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Year View| Summary| Highlights| Month View| Monday 12 December 2005 (Day View) – I graduate.

Thu 8 Dec | Fri 9 Dec | Sat 10 Dec | Sun 11 Dec |   Mon 12 Dec   Tue 13 Dec | Wed 14 Dec | Thu 15 Dec | Fri 16 Dec |

12.12.2005 – Monday 12 December – Graduation

Morning

• I forgot a belt, so we left Amanda’s earlier than planned, arriving at Bronwen’s earlier than planned, and borrowed one of her father’s belts. From there, we drove out to uni, where I picked up my gown, hood and trencher and watched an instructional video detailing just how to wear them, including showing a woman placing the tassel on her trencher to the left side, from several different angles, just in case someone couldn’t fathom this complex procedure. Being early, we wandered around the union complex area for a while, before heading down to the UQ Centre. I found the “marshalling area”, sat in my prescribed numbered place in a row of many other penguin-looking graduands, and shuffled into exhibition hall. Once seated, we watched several ads for UQ—learning that it is one of the top three universities in Australia, and definitely where you should go if you want to be successful, good looking, or operate complex looking equipment in a biotechnology laboratory—before the university elite arrived, signalling the start of my graduation.

11am

• Various dignitaries said a few dignified words, and rows of graduands shuffled up onto stage, had their name announced, and were presented to the chancellor, who in turn presented them with an empty tube. They then shuffled around the back of the audience, collecting their official award certificate and then seating themselves again. Halfway through, Mark gave his valedictory speech, and shortly after I shuffled onto stage myself, had the degree of Bachelor of Information Technology with a major in Networks and Systems given under the common seal of the University of Queensland conferred upon me, received my empty tube, walked behind the audience, was given someone else’s degree, swapped this for my own, and returned to my seat, now a wise, learned graduate. Some eminent someone, whose name escapes me, spoke about giant shoulders for a while, and we all shuffled out, getting chaotically lost for a while, and eventually meeting up with our parent’s, loved ones, and various friends. I wandered around for a while chatting to other graduates, and having photos taken, before wandering around uni to take a few more photos.

Afternoon

• Dad, Mum, Bronwen and I walked down to GPS, took a few photos from upper level balconies, in a lab, and from the duck pond; walked back to the great court and took a few photos from there and the main university door outside Forgan Smith, and nearly died from heat exhaustion. I returned my crazy penguin gear (designed to ensure the occupant overheats in the shortest possible time, while being unable to move fast enough to get to an air-conditioned area), picked up my refund, and we all drove to South Bank, where we didn’t find anywhere to celebrate, and ended up at a nice café in Paddington instead, which made very filling nachos, as well as nasty pumpkin things that Mum and Bronwen seemed to like. I was impressed to find that my official academic transcript is printed on a polymer base, complete with see-through window, very similar to Australian banknotes.

Night

• Back at Amanda’s, Dad, Mum, Amanda and I argued about everything from the French Revolution and the relative scientificity of psychological paradigms through to present-day terrorism and the differences between American and Australian education, and I realised that I miss intelligent conversation—most of the conversations I have with people are really quite shallow, probably largely because of their age.

Comment by DM – Wednesday 14 December 2005, 2:03 AM

  Congrats Ned.
  
  Or should I say Ned (BInfTech)?

Comment by Ned – Wednesday 14 December 2005, 9:30 PM

  Thanks ;-)

Comment by Lucas – Wednesday 14 December 2005, 10:32 PM

  Congrats Ned! Do you feel a little reminiscent yet?

Comment by Ned – Thursday 15 December 2005, 12:51 PM

  Thanks. I thought I would miss uni, or feel reminiscent, or something along those lines, but so far I haven’t felt any different—it just feels like I’m on holidays, the same as any other time. My life has been fairly busy though, the past couple of days are the first few I’ve actually had nothing much to do, and I suspect that I wouldn’t like that for too long—but I’ve got a lot of things coming up, so I should be busy again very soon.