Hello! This is Anteneh Desalegn, an Early Stage Researcher with the PROTECTED project. The PROTECTED project is one of the Innovative Training Networks (ITN) under Marie Skłodowska-Curie actions (MSCA) that received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation program. The network is comprised of 12 training sites at academia, research centers, and small and medium-size enterprises. I am currently employed as an ESR at Norwegian Institute of Public Health (NIPH) in Oslo, Norway. I arrived in Oslo during the summer in 2017. I came from Ethiopia, and it took me about 2 months to get a residence permit in Norway.
The summer in Norway has incredible scenery and natural beauty. The summer also has exceptionally long days and warm weather to enjoy—especially when it is sunny, almost everyone is Oslo will be outside, just sunbathing and barbecuing in the parks. I am glad that I moved in during the summer.
However, finding an accommodation in Oslo was very challenging. You need to have a reference and be ready to pay three months’ rent as a deposit. In my case, I had to send about 60 applications on Finn (a Norwegian classified advertisements website) before I got my current accommodation, but I am now accompanied by my wife and 3 year old daughter in Oslo.
The weather has, of course, changed very much since I arrived in Oslo and has been replaced with long, dark and cold days. I have survived my first winter in Oslo so far even though this not my first time facing the Scandinavian winter. I have yet to learn how to ski, but I have enjoyed sledding very much thanks to my supervisor who made my first experience with sledding possible. In general, I am enjoying the winter very well and it is beautiful with so much snow, especially this winter. I am sure most of the ESRs in the PROTECTED project will experience the next winter during the “summer” school in Oslo, and will perhaps agree with me.
It has now been about 8 months since I joined the NIPH. My first task was to get admitted to the PhD program at University of Oslo (UiO). I needed to submit mainly a project description along with tentative project plan, copies of diploma and transcript, and employment contract, but I have now been admitted to a PhD program in Epidemiology. The PhD program at UiO is 3 years full-time study, and has education component of 30 credits. I will start taking some courses this semester and am looking forward to my first secondment in the Netherlands this semester.
My role as an ESR in the PROTECTED project is to identify mixtures of contaminants associated with adverse child health outcomes using the Norwegian Human Milk Study (HUMIS) cohort. I will have to do some of the projects at my host institution, and others in collaboration with other ESRs in the network. I am currently working on my fist objective to see the association between endocrine disrupting chemicals in the prenatal and postnatal period with reproductive toxicity in boys (Cryptorchidism), and also neurodevelopmental toxicities using the HUMIS cohort.
Stay tuned for my next blog post where I will discuss about the outcome of my work so far and other events!
Anteneh
0 Comments