From Oulu to Nagoya: The Whirlwind Story of My First Conference Presentation

They say your first scientific conference is something you never forget. Mine? It came with a last-minute paper submission, a PhD interview, a vacation across Europe, a sick supervisor, a 13-hour flight, and a glass of water I downed mid-sentence. Here’s how it all unfolded.

A Vacation, a Deadline, and a Conference in Japan

I had just submitted my master’s thesis and was floating on that wonderful post-defense cloud. Finally, freedom, sunshine, and a long-awaited two-week trip through Central Europe. My flight was only a week away when an email from my supervisor arrived in my inbox.

There was a conference in Japan, she wrote, that would be a perfect fit to turn my thesis into a scientific paper. The catch? The submission deadline was in ten days.

I won’t pretend I wasn’t torn. On the one hand, the chance to publish my very first paper at an international conference, no less, was an opportunity I couldn't dismiss. On the other hand, my flights and hotels were booked and paid for, and emotionally nonnegotiable. I had been looking forward to this trip for months.

In the end, I refused to choose between the paper and the trip. We started working immediately, submitted the paper just before departure, and I made it to my flight. The vacation was wonderful. The deadline was met. So far, so good.

A PhD Position Enters the Picture

Back home, I began the next chapter: hunting for a PhD position. An advertisement on LinkedIn caught my eye; it looked like a perfect match, so I applied and didn’t think much more of it.

A few weeks later, just as I was about to leave for a work-related conference in Germany, the professor leading the PhD project emailed me. I had been shortlisted. Would I like to send a preliminary research plan? I had one week.

Another deadline, another flight on the horizon. By then, I was starting to notice a pattern. I worked through every spare moment and emailed off the research plan minutes before boarding.

The Interview, and an Email I’ll Never Forget

A few weeks after I returned from Germany, the professor wrote again: an interview was scheduled. I accepted instantly.

On the morning of the interview, I was nervous in that very specific way you can only be when something genuinely matters. I was reviewing my notes, rehearsing answers, and trying to look calm when a notification popped up on my phone.

The conference in Japan had accepted my paper.

My very first scientific publication. On the morning of my PhD interview. The timing was almost cinematic.

When the interview began, I couldn’t hold it in. Three accomplished scientists were sitting across from me, researchers with hundreds of publications between them, and the first words out of my mouth were essentially: “My paper just got accepted!”

The interview went on, and only afterward did the embarrassment hit me. Why on earth had I blurted that out to people for whom a single accepted paper was, statistically, a Tuesday? But then I gave myself a break. It was my first. Of course I was excited.

Two Big Wins, Tangled Together

A few weeks later came another email: I had been offered the PhD position. I could start in November.

November was also when I was flying to Japan to present my paper.

It was a strange and wonderful feeling, two of the biggest milestones of my life so far, braided together in the same month.

The Day Everything Changed (Again)

The day of the Japan trip arrived. I was at Vantaa Airport, scanning the terminal for my supervisor, when my phone buzzed.

She was sick. She wasn’t going to make the flight. She wasn’t going to make it to the conference.

She was the one supposed to present the paper.

I stared at the screen, then at the departure board, then at the screen again. There was no time to find a replacement, no time to call anyone. The plane was boarding. I got on.

Thirteen Hours, One Set of Borrowed Slides

My supervisor had sent me the slides she had prepared. Presenting someone else’s slides is never easy; every speaker structures a talk around their own way of thinking, but rebuilding them from scratch wasn’t an option. The presentation was less than 48 hours away, and I still had to survive jet lag on the other side.

So, somewhere over the North Pole, I opened my laptop and began practicing. Thirteen hours in the air became thirteen hours of rehearsal, note-taking, and quiet panic.

The Presentation

The morning of the talk, I was running on adrenaline and a nine-hour time difference. I was about to present, in front of a room full of seasoned scientists, a paper with slides I hadn’t prepared, in a country I’d landed in barely a day earlier.

When my turn came, I could hear my own heartbeat in my ears. My jaw felt like it belonged to someone else. I drank what must have been half a liter of water before I trusted my mouth to form sentences.

And then, somehow, I presented.

It wasn’t the smoothest talk in the world. It wasn’t a disaster either. Given the circumstances, I’ll happily call it a win.

Looking Back

That was my very first conference presentation. It taught me that opportunities rarely arrive at convenient moments, that the best plans usually need to be rewritten mid-flight (sometimes literally), and that you are almost always more capable than the panicking version of yourself believes.

If I could go back and tell that nervous, jet-lagged version of me one thing as she stood at the podium, her jaw trembling and a glass of water in hand?

You've got this. And one day, this will make a really good story.