Smoots: Eccentricities at MIT

SNOW!

2008-12-07T11:03:00.002-05:00

It started snowing this morning! First snow of the season. Much later than last year, but it is really pretty. It's not cold enough to stick to the streets/sidewalks yet. I'm sure in a few weeks I will be wishing it was spring, but right now it is putting me in a nice "Christmasy" mood.

Pixie: Our newest addition to the family!

2008-09-05T17:11:00.003-04:00

My mom has been thinking about getting a second dog for a while now. She wanted our other dog, Tully, to have a playmate and she thought now was a good time to get one. Tully is a soft-coated wheaten terrier. She is much larger than Pixie :-).

Pixie is from the SPCA and she is a Chihuahua mix, roughly 1.5 years old. I know what you are thinking....Chihuahua!!!?!?!?!?! I thought that too. Pixie does not look much like a Chihuahua, and she is actually 9 lbs, small but not as small as a regular Chihuahua (I don't have anything against Chihuahuas but many tend to be yappy). I think she might be a Chihuahua/ Miniature Pinscher mix or perhaps mixed with a bit of rat terrier. My mom tells me she is a really sweet dog and loves to sit on your lap. Right now Tully is the dominant one in the house but we'll see what happens when Pixie gets used to her new home.

I can't wait to meet Pixie, but I'll probably have to wait until Christmas!

Media Lab UROP with LLK

2008-04-14T14:44:00.007-04:00

It's been a while since I've done an update about my life. I finally got a UROP a few weeks back with the Media Lab! They do many crazy things in the Media Lab (as demonstrated by the robot post earlier). I'm working with the Lifelong Kindergarten group, which develops tools/toys to help children (and adults too) learn. Their main website is here if you want to learn more: http://llk.media.mit.edu/.

I decided I wanted to experience some of the more unique and wacky cultures at MIT, so that is why I chose to look for a UROP in the Media Lab. So far I'm having lots of fun and I'm learning a lot too. It isn't the same type of research as those of other departments, but it is still useful. I would say you should at least try out a UROP once, whether it is during the school year or during the summer, because you never know what you might learn!

I'm working with a grad student on a project called "Camera for the Invisible." This camera is no ordinary camera. It doesn't take pictures, but it can measure temperature, resistance between objects, and other cool things. It outputs the data by sound right now, but we are working on a light output. So, for example, if the temperature of an object is high, the sound that comes out of the camera will be a series of fast beeps, whereas if the object is cooler, the sound will be slower and the beeps will be different. The point of this device is so that people can come up with their own experiments and explore the world around them. I'm learning a lot about electronics, which I love, and it goes hand-in-hand with the electronics course I'm taking this semester (6.071).

I really like the grad student I'm working with, and I like the spirit of the entire group in general. Everyone is friendly, enthusiastic, and full of fun and crazy ideas.

Here is how I actually got my UROP:

Finding a UROP is very easy, but you need to keep these things in mind:
-Just because a UROP is not listed anywhere does not mean they don't take UROPers. Go bug them. Go talk to them. Be friendly and be curious about their research. Ask if they take on UROPers. They probably do. In general, I've noticed many profs do not respond to email, so seriously, just go and talk to them!!!!
-Make sure to emphasize why you think you would be a good candidate for a UROP. If you don't have any proof of your interest in their research, they won't want to take you on as a UROPer. If you don't have any previous experience in the field, do some research and read articles about it. Show them you care and really want it. If it just "sounds interesting" to you, and that's your only reason for wanting to work for them, then you probably aren't going to get an offer. They want to choose people that will fit their lab and their research.
-As for actually finding UROPs, just look through the different lab research profiles (http://mit.edu/research/), as well as professors' bios. Choose a few areas that sound cool, and then GO TALK TO THE PROFESSOR OR GRADUATE STUDENTS WORKING FOR THEM.

As for my story:
-I found a cool looking lab online (the Lifelong Kindergarten lab, which essentially creates learning tools/toys for children. I'm learning a lot about electronics and design, which is pretty fun.)
-I emailed the professor 3 times over three weeks....no response
-Finally I went to the lab myself to talk to someone. The prof wasn't there, but a few grad students were. I talked to one of them, he showed me around. I told him the things I was interested in, and my previous experiences that applied to the UROP specifically. I asked him if he would be willing to work with me. He said yes!
-Presto! I had a UROP within a few days. (Of course...I had to apply through the UROP office and do some paperwork after that, so I didn't officially have a UROP until later)

Maybe I was lucky, but most of my other friends had similar experiences. As long as you can prove you are interested and think their research is really amazing and cool, you have a very good chance of getting a UROP.

Zen Garden in Simmons!

2008-04-14T14:00:00.015-04:00

During the first weekend in April, I helped plant a Zen garden INSIDE Simmons Hall! We've always wanted more greenery in our dorm, so our housemaster brainstormed some ideas. We thought a small garden in the entrance to Simmons was a great start. Later on, we'll probably plant a lot more greenery on our terraces. Our facilities chair, Zach (who is amazing at everything he does), was in charge of the garden. We poured some concrete to make a border. Then, we laid down a waterproof tarp so we didn't ruin the floor and some gravel (for drainage). We then mixed some soil and fertilizer, then finally planted some ferns and moss. We also have one flowering plant, which you can feed insects :-). Everything is still growing at the moment, but I'm excited to see what everything looks like in a few months.

We also decided to add some rocks to our garden. We didn't want to pay ridiculous prices for rocks, so we were resourceful. We had an adventure on the rail road tracks behind Simmons, which is full of unwanted rocks :-). We just took a grocery cart and piled rocks in. We got stuck in the mud, but eventually made it back to Simmons. Getting stuck was actually a good thing, because we found some moss by the tracks and salvaged it.

Planting the garden was fun and I hope I can help with further developments. Right now I'm trying to grow some plants in my room: a lemon tree, a pear tree, and an avocado tree. Nothing has germinated yet, but hopefully something will happen in a few weeks! I'll keep you guys updated. I've posted some pictures of the entire process below.

Nexi the Robot

2008-04-14T13:42:00.004-04:00

The Media Lab's latest robot is called "Nexi." She can show emotions and move around, unlike previous robots the Media lab has built.

Read more here: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/nexi-0409.html

And watch the video below:

One of my professors won a Pulitzer!!!!

2008-04-08T09:47:00.004-04:00

I have generally liked all of my creative writing classes, mostly because the writing professors at MIT are awesome. Junot Diaz, whose writing class I took spring of my sophomore year, just won a Pulitzer for his novel, The Brief Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao! I read his novel a little while after it came out, and loved it. The book's style might not be for everyone though--if you read normal fiction and hate anything that is eccentric and/or punk-style, or if you are faint-of-heart, it's probably not for you. But Diaz's book is a fun read for those who enjoy all genres, especially a mix of science fiction and normal life, so pick it up! The book is not science, but the main character enjoys science fiction, and the style reminds me of punk science fiction like Snow Crash. One of the reasons the book is so unique is that it takes all these crazy genres and melts them all together with a taste of Dominican Republic culture

Congrats to Professor Diaz, who I really hope returns next year to teach so that I can take another class from him before I graduate.

This is one of the reasons MIT is so cool. We have amazing, talented people here!

Read more here http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/diaz-pulitzer-0407.html

MIT to be tuition-free for families earning less than $75,000 a year

2008-03-11T00:01:00.003-04:00

With all the recent financial aid statements by other colleges, MIT has followed suite!

MIT to be tuition-free for families earning less than $75,000 a year

Nearly 30 percent of MIT students to have all tuition charges covered!

That is big news!
Read all about it here:

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2008/tuition-0307.html

Super Smash Brothers Brawl Prank

2008-03-10T22:29:00.006-04:00

To celebrate the release of Super Smash Brothers Brawl, a highly anticipated Nintendo Wii game (which I preordered :-), a few hackers put up some items from the game in Lobby 7. Below are pics of Mario's hat and mustache, a pokemon ball, a super smash crate, a banana, a Mario tomato, and a few other items. There was also a healing heart container (from the Zelda franchise), but I was not able to get a good picture of it. I'm excited to play the game when it arrives here from Amazon!

IAP 6.270 Autonomous Lego Robots!

2008-02-13T13:59:00.002-05:00

Over IAP I built a Lego robot for the famous (or maybe infamous :-) 6.270 competition! I made a blog about our robot, Peg Leg, which you can check out at this link:
http://mit-6270-robot-pegleg.blogspot.com/

There are videos and pictures of Peg Leg, which are really cool. So go check it out! And if you are at MIT, do 6.270 before you graduate! It's just one of those things you HAVE to do.

My team had tons of fun over IAP, even though it was tons of work (we spent over 100 hours on our robot).

Happy New Year!

2007-12-31T17:21:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone had a great Christmas. I'm at home relaxing right now. It was a bit strange to be home, but after a few days it feels normal. I've been away since the end of August, so it's been a long time. I'm having fun with my family and will be going back to MIT in the middle of January (but I'm leaving for Houston to visit family there for a week before heading back).

HAPPY NEW YEAR!

“Beta Inside” (I built a processor!)

2007-12-31T17:03:00.000-05:00

The longest lab in 6.004 is building a simple processor. The diagram below shows the essential circuitry. It’s pretty cool that I made something that works and can add, subtract, multiply, and much more! Even better, I finished it a few days before it was due, on schedule!

Wicked!

2007-12-31T17:02:00.001-05:00

Parent’s weekend was in October, and my mom and dad came to visit me. They took me and Gus to see the musical Wicked, which was showing in Boston. If you haven’t seen it GO SEE IT NOW! Seriously, it is that good. It’s amazing. My favorite musical used to be Phantom of the Opera, which I’ve seen multiple times, but I think Wicked has replaced it. I don’t want to say too much about the story, because I think it was better going in knowing nothing except that it is about “how the wicked witch of the west became wicked” which is what anyone will tell you. I’ll just say I was astounded at the depth of the storyline. There’s stuff here for kids and adults. There’s a dark undertone, not like the Phantom of the Opera, but it’s a serious musical. Wicked is also hilarious, beautiful, moving, and just amazing in general. The music is outstanding. I keep listening to it while walking to class and I can’t get tired of it. I would suggest seeing the musical before getting the soundtrack; however, as you will appreciate it more (especially since you will know the storyline). There is nothing like seeing a musical in a theatre. The soundtrack reminds you of the experience. The actors were just brilliant. The girl who played Glenda was perfect, her facial expressions and movements were so intricate and so detailed. The actress playing Alphaba was equally amazing. Everyone was just great. We were very close to the front row, so we could see all of them closely. I just don’t know how to explain how much I love Wicked, except to say it is one of those experiences that stays with you for a long time afterward. After the show, I bought a poster which is now in my room. Every time I look at it I smile :-).

Finally an Update: Classes for Fall 2007

2007-12-31T16:58:00.000-05:00

Sorry it has been such a long time since I have updated. I’ve been busy, but not THAT busy.

Here are the classes I took this last term:

3.155J/6.152J Micro/Nano Processing Technology [Schmidt, O'Handley]

This was one of my favorite classes. The workload is not excessive, and the material is interesting. I know I want to go into the electronics industry, so this class is perfect for me. It combines many different disciplines (we have people from many majors in this class). I’ve heard this is the most expensive class per student at all of MIT. This is because our labs are in the fab at MIT, and we get to make microelectronics and nano-devices such as MOS capacitors, cantilevers, and microfluidic devices. I have a wafer in my room that I made! Seeing really expensive equipment in action and being able to take home the end product is quite cool. The lectures are hard to pay attention to (I’ve never been a fan of powerpoint), but the lecturers do a pretty good job of giving you the pertinent details.

6.004 Computation Structures [Ward]

I have enjoyed this class. There are no psets, but there are labs and quizzes (8 labs and 5 quizzes) throughout the term, so you still have something to do each week. This is a great class to take along with 3.155J because at the beginning of the class we studied semiconductors, but from and electronic standpoint. This class is not overly difficult, though I must say that it is very easy to lose points on the quizzes. I’ve gotten 100% on all the labs so far though. This class uses a point system. There are 210 points total and you need 170 to get an A, so it’s rather neat since you know exactly how well you need to do to get a certain grade. I’ve learned a lot about how computers work at the basic level, in fact, we even “built” (virtually) a processor!

10.302 Transport Processes [Dalzell, Smith]

What can I say? This is a Course 10 class, and I generally find them very difficult, frustrating, and not all too likeable. This one is not much different. The good thing about this class is that the material is much easier to grasp, since everything we talk about can be related to the physical world. For example, the entire class is about exchanging heat and mass, so I can tell you why windows are often double-paned instead of one thick slab (so...technically I knew that before I took the class but now I can model it mathematically!). So, it’s very different from 10.213 (thermo and kinetics for cheme majors) in that aspect. I like it better than other Course 10 classes I’ve had. The lectures are not all that helpful, but our book is very useful (thank goodness, since the last few textbooks I’ve had for classes have been worthless).

Writing Longer Fiction [Haldeman]

This class is taught by the Hugo award winning author Joe Haldeman. I’ve generally enjoyed it, Haldeman is interesting to listen to. I’m not sure how much I’ve actually learned in this class, some random tidbits about writing and publishing. I like how we have to read a short book every week (at least for the beginning of term), because it forced me to read, which is something that always seems to be on my to-do list but is never completed. I enjoy creative writing, so the writing assignments are fun for me. I don’t always agree with Haldeman’s opinions (he’s a very tough grader, if he likes it you’re fine, if he doesn’t…well…sucks for you :-). For this class the major assignment is to write a synopsis for a novel and a few sample chapters (essentially 30 pages). So it’s a lot of work, but fun. Just pray he likes your story…and don't write ANYTHING relating to magic (meaning essentially anything that involves special powers).

