Started working at the new job; I quickly learned from coworkers that apparently our positions are not considered employment (academia woohoo), so I don’t have access to lots of social benefits that are standard in this country

… to partially mitigate this, I made the dubious decision of writing an application for a highly competitive fellowship that is… due next week. Realistically should have started two months ago but I guess we work with whatever we have. I’m a bit stressed out lol