial masseuse regularly it won't be as bad?

Speaking of migraine, thankfully my symptoms have not been that bad lately. I have had some mild headaches and neck pain, but, considering the amount of stress and driving I have been doing it has been quite the miracle! Sunday evening my brain was pretty foggy after work, I think everything from the previous 2 weeks of non-stop doing things and a family death had finally caught up to me, but again no severe migraine which was great :)

Monday night I even fell asleep on the 2-seater couch that is definately too short to lay straight on. I passed out around 8 pm and didn't get up again until past 8 am. I woke up a few times but I just rotated and went back to sleep, I was way too exhausted to get up and go to bed even. I did notice my lower back aching a bit, but once I got up it appeared to improve. Again, despite not even having a proper pillow, I had no migraine symptoms the next day! I did decide to work at home another day though.

Well, I better wrap things up for now and try and do some more work whilst my data is downloading still. This is why I am currently on two laptops, so I can actually do something. 

Ta Ta For Now.