Hey, Cis!

Isaac Cook:
Hey, Cis!

From coast to coast, we're bridging the gap between

the cisgender and transgender community, creating

meaningful dialog and space to learn and grow.

Cyn Sweeney:
Join us as we connect with our community, Break down

tough conversations and get comfortable being better

humans.

Isaac Cook:
Welcome to Hey, Cis!.

My name is Isaac Cook.

I use they/he pronouns and I am a trans, non-binary

social scientist from Atlantic Canada.

Cyn Sweeney:
And I'm Cyn Sweeney, She/Her pronouns and I'm a

journalist, educator and a parent of a trans child.

And together we are breaking down the binary and

building better humans one conversation at a time.

So the Rhodes Scholarship was established through

the will of Cecil John Rhodes in 1902.

It is fully funded full time postgraduate award,

which enables talented young people from around the

world to study at the University of Oxford in

England. According to the Rhodes Trust, the overall

global acceptance rate stands at only about 0.7%,

making it one of the most competitive scholarships

in the world.

And it's worth repeating the global acceptance rate

is 0.7%.

It's uber competitive.

However, over the years, the Rhodes Scholarship has

not been without controversy for excluding black

people, excluding women and many others, and for its

name commemorating a South African leader who once

introduced legislation to push black residents from

their land. But today we're celebrating.

We're going to be talking all about that.

But with the current stats surrounding the

percentage of trans Canadians almost paralleling

that 0.7% rate, imagine the odds of being named the

first transgender woman in Canada to be the

recipient of this prestigious Rhodes Scholarship.

Well, today's guest knows exactly what beating those

odds feels like Today.

Isaac Cook:
Cyn and I are joined by Julia Levy.

She/Her. A recent Rhodes Scholarship recipient.

Julia is a recent graduate from the University of

Victoria, also known as UVic, located in western

Canada on Vancouver Island, with an honors in

chemistry and a minor in visual arts.

In addition to her lab research at UVic and the

University of Bristol, Julia has worked with a

nonprofit for gender diverse Youth Gender

Generations Project.

As a director and trans mentor, she is excited to

pursue a master's in theoretical and computational

chemistry and education, digital and social change,

and hopes to leverage this work to continue to

develop educational software that improves learning

outcomes for students of all backgrounds.

Julia is hoping to be able to take these ideals to

Oxford and use the education offered by the Rhodes

Scholarship to make positive impacts in the

community she is connected with.

Welcome to Hey, Cis!

Julia.

Julia Levy:
Hey, good to be here.

Isaac Cook:
We're happy to have you. So let's begin perhaps with

a Hey, Cis! foundational question.

Where do you currently reside and where do you call

home?

Speaker4:
Yeah, so I grew up in Vancouver, which is on the

Musqueam Squamish and Tsleil-waututh Nations, but I

grew up in Vancouver and that's where I am right

now. But I went to school at the University of

Victoria and so I call Victoria home, but that's of

course on the Lekwungen peoples land and the Bosonic

peoples and the Esquimalt peoples lands.

I've always been like a BC gal and that's kind of

really all I've lived. Although technically I'm

living in Berlin right now.

I'm actually I leave tomorrow to fly back there and

then I guess I'll be in the UK for a while and then

who knows where. I'm sort of I'm sort of in this

weird uprooted state right now where, you know,

moved out of my place in Victoria and don't really I

just actually moved out my childhood bedroom

yesterday and now I'm kind of moving out properly to

a to a new city again.

Cyn Sweeney:
Oh, that's so exciting. You're like a citizen of the

world right now.

Speaker4:
That's a romantic way of putting it.

Cyn Sweeney:
I think when I found you after I'd seen the article

and I'm like, Oh, we need to talk to Julia.

You were in Germany at the time and some people

within the department at U of Vic were really nice

to say, We're not connecting you, but we will track

her down and see if she wants to talk to you.

So that was that was great.

Thank you for for getting back to us.

And we want to hear all about this Rhodes

Scholarship. I just want to like back it up to the

moment when you first heard, and we're wondering

like, okay, so how how did you hear the news?

Like, what do they knock on your door?