Funny tidbit of the day

2007-10-23T10:18:00.001-04:00

Who knew flushing a shirt down the toilet could turn off the internet? I certainly would never have guessed such a strange result. Apparently the kids over in Burton-Conner had some problems the other day with their plumbing...

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V127/N47/briefs.html

Star Simpson and "Fake Bomb"

2007-09-23T11:10:00.001-04:00

Since this is all over the news I thought I should comment. Star Simpson, a sophomore that lives at East Campus, went to the airport with an electronic name tag she made for herself . The device had LEDs on a circuit board that were in the shape of a star (her name is "Star"). State troopers thought she had a bomb and she was arrested at gunpoint. I want to make sure people knew that Star had no intention of causing such a ruckus. She made the name tag for MIT's career fair last Thursday. The playdoh in her hands was from the career fair.

I'm not trying to make an excuse for her or what happened. Star should have been smarter about wearing such a device to an airport, especially since there have been so many terrorist scares recently. It was clueless for her to do such a thing. To her, it was probably just a cool thing she made and wanted to wear it around and get some use out it, not realizing that it looked so suspicious. The MIT administration has commented on this incident, and I am disappointed with their report. Sure, they want to look good after this incident, but they could have easily clarified that Simpson was not carrying a "fake bomb" and that she didn't mean for this to happen. They still could have been stern in their comments about how she was clearly not thinking about her actions. It makes a big difference to the MIT community. This isn't something where she was like "Hey! I want to wear this so people will get freaked out and it will be totally hilarious." In that type of situation I would expect MIT to practically disown such a student. This was NOT such a case. I don't believe Simpson or MIT has handled this very well with the media. Hopefully it will all get sorted out soon. The MIT administration needs to recognize that some of the people here are extremely book smart, but not street smart. I think it's something that needs to be addressed and can be corrected.

New Layout

2007-09-17T09:59:00.000-04:00

I just updated the layout for the blog. I hope everyone likes the new banner. I'm still not completely happy with it but over the next few weeks I'll do something more professional. At least it looks more MITish with the great dome on there. I will probably change it a bit more to see what looks the nicest.

Intel Internship (Summer 2007)

2007-09-15T22:00:00.000-04:00

My internship at Intel was a great learning experience. I stayed in my family’s apartment during the weekdays and then drove back down to our house in Monterey on the weekends. My group had four other people in it. I worked in the Lithography/Etch department, but we did not have much to do with that. We were environmental processing engineers, so we dealt with things coming out of the fab (another way of putting it would be “waste” :-). I worked on three projects while I was there. The first was working on a bioreactor pilot to process wastes from the fab. I tested new feed solvents for denitrification for that. Unfortunately I was not able to continue this project because there were some complications with upper management. I also developed a model for ultra pure water in the fab using Visual Basic for Applications. Additionally, I completed fab emissions testing using Fourier transform infrared spectroscopy. I even got to visit the Intel facility in Hillsboro, Oregon twice. I felt special going on business trips and being an intern :-). I flew in Intel's jet (don't get excited, it is just a regular airplane...but they do have electrical outlets to charge your computer) which was pretty cool. We stayed there for a few days to do some work on the bioreactor pilot. Oregon is beautiful and extremely green. The Intel facility there is much larger than Santa Clara's because they actually make chips there.

I was very fortunate to work in a great group. I had lots of fun with my team members. They even took me out to lunch a few times! I also attended SEMICON west 2007, where companies that have anything do whatsoever with making semiconductors come and present their wares. There were cool robots that handled wafers. Nikon even had microscopes to analyze wafers. There were so many companies that had niche products just for semiconductor manufacturing. My group was very supportive of me and they always made sure I had something to do. Some of my other friends were not so lucky in that respect.

By the way, Intel pays their interns a lot of money for the summer, especially considering it is an internship. If your college is far away, they even give you relocation money to help pay for costs. Interns also get a share in the bonuses! It’s a really good deal.

My favorite part of the summer was hanging out with interns and other young employees. I mostly hung out with a group of about four other employees and their boyfriends/girlfriends. We went ice-skating one night (why I’ve been ice-skating in the middle of the summer in California but not in Boston in the winter I can’t tell you). I also got one of my intern friends hooked on the show, Firefly. There was an intern picnic that was also fun. I played football with the guys. I’m not the best at catching and throwing but I can do some pretty good defense…at least in touch football. We even visited the aquarium in Monterey one weekend, which I have seen dozens of times, but it’s still fun to visit every once in a while. My experience this summer would not have been the same without these awesome people! I am so glad the interns at Intel were more active than at Agilent. I had no problems getting together with people at all, unlike last summer. There were events going on almost every night!

If you want to see a hilarious video about Intel (you can even see the building I worked in!) click on the link below. Conan O Brien visited Intel and made fun of it. (And yes, there really is a plaque in the ground to tell you where to take a picture :-).

http://www.clipstr.com/videos/ConanVisitsIntel/

I really enjoyed working at Intel. Since Intel is a large company, it has its own problems, but working there for the summer was great. They were more organized than Agilent and the interns did many more activities. I also liked the combination of chemical engineering and electronics. I know now that I want to go more into an electronics area with my cheme degree. I highly recommend Intel for summer internships. It is possible that you might get a bad group and not accomplish much during the summer (this happened to one of my friends), but if you have a great group it's a good experience.

After my three-month internship was over, my family and I went to Maui for vacation. I had a nice, relaxing time before heading back to MIT.

Room for Junior Year in Simmons Hall

2007-09-08T16:02:00.000-04:00

I'm all moved into my new room, so I thought I'd post some pictures. I have a single this year in Simmons Hall. Look at some of my first posts of each year if you want to see pictures of doubles in Simmons for my first and second years. My room faces Boston, so at night I see the pretty skyline :-). My single is pretty typical of Simmons' rooms. (In general, MIT dorm rooms are large). I actually have a small single. Next year as a senior I will be able to get a larger one if I choose to move to another room. In Simmons, freshmen and sophomores normally have doubles (maybe a few sophomores can get singles). Juniors and seniors normally get singles.

MIT FAQ from Smoots: Student Life at MIT

2007-09-03T13:59:00.000-04:00

I have a website called Smoots: Student Life at MIT that has a lot of valuable information about MIT. Unfortunately, not many people come across it on the internet. I thought I would put some of that information on this blog, since it is directly connected to Google and it gets more hits. Here are some of the questions that are answered on the website:

Go to http://www.mit.edu/~avihess to visit the Smoots: Student Life at MIT to see more!

FAQ

Everyone I have talked to says that MIT is difficult, but not impossible; if you stick with it and work hard, you can do well. Before accepting my admission at MIT, I asked some upperclassmen their thoughts on MIT. So, the answers to this FAQ were written by students that actually go to MIT. Please keep in mind that before making any type of decision to attend MIT, you should definitely visit to get an idea about how you would feel there. Just because these students enjoyed or disliked something does not mean you will. Use this FAQ as one resource, not your only resource, to get information about MIT.

For the more sensitive and student-dependent questions, I had multiple students write up answers (go to Student Opinionsto read them all). There is a brief "highlight" section below that summarizes how most students answered each question. For the rest that involve opinions, I tried my best to represent the majority of students' feelings.

Frequently Asked Questions

(NOTE: FOR THE FIRST 11 QUESTIONS, CLICK HERE FOR MORE DETAILS FROM MULTIPLE STUDENTS)

· There is a rumor that most MIT students are depressed (the whole suicide rate being high), what are your comments on that?

If you let the work get to you and are not organized, you will probably become very stressed. This could lead to depression if you do not get help. In general though, MIT students are enthusiastic people who love their school and are happy with their lives. MIT's suicide rate is NOT above average. Every college has suicides, but since MIT is a big-name school and is known for having a tough workload, when something like that happens here there is a lot more media coverage, and then the rumors start.

· So, how many nerds are there really?

Everyone here is smart and we have lots of nerdy jokes, but most people are quite "normal." You will find few people who talk in a high voice and have a problem socializing.

· How much sleep do you get on average (can you get 8 hours of sleep)?

If you are organized, you can get 8 hours. Most people get about 5-7 hours.

· How much time do you spend doing homework?

20-40 hours a week depending upon how efficient you are and what classes you are taking. Expect to spend quite a bit more time on homework than in high school.

· Do you have time to do anything else except study? If yes, what do you spend your free time doing?

Yes you do have time to do other things. People participate in clubs, research, sports, go out to parties, explore Boston, and do tons of other activities. There are so many things to do in college and at MIT, it would be a shame if people studied all the time.

· Are the classes totally impossible, or can you actually do well in them?

If you put in the effort you can do well. The average GPA at MIT is about 4.1/5.0, which is a B average (from this it is evident that most students are doing quite well here, and are far from failing all their classes).

· What is your overall experience with professors (do you think they are good teachers?)

There are good professors and bad professors just like any school. Most people have good experiences with them. TAs and professors hold office hours and will help you if you get stuck on a problem or do not understand something from lecture.

· Have you participated in UROP? What was the experience like?

Most people tend to enjoy their UROPs and learn a lot. It is a great way to gain work experience and explore possible majors. You get to work with graduate students and/or a professor and do REAL research! It is very easy to obtain a UROP, just go and bug a professor or go to the UROP office to look at available ones.

· What are the worst things about MIT?

The workload
Cold weather
Some people dislike the campus

· What are the best things about MIT?

The people are friendly and enthusiastic
Students have a lot of freedom and can make their own decisions. If you want to do something or get something changed, you probably can.
You can essentially choose what dorm you want to live in (each has its own personality)
Very easy to get involved with research (paid or for credit)
Community atmosphere (not cutthroat, people work together and go out and do things together)
IAP (you get January off to do whatever you want, including vacation and/or taking fun classes)
There are so many opportunities to excel and do your own thing; you won't ever be bored!
Boston is an awesome city
Once you come out of this place, you will have an outstanding education and have great problem solving skills so that everything else will seem easy
You will be challenged like never before
The first semester is pass/no record (i.e. there are no grades!)
MIT is recognized internationally and nationally as one of the best engineering schools in the world

· Why should you go to MIT? Is it the right place for everyone?

If you want a challenge, are willing to put in many hours of studying, are enthusiastic about learning new things, and want to have a well-rounded education, MIT is for you. If you want to be at the top of the class and can't handle people getting better grades than you, you may want to think carefully about attending. Do not come here if you want to party all the time and do not want to put in the effort!

FOR MORE DETAILED ANSWERS FROM MULTIPLE STUDENTS, GO HERE

---------------END OF SECTION ANSWERED BY MULTIPLE MIT STUDENTS---------------

· What type of AP credit does MIT accept?

This varies on the subject. Visit this website: http://web.mit.edu/firstyear/2010/subjects/ap.html

· What are the dorms like?

MIT is unique compared to other colleges in that each of its dorms has a different personality. Each dorm building has different architecture, furniture, and stereotypes associated with it. MIT has an all-girls dorm, an oddly shaped "waffle building", a dorm where explosions are considered the norm, a "party" dorm, and more. So in short, there are a lot of varieties. I am not going to go into the stereotypes of each dorm and how I feel about them, because each dorm fits different personalities, and a dorm that I don't like is "home sweet home" for another person. When you come to MIT that is the time to visit the dorms and find out which one is the best for you. There is a general list about which dorm has singles, doubles, quads, smoking, cafeterias, etc at this website: http://web.mit.edu/cmi/ue/residences/dorm-details.html. Freshmen have plenty of time to explore the dormitories during summer and orientation before they have to put down their preferences.

· What is the surest way to get accepted to MIT?

Okay, first things first. There is no sure way to get accepted to any college. You can do things that make it extremely likely, but nothing is ever sure. I know someone who was an Intel Science Talent Search Finalist (there are only 40 in the entire country), had done well at other science competitions, and he did not get into Harvard or Stanford. During my senior year in high school, we had people accepted to Columbia, Brown, Stanford, MIT, and UC Berkeley, but not to Pomona. The college admission process at all schools has some randomness associated with it (there HAS to be since there are a ton of students applying that have similar GPAs, activities, and SAT scores). People always ask, "If I have these grades, this SAT score, and have done these activities, will I get in?" Don't ask me. Don't ask other students. They won't know! So many students and their parents get obsessed with test scores and such, and truthfully, it's not a good idea! Just because you scored higher on the SATs than someone else doesn't mean you should have gotten accepted and they should not have.

An example: at one of the science competitions I participated in, I won an award. A couple of random parents stopped to congratulate me and asked where I was going to college. I told them and then they said their son (who had also won something) really wanted to go to MIT, but he was not accepted and was going to another engineering school. They then proceeded to ask my SAT scores! I told them, and I could tell by the look on their faces that their son had scored higher. I had been judged just by my SAT scores. They didn't even ask me what other activities I did and other science competitions I had competed in. Right then and there, they had already decided that I should not have gotten into MIT and their son should have. Don't be like this!

Look at it this way. The highly competitive colleges admit only about 10%-20% of their applicants. If EVERYONE has pretty good test scores, grades, etc. then it is very hard to choose who should be admitted. Sure, there will be students that are obviously more qualified than others, but there are so many applicants that look the same, getting in is also based on luck and chance. Do not be discouraged if you were not admitted to the college of your dreams! It doesn't mean anything! All it means is that there are a limited amount of spots at the school and it's hard to get in.

Keep in mind that applying to more colleges does mean you are more likely to get into at least one of them, (but don't apply to a ton, otherwise you will not have a life senior year!).

I will say that the MIT admissions office does seem to have a very good admissions procedure. Even better, they are very friendly and actually treat you like a person.

