From the grad student point of view, a free lunch with a visiting seminar speaker should be a fantastic opportunity. After all, it is basically free lunch, often catered by a local pizza or sub joint. You just have to show up, right?
Also, it’s free.
Unfortunately, the old adage “there is no such thing as a free lunch” applies. If this was a truly free lunch, you could show up, stuff as much as you can in your bag/pockets/hands/face, and retreat to a good hiding place to be alone with your delicious, free food.
But remember, you work at ground zero of departmental research, so you have a role in representing the department. It’s an understatement that graduate school requires a ton of focus and attention, and a casualty of this is that normal, everyday things like proper dress, hygiene, keeping up with popular culture, and of course, etiquette kind of go out the window. And yes, these things can be forgotten.
So, I present for you all some general do’s and don’ts for properly conducting yourself while you eat lunch with the visiting seminar speaker.
DO
Be on time. You can grab a spot at the table set out that is perplexingly too small to accommodate all the grad students. It’s almost like they actually want to exclude the folks that fail to show up on time. Another benefit to being early is that you can also raid the last of the departmental coffee to fill your giant mug. It may not be good, but it’s free, right? Remember, the piggy bank sitting next to the machine is just for donations, right? Whatever. They don’t pay you enough anyways. You’ll take it all.
DON’T
Be late. If you’re late, there will be no spots left, and you’ll have to sit in the one of the stray chairs that did not fit around the too-small table. Here you’ll be forgotten, left to awkwardly chew your food and think about what you might do better in the future to manage your time. You might get called on to discuss your work, and you can apologize at this time for your lateness and say you were working on something SUPER important that took longer than you thought it would, but no one will be able to hear you. You are now an outsider. What was your name again? Do you even belong here? Who let you into grad school anyways? You may as well take your food and go, you cretin. I guess leaving is for the better, as you get the feeling that everyone makes fun of you behind your back. But look at the upside. If they are talking about you, that means they know your name.
DO
When the ritual going around the table to discuss your research projects commences, make sure you are not chewing/drinking/swallowing.
DON’T
Take a massive bite of food right as the person next to you finishes their turn. All eyes will be on you as you desperately and insufficiently masticate and swallow. The awkward silence, where the only sound is your jaw working, will feel like hours, and putting one finger in the air as if to say “just a sec” won’t make anything better. Once you do swallow without needing the Heimlich maneuver (and probably for the best, as you are surrounded by people that would likely skip the Heimlich and go straight to the tracheostomy) and begin to talk, you can most certainly bet that your teeth will be coated in food. You are gross.
DO
When it is your turn to talk, give a smile to show off your clean, food debris-free teeth and introduce yourself. Give a short, yet concise description of your work, but avoid speaking too quickly. This is actually good practice for the “what do you study?” question that you will get now and forever. It is likely that the visiting speaker may ask some follow-up questions, and if you are worth your salt (and of course you are, because you are the shit) you will be prepared to answer.
DON’T
Start by mentioning where you are from, your experience growing up as a neglected child in a wealthy yet dysfunctional family, how you knew you were meant to rise above your peers the moment you were inspired to enter this line of research, and your pursuit of ending world hunger/curing AIDS/figuring out nuclear fission/curing cancer/publishing in Science, Nature, and Cell every year. The more you keep talking, the more likely it is that you will say something completely awkward. And the more awkward things you say, the more your mental state degrades. Eventually, you will lose all pretense and, like a possessed individual, start rambling about how your third dissertation project failed and your advisor has recently told you that there is no more funding left so write SOMETHING, call it a thesis, and GET OUT. It’s too bad when this happens, but your advisor is probably relieved because you are completely insufferable and he/she is looking forward to not having to deal with you after seven long years.
DO
Listen intently as the visiting speaker discusses their program. Be sure to ask appropriate follow-up questions, especially if their work parallels your own. This is an excellent opportunity to talk to someone outside your own department, and to practice having mature adult conversations about science that are not with your advisor, who is a little too eager to play devil’s advocate, and while you know it’s a good exercise, it does get a little tiresome.
DON’T
Put your face an inch away from your plate and start rooting around like a pig, making it apparent that you are only here for the food and have no intention of making any conversation. The professor shouldn’t have to raise their voice to accommodate your sloppy open mouthed chewing sounds. The other students, although grossed out by your behavior, may secretly admire your DGAF attitude, but other students won’t be making or breaking your career.
DO
Ask the visiting speaker for advice on being a young scientist, and what you can do now to ensure that you are on the path to success. After all, the visiting speaker was once (and still might be!) a young scientist, and if the department saw worth in inviting her/him to give a talk, it means they are successful, right? Alternatively, you can ask for pointers on appropriate life/work balance. In doing this, you have an excuse to work into conversation the fact that you surf/do CrossFit/are a marathoner/play in a band and how you feel like it makes you a better scientist. After all, being a good graduate student is merely a job, and you are interested in Living with a capital L. You are different than all the rest of the lesser people around you, as your motto is to “work smarter, not harder” and therefore all your research will be brilliantly flawless. In the meanwhile, the poor muppets around you will struggle to churn out something mediocre that reeks of insecurity and bile.
DON’T
Zone out. You might start looking around and thinking about your status among all of these folks. These are the people you hang out with, both during and after work. That means they are your friends, right? Or, are they the only people you know since you don’t ever really get out at all? Come to think about it, there isn’t one person that you really like here. Maybe you should get out more often. You do need a hobby; maybe you can meet some people there? Preferably, your new hobby will involve physical activity, because you feel a little squishy. Perhaps you’ve been overindulging in too many free lunches. Anyways, this is not good because you can’t really afford any new clothes on a grad student stipend. Yup. You’re going to buy a membership for university gym today, and you are going to go work out every morning before you come into the lab. This will totally happen.
DO
Get back to work as soon as lunch adjourns. After all, you need to make sure your experiment du jour is at a stopping point so you can attend the seminar. This is a no brainer. If you attended the seminar lunch and got some delicious food out of it, for sure you would want to show up for the seminar itself, right?
DON’T
Be a postdoc, and still attend grad student lunches. Grad student lunches are for grad students, and you don’t belong there. The grad students seem to like you just fine, but they probably think you are a little weird. I mean, who spends five and a half years getting a PhD, then makes the conscious decision to keep working in the same department? This is where you plaster on a Cheshire Cat smile that says, WE ARE ALL MAD HERE. Anyways, you make a livable income and should be able to afford a decent lunch. If you really must experience “free” food, then know that there are almost always leftovers. But be sure you stop by right when the hour is over; you’ll want to beat the grad student who thought it would be a good life choice to support three kids and a spouse on a grad student stipend.