Do they phone your cell?

Was it how did that happen?

Do they do interviews?

Speaker4:
And then on the same day, they do like interviews

during the day and everyone gets interviewed and

then they finish the interviews at like four and

then they call you at 5 p.m.

with who got it.

Wow. And so and I and I was I was convinced after my

interview that I didn't get it absolutely convinced,

partially because the other candidates were so

incredible and partially because the questions they

were asking me thought that maybe the other

candidates were more applicable for what the

questions they were asking. So I came out convinced

I wasn't going to get. It was like watching TV to

distract myself.

And then I get a call and I guess the first thing I

said was, You're kidding me.

Or like, I like, I did not expect that.

So it was a real lovely surprise on that front.

Cyn Sweeney:
And so it is a process, right?

You're going to have to go through this whole

process now because I didn't realize it was all so

quick and on the like on the same day.

Julia Levy:
Oh, yeah, yeah.

Isaac Cook:
Were you well connected with the other kind of

applicants or what was that?

Speaker4:
Yeah. So you applied to the university first and the

university chooses some people to.

Ply on, and those people have become finalists in

Canada. The six finalists for every one person

selected. So like, there's two people in Ontario who

get it, for example. So they have 12 finalists or

two. In Quebec, they have 12 finalists.

We had six because we only have one in BC.

Then you do like a dinner event with everybody where

you you kind of meet and greet with the like six

applicants and then seven judges sort of

adjudicators, and you do like a meet and greet with

them. So really got to get to know them.

And actually a couple of them, 1 or 2 of them were

people that I actually had like known through

something else. Or there's a bunch of UVic people

who like University of Victoria, people who got in

who are extremely strong applicants.

And one of them who I actually had known already.

So it was, it was nice and we got to connect

beforehand and like we all like met up and went

together into the dinner. So it was really lovely to

do the dinner. And then the next day you do the

interviews and then like by the evening, you know.

Julia Levy:
That's so fast.

It's a real process.

Yeah. When did you personally first apply?

I started to apply like in.

Speaker4:
May, but I think I submitted my application in like

September.

Cyn Sweeney:
Okay, So you submitted.

It's still.

Isaac Cook:
Really fast.

Cyn Sweeney:
Yeah. And then so when did you find out then?

Exactly. It was, it was November.

Was it or.

Julia Levy:
Found out like.

Speaker4:
In November that I was a finalist at the time I found

out I was in the UK traveling.

So then I came home to do the interview and then

like flew out like four days after the interview.

It's been such a trip.

I applied for it with no intention that I was going

to get it. I applied for it just thinking, you know,

it would be a good experience. It'd be a good thing

to like get to a finalist. It'd be, you know, gravy

if I got it. But it was not not critical.

I was I was doing it for the experience.

And then, you know, even in the interview and in the

dinner, like, I felt like I was a good candidate,

but I didn't feel like I was that strong.

It was a really lovely group of people and everyone

was so incredibly interesting and had done such cool

stuff that I was like, These people are going to get

it. These people are doing amazing things.

It has taken more time to come to terms with the

fact that it's happened than it has to actually

apply for an amazing application to go through.

Isaac Cook:
And it probably really won't hit you until you're

actually there.

Julia Levy:
And experiencing it.

Speaker4:
No, absolutely. It definitely I definitely like I was

back in the UK and I got to like go by Oxford for a

moment. And I was like, Oh, yeah, okay.

It felt more real then.

Yeah.

Isaac Cook:
So being the first transgender person in Canada.

Speaker4:
A woman, there has actually been other transgender

people in Canada who have gotten it.

But it's interesting because I think it's it's an

interesting flavor of the ways that media is

interested in trans women specifically.

Yeah. And and, you know, the old joke that like, you

know, you talk to people about trans people, it's

like trans women are the entire monolith of it.

And trans men are like, do they even exist?

And that's kind of indicative of that sort of

dynamic in that there has been, I think, a trans man

who's won it and there's been a non-binary person

who identify as trans who's won it.

It was a little less publicized.

I think they were pushing it a little bit less

themselves. But but it's definitely like when I talk

to them, talk to the media about it, definitely.