What's my advice? Besides doing your best in school and doing well on the SATs (you do NOT need to get a perfect score!), do other activities that make you stand out. If you are good at something, then prove it! Participate in competitions and make yourself unique. Participate in writing competitions, science competitions, music competitions, publish your writing, start a non-profit that really does make a difference, etc. This will boost your resume, you'll make a lot of great friends, and you'll learn a lot. But don't do it just for your resume, that's just stupid because you won't enjoy it as much. Do something you enjoy and show that you excel in it.

By making your activities unique, taking high school seriously, and a little luck, you have a good chance at getting into your top school. But if you don't, it isn't the end of the world. I know a lot of bright people who went to state schools and less competitive colleges and are at the top of the "food chain" at their jobs.

· How does the advising system work?

There are three major advising systems at MIT:

Traditional Advising: You have an advisor and meet with him/her periodically. This is just like most other advising systems.
Advising Seminar: This is like an easy class that doesn't involve much work. You have an advisor, and you meet with him/her and the rest of the advisees once a week to learn about a specific topic. You also meet with them individually a few times a semester.
Residence Based Advising (RBA): Your advisor is based in your dormitory and there is a very community-based atmosphere.

For more information, look under "Exploration" and "Advising" on this website: http://mit.edu/firstyear/2010/advexplore/

· What is a UROP?

UROP stands for "Undergraduate Research Opportunities Program." It is a great way to gain research experience with a graduate student/professor. There are many UROPs available to undergraduates, even as freshmen. It is very easy to obtain a UROP. UROPs are one of many things unique to MIT (there are similar programs at other colleges but most of them hardly come close). You can look online or around campus for advertised UROPs, or go and bug a professor whose research interests you. Most of the time students end up doing REAL research, not just washing beakers. You can do a UROP for pay or for credit. Many students stay at MIT during the summer and do research. For more information go here: http://web.mit.edu/urop/

· How good is the English/Humanities department at MIT?

This obviously depends a lot upon the class you take, but in general, most students enjoy their humanities classes and get a lot out of them. The MIT administrators emphasize having engineers with a well-rounded background, so 8 humanities classes are required to graduate (that's one per semester!). The humanities classes at MIT are generally less demanding than the science and engineering classes, but most professors do not grade easily. You probably don't want to major in English at MIT (it is not a liberal arts school), but at the same time, the humanities are not left out here. In particular, MIT is ranked very highly in Economics, Political Science, Linguistics, and Management. The Music department is also outstanding (I'm taking an introductory course this term, and it is great so far). Tons of people double major or minor in music. Our English department is not bad either.

· Do people date at MIT? What is the social scene like there?

I have a boyfriend, my roommate has a boyfriend, a few of my other friends have boyfriends/girlfriends. So yes, people definitely date here. Contrary to MIT's stereotype, there are also parties here. The Greek scene is quite huge at MIT, there's always a party at one of the fraternities. The dorms also throw parties and such. People go out to dinner, walk around Boston, go out to movies, etc. We don't stay in our rooms all day and study!

· Is the food good at MIT?

This depends upon where you eat of course, but in general, MIT food is not bad. The first few weeks you'll think there's a lot of variety in some of the cafeterias, but then after about a month you realize it just appears that there is a lot of variety. The food does get old after a while. However, I've had friends from other colleges visit me and talk about how great our food is. I think our food is pretty good compared to most colleges, but it's not like your mom's home cooking. In terms of places to eat around campus: at the student center there is a Dunkin' Donuts, a Mexican food place, a small grocery store that sells sandwiches, an Indian, and Japanese food place. In my dorm we have a cafeteria that has a salad bar, stir fry, sandwich bar, grill, "home-style" food, and another counter that serves more unusual food items. There are also cafes spread throughout the main academic buildings and food trucks that serve lots of things around MIT.

· How much drug/alcohol usage is there at MIT?

MIT is a college with lots of different types of people, so yes, students drink alcohol here and do drugs. BUT most students are very respectful and will not impose upon you if you do not want to participate. Most people are very good about doing these types of things in more enclosed areas so it's not even noticeable. I rarely ever see people doing drugs. At parties the alcohol is more obvious, but most students are responsible enough to know when they've had enough. If you want to avoid people who do these types of things, it's very easy. There are a ton of people who do not drink or do drugs. Since the workload at MIT is heavy, people are also limited in their usage of alcohol and other substances. Drinking and drugs are not something you need to really worry about at MIT. I would say people "party" less here than at most other colleges.

Paris

2007-07-30T23:19:00.000-04:00

Gus is in Paris doing an internship at Schlumberger. I visited him over the 4th of July weekend and we had lots of fun. Instead of describing everything we did, I'll just post some pics. I took over 200 pictures, but I don't really want to upload ALL of them. The pics below are of the Eiffel Tower, Versailles, Notre Dame, another church I don't remember the name of, The pompidou pop art museum (and not, it’s not under construction :-), and the Louvre.

I will do a huge update about MIT and my summer very shortly. Sorry it's been such a long time since my last post! I hope everyone's summer is going well.

It's Summer!

2007-06-03T13:43:00.000-04:00

I’m done with all my exams and papers, which is such a relief. I will write up a summary of how I felt about my classes soon. I’m back at home in California, and I have started my internship at Intel. This summer looks to be a very productive one with my internship and then figuring out what I want to do with the rest of my time at MIT. Right now I’m just enjoying the sunny day and doing some random chores, along with some much needed relaxing. Gus is already in France, and he will be starting his internship with Schlumberger within the next few days. I hope everyone is enjoying the summer.

Finals

2007-05-20T10:49:00.001-04:00

I have two finals this semester, one tomorrow and one on Tuesday. Then I'm done!!! Check back in a few days for an update on the last few weeks of school. Right now I'm studying like crazy.

Room for next year!

2007-05-06T16:24:00.000-04:00

Yesterday was Simmon's rooming lottery. Each dorm has a different method for picking rooms, and Simmons uses a lottery, with rising seniors picking first, then juniors, then sophomores. Now that we are rising juniors, we will all get singles! I was pick #88, and there were about 200 students total. I was in the upper middle of the junior class. My friends and I were very lucky since we were able to take over the 10C tower. My new room will be the one next to Gus' current room. It is 134 square feet, which is actually a relatively small single, but it will be plenty of room for me. Kaitlyn will take Gus's room, Gus will be living across from me, and Amanda will be a few doors down the hall. We also have two of our freshman friends in a double on the same floor (the room Kaitlyn and Amanda currently live in). It should be fun next year. It is quite strange because there are still tons of singles and doubles left. My current room with Annelise was not taken. I think this is partly because some people chose to just live in doubles to be closer to friends, and also because there are about 30 people fewer in the lottery than last year.

For pictures of a typical Simmons dorm room, go to the blog entries: "Simmons: My Crazy Dorm" (October 2005) and "My Room" (September 2006). Early next semester I will also post pictures of my new single room, so look out for those.

Ring Delivery

2007-05-04T18:19:00.000-04:00

We got our Brass Rats!!! I keep looking at mine, smiling to myself. There was a reception in the State room of this really nice building in Boston. We had fun, even though it was on a Thursday night and we had psets to do.

Below is a snippet of a Tech article from this link: http://www-tech.mit.edu/V124/N10/RoseRing10.10c.html\

I think it expresses how MIT students feel sometimes.

“It seems that with each year here, undergraduates become more and more entrenched in this spiral of self-pity and disgust at their lives. But really there are a few milestones within those four years that seem to keep us sane and above water. One is graduation and finally being done with this place. The other is getting your brass rat.

The brass rat is a symbol of what you have accomplished so far, what you have to look forward to, and what you will accomplish when you leave campus. When you are a freshman, you look with envy to the upperclassmen’s fingers wrapped in shiny yellow. You know that you’ve got a long road ahead to finishing your turn in the Institute, but there’s a concrete item and experience to look forward to, to keep you plugging away at your work day in and day out.”

Very well said. See pics below of our beautiful and clunky rings!

CPW

2007-05-04T18:13:00.000-04:00

The weekend of April 13^th was Campus Preview Weekend (CPW) for MIT. Many of = the admitted students come and visit the campus to see if they like MIT or not. CPW is a very huge deal here, and everyone puts a lot of time into planning activities so that there are a ton of different things to go to. Parents of the prospective freshman also come, so there are special activities for them, too (they need to be kept preoccupied so that their kids have some freedom :-). My CPW was one of the best weekends of my life, and I hope the kids this year thought so, too.

My roommate, Annelise, planned all the Simmons’ activities this year, along with another of our friends, Erin. We tried to have as many different types of activities as possible so that everyone would feel like they could fit in.

I had a prefrosh stay with me named Tiffany. She was from Fremont, California, and was into anime and music and many other things. She was undecided about MIT at first, but I received an email from her a few days ago about accepting MIT’s offer, which is great!

On Thursday night, we had a movie marathon, with Office Space and Euro-Trip, both quite hilarious (and very college-oriented) movies. I stayed up pretty late for that, since I did not have anything due the next day.

Friday we had an Arcade night, along with an Italian dinner. Unfortunately, I missed the dinner, but I had a good reason! There was an Intel Science Talent Search reunion dinner, so I saw some old friends and met the winners of this year’s competition. It’s amazing how we still have bonds from just being a week together.

Saturday was a very busy day, as there was chocolate baking, dorm tours, a brunch, and then at night there was a Mexican dinner with salsa dancing, and then board games! We decided to play board games while frat parties were going on, since so many people go to them. For people who did not feel like going to frat parties, they could at least come to Simmons and join us.

The pics above are the mexican dinner/salsa dance setup. The bottom one is me at Phi Sig's graffiti party, where Gus put high lighter on m y nose (don't worry, i got revenge!).

So you can see how busy ONE dorm was for CPW, can you even imagine how many things there are to do if each dorm, each frat/sorority, and most student groups and other people put on activities? There were pages and pages of things for people to do while here, and everyone does it with enthusiasm.

One of the largest compliments we get is how much fun MIT’s CPW is compared to other colleges. I didn’t go to any others, and I thought they were similar, but I guess MIT’s is one of the best. People really do get excited about the weekend, even if there is tons of school work to do, and tons of planning, but that doesn’t deter people from making an awesome CPW every single year. The weekend was fun, but very tiring for us. I hope everyone had fun!

Update is coming

2007-04-22T23:19:00.000-04:00

Lots of things have been going on, and this next week is busy too, so I will update next weekend. Look forward to details on CPW, ring delivery (we got our brass rats!), tests, spring weekend, and more.

Virginia Tech

2007-04-16T21:43:00.000-04:00

Pray for the students and their families fromVirginia Tech. At least thirty students were shot during classes today by a man who then killed himself. http://www.cnn.com/2007/US/04/16/vtech.shooting/index.html

New Friends!

2007-04-14T13:08:00.001-04:00

Being in Simmons is somewhat difficult at times because there are not many course 10 majors in my year. I go to office hours a lot to get help, and two weeks ago I finally found a nice study group! I somehow wound up at Bexley after 10.301 office hours, and a bunch of people from my classes who I have seen but did not really know, were all studying there. It is much more fun to work with people, something I had somewhat forgotten, so I enjoyed working with them on the pset. Now I have a great group of friends in my major and we all help each other out.

A little while before spring break I also played board games somepeople. We played Risk, Settlers of Catan, and Robo Rally, all which are very addictive and fun. We stayed up late playing games and just laughing and talking. I want to do something like that more often.

There have also been quite a few parties up on Gus’ floor, so I’ve gone to some of them and that has also been fun.

A day at a time

2007-04-14T12:48:00.000-04:00

There are some weeks that you just have to go through one day at a time, trying to survive until the next day. Last week was one of them.

We had a horrible 10.213 pset that hardly anyone finished. My group and I went to office hours every night, Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and still could not finish. The pset was due on Thursday. Most of our psets are not like this at all, and are very manageable. We had spent over ten hours on it by Wednesday night, but I still had to finish my 10.301 pset and I had a test I needed to study for (5.310, which seemed to go well, by-the-way), so I stopped doing the pset around 12:00 am. Most of us still had one whole problem left (out of three), and a few parts from other questions. Let’s just say we are not very fond of the professor right now for that class. He is teaching the second half of the course, and it’s all completely theory now and it makes no sense to anyone. Our book is not helpful, so I went to the library to get a better one. The library didn’t have the one I wanted, but hopefully I found a good substitute. We’ll see how studying goes tomorrow with it.

So, last week was not very fun. The good thing is that this weekend is CPW, which I will write about soon, so the next entry should be much more positive :-).

Annoyances and Bad Things about MIT

2007-04-14T12:41:00.000-04:00

It is slowly getting warmer in Boston. We didn’t really have a bad winter, but it has been in the lower forties and thirties lately, sometimes even higher, which means that spring is coming soon! I’m glad, since the last few months have been frustrating at times. Although I wish I had more people visiting my blog, like the official MIT bloggers, there are some pros about not being associated with MIT. For example, I have much more leeway to talk about the cons of MIT.

I did ok on my first batch of tests. As I said earlier, hardly anyone finished the 10.301 test, and I ended up doing above average on it (the average was 37), so that was good. I got a 96 on my first 5.310 lab, so hopefully that trend will continue. So far 5.310 is getting easier, we don’t always stay the full four hours in order to finish everything, which is extremely nice. 8 hours of lab per week is a lot of time. My first 10.213 test was not good at all, the average was 47 (but the prof was aiming for an average of 65—oops), and I scored below average. I was extremely frustrated because I know the information well, but coupled with some stupid errors and really harsh grading (hardly any partial credit, which I am not happy about) meant my score was not very good. I’m going to try and get the test re-graded, and hopefully I’ll be able to get some points back. My HASS class is going fine, I keep improving after each story so hopefully I’ll be able to get a good grade in that class.

