My Academic Journey

1) Carrots  Lunch and dinner. Most of my colleagues eat carrots as a part of their lunch every single day. And why not? Carrots are healthy and here they are very tasty. I had to buy one. This pictures is originally  meant to my beloved one.   2) Pullover / Sweater.  That seems to be in Fashion (for practical reasons?) 3) Open windows To ensure better air quality. The other local Finns told me that the automatic "air conditioning" is not enough and that the inside air quality isn't necessarily that good. A Danish friend told me a minimum time to have a window open at my home. So, windows open.  4) Bikes The best way to get around. Usually, Danes lift a hand up when they stop and lift it to the side of the aimed direction when turning. Biking is almost like driving a car expect that cars are usually very careful with minding the bikers. There are lots of bike roads.  From Tivoli Friheden. 5) Lines If you were there first, you wil...

Here are some photos that I have taken during the walking breaks, which have become my new habit. Aarhus (and Denmark in general) is a fantastic place to live and work. The nature is just couple of steps away. I present some of them here in two parts. Let's start with campus and the lake near to the department of political science and CFA (Dansk Center for Forskningsanalyse)  where I am located. Part one: campus This is where I work! This is where I walk. Part two: other beauties outside city center. There are lots of different berries.. berries. more berries. Wonder if you can eat these? Countryside is very close by. Way to Aarhus! Way to work. (photos are from last month, couple of days back we got the first snow)

In the third workshop, we had professors Vibeke Lehmann Nielsen and Carten Jensen to tell us about publishing. They also pointed out that as a young scholars, using time for non-academic writings and presentations is not strategic: they don't count towards tenure. This conflicted a lot with the discussions that I have been following in Finland. Like at the conference in Pori, Finnish professors were telling how scientists should be more openly in social media. Additionally, in our evaluation format there is a place for public visibility.. Maybe I should rethink about blogging? Although, I am not using my "work hours" for writing here - which is why the topics and texts are quite light. In any case, it is something to think about in addition to should I stay (in academia) or should I go (to industry) . a tired doctoral student. The biggest take away from this workshop was cover letter in which you should tell the editor "why this is a must -pub...

The doctoral students of political department had organized a two day seminar far away from campus (although nothing is actually really  far in Denmark). The ride took couple of hours and the place was astonishing. Steffen Armstrong Gjedde told us about using new media. Quite many had a researchgate account and also academia.edu was mentioned. To me, there were several new hints even though I already had had some lectures about it.  ORCID - to make sure your research is linked to you. it helps also with name changes. Mendeley - you can use it for reference organization tool? I better get to know this. CreativeComments - helps to deal with copyrights and to allow the use of your material.  But that's not all! We also received useful links. One of them is  http://www.phdontrack.net/  which has a section about literature review (a part that I find hart). It indeed looks like a good resource. Then,  Altmetricblog  was recommended f...

It seems that the Danes want to celebrate the summer when it is ending. It also looks like as important party as the pre-Christmas parties in Finland. For an introvert like me, it's been a tough week. We had a running team at the Aarhus Motion event on Thursday, Business School's Summer party on Friday and the Summer party of student housing in Vejby on Saturday. Thus, I am now happy to stay at home a prepare for the behavioral economics of education course. BSS Summer Party was totally different from the parties that my university or department arrange. First, the payment method: When bought the entrance, you also pay for food and drinks (partly illegal in Finland). The entrance costed approximately 20 € and included 30 coupons. With 6 coupons you could get a hamburger, with 2 a beer or class of wine and with 3 an ice cream. So, no one needed to buy more of them. Second, it mixed alumni, staff and students. Third, they had three very good bands! I am now a fan of ...

The advantages of the office start to feel normal and - the research is going great! I'm used to having possibility to get a fruit and thus be able to stay later at work. I'm used to the free good coffee. More importantly, the advises and comments that I have got from Carter, who is my host here, have encouraged me to think deeper.  There has also been a lot of social interaction, like a team running yesterday (Aarhus motion).  Today is the summer fest of the Business School and tomorrow is the summer party of the student "kollegium" where I live. I have also made a lot of excursions by my self.  This morning, we had Ismael Rafols from Valencia to speak about his current research ( Exploring (mis)alignments between science supply and societal demand ) of how scientific research supply correspondences to the societal demand of research. In short, research is driven by funding that is affected by intention groups. The solution is not always the optimal one. The...

So, I am in this cool little country, called Denmark. It has an own currency, unlike Finland. Now, 1 DKK =  0.1345 € meaning that 10 DKK is approximately 1.35 €. Well, this is a hard calculation to do when you're tired after work. Thus, the prices in stores don't tell me much. But let's this time check: Is Denmark really that expensive? I went to this local store calle Fotex: I needed stuff. And I mostly followed the funny discounts. Like: Buy 2 get the second one practically for free! Buy this product for -30% and these for -50%... Yep, it's a deal. Noteworthy: There are many discounts in the store, simply too many. But what does it mean in €uros? First of all, the total cost was 182.85 DKK. According to Google, I just spend 24.58 € (27.32 US Dollars). Additionally, the tights that I bought made almost 40 % of this. Wow, they were relatively expensive.. Balsam : 10 DKK = 1.34 € = $1.49  --> Cheap! Tights: 69 DKK = 9.28 € = $ 10.30 --> affo...