I was like very clear that I wasn't the first trans

person to get it. It wasn't for the trans person in

Canada to get it, but often that got lost in

translation a little bit.

Julia Levy:
Gotcha.

Isaac Cook:
And I think that's I think that's a really

interesting specification to make, too, because I

know when Cyn and I, you know, I was trying to do as

much research as I could because I was like, there's

no like it's so hard to believe in 2023.

Julia Levy:
You.

Isaac Cook:
Would like to hope that there'd be other trans people

getting such an incredible opportunity.

And yeah, I don't think I was able to find anything.

So that must have been the case that it was pretty.

Cyn Sweeney:
Yeah, I thought the, I thought the article that I had

found. But I'm thinking now No, it did say first

Canadian.

Julia Levy:
Trans woman maybe.

Cyn Sweeney:
Yeah, yeah. Which is interesting.

I don't think any of the other winners were were

listed or passed past in there.

So it's nice to it's nice to have the perspective.

And I'm wondering then when you heard like from the

adjudication and that did they share with you like

what jumped out about like your answers to the

questions or about the research?

Speaker4:
No, I have no idea actually, because, you know, it's

I don't know why they chose me.

They called me 45 minutes after the last interview.

It could have been those 45 minutes could have been

arguing and throwing fists and fighting over

candidates. Or it could have been a unanimous thing.

I have no idea.

Didn't connect with the entire committee as well.

I connected with a few people really, really well,

but I don't know how the other applicants

interviewed. I don't know what they were looking

for. It's a pretty arcane process in that way, for

sure. Yeah.

Julia Levy:
And so what did winning mean to you?

Isaac Cook:
Looking back before the process, like, what were you

telling yourself aside from, you know, I'm going to

do this for fun or I'm going to do this for the

experience? Like, what were you thinking in your

head? You know, like, what if I do win?

Julia Levy:
Well, I think.

Speaker4:
I didn't allow myself to imagine what would happen if

I did win. I didn't realize how much it was going to

mean to me until I got it.

The interview process itself was a really clarifying

experience for me around what I would want to do

with the Rhodes Scholarship, because they ask you a

lot of questions like, Where do you see your

research? Where do you see what you're doing?

Where do you see the future? Where do you see what

you care about? Why does that matter?

And it was a really have to think about that and

actually like really put that into words and like

market myself I guess is the right way to put it

made me realize the ways that I do want to engage.

I think the significance of this scholarship for me

is that especially I didn't know again, I didn't

know that I was going to be the first trans woman in

Canada to get it until after I got it.

And I was like, I was like, wait a second.

I was looking at some of the other scholar.

I was like, Wait, there's actually no other trans

people. I assume there would be.

I just hadn't looked. So I was like, Google it.

I was like, Oh, there's actually only one other

trans woman, and she's from the US.

It was two years ago and I was like, Oh, I'm the

first trans woman in Canada to get this.

So didn't know that until after I got it.

And all of a sudden it really hit me that, like, I

feel a responsibility now to really take this and

make something for it for trans communities.

And I'm not sure what that looks like in the future.

I'm not sure where that fits in.

I definitely feel in receiving this scholarship that

it has really clarified for me a mission to make

something good with it.

And I think especially because the Rhodes

Scholarship does have like a really awful past, you

know, I don't think Cecil Rhodes is a particularly

good person. You know, it has it has a racist

history. It has a sexist history.

It has a colonial history and extremely colonial

history. This scholarship is going to be a lifelong

journey of figuring out what do I make with that

money that has this sort of history and how do I

make something good out of it?

And what does that look like?

And can you make something good out of it?

And and what does that mean to be a visible trans

person? A really crazy thing for me was realizing

that was the first trans woman in Canada to get this

and then realizing that if I wanted to post about

this in like in my scholar bio, about kind of

something about me being trans, it would mean now

for the rest of my life.

I could never go stealth.

Not that that was like a huge priority or anything

that I was like planning on doing.

But I think that when I began to transition, I was

imagining you have a fantasy of like, you move

somewhere new and no one knows you're trans and like

you can just kind of exist in the world as not a

trans person, because I think it can be really hard

often to exist as a trans person in the world.