I’ve been getting frustrated with homework grading lately (for both 10.301 and 10.213). I don’t feel like the graders are giving very much partial credit. There were some parts to certain questions that I got zero credit for, and I know that some of the stuff I wrote down was correct. How much sense does it make to give someone the same grade as a person who did not even attempt the problem, especially if not all of it is wrong? Homework is not a huge part of the overall grade in my classes, but every little bit helps. In the meantime, I’ll keep doing the best I can on the psets, and if this grading trend continues, I may go speak to the professor! It is not a good feeling when you spend hours on a pset and then come to find you get no credit for some of it.

What are some other things I’m not happy about? This semester I am not having as much fun in my classes. I still enjoy 10.301, and 5.310 is ok, but I am not a huge fan of 10.213. The professor is a solid lecturer, nothing special, but she does explain things pretty well. My qualm does not have much to do with her. I’m just frustrated because the way the material is presented, it is not very practical. I want REAL problems, not a bunch of partial derivatives and calculations. Some of the stuff they give us is just plain busy work. The frustrating part though is that many classes at MIT are like this. I’ve seen it in other classes too. Some stuff is just too theoretical. Theory is all good and fine, and sometimes I find it quite interesting, but when I’m learning something like thermodynamics I want something more applicable. Don’t get me wrong, I think learning the theory behind something is very important, but do they have to present it in such a boring and mathematical way? I was very happy when one class, our prof pulled out a fire extinguisher and told us about expanding gases, and she also did a very good lecturer about refrigeration, so why can’t more lectures be that way? It’s so much easier to understand the information when you can relate it to something in real life. Unfortunately, this doesn’t happen just at MIT, it happened in high school and I know it happens at other colleges. I just think it is something that could be improved in general. Even though 10.301 can also be abstract and difficult, I find the problems are interesting, sort of like 8.022.

So I think that some of my classes could definitely be less theoretical and more practical. Overall though, I still really like MIT and I know I’m getting an amazing education and will be able to solve tough problems.

Anyways…that’s my rant.

Published At Long Last

2007-04-14T12:39:00.001-04:00

My research paper has finally been published in the Journal of Chemical Education! It's in the May issue, and is available online now. My paper was accepted in the winter of 2005, so publishing takes a while. I started the process in the fall of my senior year of high school. The first time I submitted it, the paper was rejected, but then I edited it and sent it in again the next fall.

Go to the JChemEd website to check it out!
http://www.jce.divched.org/Journal/Issues/2007/May/abs842.html

I don't think you can read the paper without a subscription, so if you want to read it, go here and you can download the pdf under the "Downloads" section:
http://www.sciencebuddies.org/science-research-papers/tlc_analyzer.shtml

Chocolate pancakes

2007-04-11T09:44:00.000-04:00

This is very random, but on Monday there was a study break and they had chocolate fondue. And pancakes and french toast. Eating pancakes and french toast with chocolate and syrup is heavenly. You should try it.

I'll do more updates later about how my life is going at MIT. This is a busy week, with two psets, a paper, a test, and my prefrosh for CPW comes tomorrow too!

Spring Semester 2007 Classes

2007-03-12T11:06:00.001-04:00

Here are the classes I am taking this semester. I'm taking 48 units. I’m really starting to get into my major!

10.213 Chemical and Biological Engineering Thermodynamics [K. K. Gleason]

This class expands on 5.60 (Thermodynamics and Kinetics) from last term. It seems very similar to 5.60 in that a lot of the stuff is not presented in a very exciting fashion. The professor is very friendly and nice, and when she lectures I understand her, but that doesn’t make the 1.5 hour lecture twice a week easy to pay attention to. A lot of this stuff is just so mathematical that it seems they have forgotten the practical aspect of it. We’ll see what the class is like as the semester goes on. I have my first 10.213 exam tomorrow!

10.301 Fluid Mechanics [P. S. Virk, W. M. Deen]

This class is very interesting so far. Although a lot of it is just “plugging and chugging” numbers, each equation has a very definite practical application (such as pipe flow or drag on a plane). Professor Virk is very amusing and his hand outs for each lecture are extremely helpful. Professor Deen just started lecturing last week, so I’m not sure what to think of him yet. This is one of my favorite classes this semester. The information we are learning is different than other things I’ve studied, so maybe that is why I enjoy it. I just had my first test in this class last Thursday, and it was extremely long (although the questions were not that difficult) and hardly anyone finished. I felt like I understood the information well though, so we’ll see what happens with that.

5.310 Laboratory Chemistry [J. L. Schrenk, M. D. Gheorghiu]

This is just your basic chemistry lab course. Some of the labs have not been very exciting, but now that I’m getting used to everything in the lab the 4 hour lab periods are not so bad. Other than lab reports, the class does not take a lot of time. We have a lab report due about once every month, and they are around ten pages. I actually like writing up the lab report, possibly because my previous science research gave me experience with the research process. There are two lecture exams in this class and we have one small quiz for each lab. And then we have the lab reports. I turned in my lab report last week, but we haven’t gotten anything back in this class yet, so I have no idea how I’m doing, which is somewhat frustrating. The TAs seem to be slow graders, but at least they are helpful in the lab itself.

21W.757 Fiction Workshop [J. Diaz]

I love creative writing, so this class is fun for me. It involves more work than most of the other HASS classes I have taken. We are averaging about one story (about 7 pages) every other week, and we have reading assignments and must critique other people’s stories each week. My professor is extremely eccentric and funny, which makes the class a joy to be in. After a long day I feel like I just want to go home and sleep, but I find that this class keeps me awake and alert. I think my writing will improve a lot this semester, since he is a tough grader. I highly recommend taking one of Professor Diaz’s courses if you enjoy creative writing.

Big Winter Update (Finally)

2007-03-11T22:36:00.000-04:00

Now it’s finally time for my update on what happened during winter break! I went home after finals and enjoyed spending time with my family. We had uncles, aunts, cousins, and grandparents at my house for the holidays, so it was crazy but lots of fun. I saw a few friends while I was back home, but I mostly relaxed. I got a Nintendo Wii for Christmas, and I’ve been playing the Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess. Gus is actually way ahead of me in the game now, which is amusing considering I had a lot of break to play it and he did not. I even got my grandparents to play Wii Sports, and I think they had fun too!

MIT gives you all of January off, so you get 1.5 months of vacation. This January period is called “Independent Activities Period” (IAP). During IAP, you can take classes (for credit or not), and it is just a great time to hang out with your friends with no stress. To see some of the offerings for IAP, check out this website: http://web.mit.edu/iap/overview/index.html.

During IAP, I searched for internships, hung out with my friends, attended a few seminars, did a short class, and just relaxed and had fun in general. I have summarized a few of the things I did below:

-Mystery Hunt! The annual mystery hunt is a big tradition at MIT. It is a huge puzzle competition and lots of people take part in it. The team who wins gets to organize the next mystery hunt. Some of the puzzles are really hard, and others are easy. It doesn’t matter if you are bad at puzzles or not, because some of them just require you to know something really random, like the name of a song, or a movie, or something. Many people stay up really late working on puzzles each day (it’s a weekend with hardly any sleep). The Simmons “Lego my Ego” team (remember that Simmons looks like a huge waffle) did pretty well this year, we didn’t win anything, but we were far from being last. Below is a picture of the white board used to display answers people had gotten.

-Seminars: I went to a few lectures about searching for internships. I also went to one on science writing. They had four actual writers (who were all related to MIT in some way) in the industry come out and talk about their jobs, so that was cool.

-Storytelling and Games in the Digital Age: This was a week long class that involved a lot of effort, but was also a lot of fun! Sony puts on this workshop for students and we got to design a video game (and when I say “design” I mean we come up with ideas and present them, we don’t actually create a videogame). We had to come up with an already existing franchise and make a game out of it, and then we did a presentation at the end. My group designed a game from the Twilight Zone, and it was in the adventure/horror genre. We stayed up a pretty late a few nights trying to finish everything. Our presentation went well the last day, although we didn’t win the competition. The team who won had a Beatles game that was very creative. I had a lot of fun and I’m glad I did it, even though it did take a lot of time. A pic of my team is below:
-I also went to a Boston Symphony Orchestra (BSO) concert during IAP with Gus. The music was pretty good. I love Beethoven, and Schoenberg was good, although I just don’t like the sound of his music as much as other types of music.

It was also my birthday in February (I’m 20….which is kind of strange). We had celebrated Gus and Annelise’s birthdays in December, so we had quite a few birthdays within two months of each other. My friends threw a surprise party for me the day after my birthday, so it was a lot of fun. Below is a pic of the beautiful (homemade!) and delicious cake that Gus and a few of my other friends made me.

I think those are the major things that happened during my winter break. Sorry it took so long for me to write that up! I’ll do an update about my spring semester classes soon.

Sand Mandala and 300

2007-03-11T14:27:00.000-04:00

One of the reasons Simmons is a uniuqe dorm is because we have visiting scholars that live here for a short time (a few months to a few years). One of them in a Buddhist monk, and he and a few fellow monks used sand painting to create a mandala over the past week. I went to a lecture about the mandala on Friday and it was very interesting, and the mandala is beautiful. The mandala was displayed in the Simmons' Multi-Purpose Room, and it was ceremoniously destroyed yesterday afternoon. To see more pictures and learn more about what the mandala represents, visit this website.
http://web.mit.edu/metta/mandala/

On Friday night I also went out with a group of friends (my "lounge" group, sort of like a club made for going out and doing things). We went to an Italian restaurant in Boston and had a family style meal. They refill everything for free (although it is about $25 per person), but the food was soooo good. I was so stuffed afterwards!

Yesterday night I went out with a few friends for dinner and then we went to see the movie 300. It's by the same people who did Sin City, which I thought was a very well done movie and I appreciated its style, but I didn't really enjoy watching it. 300 is also very stylistic and it is about the famous battle of Thermopylae where a small army of Spartans (300 of them) fight to defend Greece against Xerxes, the Persian king. The imagery was very beautiful, and although the action was gory, it was fun to watch, much more fun than Sin City for me. The acting was pretty good, and the action was awesome, although some of the dialogue was a little awkward. I recommend seeing it if you want to have a good time and don't take the movie too seriously. Gladiator is still at the top of my list in terms of old war/action movies about Greece/Rome.

Random Hacks

2007-03-03T11:13:00.000-05:00

Earlier this year, there were two major hacks. On the day the Nintendo Wii came out (November 19th), the triforce was seen on top of the great dome. For those of you who don't know, the triforce comes from the Legend of Zelda video game series (my favorite game series!).

There was also a very amusing hack by MIT during the Harvard football game against Yale. The Harvard coat of arms on the score board was changed to read: HUGE EGO instead of VERITAS (meaning "truth").

Internship!

2007-03-03T10:56:00.000-05:00

I have been searching for an internship since the beginning of the fall. I interviewed with Exxon Mobil and Shell (and the interviews went well), but with no luck. It is tough being a sophomore, even a sophomore with a good resume. Determined to get an internship this summer, I rewrote my cover letter to make it especially great and sent it off with my resume to as many Intel people as I possibly could. I want to work at Intel because they are a great company and they need chemical engineers to work on making semiconductors (and I like electronics). I did get a response from someone, unfortunately he wanted me to work for six months instead of three, which would not allow me to graduate on time. I sent my resume to someone else at Intel, who forwarded my email to lots of different people at Intel. I got a few responses, and interviewed with one of them on Tuesday. I thought the interview went very well--and I was right! I got the job! I just found out yesterday morning that I have a job offer in Santa Clara, California for an environmental process engineering internship at Intel. I am so happy to finally have an internship. I haven't officially accepted it yet, but I'm pretty sure I will. I don't have a ton of details about the internship right now, but I'll post something on my blog when I know more. Does anyone else have any plans for the summer (or have something they would like to do?). Post your comments here.

Class of 2009 Ring Premiere!

2007-02-18T11:14:00.000-05:00

Part of MIT's culture that is recognized outside MIT is the MIT ring, affectionately called "The Brass Rat." Supposedly, it is the second most recognized ring in the world, (the first is the Super Bowl ring). MIT's mascot is the beaver, which is where the word "rat" comes from. Many alumni wear this ring, and it is one way people know you are from MIT. Students receive the ring the spring semester of their sophomore year, in other words, very soon!

On Friday the class of 2009 had it's "ring premiere," where we got to see the design of our brass rat. Each brass rat is slightly different, with special designs to evoke memories of what memorable things happened the first two years you were at MIT.

I'm very excited about my brass rat and will wear it proudly! Visit this link for more information, and to see pictures of our awesome ring! http://web.mit.edu/2009/ring/design.shtml.

I will do a larger update soon about my winter break and IAP, so stay tuned. :-)

Fall Term 2006 Wrapup

2007-01-24T13:55:00.000-05:00

I'm finally updating after a very long absence! This post will discuss the last few weeks of fall term, at least for academics.

I did very well on my last few tests, I even got way above average on my final 5.60 test, which was exciting! My finals went pretty well, but having four is not fun. I had 10.10 and Western Music on Tuesday December 18^th. On Wednesday, I had 6.001, and Friday, the 22^nd of Dec., I had 5.60. (I know, they are so close to Christmas! But the good thing is, you get two weeks off, and then you have all of January off for IAP, which I will discuss in another post). Most of them seemed to go fine. Unfortunately, I was not feeling very well for the 5.60 test, as I had a bad cold, which did not help me on the exam. But oh well, I didn’t end doing all that badly. I got an A in Western Music, so I was very proud about that! I was also very proud of my B in 6.001, especially since many students in the class have been computer programmers for years, and since it isn’t in my major.

