Signup date: 07 Mar 2016 at 9:20pm
Last login: 22 Apr 2016 at 1:39pm
Post count: 6
The fears of being unemployed and having unstable income makes me very struggled about making this decision. I know I'm not happy here and I will be turning 30 very soon. I thought Ive made a big step of my life and now I just wish I never had this scholarship so I dont need to choose.......
Thank you so much for all the messages. I think the only thing I can do right now is to look for other funded PhD, but I know the chances are very low since its highly competitive and I don't have a very strong academic background. I have told myself that I would give it one year and I will really try to adapt myself into the life here. But I keep hearing all the other foreigners saying after a few years of trying they still got very few friends and feeling regret about wasting their time here in this country. I know everyone's experience is different and I probably shouldn't let them affect my decisions. But I can't help but thinking what if the same thing will happen to me......
I'm on my first year of my PhD in a northern european country. It's a fully funded 4-year PhD program, great funding, nice program, the working environment is very supportive and my supervisor has been very nice to me. The only problem I have is that I cannot stand where I live right now. I'm feeling very depressed and I just want to get out of this country. Its a very small city and basically nothing is going on here. Local people are very reserved and basically have no interests in getting to know you, and the expat community is very small. Every foreigner I met here just looking miserable and wanting to leave. I think I'm a very outgoing person, I have been living in other countries before and been making friends everywhere. But I find making friends here is extremely difficult and I'm about to give up. I feel like my social life is over.
Everybody has been telling me how lucky I am and that I should just suck it up and continue coz life ain't easy elsewhere either. I have been very depressed lately and I can barely get any sleep. I have had a few other offers before in other big cosmopolitan cities in Europe, but no fundings (humanity project). I have been thinking to start looking for other scholarship opportunities. Or if I can't find other fundings, should I quit this fully funded program to another self-funded one so I could live in a place that I like. People has also been telling me that being a self-funded phd student could also be very difficult. I'm trying to evaluate the situation but I really don't know what to do now.
I love doing my research. But at this stage of my life, I'm also really looking forward to settling down, having a family, some good friends around and a nice social life. I'm very much a city person and I feel like I just come to this place where I know I would want to leave.
Another reason I haven't quitted yet is because my parents were very proud of me in getting this scholarship. That just made me felt really guilty for not taking it.
Do you have any suggestions?
Thank you so much.
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