It was a real interesting experience of being like,

Oh no, this is like a commitment to be trans, and

that being trans is now a fundamental part of who I

am and part of my story in a way that I hadn't

always planned for it to be.

Cyn Sweeney:
Like at a fork in the road maybe, where you had to

decide now. And that choice is kind of gone because

it's going to be married to that identity.

Is that right? Exactly.

Yeah. And you're going to be in the UK and traveling

and to different countries.

Obviously you feel quite safe in the UK and that or

how do you feel like with Oxford and having gone by

there and a.

Speaker4:
Land of contrasts as they say you know UK, I think

overall is terrifying.

I mean, just the amount of transphobia that's been

coming out of there specifically in the last like

couple months has just it's really ramped up in the

last couple of months, especially with this Scottish

gender bill stuff and then all the culture war

bullshit that's coming out of that.

On that front, I'm a little nervous, frankly, but I

know that the cities themselves, like I've been to

Manchester, I've been to London, I've been to

Glasgow, I was even in rural Scotland.

And, you know, the people who knew I was trans

didn't make a fuss about it.

And the people who didn't know I was trans didn't

know I was trans. So it didn't like it didn't it

didn't create issues. But, you know, I do think

Victoria and Vancouver are very trans friendly.

And I think as far as I've talked to people, Oxford

seems pretty good.

But there are professors there who I'm sure are not

going to be super trans friendly, and I'll have to

navigate that, I'm sure.

Part of getting the scholarship is that, you know,

there's a kind of the political take of like trans

people shouldn't have to explain trans ness to cis

people. Yes.

And I and I agree.

But I think that like, as a white trans person who

has a lot of privilege and a lot of other ways, that

message isn't for me.

Like for me, if I don't explain transness and I don't

make allies and I don't answer questions and help

explain like my experiences to people and things get

more transphobic, I have means of escape that will

help me to avoid the consequences of a movement

towards a more conservative and transphobic

political environment.

So I've always felt that, like, it's actually my

responsibility as a trans person who has a lot of

other privileges to be open, to answer questions

that might be a little probing and be open to be in

rooms with people who are maybe not super trans

approving because I can and I actually won't face

the consequences of my own failure to do that.

And I think that has now played triple now with the

scholarship that like I think that there will be

rooms that I'm sitting in where I'm around people

who don't agree about my own rights.

And I think that part of the responsibility I feel

with the scholarship is to to be okay, to sit in

those rooms, even if it's uncomfortable because I

was allowed into the room and not everyone is

allowed into that room.

And so it's important for me to take advantage of

that.

Cyn Sweeney:
Can I just jump in and clarify on one thing here,

because you said that a lot of people aren't allowed

into the room and that you were allowed into the

room. And can I just with all due respect, say you

earn that space in the room, though You're not just

allowed in, you've earned it.

And, you know, I'm just it's such, you know,

congratulations on that.

And like, you going in there, too, is, you know,

hopefully people will see that you don't have to

prove yourself, you know, to be there.

You've earned that space and you have every right to

be there alongside everybody else.

And I feel like the energy that you bring to this

conversation, even in that, like you're going to

rock it like you're just yeah.

And coming into it with just such empathetic

forethought on how you can give to your community as

well is just really incredible.

Isaac Cook:
Thank you. It's very powerful and especially, you

know, for myself, I'm also a trans person and

there's a lot of internal dialog even within the

trans community that we have to have for ourselves

because, you know, like trans mask, people do have

privilege in social situations if they are being

observed or seen as a man and our societal

standards. So it's it's important even as trans

people that we reflect and kind of as you're saying,

like as like white trans people, like we have so

much privilege and it's a lot more comfortable for

us to sit in a lot of these spaces, especially

within academia, where, you know, indigenous black

people of color historically have not been allowed

to even enter that room to begin with.

But for you to acknowledge that, I think speaks

speaks volumes about your your strength in the power

that you bring into these spaces, especially as a

trans woman, because it just brings those those

levels. And I greatly appreciate that.

Yeah, of course.