I really enjoyed my classes this semester, although they did have their annoyances, which I will sum up below.

10.10 Introduction to Chemical Engineering [H. H. Sawin]

I learned a lot of Matlab for this class, which was good. Unfortunately, the psets take way longer than they should. I went to the help sessions Tuesdays and Thursdays after class, and that helped TONS. The TAs would answer questions and help us with the problems, and most importantly, Matlab errors. I’m not sure how good of an introduction this class was to chemical engineering, but I did learn about flow rates and such, which was interesting. I wish they would have gone more in depth with certain fields, so we could have a better feel for what being a chemical engineer is like. They did bring in lecturers from the department, which ranged from research in energy to biomedical, so those were very intriguing. We had a project at the end of the class, and I worked with two other people on it. We worked well together, dividing up the work, and we got a good grade on it in the end. I actually had fun working with them on it! All in all, this class was difficult, and often frustrating, but still fun.

5.60 Thermodynamics and Kinetics [R. W. Field]

This class was not too bad. The tests and psets were often long, but rather easy. I learned a ton about thermodynamics, and the material was interesting. Sometimes lectures were boring, but it was ok. I would have done really well in this class had I not felt poorly during the final, but at least I know I am well prepared for my chemical engineering thermodynamics class next term.

6.001 Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs [W. E. L. Grimson]

My roommate, Annelise, thought I turned into a programmer this term instead of a chemical engineer. It’s sort of true, because I spent so many hours at the computer lab for this class. This one was my toughest class, as I did well on the projects and homework, but not on the tests. It was tough for me overall, but it was one of my favorite classes this year. The professor was excellent, my TA (who is actually a professor as well), was amazing. I think I might have learned the most in this class, especially in terms of how to think. 6.001 is different than other intro programming classes at other schools because they teach you how to THINK about programming. The theory is that once you understand how to program in Scheme, you can learn other languages easily because you know HOW it works, not just how to program. I now know a lot more terminology for computers, and I know how to program. I loved this class, even though it was hard. I sometimes stayed up programming until 3 in the morning, and even a few hours before projects were due, and I had started them a few days, if not a week, before the due date. Some of the projects were very tedious and difficult, but they were still very helpful in learning the material. My favorite project was the famous “Adventure Game” which is based off of the Harry Potter universe. It was just text-based, but you could interact with objects and people, and cast spells and such. I implemented a humorous puzzle system in mine, and I also added health items and “bosses” to my game. I would definitely recommend taking this class, whether you’ve had tons of computer experience or not.

21.M011 Introduction to Western Music [M. Marks]

I also learned a lot in this class. I had the lecturer as my recitation instructor, and in some ways that was a blessing and a curse. I have never seen such an anal grader, but it did improve my writing. I learned a ton about music in this class, so much so that I actually recognize songs and styles just by listening to the radio, or an advertisement. When I was playing Gus’ Civilization IV game, they even had a song in there from the medieval period that I recognized, which I thought was really awesome! I can also go through most of my dad’s classical CDs and recognize composers such as Palestrina and Purcell. I found the lectures and recitations somewhat dry, but I learned so much in this class, so I recommend it!

All in all, this was a great semester, and I enjoyed my classes, even if I did feel like screaming IHTFP a few times :-).

Finals

2006-12-18T10:52:00.000-05:00

Sorry it's been a while since I've updated. I'm in the middle of finals now, and will be heading home this Friday! It will be so nice when the semester is finally finished, and I can just relax for the holidays. I'll do a huge update over break, so check back in a week and a half or so.

Fall Formal 2006

2006-11-09T22:44:00.000-05:00

Last weekend was the fall formal! Simmons, Next House, MacGregor, and McCormick put it on for the entire campus, so we got a few dollars off of the tickets since Simmons was a sponsor. The event was held at the Hyatt, just a few blocks from Simmons, so it was a short (but very cold!) walk. Inside the hotel MIT students had a large room all to themselves. Plus there was food, a live band, a DJ, and dancing of course. All in all it was an awesome party and Gus and I thoroughly enjoyed it. The weekend was actually rather momentous for Gus and I, since we went to the formal last year together, and it was one of our first dates :-).

Pumpkin DROP!

2006-11-05T23:26:00.000-05:00

I hope everyone had a great Halloween and ate lots of candy. Each year at MIT around Halloween, pumpkins are thrown off of the tallest building, the Green Building (Building 54 in MIT-speak). A huge crowd showed up to watch the event. Police are there and the whole building is roped off so no one gets crushed by the falling pumpkins. They threw off about 20 or so pumpkins and other forms of squash, which splattered onto the pavement below. There was even music in the background to make it more dramatic. Here are some pics of the remains of the pumpkins and Building 54:

Simmons also had a Halloween Carnival the same afternoon. Some of GRTs dressed up as characters from Nintendo’s Mario franchise, and their costumes were very creative. Unfortunately, I don’t have any pics. I didn’t dress up, but I do have a picture of me looking frightened underneath a giant spider.

Random Fun Stuff

2006-11-05T23:08:00.000-05:00

So, here's some random things I've been meaning to mention.

Think invisibility cloaks only exist in Harry Potter? Think again. Some researchers created the first cloaking device! http://articles.news.aol.com/news/_a/scientists-create-cloak-of-invisibility/200610190951099900 46?ncid=NWS00010000000001

One of my friends was on the front page of slash dot (a very popular, and somewhat nerdy news website about cool things). Dheera has a bunch of awesome stuff on his website, including a description of how he made a giant LED display in the windows of Simmons.http://hardware.slashdot.org/hardware/06/10/21/1249200.shtml. Being mentioned on slashdot is a big deal, so congrats to Dheera!

And, lastly, a really amusing Doonesbury comic because it captures the “spirit” of MIT. (And don’t worry for those of you applying, it really isn’t this bad here, you’ll probably only have a few days like this).

Meet the Parents: Parents Weekend at MIT

2006-11-05T23:06:00.000-05:00

We had a four day weekend at the beginning of October, and I went with Gus’ parents to Rhode Island. This was my first time meeting them, so I was a little nervous, but after the first few minutes I felt comfortable with them. We stayed with some of their relatives in Rhode Island, and did some sightseeing (although, not as much as I would have liked, since I had to do a 6.001 computer programming project). During one trip, we went to see some of the famous mansions that go along the Rhode Island coast. All in all, it was a lot of fun, and I’m glad I was finally able to meet Gus’ parents!

A few days later, it was Parents Weekend, and my parents came to visit! They sat in some of my classes, went to lectures, and hung out with me in general. They got to meet Gus’ parents too, and fortunately for me, it seems that our families are compatible with each other. On the weekend, we went to see the Body Worlds 2 exhibit at the Museum of Science, which was cool, but also disturbing (they are real bodies!). Check it out here: http://www.bodyworlds.com/index.html.

It was great seeing my parents, I’ve missed them over the past few months!

Zoo!

2006-11-05T22:48:00.000-05:00

A while ago, I went on a Simmons government retreat to the Franklin Park Zoo. The zoo was quite small compared to the ones I have visited, but it very quaint and cute. It was a nice break from studying, and we had a picnic in the park beforehand. During this retreat, we talked about how to improve social activities, dining, and many other things. I’m not officially part of the Simmons government, but anyone from Simmons could attend the retreat. Here are some pics (including a goofy one of Gus and I):

First tests of the semester

2006-10-22T23:25:00.000-04:00

My first tests did not go as I wanted them to. I didn't do horribly, but I didn't do outstanding either. I just had my music test last week, and I think that went well, but I have not gotten it back yet. I just need to adapt to these classes and now that the first tests are over, I know what to expect.

The last few weeks have been very stressful since I had three tests in one week, I had a 6.001 project I needed to do (and I met Gus' parents at the same time), and then my parents came for parents weekend, and then I had another test! This weekend I've had a bit of a break, even though I had to write an essay. But at least there are no tests next week!

I will give a more detailed update on all of these things shortly. I hope everyone had a relaxing weekend!

Career Fair

2006-10-22T22:06:00.000-04:00

MIT had its career fair in the middle of September. More than a hundred companies showed up to hand out tchotskies and talk to us about internship/job opportunities. I visited Intel, Shell, Procter and Gamble, General Electric, Baker Hughes, IBM, and many others. I handed out my resume to each of them, and I will apply to some of these companies to try and get an internship for this summer. Since I’m a sophomore, it will be harder for me to get an internship compared to upperclassmen. Here is a funny (but actually quite accurate) representation of the MIT career fair (it is from Volume 125, No. 41).

For a list of all the companies that showed up, go here:

https://career-fair.mit.edu/secure/student/

3 Tests!

2006-09-30T17:49:00.000-04:00

I have three tests next week, so I'm studying a lot this weekend. Check back next week for a blog update!

An Awesome Hack (Fire Trucks Anyone?)

2006-09-12T08:26:00.000-04:00

MIT has a "hacking" culture. For those of you who do not know, "hacking" is another word for "pulling a prank." There are a number of other meanings, too (like exploring buildings, etc.). So, at MIT a prank is called a "hack." There are acually many rules for hacking (people have to be respectful, and most people are), so most of the hacks are actually very well done and do not disrupt the flow of the university.

Yesterday on the morning of 9/11 (say a prayer for all of those who were affected on that terrifying day), a fire truck appeared on the top of the Great Dome! Not a full-fledged one, mind you, but a large truck nonetheless. A similar hack was pulled quite a few years ago with a car, and it is one of the most memorable hacks in the Institute's history. (Update) It was verifed in The Tech (MIT's newspaper) that the hack was to commemorate the 5th anniversary of 9/11. A painted seal on the door states "Meminimus" which is Latin for "We remember." There are also toy dalmations sitting on the outside of the truck. The hack has been getting quite a bit of publicity lately. It was supposed to be taken down from 10-11 today, but it was still up at 3:30. I think this hack will be remembered for a long time to come.

To read the Tech article, go here: http://www-tech.mit.edu/V126/PDF/N37.pdf
Here are some more pictures of the hack: http://web.mit.edu/liz_b/Public/DomeHack/domehack.htm

MIT Ranked 1st in Engineering by USNews

2006-09-12T08:20:00.000-04:00

This was announced a few weeks ago, but I never discussed it. MIT moved up in the USNews college rankings from #6 to #4 overall (of course we all think it should be #1) and was ranked 1st in Engineering!

U.S. News: http://www.usnews.com/usnews/edu/college/rankings/brief/t1natudoc_brief.php
MIT Article: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2006/usnews-undergrad.html

Go MIT!

New MIT website!

2006-09-09T14:44:00.000-04:00

I just finished making a new website about MIT! It has a FAQ and lots of other things to explore. Go to http://www.mit.edu/~avihess/ to visit it!. The website is called Smoots: Student Life At MIT and it aims to provide information to prospective students, incoming freshman, parents, and other people curious about MIT.

Fall Term Classes

2006-09-08T17:17:00.000-04:00

Classes started on September 6th! It is strange that school is starting up again, but I know I feel much more comfortable than the new freshman. This term I am taking four academic classes (with a total of 51 units, most classes are 12 units each) and an exercise class (running at 7 in the morning!). I am Course 10 (Chemical Engineering), so I’m taking two chemistry/cheme related classes this semester.

10.10 Introduction to Chemical Engineering [H. H. Sawin]

This class has two psets each week. I really hope they don’t take a long time (I’ve heard the class is pretty difficult)! It introduces basic chemical engineering concepts using Matlab (a programming language). The lecturer so far seems great, I have yet to start falling asleep!

5.60 Thermodynamics and Kinetics [R. W. Field]

I’ve heard good and bad things about this class. I’ve heard it’s boring, and also interesting. I've also heard it is easy, but also hard. I suppose parts are interesting and parts are boring. I wanted to take 5.07 (Biochemistry I) instead, but the course 10 administrators changed when a higher level class was offered, so I need to take 5.60 this semester. It doesn’t seem bad so far…the first pset doesn’t look too hard.

6.001 Structure and Interpretation of Computer Programs [W. E. L. Grimson]

If you remember one class at MIT, remember this one (pronounced six-double-oh-one). 6.001 is 15 units instead of 12. A large portion of the student population is course 6 (Electrical Engineering and Computer Science), and this is the introductory class that all those people, and then some, take. Instead of focusing on learning a specific language, this class teaches people how to program in general, and how a computer language works, so basically, how to think like a programmer. It seems very good so far and I’ve heard it takes a lot of work but it is worth it. I wanted to take a course 6 class so I could learn more about computers and electronics, and I also wanted to keep my options open in case I don’t like chemical engineering.

21.M011 Introduction to Western Music [M. Marks]

At MIT 8 humanities (HASS) classes are required to graduate. This means you should take one per semester. I do not know a whole lot about music, although I took piano and drums when I was younger. This class will teach me about the vocabulary for music and how to listen and analyze music. It is fun so far! I enjoy listening to the Gregorian chants on the CD they gave us, it’s quite relaxing. The main focus of the class will be on Classical music, but right now we’re starting at the year 1000 A.D.

This semester looks the most challenging one yet, but also fun. I think I’ll enjoy all of these classes and learn many new things.

My Room!

2006-09-01T11:33:00.000-04:00

REX: Choosing a Dorm

2006-09-01T10:48:00.000-04:00

I’m finally back at MIT! I miss my parents but I’m very glad to see my friends again. Annelise and I have had a lot of fun planning our room and figuring out where to put our furniture (I ordered a rug, a little table, and a fridge before I came back, that’s how excited I was!). The past week has been very very busy, since it was Residential Exploration for the freshman. In order for me to come back to MIT early (school starts on September 6^th), I had to help out with REX. Gus is in charge of it along with his friend Nunu, so it really wasn’t a bad thing :-).

