2 Decades of Dreams...

“When I grow up I want to be a scientist,” I spoke into the microphone. I was six and I had just finished my first year of school. I was graduating from Casa (kindergarten in my elementary school) in front of hundreds of people in the Philippine Heart Center auditorium. They lined us all up on stage and we each had to tell the audience what we wanted to become when we grew up. At this point in my life I wanted to be a scientist. I look back at that part of my life and I almost die laughing because anyone who knows me will say that I’m the last person who’ll ever make it in Sciences. Then I started remembering everything that I wanted to become...

I’ve pretty much wanted to become everything ... paleontologist ... chemist ... astronaut ... astronomer ... zoologist ... veterinarian ... doctor ... actor ... lawyer ... teacher ... writer ... pirate ... wizard ... hunter-gatherer ... warrior ... Greek god ... singing Austrian nun (haha) ... Peter Pan ... Superman ... Simba ...

By grade 9, I was pretty much sure the first half of this list wouldn’t work because I found Sciences boring (below the visible level). And now that I think about it I wanted to be a dinosaur much more than someone who studies dinosaurs. The lawyer thing was a phase...so was the doctor thing. They were mostly influenced by TV shows and movies. A lot of the other ones were weird childhood ones. I’m pretty sure I can’t be a superhero, because I would never be able to keep a secret identity secret...and if my mom found out, she’d probably put it on her blog. Haha. Acting and writing are good hobbies, but I’m a bit too ambitious to make it the sole focus of my life, so I just do those on my own time.

By grade 10, I wanted to become an English Professor. English was my best subject. Back then, I was going through my book-worm phase...I read everything and I started writing secretly...that changed in a few years. Right now, I read Harry Potter more than anything else, and I don’t read anything else as much anymore, although I still write...evidently. I graduated from highschool intending to become an English Major.

Then I got to UBC...it turned out I liked everything except English, which is now incredibly boring for me. By the first half of first-year I wanted to major in Religious Studies because the courses were so much fun...keeping in mind that I still wanted to be a professor, so any discipline I choose was to lead to at least 10 years of study.

So the question remains...what the hell do I wanna do now?

Well, after considering my strengths and weaknesses, interests and dislikes, hobbies and favourite classes, I have decided that I really wanna be an Archaeologist.

So what’s Archaeology about? I’ll tell you what it’s NOT about: Dinosaurs. Archaeology basically studies material human past. It doesn’t study ancient writings, aliens, or try to find Atlantis. A central method used in Archaeology is excavation, ie. digging. That sounds boring, but Archaeology covers everywhere that humans have ever been. So it can mean going deep into a forest, trekking a desert, scuba diving to a sunken village, or climbing to the peak of a mountain. Archaeology covers a lot of different fields: Classics (Greek and Roman stuff), Biblical Studies (Ancient Jewish-Christian stuff), Zooarchaeology (stuff about animals we used to eat and animals who used to eat us), Paleoethnobotany (stuff about plants we used to eat or feed to animals we used to eat), Acoustics (sound and music stuff), and Genetics (stuff about the birds and the bees). Archaeology is not in Sciences so I’m safe...it does use some scientific methods but it’s still very interpretive.

I plan to be a professor in Archaeology. So, apart from studying about “who are we?” and “where do we come from?” and “why is that guy picking his nose while I’m trying to blog?”, I also get to teach university students and be called Doctor. And sidenote: I don’t want to be called Dr. Canlas cause that just sounds ewww, so I decided I wanna be called Dr G. Haha.

So how am I gonna do this? What’s gonna happen? Well, I’m gonna major in Classical and Near Eastern Archaeology at UBC...probably 5 years, although 4 years would also be fun. In order to get my Master’s degree, I have to be able to speak French, Italian and/or German and relevant ancient languages. I need field experience...so I’m probably gonna be volunteering on an archaeological dig this summer in the Interior of BC with one of my archaeology profs, and then I have to find a way to work on excavations in the Mediterranean before getting my Master’s. I also have to get pretty high marks, and kiss lots of butt. I also get to learn a whack-load of things like forensics, architecture and art history. After my Master’s I need to get my PhD, which I don’t wanna do at UBC. I’m looking at several schools in Europe, the top of my list being in Vienna, London, Paris and Athens (my whole language thing is really coming in handy now).



When I become a prof, I’m gonna be working at a university during the Winter Sessions and doing fieldwork during the Summer Sessions. I haven’t given a lot of thought to where I wanna work...but I’ve really fallen in love with Vancouver the past few years and I’ve been thinking of working for UBC.

So I think this path is perfect for me. I get to put all my interests and talents to good use. I’m not gonna be confined to sedentary work; I’ll be travelling and exploring, which will be fun because I have a talent for turning even the most normal bike rides into an adventure. I get to learn even more languages and put them to use. I get to endlessly feed my curiosity. I get to influence thousands of students...I can even influence what the world knows and thinks. I get to jump on controversies. I get to help answer why we are the way we are...



I really don't know what's gonna happen...but whatever it is, I'm excited.