Speaker4:
I think it's interesting being the first trans woman

in Canada to get this and having all this other

privilege. You know, and I do think I've earned

this. I've worked my ass off.

Absolutely. But the ability for me working my ass

off to yield the results that it did came from a lot

of other places of privilege.

The wealth security that I had as a kid and as a

college student, not having to work a second job.

You know, there's all these sort of like knock on

effects. So and I think it's interesting to have all

these other sets of privileges and then to also be

the first trans woman in Canada to have this.

I really think it's a milestone and it's great.

I'm really looking forward to the milestone when

somebody who's really underprivileged in some other

way is able to get it as a trans woman because it's

a clear thing that, hey, the trans thing is not a

hindrance. It's just another aspect of someone's

life, another aspect of their flavor.

That's a really exciting thing for me.

Hey, Cis! is.

Cyn Sweeney:
All about connecting communities and thanks to

support from TD Bank Group, here is this episode's

connected community moment.

So speaking of scholarships, P-FLAG Canada is a

community partner with the Ted Rogers Scholarship

program, and they offer a scholarship every year,

and we wanted to put it out there.

It's specifically for Lgbtq2s+ graduates that are

graduating post-secondary program that year, and you

can be eligible to get up to 2500 yearly for up to

four years.

And that scholarship is open for application.

Now, if you're involved with or want to connect with

a PFLAG Canada chapter somewhere across Canada and

get involved or have been involved, be sure to

submit your name, put it forward and apply for the

scholarship. The deadline for applying is March 22nd

and if you have any questions with that in my spare

time, I happen to be a chapter lead with PFLAG.

Halifax. You can reach out to me at Halifax at

P-FLAG Canada.ca, and I will point you in the right

direction.

Isaac Cook:
This has been a Hey, Cis!

in TD Bank Group Connected communities moment

because inclusion matters.

I just quickly wanted to cite something that you

said in the CBC article because it really stood out

to me. You said there's something very powerful

about coming into a scholarship that was not

intended for you originally, and I love that.

Speaker4:
It's kind of funny because you actually have no idea

how Cecil would see me.

Julia Levy:
I mean, that.

Speaker4:
Scholarship was not intended for women originally.

And so I don't I don't know where trans women go in

on that. I mean, I think that's one aspect of me

trying to figure out what it means to get this

scholarship that I don't feel like I agree with the

the politics of Cecil Rhodes.

There's a lot of power to do something with the

money that I don't think would maybe be approved of

by Cecil Rhodes. And I think I do want to separate

Cecil Rhodes from the Rhodes Foundation now.

And they would be the first ones to say that Cecil

Rhodes was not a good person.

And they do say it.

What I'm trying to say is like it feels somewhat

subversive to take this money and do something very

trans with it and very trans positive with it.

But I would be lying if that's not.

Also, I think one of the things that the foundation

is wanting to do with the money to.

Cyn Sweeney:
Julia, if you can break it down, maybe for us what

it's like being a trans chemist and a bit about then

your specific focus of study.

Speaker4:
The chemistry department at University of Victoria

was odd and there was actually a high number of

trans women there. And I don't know if that's like a

computer science, sort of like one of those weird,

one of those weird fields where you just get like a

lot of trans women or if it just was a fluke.

But I think that it was it was interesting

transitioning because I transitioned about three and

a half years ago.

Transition. I came out and I don't know, it's been

it's been a long, slow process of transitioning.

But like it came out more publicly three and a half

to three years ago.

Cyn Sweeney:
Was that your undergrad then?

Julia Levy:
During my undergrad.

Speaker4:
I was like, during my undergrad, yeah.

At the time I had already done a lot of like I had

worked with a lot of professors.

I had done a lot of work.

I was already kind of known in the chemistry

department for doing a lot of stuff.

So it was a bit of an interesting experience because

I think that I already had a reputation, a positive

reputation within the department before I

transitioned. So even if people, even if people who

may have not understood or approved or whatever or

got it, I think that being successful in a field is

a great way for people to not really care what

you're doing. And academia is weird in that.

Like there's a lot of tolerance for non-conformity

in that way. I'm really interested to see how it's

going to be when I go to the University of Oxford

where I'm not known already, and I have to kind of

reintroduce myself to everybody.