MIT is unique compared to other colleges because they give you a lot of control over where you live. Each dorm is very different, so you should look around thoroughly. Before arriving at MIT, the frosh receive information about all the different dorms and they rank all of them in order of preference. During part of orientation, they are put in a “temp” dorm (based on their preferences and a lottery that is held). REX started last Friday and ended this Wednesday. During orientation/REX, there are a lot of activities that each dorm puts on. This allows freshman to go around the dorms and decide where they would feel most comfortable. If they do not want to stay in their temp dorm, they have to enter a second lottery (the same as the first lottery) to determine their dormitory. Most people get one of their tops choices. Yesterday Simmons’ residents found out their permanent room assignments. Within Simmons, we also have another preference sheet so the freshman have as much control as possible over what room they get. On the preference sheet you have to rank in order of importance to you: curvy vs. straight walls, size of room, Cambridge side or Boston side, which floor, etc. You can also choose a roommate, but if you don’t have anyone to room with you can fill out a roommate preference sheet too.

Here are the activities we did last week for the freshman:

FRIDAY:
-In the morning, we greeted freshman at the entrance to Simmons, there were donuts!
- We took some frosh out to dinner. My group went to Royal East, a Chinese restaurant.

SATURDAY:
- In the morning, we greeted freshman at the entrance to Simmons
-We had a barbeque outside for lunch and there was a water slide (I got all wet because Gus threw me in it :-).
-There was a Star Wars movie marathon that lasted until about 4 in the morning. We started at 8:00 with episodes IV, V, and VI. Our plan was to watch Episodes I, II, and III after that but I guess people went to sleep after Episode I.

SUNDAY:
-The housemasters served brunch to freshman
-We tie-dyed boxers, thongs, and t-shirts in the afternoon
-We gave tours of Simmons to parents and freshman
-There was a water war between East and West Campus, but it was raining so I don’t think many people went.
-Fluorescent party (including a DJ and glow in the dark stuff!) and capture the flag in Simmons at night
-We served waffles at midnight along with ice cream and other goodies (mmmm soooo yummy!)

MONDAY:
-We went paint balling, it was awesome!

TUESDAY:
-We invited the freshman to do a 3.5 mile run along the river at 7:00 in the morning :-)

WEDNESDAY:
-Freshman know what dormitory they are staying in
-Simmons orientation, freshman met the different GRTs

THURSDAY:
-Simmons Mystery Hunt (puzzle solving competition!)

I had a lot of fun meeting the freshman and helping out with the events (I did almost all of them!). It was stressful at times but definitely worth it. We had a great REX this year thanks to all the Early Returns and Gus and Nunu!

Minor Planets and Huge Telescopes

2006-09-01T10:29:00.000-04:00

Before I left for MIT (which was on the 23^rd of August), my family planned a surprise for me. One of the science competitions I went to actually named “minor planets” after all the participants. A minor planet is similar to an asteroid. If you put “amberhess” in Google it will actually come right up. http://www.ll.mit.edu/LINEAR/winners_2005.html My “minor planet” is number 21431. Here’s some more information about minor planets: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Minor_planet

There is a place called “MIRA” (Monterey Institute for Research in Astronomy) near where I live. We drove up to the top of a mountain to visit the telescope they have there! It was so cool! The view was spectacular (the sunset was gorgeous), the telescope was huge, and I got to see my minor planet! I don’t have any pictures of the planet right now, but I should be getting some soon. When I do, I’ll post them!

In order to find “amberhess” we took multiple pictures using the telescope of the place we knew it should be. Since the other stars/galaxies and planets have such a larger orbit, they appear to be standing still. My asteroid orbits around the sun, and so the asteroid moves quite a bit in just a few minutes. So the bright dot that moves a bit from one picture to the next was my minor planet! Luckily there were not other asteroids in the area we photographed.

It was a very memorable experience and I thank my family and the researchers at MIRA for making it possible.

Sea Turtles and Beaches Galore!

2006-08-19T20:51:00.000-04:00

Going to Maui was a very relaxing vacation. It was a great end to the summer, and now I feel rested and very excited to go back to MIT. While snorkeling, we saw a lot of brightly colored fish and even sea turtles! The turtles were really cool, and they are huge! They can weigh up to 300 pounds! They go down among the rocks to have fish clean off the algae on their bodies and when they come up for air, they surface right next to you! We also went surfing (very small waves, since we are beginners). It actually is not very hard to stand up on a board. The beginners have much larger boards than advanced surfers (you should be able to use physics and/or common sense to figure out why :-).

I read quite a lot while I was in Maui. I finished George R.R. Martin’s A Feast for Crows (Book Four of A Song of Ice and Fire series). This one wasn’t as good as the last few (not a whole lot actually happens), but he still has a few more books coming out so hopefully they will be better. I also read Terry Pratchett’s Monstrous Regiment, which was quite amusing. It’s a great book to pick up if you want to read something that has depth, but is also rather silly. I laughed out loud a few times while reading it. At the same time though, Pratchett uses the humor to point out important issues about war, sexism, and everyday life in general. I’ve also been reading Democracy in the United States: Promise and Performance by Robert A. Dahl. It is a fascinating account of how the constitution was formed, and its effects today. Although the people who wrote the constitution were not almighty and no where near perfect, their insight into democracy was certainly unique, and the proof of that still stands today. No democracy had ever been placed over such a large area as the United States, and many democracies fail in general. I just find it so amazing that our constitution is still here, and hardly altered.

Hmmm….I have diverged a lot from my main topic. So back to Maui :-). We also ate REALLY good food while there. I had so much fish and pineapple! Soooo delicious. I think I was full every single night. And of course I can’t forget about the wonderful smoothies! One day we took a trip to Lahaina, a shopping area with tons of stores. My mom and I went through some of the more touristy stores and got pretty dresses. I got a mouse pad from David and Goliath (The Stupid Factory), a rather interesting store that has lots of random things to buy. My mouse pad says “How do you do this thing on?!” and it has a girl with pigtails holding pompoms. Since I go to MIT and I am relatively good at using computers it was rather amusing. I am a little tanner, but not very much (30 spf is not the best thing to tan with….), and I am now sufficiently relaxed.

I have so many things to do before I leave for MIT though, so it’s time for me to start packing! I leave on the 23^rd!

Maui!

2006-08-05T18:25:00.000-04:00

I finished my job at Agilent about a week ago. It was a great experience; I learned a lot about the working world and about biochemistry (more details on this later!).

Right now I am packing for a trip to go to Maui with my parents! I'm very excited! I can't wait to relax, read a lot, listen to my ipod, and sit by the pool. We're going to swim and surf and snorkel (such a strange word)!

It's so crazy that I only have about three weeks until I go back to MIT. I hope everyone has enjoyed their summer so far.

I will do more updates when I get back (which will be on the 14th), including lots of pictures!

PLEASE POST COMMENTS on my blog! I like it when people leave notes or suggestions. So far no one is posting anything except for Gus :-(.

Review of the 1st Year: My thoughts on MIT

2006-07-20T01:18:00.000-04:00

So, here’s the update you’ve all been waiting for (drumroll please)….what do I think of MIT?

Was it the right place for me? Is it the right choice for others? Read on to find out…

When I was looking at colleges, I never would have thought I would end up at MIT. I had heard so many bad rumors about it: the campus was ugly, the people had bad social skills and didn’t party at all, all the students did was work, everyone was depressed because it was so tough. But after being persuaded by my parents to visit MIT on our East Coast college tour, I became in love with it. The campus wasn’t as ugly as I thought it would be (it’s not like Princeton, but each building’s architecture is very unique and there are quite a few green areas…plus you are right on the Charles river with the Boston skyline in the background!). The people were so friendly; we must have had at least two people stop and ask if we needed directions. I also talked with a few alumni and current students, and all of them said that MIT was an awesome place, and even though it was hard, it was not impossible to do well. After visiting, MIT became my first choice!

Then I got in, which was a very exciting occasion. So after all that wonderful history about my life, I will finally tell you what my first year was like. Here is a list of questions I asked MIT students, and now I will answer them myself.

How much sleep do you get on average (can you get 8 hours of sleep)?

Most of the time, I averaged 7-8 hours each night. Of course there was one or two nights each week where I got only 4 hours or so, but it really isn’t all that bad. If sleep is very important to you, you can get enough sleep, it’s all about organizing your time. This was actually one of my worst fears about going to MIT. I get headaches if I do not get enough sleep (sometimes this happens with 7 hours!), and I the only time I got headaches in college was on weekends, and I think I only got two minor ones the entire year! So if I survived my freshman year, I think you’ll do just fine. Another thing that helps is that most classes do not start until 9 or 10 in the morning, so you can sleep in until at least 8 and still have a ton of time to get ready in the morning. The people who get hardly any sleep are the ones who start their psets the night before they are due and do not pace themselves. So don’t do that!

How much time do you spend doing homework?

This varies a ton on the class. For HASS classes, I definitely did not spend as much time on homework as I was supposed to. I did most of the readings and did all the papers, and I don’t think I spent seven hours per week preparing for class. For some of my science classes, the homework would take a very long time (seven hours or so), but a lot of this was because it was late at night and I was tired, so I was very inefficient. I studied at least four hours a day after school and a few hours on weekends. I would say homework takes at least thirty hours each week. At the same time though, those four hours of studying were often interrupted by friends dropping by and such, and I survived somehow.

Do you have time to do anything else except study? If yes, what do you spend your free time doing?

Definitely! Although on weekdays I would mostly just study, I still had time for all the essentials, and then some. I had time to eat dinner, take a shower, talk to friends, go to study breaks, and exercise. On weekends, even though I would do homework during the day (and not very efficiently sometimes I might add), I still had time to watch movies with friends, go to parties, go out shopping every once in a while, play video games, and spend time with my boyfriend. And Boston is right across the river, so we would sometimes go out to dinner or walk around Boston a little bit. I also have lots of friends who participated in sports everyday. So you do have free time as long as you manage your time well.

Are the classes totally impossible, or can you actually do well in them?

The classes may seem impossible at times, but with some effort you can do well in them (my GPA is testimony to that). And when I say well I mean you can get a B or an A. Lots of times the test scores will seem very low (50s and 60s are very often the average), but the professors scale them to benefit everyone (there are no bell curves that force some people to fail). If you spend time on the class and are serious about doing well, you will be able to. Sure, some tests you might study your butt off and still do badly, but the next test around you will probably have adapted and then you’ll do better. If you don’t slack off, you can do very well here.

One thing I’d like to emphasize: MIT IS NOT CUTTHROAT! Sure, it’s competitive here, but since there are no honors, rankings, or anything like that, people aren’t afraid to help each other. I often work with friends on homework, and people generally seem to WANT to help you with your studies. The person you end up competing the most against is yourself.

What is your overall experience with professors (do you think they are good teachers?)

Just like high school, you have good professors and bad professors, and good TAs and bad TAs. I’ve seen a very wide range. Many of the teachers I had were quite good, very interesting and enthusiastic, organized, and obviously cared about the students. Others were just okay, and some were terrible. Luckily I only ran into one terrible person. Overall I am happy about the quality of teaching here. Another nice thing MIT does is that they have you fill out an evaluation for the TAs and professors, and they put the results online. I’m sure some professors totally ignore the suggestions students give them, but others probably do listen. And it’s great since you can see online which professors are must-haves and which are ones to avoid.

One question that is also asked a lot is about the humanities. Since MIT is known for its engineering and science programs, aren’t the humanities left out? Actually, in my experience, my humanities professors have been very good. I enjoyed my classes, and although HASS classes do not require as much work as your other classes, I’ve found the teachers do not grade easily. You need to write a good essay to get an A, and A’s are not just handed out on a silver platter to anyone. MIT is not just science and engineering, the administration is very focused on creating well-rounded scientists/engineers that are able to communicate well. MIT has some outstanding humanities majors, specifically Economics, Political Science, and Management. Supposedly our creative writing program is also well ranked (I took a creative writing class and enjoyed it immensely).

What are the worst things about MIT?

There’s a big workload, and sometimes you want to scream “IHTFP!” (I Hate This F****** Place, see http://www.mit.edu/people/mjbauer/ihtfp.html). So if you come here, be prepared to work. It doesn’t matter if you’re a science stud and think you’re all that, whether you got 1600 (or 2400) on your SATs, if you won the international science fair or the international science Olympiad, you still have to work hard. Sure, there are a few geniuses here that seem to pick up everything they hear, but those are very rare. All of my friends are very smart, but they still have to work their butts off. Sometimes the workload does get to you, and if it does, take a break, and just remember that YOU chose to come to MIT.

Also, the weather was a big adjustment. Luckily this winter wasn’t all that bad, but it was still cold to me. The snow is fun, but I would much rather be in California. So it’s something to consider.

Even though MIT is a pretty big name school, there are lots of people who have never heard of it. That isn’t really what is important to me, but sometimes it can get annoying. I get “Michigan?” quite a lot, and sometimes, I even have to explain that there is more than one type of engineering than “engineering.” MIT does still carry around some bad reputation for depressed students and whatnot, and I’ve had a ton of people ask me if I feel comfortable being a girl there (it’s almost 50:50 male:female ratio now by-the-way). But that really doesn’t matter because I know the people that have heard of MIT are the ones that are going to give me and job in the future, and that is what counts.

What are the best things about MIT?

So many things, where to start?

