HKUST and Research Obstacle

I love research, especially the physics which explain all these phenomena as simple and from a scale as tiny as it would be. Sometimes I love the maths, sometimes I don't, although usually I tend to love it more. 

Up until now, there are of course ups and downs that I went through during my career as a research student. I even fell into a long period of depression for as long as a year. However tough it was for me, I pulled myself together in the very end with the help from the love of my family, and particularly the ever-tolerating attitude of my supervisor. One of these days when I am working real hard, I come to think that one of these reasons that made me really upset all these years would be the ever-dragging university technicians. 

I admit it. A lot of them are top-notched, but some of them are worse than drunkards when it comes to working out the possibility of your new experimental design and refining it. I know the mentality that they're getting paid no matter you get the job done or not, since the research students are in such a position which we own no superiority nor the employer-employee relationship with them. But these situations, when occur more than three times a week, will really get frustrating when one or two of these really hard-to-go-with people decided to screw you up over, maybe, how you look on that particular day when you relay your idea to them.

I learned to go around them. To please them, with some of the hometown cookies. But seriously, they are the reasons which I loathe and put myself down at times when I am thinking of some new designs. Sometimes when you are doubting whether these new designs would work or not, because of these hurdles, you would tend to tell yourself, nay, maybe, some other day? 

And that day never comes.

Well, unless some of those days when you let in some lights during a meeting with your supervisor and he/she decided that it is such a good idea to try, then will it get revive and you toughen yourself up to fight with these people again.

I seriously think this is such a waste of time. In the end, university is the spring of creativity, of places where all things and ideas are tried out, whether they work or not.

In the end I decided enough is enough with the technicians. The only way I can minimize my frustration is to build my own lab, with my own people, and so far I got pretty satisfied about it, with everybody working as hard and crazily as I am.

I secretly promise to myself that when some day I land myself at a place in this university, like the Dean, then this would be the very first problem I would attend to. I would make sure the contract of the technicians who are reported by the students be put under renewable contract, half a year once. Maybe then, they would get serious with the all the vibes going about, trying out new things and getting new findings.

I am not so sure if other schools have this problem too. I refrain from making generalization, but there is in fact some things you can do:

1) Get your supervisor to help. Persuade the technician to get something done faster. Some supervisors are really helpful, they might even scold the technicians as I had heard, although I don't really like that to happen, since after the incident the worst victim would be the student. Soft persuasion is preferred, of all the others.

2) If you have a new idea, talk to people around you. If the feedback is good, or you have a great feeling that this is going to be the next big thing for you, just bang head-to-head with the technicians, and use (1) to solve things afterwards if they decide to 'snail', a.k.a. indefinitely prolong the working progress.

3) Sweet-talk them. Or buy them things, from time to time. Write them thank you cards. Surprise them! Play badminton with them. Go to the illegal afternoon tea sessions with them often enough to make them feel guilty! It works!

Well at the end of the day, if none of the above works for you, perhaps, you need a bit of luck!