And I'm, you know, being at Victoria, I got to be a

chemist first, and then I got to come out as trans.

Julia Levy:
Okay.

Speaker4:
But in the future, I'm always going to have to be

putting the trans second or first, but it's going to

be in the it's going to be in the opening, the

opening salvo of people meeting me.

Cyn Sweeney:
Your transcripts then and everything, obviously.

And you've changed your gender marker in your names

your transcripts will all transfer over to as Julia

Levy. Okay.

Yeah.

Speaker4:
And so the, the work, the work I've done with

chemistry has been like there's like three kind of

genres. One of them is very technical and not, I

think, particularly interesting for non chemists and

it's more of just like my own passion for like

organic chemistry and like synthesizing weird

compounds. That's, that's like a lot of work, like

in the lab in that kind of field.

But the other two that I think are really

interesting and relevant and socially, socially

interesting as well is so I've done a lot of work in

developing software for assisting with the education

of chemistry. So chemistry is a very 3D kind of

field. You have a two dimensional drawing of a

molecule which is just like kind of sticks in

letters and stuff like that.

And then you have to imagine that chemical in the

three dimensional space and imagine it interacting

in a three dimensional way with other chemicals and

things moving and flipping and rotating in this

three dimensional space.

That skill set of being able to visualize those

three dimensional transformations and interactions

is is a skill set that I have realized that not

everybody has and that people's performance in

chemistry is really determined by whether or not

they have the skill set.

And so I wanted to develop some software that like

helped bridge that gap and allowed people to really

visualize things in a three dimensional sort of

space. And that was the stuff that I was initially

applying for the Rhodes Scholarship with the

intention of really working on.

I think having now gotten the Rhodes Scholarship, I

really feel like. I'm pivoting more towards the

other aspects of chemistry that I'm more interested

in, which is harm reduction.

So I worked as like a tech at this drug testing

place in Victoria to help combat the opiate crisis.

That's, you know, bad everywhere in Canada, but

especially bad in British Columbia right now.

That work has been, I think, the most rewarding

because I think that chemistry doesn't have the most

avenues always for social change and social

consciousness. But I think that I found a couple

flavors of that and I really want to continue to

work on that.

There's a lot of stuff around trans care and harm

reduction because in the UK, as I'm sure people

know, the waiting lines for trans care are really,

really, really, really, really long.

And you can go private, but it's expensive.

People often have resorted to self-medicating.

And there's a there's a real gray market right now

for hormones where you can you can get hormones that

are legal to have but not legal to import.

And you're legally allowed to take them, but you

can't legally get them into the country.

So people are sort of getting the hormones in and

then self-medicating with like injectable hormones

mainly.

Julia Levy:
Which is really.

Cyn Sweeney:
Dangerous, right? If you don't get the levels right,

it.

Speaker4:
Can be dangerous, but it is a situation where the

alternatives are worse.

I think that, like, if I was in that same situation,

this is exactly what I would be doing.

Julia Levy:
For a long.

Isaac Cook:
Time. There was a huge testosterone shortage to the

degree that I know some trans people who were

sharing vials and such.

Cyn Sweeney:
Every September it happens because they go on

holidays. I think a lot of that production, those.

Isaac Cook:
Types of situations where people, you know, assume

that you're fine.

Like, for instance, I haven't seen a primary health

care provider in probably two years, but I've been

calling up being like, Hey, can you refill my

prescription? Like there's no stability.

I just wanted to quickly go back.

Julia, just really quick on the harm reduction side

of it. So in your position as a chemist, for

instance, there's a lot of like drug testing to make

sure that there's no fentanyl or anything that could

actually harm users.

Speaker4:
Don't know how much you guys know about the opiate

crisis and the details of it, but the supply chain

shortages that occurred during COVID seriously

screwed with the drug supply.

Before COVID, when I was working at working the drug

testing, there was, you know, heroin that was

sometimes had fentanyl in it, but you could have

heroin. And we sometimes saw we saw lots of clean

samples of heroin. And so you could just test the

heroin with a test strip and say, okay, this has

fentanyl. It doesn't have fentanyl, it does have

fentanyl, doesn't have fentanyl.