I managed to find the right building and the right research center: Dansk Center for Forskningsanalyse (CFA) . Everyone is very friendly, helpful and welcoming. The coffee machines are amazing: there is cappuccino! There is also plenty of different kinds of tea to choose from. This should promote everyone's productivity! My office is also very cool with two lovely roommates. The table is electronic and I got to borrow a brand new keyboard and muse. The keyboard felt so good that all I wanted to do was to write my first article. (I was also happy to discover that the draft wasn't in as bad shape as I remembered.)  No wonder that PhD takes here only three years!  Oh, and on my way back to home, I only took a wrong street four times (with googlemaps of course). Biking with google maps on your phone and that phone in your hand is hard. Additionally, the bike traffic is hectic. It will take a while to get used to it and to remember the way home by heart.  So, all ...

Finally, I am in Aarhus. For now, everything is good. But obviously, everything didn't go that smoothly. It was very very hard to say good bye to my loved one and, let me be honest, I wanted to cancel the whole thing when heading to the security check. But I didn't. The second and third flights left late from schedule. I was only worried for missing the third flight. I had booked my flight so that my mom would have the same flight from Copenhagen to Aarhus. She left from Helsinki, unlike me. However, there was plenty of time to have dinner at the Copenhagen airport (as the third flight was so late). Lovely place by the way.  I had one carry-one baggage, one luggage and a big backpack. The backpack didn't arrive. I hadn't had sufficiently time to fill the files at the airport as the kind airport bus driver came to check that all potential passenger would be on the bus. He gave me contact information to the airport and told that I could arrange my luggage later -...

A lot has happened. It turned out that I wasn't eligible for the housing I wrote about in Part 1 . I have crossed fingers and hoped for the best while browsing the housing offers of the private sector. But today, just an hour or so after leaving the office, I received an email from AU Housing:  "Dear Carita Eklund     We are happy to inform you that we have reserved housing for you. This email contains important information about your housing offer, deadlines, cancellation policy --- " I am so relieved! The apartment was offered only to me and I had 48 hours to decide. After a quick check of location (12 min to uni by bike), the decision was made. I payed the rent of the first month with credit card (there aren't any other options), which costs 78,51 DKK (10,55€). The deposit (over 1300€) needs to be payed with the second rent. The rent is luckily reasonable, less than 500€ per month.  The apartment should be furnished and 36 square meters....

Phew, I have received the second offer for a furnished room. The first one was rented before I contacted the owner and the current offer is from StudenthousinAarhus. The dorm is located farer from the uni than I was hoping but in Aarhus standards that distance is fine. By bus, it takes 40 minutes to the uni and by bike a little bit more than 20min, according to google maps. Thus, it's clear why biking is so popular. Further, my Danish contact wrote to me that there is a nice nature area near. In this aspect, I feel like typical Finn: nature is important. From time to time I need to get out of urban area.  So far, I have noticed one major difference to Finland: room is offered to many people at once. In this current offer, my number is 2. So, if number 1 accepts, I won't be notified and I don't get the room. If number 1 rejects, I get it (probably?)  - and then they email to me.  Yet, I'm still considering whether to accept or reject the offer as the contract wo...

Yesterday, the funding decisions of South Ostrobothnia Regional fund became official. I am very thankful for the funding, first one for me, which will enable my research exchange at the Aarhus university during the next fall. I was excited but also nervous when waiting to be called to collect the certificate. But when I heard "Kauppatieteiden maisteri Eklund Carita" I just stood up and walked to the stage - like automated. Unlike I had feared, I didn't stumble and soon the next person was also coming. Afterwards, I picked my favorite painting in the ballroom of the city hall of Vaasa and we immortalised that smile.  Photo credits: Jan Gustafsson Also the local newspaper Pohjalainen noticed this event held in the city hall of Vaasa. My colleague Siru Lönnblad and I made it to the front page - like many others. Another friend asked about the just received funding: "It does feel pretty nice doesn't it?" It feld fabulous to be trusted like this.  ...

Jette Nordam, ambassador of Denmark The theme of this weeks has been the Nordic countries. There were many open lectures during tree days in the university of Vaasa. On Monday, the ambassador of Denmark hold a speech about similarities and dissimilarities of Finland and Denmark. As the Danish is in written form sometimes possible to confuse with Swedish, I thought that the speech would be in Swedish or English. Well, it was in Danish, I couldn't follow much. I understood that she expected all participants to study the Nordic languages as a major subject so I think that her expectations were exceeded as someone outside showed up. Denmark is really interesting in all aspects: business models, branding (many expensive brands), education (famous universities), labor markets (really good unemployment benefits that run quickly off) and culture (the Danish food and beer are amazing). Even the language is cool: it is almost like Swedish and almost like German but non-understan...