I love the people here: I think almost everyone here deserved to get in. Everyone is smart, friendly and fun. MIT students are very enthusiastic and passionate about what they do, and they all have a drive to succeed. I love my friends so much! We all support each other in whatever we do, whether it is going to a concert someone is performing in, giving surprise birthday parties, and helping each other with homework. The upperclassman try to help, too, even if they may not remember what you are studying. I love how people work together on problem sets, and that MIT is not cutthroat.

I don’t feel like the nerd or the geek anymore like I did in high school, because everyone here is interested in having intellectual conversations and talking about crazy physics ideas or going over a strange math proof. It’s nice to finally feel accepted. At the same time, it’s not all “geeks and nerds” here either (see my response about that below).

I love how MIT challenges you but doesn’t kill you. How you feel like you’ve accomplished something just by finishing a pset. I love how I’ve gotten much better at managing my time. I love how MIT teaches how to be a hard worker.

Another thing that is great about MIT is how the administration is always looking at how to improve things. As I said before, students can fill out surveys about their professors, and the results are posted online. MIT is also trying to constantly change the way things are done in the classroom. Sometimes these changes are for the better, and others sound good on paper but do not work well. But the point is that the administration does care. The TEAL format of my physics class was one of these changes (and you can argue it was not well executed, but there are also positive things about it). Right now MIT is looking to change its General Institute Requirements, and they even had a student committee to give input.

I love how the administration is very approachable. Teachers and TAs often lead review sessions before tests, hold office hours (and they don’t seem to think it’s a pain). Even before I was accepted, the admissions officers were not stuffy in the least, and they actually seemed to care about me as a person.

I love how I’ve been challenged in new ways, and I love seeing how I’m improving each day. I love how MIT teaches you how to solve problems so that you can solve anything. I love how MIT education does not emphasize memorization, but understanding the general concepts and then applying them to much more difficult situations.

I love how we have a unique sort of school spirit. Our “brass rat” school rings are the 2^nd most recognized ring in the world besides the Super bowl ring, and any alumni will proudly show it to you and start talking about fond memories of pulling a prank, blowing up something, and how “that class was the hardest thing I’ve ever done in my entire life.” We have nerd pride, it’s true, and we aren’t afraid to show it.

I love how MIT has a reputation for being a “bootcamp” for science and engineering. I know that when I come out of this place, I will be able to do anything. You can’t get the same level of respect from people when they find out you went to MIT anywhere else (maybe Caltech….but honestly, why would you go there? :-). I know I will be very well prepared for life after college. MIT will teach me how to be the best engineer and person I can possibly be.

I love how there are so many opportunities at MIT. There are so many things to do: you can start your own research, join a club (or twenty), participate in a sport, do community service (or start your own non-profit), join the student government and change school policies…the list goes on and on. If you want to do something at MIT, you probably can. The possibilities are endless.

I could continue on, but I’ll spare you the text.

There is a rumor that most MIT students are depressed (the whole suicide rate thing), what are your comments on that?

To put this straight, MIT’s suicide rate is either the national average or below it (I’ve heard both). Either way, we are not ABOVE the average. Sure, MIT is stressful at times, but there is no need for people to become depressed. In fact, since a few years back when a student committed suicide and it was all over the papers, the faculty has taken depression very seriously. One time Annelise called the nurse about having a stomach ache, and when she mentioned something about being stressed out a little, they asked her all these questions about how she was feeling. Sometimes it can actually get a little annoying, but it’s nice to know that they do watch out for it. Our GRTs (the graduate students that look after us in the dorms), also come by often to see how we’re doing.

MIT wants you to succeed (and people do, we have a very high retention rate), and consequently there are lots of resources for help. Whether it be tutoring, office hours, talking to a GRT or psychologist, there is no reason to get depressed unless you let yourself. I love MIT, I’m happy there, and so are my friends. Of course we complain about the coursework, of course we get frustrated at times, but we still can’t imagine ourselves anywhere else.

So, how many nerds are there really?

This really depends upon how you define a nerd/geek. I consider myself a nerd. I don’t dress up in suspenders every day and talk in a high pitched voice, but I do enjoy learning things. Almost everyone here likes intellectual conversations, and we have lots of jokes about science and math, but there are surprisingly few people that have no social skills. I was surprised at how many “normal” people there were at MIT. Everyone is smart, but most people do not act “geeky.” But most of us do enjoy a good Star Trek episode or Star Wars marathon (excluding the prequels….at least for me :-).

Why should you go to MIT? Is it the right place for everyone?

You should go to MIT if you love math and science and learning in general. If you’ve ever felt alone in your high school for your love of Star Wars, physics, and other intellectual hobbies, then this is the place for you. If you were bored in high school and want a challenge, MIT is for you. If you want to go to the best school in the world for science and engineering, MIT is for you. And, if you want to meet some of the brightest kids in the world, MIT is for you.

If you slacked off in high school because you were really smart and could get straight A’s without any effort, and want the same thing to happen in college, you might not want to come here. If you want to party all the time in college, don’t come here. Geniuses who didn’t need to put any effort into high school often find MIT to be very difficult because they don’t know how to work hard. If you come here, be prepared to put in the time and effort. I don’t say that to discourage you from looking at MIT, it’s just something that people need to know. You will need to work hard, but that’s not all you’ll be doing. You’re going to be learning a ton of cool things, meeting awesome people, participating in amazing activities, and having fun in general. MIT isn’t a place where people study all the time. Sure, it takes up a lot of our time, but college isn’t college without other things too. You can have a balanced life at MIT as long as you are organized.

You probably should not come to MIT if you absolutely detest science. Although MIT does have some world-class humanities programs (economics, political science, and management in particular), you might feel a little left out of all the science jokes. At the same time, there are tons of niches for non-science and math people. So the choice is up to you.

If you think you are the best thing since milk and cookies, MIT is definitely not the place for you. We are very friendly and down-to-earth people (you have to be to survive here, since you'll be relying a lot on others to succeed). Of course we have a few people who think they are "all that", but almost everyone I’ve met at MIT doesn’t have a high opinion of his/herself. Let’s put it this way: don’t expect to be at the top of your class anymore. At the same time though (and as I’ve repeated a billion times), there are many ways to shine here, and it is not impossible to do well.

I love MIT, and I am so glad I came here. I can’t see myself anywhere else.

4th of July in Boston

2006-07-08T19:43:00.000-04:00

Being away from Gus from a month has been like going with out water. Okay, so maybe not that horrible, but I do miss him a lot! I guess it feels like losing your watch and not being able to have coffee when you have it every morning. Maybe that’s also a bad analogy, but I feel like something’s missing all the time, and I have this weird craving in my stomach, like I’m addicted to something and I’m not sure what (but a good addiction, mind you).

Luckily, I was able to go back to Boston and visit Gus (he’s doing research in the Media Lab). And even better, it was on the 4^th of July weekend!!!! I took the redeye flight out of San Jose and arrived in Boston at 5:30 in the morning. Gus met me at South Station (he was so excited to see me he stayed up all night :-), and then we walked back to Simmons. It was so great to see him! We had both been counting down the days before we would see each other. It seemed to take forever until it was finally June 30^th.

We walked around in Boston a little bit, saw Superman Returns (good movie, by-the-way), ate lunch along the river, played Nintendo (I brought back some of my Nintendo 64 games for him, including The Legend of Zelda Majora's Mask, so he was very happy, and we played Banjo Kazooie and then Gus showed me some old school Nintendo, like the original Legend of Zelda and Star Tropics), watched some crazy movies at the dorm, exercised on the treadmill, and had a romantic dinner (which included candles!!!). Aww my boyfriend is so sweet. Don't worry, I won’t bore you with all lovey-dovey details, but I will say this: I don’t think I’ve ever been so relaxed. I had the time of my life, and I will always remember it.

And how could I forget to talk about the fireworks?! Thousands of people must have shown up across the Charles River. MIT was flooded with people, and the Harvard Bridge was completely packed. Gus and I were on the MIT side of the river, and we had a spectacular view of the fireworks. They lit off so many it seemed like a large golden cloud had been formed. I’ve never seen anything like it! Boston is an awesome place to go for the 4^th of July because its history is a major part of

America

’s independence. Here is a pic of Gus and I and my lame attempt at catching some of the fireworks. Unfortunately I didn't take too many good pictures on this trip:

Now I’m back in California :-(, and I miss Gus again. I’m counting down the days until school starts and I get to see him!

Hope everyone had a great 4^th of July!

Agilent Internship

2006-07-08T19:00:00.000-04:00

I’m now about three weeks or so into my Agilent Internship. My parents own a small townhouse up in the Bay Area (my dad was always going back and forth for work), so it has come in handy for me because it only takes twenty minutes to get to work. I also enjoy the peace and quiet, although at times I do get lonely, which is when I call Gus. On the weekends I come home to visit my parents.

My work at Agilent has been very interesting so far, and I’ve learned a lot. We still haven’t started on the actual experiment yet, but everything is finally starting to come along. Agilent just moved into the Santa Clara site a few months ago, and they are still remodeling the buildings, so it took a long time for everything to get set up. Our machines appear to be in working order now.

The great thing about this internship is that I came in just as Viorica, my boss, was starting this new project. So I can pretend that I know just as much as she does….or something like that. We’re studying enzymes called Matrix Metalloproteinases (MMPs), which are in the matrix where cells are located. MMPs do lots of things, from eating away at collagen or breaking up other parts of your body. If MMPs go out of hand, recent research suggests that they play a role in arthritis, cancer, and many other diseases. Essentially, they are an important batch of proteins that are worth looking at. Viorica and I are going to develop a method to detect MMPs with an inductively coupled plasma mass spectrometer (ICP-MS). This particular machine allows you to determine the concentration of metal ions in a sample (which in our case will be blood serum), and MMPs are have a center of calcium and zinc. Want to learn how one works? It’s quite cool actually. Visit this link: http://ewr.cee.vt.edu/environmental/teach/smprimer/icpms/icpms.htm

At the moment we have been gathering a bunch of research articles to see what other people have done before us. No one has ever used an ICP-MS before to measure MMPs, so it’s rather unique. Soon though, we’ll start the real experiment!

I’m glad that I am doing an internship, it keeps me busy, keeps my mind working, and it’s fun earning money! I highly suggest you do something over the summer after your first year of college.

Family time! Bridesmaids Are Awesome

2006-07-08T15:12:00.000-04:00

A week after I saw my cousin Christopher graduate from high school, I went back to Texas again for his brother, Kyle’s, wedding. I’ve known Kyle’s wife for a few years now, so she already seemed a part of the family because the two of them were always together.

The wedding went so perfectly. Our dresses were pretty, Katie looked gorgeous, Kyle looked handsome, and our baby cousins Logan and Lucy (5 years and 3 years respectively), performed their duties as a flower girl and ring bearer adorably. It was so wonderful to see the family again, we are all very close. We always play a mean game of Pictionary (the best game ever created!) when we get together. The great thing about Pictionary is that you have to guess what someone is drawing, and since people think differently, there are a ton of amusing drawings. One of my favorites was Christopher’s drawing of “Scent of a Woman,” which consisted of a girl that had smells radiating from her body (including armpits). We were never able to guess it :-). Here is a picture of me wearing my bridesmaid dress. I will upload more once I get the pictures from my dad.

Summer is here: finishing finals, storing all my stuff, and saying goodbye

2006-05-31T19:31:00.000-04:00

Finals are over! I did well on all my exams, giving me a much higher GPA then I thought I would have. Somehow I ended up with A’s in everything except physics :-). So you can see that it is not impossible to do well here, and I’m far from being a genius (I thought I would get B’s or worse in all my subjects this term, just shows where putting in some extra effort gets you).

My finals were over quickly, but they were very crammed together. They started on Monday, May 22^nd and ended the next day. I had my two hardest finals, 8.022 (physics II) and 5.12 (organic chemistry) on Monday. 18.03 (differential equations) was on Tuesday afternoon. Luckily I didn’t have a final in my creative writing class. I finished much earlier than most people. My mom came out to Boston to help me pack up everything. I stored some of my things in the dorm, and some right down the street in a storage facility. There was actually plenty of room in Simmons (wish I would have known that before hauling some of my stuff down the street).

On Thursday I spent time with Gus and my mom, and we went for lunch in Boston, then in the afternoon we saw “Over the Hedge” at a movie theatre, it was entertaining and pretty well done. I would suggest going to see it. It was so sad saying goodbye to all of my friends, especially Gus. We'll all keep in touch over the summer.

Now I am finally home! Before flying back to California, we stopped in Texas for my cousin’s graduation. I’ll be flying back again next week for his older brother’s wedding.

I have an internship at Agilent Technologies this summer. I won the internship at the Intel International Science and Engineering Fair last year, but decided that I didn’t want to do it last summer. I’ll be working in a lab doing biotech/ chemical engineering specifically with cofactors and enzymes. My mentor even said that I would learn how to use DNA electrophoresis! I’m very excited.

I’ll be doing a write up shortly on my entire first year at MIT: what I learned, what I would do differently, and whether I would recommend MIT to others.

I hope everyone enjoyed Memorial Day weekend!

Spring Weekend: Steer Roast, Cake Concert, Piano Drop

2006-05-31T19:23:00.000-04:00

There were a few things I forgot to mention in my last blog entry. Two people from Simmons mud-wrestled during Steer Roast. Steer Roast is an annual party that Senior Haus puts on. They roast a giant steer, and it is a really unique party (definitely not for everyone). It was quite fun to see our friends get spattered in mud: a huge group of Simmon’s Residents showed up for the event. Click here for more info: http://web.mit.edu/senior-house/www/steerroast.html

After the wrestling, Gus and I went out into Boston for dinner. Surprisingly, we ran into Rajiv (Gus’ “cousin”) at the restaurant we chose (it was called Island Hopper). We had a good time chatting with his friends and pigging out.