After COVID, there is no heroin anymore.

There is just fentanyl.

The heroin supply has is completely impossible to

access now. And so it's fentanyl.

But fentanyl obviously is a very strong drug.

So it's cut with like mainly caffeine and people are

smoking it, but people don't know often how much is

in it. So sometimes you'll get like a sample is 10%,

sometimes it's 20% and sometimes it's 5%.

And that can create a lot of overdoses where people

don't know the actual strength of the drugs that

they're taking right now, drug testing is the most

important, I think, it's ever been in Canada.

You know, we've gone from somewhat clean heroin to

fentanyl. That's not even clean.

Now, that was one of my biggest passions when I was

in school, was working with that group.

And so how does that how does that interact with it?

I just want to kind of give that. But how do how do

trans care? You know, there isn't as much fentanyl

in the UK right now.

I suspect that will not always be the case.

I think that I think that I suspect that fentanyl

will make its way around the world in a much more

global way than than it currently has.

Julia Levy:
But. The way it works with trans care.

Speaker4:
So right now, the the way I see it is trying to find

ways to test the the substances that people are

self-medicating with.

Um, you know, the lab results, the figuring out labs

for levels and stuff is a totally different section

that is much more health oriented.

But the actual making sure that drug supply is clean

and making sure it is what people think it is, is

something they have a lot of experience with and

something that I really do want to look forward to

doing in the future if possible.

Um, there's lots of good groups in the UK doing that

kind of work right now, but there hasn't been a lot,

as far as I can see, with coordination between

universities in those groups.

So I'm hoping to maybe bring that, bring that in if

those groups want to do that.

Cyn Sweeney:
Can I ask them just as we're slowly wrapping up,

you're off to Berlin tomorrow and then you're going

to be in the UK, is that right?

As you're.

Julia Levy:
Yeah, I'm going to be in Berlin for like.

Speaker4:
Six ish months.

Seven months. I'm not sure right now.

Is this visa complications?

It's a whole thing. I was doing that like classic

year abroad between undergrad and Master's and I was

playing. I'm actually doing two years abroad before

I got the Rhodes Scholarship.

So. Yeah.

Julia Levy:
Yeah. So I'm.

Speaker4:
Cramming in as much travel as I.

Julia Levy:
Can.

Cyn Sweeney:
Do you need to do that?

Absolutely. Oh, awesome.

You're going to have a fabulous time.

And I don't know. I can't wait to hear more about

all of these ideas that I know are going to

formulate at various times and maybe not in the

order you think they are, but I really hope that

you'll keep in contact with us.

Yeah, would love to.

Isaac Cook:
Yeah. Is there anywhere in particular that listeners,

for instance, who want to stay in touch but may not

have your email can kind of stay in touch with you?

Do you have like a website, a blog, social media,

anything like that?

Julia Levy:
I don't actually at all.

Yeah, there may be a website.

Speaker4:
In the future, but I've just now realizing that I

have to maybe market myself.

So it's a new it's a new thing on that front.

I do have a link. If people want to connect with me,

go to go to my LinkedIn. I just made it like three

days ago, so perfect.

Julia Levy:
Oh, there you go.

Cyn Sweeney:
All right, well, we'll put the link in the show notes

and you keep in touch with us too, because we would

love to follow up, you know, a year down the road

from now or when when suits and hear how it's all

going and and even about your travels.

That too. Sounds great.

Julia Levy:
Cool.

Speaker4:
That's great. Thank you so much.

This has been such a fun experience.

Julia Levy:
Thank you for for joining us.

Cyn Sweeney:
Yeah, well, safe travels and all the best.

Julia Levy:
Thank you.

Cyn Sweeney:
Thank you. That's all the time we have today, folks.

Thank you for joining us for another episode of Hey,

Cis!.

Isaac Cook:
The conversation doesn't have to stop here, though.

If you would like to get in touch with us to ask us

a question or share your story on a future episode,

you can email us at Connect at Simply Good Form dot

com or visit us on our website at Hey, Cis!

dot com.