A Story of a Student: Having Internship in Geophysical Station Yogyakarta

I went to a university in my hometown, Malang, and so I didn't get many chances to live away from home. I decided to apply for an internship program in Yogyakarta. I had planned to take my internship program in earthquake monitoring and I wanted to do it in Geophysical Station of BMKG (Badan Meteorologi Klimatologi dan Geofisika). Although there are two geophysical stations in East Java region, I insisted that I would rather go to a geophysical station of Yogyakarta Region since it is the upper class of the two stations in East Java.

When I started making my proposal, I thought everything was gonna be easy and going the way it had to be. Before I sent my proposal, I contacted the one that I thought of having responsibility for the internship admission. Unlike what I thought before, the thing turned out to be a little challenging. I said it was challenging rather than difficult because I believe that there is no such thing as difficult, we just need to try harder to get through it. So I like to call it challenge when some things don't go easily. That person I contacted said that there was still no space to accept new internship student. He also brought up the last two students who hadn't finished their reports and he sort of warned me if they couldn't make it in time they would be considered to never have an internship there. Maybe this sounds a little bit tough, but clearly, he did the right thing. At first, I got disappointed a little but I guessed it was okay until I heard some people blasting about my internship getting rejected because there was a former internship student who hadn't finished his report. For I had been told by the one I contacted, that turned to be the Head of Observatory Section in Geophysical Station (I really didn't know who I'd been dealing with since my friend didn't tell me who she gave me the number of) that I still got the chance to have internship there, I had no trouble hearing people blazing about that rejection thing. I only knew that I couldn't get there as soon as I wanted.

Anyway, after that drama, I finally got to start my 1-month-long internship program on January 18th, 2016. I hoped to start it in August 2015 if there's nothing got in my way since I had started making my proposal since September 2014. But it's really okay and I was so thankful that I got there eventually. Really it's just the matter of time. I didn't think of this as a bad thing since I had nothing to lose, just a little more time to go.

During my internship, I lived in a house next to the office. The house belongs to an old lady with her daughter. They were very nice and made me feel home even though I had to live far away from my parents cause I never did before. That house I lived was so close to the office that I could go by the walk and have no worry that I should come to the office in the evening. This house was surrounded by the threes that were actually woods.

My room was painted green with a double bed and a window. through this window, I could see the side part of the house where they hang the laundry. I could also see the chicken's cage. They were very loud and I didn't mind this thing cause I like something I never experienced before.

The first day I came to the office, I was introduced to my adviser. She looked at my proposal and asked me to look for another topic that could be done more easily. Since it was only the first day, she introduced me to some of the monitoring systems and told me about how to determine earthquake parameters. I didn't know what was wrong with me cause I couldn't just catch it when she asked me to operate an software to pick signals that responsible for determining the distance of earthquake source. Maybe it was because I'd only seen that once and I was nervous being in there. But fortunately, things were going okay and I could catch a little of how to operate that software.

Day to day I spent on looking for the right topic for my research. I was suggested to take micro tremor since two of my friends from the same program study in university had their minor thesis about microtremor in Kulon Progo Regency. I had no problem with that cause I only hoped to finish this internship in time. For this research of microtremor in Kulon Progo, we needed to collect the field data by recording the signal from some spots in Kulon Progo. Before we could start going to these spots, the acquisition design had to be made and the devices should be tested first. These took a bit longer than I thought. Two to three weeks have been spent and all I could do was doing my report. I tried to do my best on this so that I could finish the report by the time I ended my internship. 

It took so long until the last week of my expected-1-month-long internship program that we finally could start collecting the field data. It was long enough that I was able to ask my parents to come around and took me for a trip in Yogyakarta. We stayed a night in a hotel near UNY (Universitas Negeri Yogyakarta). We went to UNY campus and downtown of Yogyakarta on February 8th. The next day we went to Ratu Boko Temple. 

The field data collecting was really exciting since I love to get involved in field activity. We collected field data from at least 9 spots of some parts of Kulon Progo Regency. There were actually several days for collecting data but I only got to join the second day and the next day I had to have my presentation to complete my internship program. This time was kind of hectic for me since I went to collect the field data on Tuesday and expected to have a presentation on Thursday. I had to finish my data processing, analysis, and interpretation overnight so that could report it to my adviser. I had to convince my adviser that I was ready to present my work on Thursday even though she thought it was better to have it another day. I begged her to let me do the presentation on Thursday and she asked me to rehearse it on Wednesday afternoon. I kind of hesitated of what I decided cause I really didn't want to waste another day. Then another staff of the office who was my friend's adviser said that it was okay to do the presentation on Thursday.

Things went okay on my presentation day. I could finally complete my internship program and got my grade. I hadn't finished my report cause I could do it home and had a consultation with my campus adviser.

That evening on Thursday, I went home by train. I could not believe I could get through this after all those things that didn't always go easily. I was so grateful for all the things I had been through. It might not be perfect but it was okay.

I arrived home in the dawn. In the morning, I went to campus. There came my 8th semester.