Another annual event was held at Baker House: The Piano Drop. A piano is dropped from the top floor of the building, smashed into the pavement below. Unfortunately I got there just after they dropped it, but I did get a souvenir.

During Spring Weekend, there were a whole bunch of activities. Gus, Kaitlyn, and I went to see the band “Cake” perform in the athletic center. Amanda M. was on the committee to organize it. I’ve never been to an actual concert before (unless you count Bach concerts :-). The thrill of hearing a band perform live was very exciting. Cake had a lot of energy and they sounded great! The athletic center was packed full of people singing Cake songs and cheering for an encore. I’m definitely going to more concerts next year!

Last week before finals

2006-05-13T13:24:00.000-04:00

My hellish weekend is over! Last week I had a 5.12 test and two psets. The only things due next week are my two short stories, which I’ve already written and just have to edit. So it’s just studying for finals now.

I finally sent in the final version of my research paper to the Journal of Chemical Education! Hopefully they will not have many comments and it will be published soon (within the year). I was also able to compile my Matlab program, there are still some things that I need to tweak, but it does work.

I did well on my 5.12 test (103/100)!! The average was about 83. I also did well on my 18.03 test, getting about ten points above the average, which was 73 if I recall. My physics test did not go as well, so I’ll have to study a lot for the final. In other good news, my HASS teacher really liked my new short stories, so hopefully I will get a good grade in that class.

Two weekends ago Gus and I went to half of a sorority lip sync fundraiser. A bunch of annoying guys kept yelling and screaming stuff for most of it, so we left. After an hour or so of exploring the basements of MIT’s main buildings and going into mechanical rooms, we decided to go a bit higher….on top of buildings :-). We went to the top of the small dome and on top of Walker Memorial. The sky was clear, and we had a spectacular view of Boston (it was very romantic).

Last weekend the Massachusetts State Science Fair was held in the athletic center at MIT. Gus and I went to see some of the projects. Only the high schoolers were presenting at this time, the middle schoolers present in June. It was fun talking to the students about their projects--so nostalgic for me. I love science fairs! (my inner nerd is coming out :-).

This week there was the Electronic Entertainment Expo (E3) in Los Angeles. I’ve been keeping up with everything online. It’s exciting because the PS3 and the new Nintendo “Wii” system are coming out. If I have enough spending money I will probably get both of them. The PS3 graphics are amazing! The Nintendo Wii has weaker graphics than both the Xbox 360 and the PS3, but it has a really cool controller that allows you to point at the screen, making control easier for games. Plus I love Nintendo franchises like the Legend of Zelda, Mario, and Metroid.

Last night Kaitlyn had a wind ensemble concert, which Amanda, Gus, and I attended. She played very well! I also went to a party up on the 9^th floor for about 30 minutes last night, and then promptly went to bed.

This weekend I’m starting to study for finals. It’s been rainy and gloomy all week long, so I guess that is a good thing because I can’t go outside and distract myself from studying. Simmons is having a campus wide barbeque (indoors) tonight, so I will be helping out with that. Amanda M. is organizing it.

We are getting special 5.12 t-shirts! There is a little acetal “person” running up a beta-carotene molecule. Very amusing.

Stressful Weekend

2006-04-23T13:20:00.000-04:00

Last weekend was Amanda's Birthday so we threw a surprise birthday party for her. Once I upload pictures from my camera I will add some. I also went to "Masti" a South American Asian concert that had lots of dancing, skits, and singing. Rajiv (Gus' "nephew," a first year grad student), danced in it. All the students were very enthusiastic, it was a lot of fun to watch.

Gus and I went to church on Easter Sunday. I hope everyone had a great Easter! Since it was a 4 day weekend I was pretty efficient with getting work done, I studied a lot for my 5.12 test, which I got above average on (which was a B), so it was worth it.

This weekend however, isn't too fun. I have an 8.022 test on Tuesday, an 18.03 test on Wednesday, and a 5.12 pset due on Wednesday. And 8.022 is going to be very hard. I also found out that I got a really low lottery pick for my room next year (230....and there are 236 people total). Annelise got 215. Hopefully we will just room together and get a larger double than this year. We are really good roommates and great friends, but both of us are used to having our own room. We'll see what happens....but there probably won't be too many singles left after the upperclassmen pick their rooms. (Simmons has a lottery system for each class, sophmores are last). We were both really unlucky, as was Gus. He will still be able to get a single, but he was one of the last rising juniors picked out of the junior lottery. I hope everyone else is having a better weekend than me.

On a positive note however, my neighbor's that lived next to us before we moved visited me yesterday, and Gus and I went out to dinner with them. It was wonderful to see them! Their daughter is a sophmore and already starting to look at colleges. Visiting with them was a nice break from all my studying.

I just have to get past this week and then all I really have to worry about if finals!!!!

CPW

2006-04-14T18:42:00.000-04:00

Winter is now over I think! It has been gorgeous the last few weeks, nice and sunny and warm. I haven't needed a jacket or anything. When we got back from break, it was Campus Preview Weekend (CPW)! CPW is when all the accepted students come to visit MIT. I had sooooo much fun last year, it was one of the best weekends of my life. Annelise and I both hosted a prefrosh, so our room was a little full at night. We didn't get to see much of our prefrosh because they were out doing so many things. I helped set up a Karaoke night and Games night at Simmons, both of which went very well. I had so much fun singing my heart out with my friends and embarrassing people. Overall I think CPW went really well. There are so many activities for people to attend, I wish I could be a prefrosh again! Here’s just a sampling of what went on: http://web.mit.edu/admissions/cpw/schedule.html

On Thursday, a cannon appeared next to the Green Building. And not just ANY cannon. The CALTECH cannon--yes that's right, the official Caltech cannon that is like a mascot to them, found it's way to MIT. Some MIT students stole it, posing as a moving company. It was a very well done prank. They made a plaque for it, and they even made a huge brass rat (the MIT ring) to go over it. Everyone was talking about the cannon! Since Caltech and MIT don't have an official rival, we sort of pick on each other, especially since we're both technical schools. The reason MIT stole the cannon was because of last year's CPW. Caltech students came and put t-shirts in the free t-shirts pile that said "MIT" on the front and "because not everyone can get into Caltech" onto the back. The also changed the wording on the small dome to "The Other Institute of Technology," MIT retaliated by putting up "the only." Go here to see pictures of the cannon:

http://www.howeandser.com/

http://flemingcannon.com

Right now we have a four-day weekend, but I'll be studying for most of it (I have a 5.12 test on Wednesday and then I have 8.022 and 18.03 the week after that). At least it's still a four day weekend. I'll just study during the day and then go out and do things at night.

Spring Break

2006-04-14T09:05:00.000-04:00

After my second round of tests, which I did much better than the last ones (but can still improve), I flew back to California with Gus. I think he was nervous about meeting my parents, but it all worked out. My parents liked him and we had tons of fun. I showed Gus around Carmel, went to the beach, walked around Cannery Row and went to the Aquarium, and we drove by the coast. Then on my last day, I visited my high school and said hi to people there. One of the juniors is going to ISEF this year, so I talked with him about it, he should have a blast! It was very amusing because while we were at my house we watched Meet the Parents and Meet the Fockers--Gus had never seen them before, and didn't want him to watch them before we left for fear he would be afraid of ruining his chances with my parents. It was nice to have a break from school. When I got back to MIT, I had to finish up a story for my HASS class, hopefully the teacher will like it!

First Tests

2006-03-17T22:41:00.000-05:00

I’ve bravely traversed across the fiery pits of despair (my first tests) of the semester. I was frustrated because my speed is not as good as it was before. I need to practice doing problems quickly again, because I wasn’t able to finish any of my tests (although other people also had trouble, but I especially affects me because I’m a slow test taker in general). 18.03 and 5.12 were not too bad, but not finishing affected my score, and I could have done much better.

My most difficult test was in my hardest class (not surprisingly). The 8.022 test was one of the hardest exams I have ever taken in my entire life. The average was a 49….I was ecstatic just to pass, and I even got average! Which means that I am average in a more competitive class with more intense students. I am proud of myself, and if I study harder, I can be above average!

So, in summary, I need to get back into practice with my test taking. This weekend I am going to do practice problems as fast as I possibly can, and I’ll be efficient in studying so I can maximize my scores.

I really like all of my classes so far. What I said earlier about them has remained true. My 8.022 psets take forever, and are very challenging, but I feel so good when I get a problem by myself.

Two tests and a pset next week, and then I’m free!

Happy Saint Patrick's Day!

2006-03-17T21:29:00.000-05:00

Remember how it was my birthday a few weeks ago? Well I never finished what happened during my birthday week! Not only did my friends surprise me with dinner and decorating my room, they also threw a surprise party for me that Friday! I was getting a little suspicious because they kept disappearing randomly and Gus kept making up excuses like “they’re umm…making cookies….” and “I need to go meet with friends to practice our role-playing game…” It was a lot of fun and I was definitely surprised. I got homemade cake and we danced to music late into the night. My friends are awesome!

For Valentine’s Day, I cleaned Gus’ bathroom (three guys sharing a bathroom….can you even imagine—or maybe you don’t want to—how awful that was?). They were very appreciative though, and now it isn’t gross anymore…at least for a little while. I figure that my present was practical and since it was disgusting it means I care about him….or something like that. I also made him breakfast. Gus surprised me during Valentine’s Day by having the Muses (an all-female a capella group, you can hire them to sing for your sweetheart the week before the big day) serenade me during my 8.022 lecture. Then we went to dinner over the weekend at Harvard (gasp!).

I helped Annelise with a Quiz Bowl Tournament one weekend. I had to be a score keeper. For the first round, I was pretty bad (I totally screwed up the score….and it was embarrassing), but then for the other rounds I didn’t screw up at all, and I became pro! I just needed some practice.

In the meantime, we had one of our friends, Jongjin, dress up like a girl. He actually wasn’t a bad looking girl….kind of funny. Annelise and I have also been working on Simmons’ I3 Video. MIT sends videos of each dorm to incoming freshman so that they have an idea of what all the dorms are like. It’s been fun filming things around the dorm and getting people to do weird things for the camera. I think it will be pretty good when it’s done, and we were recruited at last minute to do the entire thing! Next year if we start earlier, it will be even better.

Only one more week until my spring break! Everyone else has spring break this week, so I will miss everyone when I get back. :-( Gus is coming with me to California, so it will be amusing. I’m sure (and I hope) that my parents and him get along. This weekend I am studying for two tests I have next Wednesday (18.03 and 5.12).

Happy Saint Patrick’s Day!

Tests Ahhh

2006-02-27T14:18:00.000-05:00

I have two tests on Wednesday for 5.12 and 18.03, so hopefully I do well! I will update with more news later.

Spring 2006 Classes

2006-02-10T18:13:00.000-05:00

I’m taking four classes (48 units, for 12 units each) this semester. You are only allowed to take more than 57 units if you get sophomore standing, which can be read about here: http://web.mit.edu/firstyear/advisors/advyear/sophstatus.html. Annelise got sophmore standing and one of my other friends did as well, so they are able to take 5 classes. I didn’t want to kill myself especially since I’m thinking about getting a UROP, so I decided against it.

5.12 Organic Chemistry I [B. Imperiali and B. Berkowski]
This is the class that doctors hated in college and most students fear. Annelise LOVES organic chemistry. So far, the lectures have been very enjoyable. Two women are teaching it, one will teach the first half of the semester and the other will teach the last half. Both of them seem very energetic, which I am thankful for—I have stayed awake in lectures! Lectures are interesting and easy to understand, the professor speaks clearly and I look forward to going to class. During our first lecture, they both emphasized how they wanted to make Ochem as fun and non-stressful as possible, because so many people have bad experiences with it. Hopefully it will be fun!

8.022 Physics II [G. Sciolla]
Since TEAL physics (the type I took last term) is sort of annoying, and I wanted a challenge, I decided to take the more advanced version of 8.02 (Electricity and Magnetism). I really hope I don’t die. Annelise and Kaitlyn are also taking it, so I have a study group. The professor for this class is also energetic, she seems to be good. This will probably be my most challenging class besides 5.12.

18.03 Differential Equations [H. Miller]
This class seems pretty standard so far. I really wanted Professor Mattuck to teach it (I’ve heard he is a great professor), but no luck. I’ve been able to understand the lectures and the prof doesn’t put me to sleep, but he isn’t “exciting” either. I’m happy because my kickboxing teacher from last semester might end up being my TA! She’s very enthusiastic and is a great teacher (her name is Hoho).

21.755 Writing and Reading Short Stories [S. Lewitt]
I enjoy creative writing, and I’m really sick of analyzing books after all the English classes I’ve taken in highschool and last semester, so I thought I’d try this class. It is well organized (weird for an English teacher) and it looks like we will actually be covering HOW to improve our writing, which is wonderful. Most creative writing teachers seem kinda of flimsy, this one got her undergraduate and PhD at Yale, so maybe that’s why she is not.

After the first few weeks have gone by, and I’ve taken a few tests, I’ll give a more detailed description of my classes and what I think of them.

It's My Birthday! And IAP is over :-(

2006-02-08T23:06:00.000-05:00

It’s my birthday today! I turn 19! Wow, in one year I will be 20, that’s pretty crazy. Gus made breakfast for me today, and then my friends decorated my desk and bed with a happy birthday sign and streamers and glittery ribbon. Gus also bought me flowers :-). After people got back from classes, Gus called me to go “play DDR,” but we actually went to dinner with friends at an Irish Pub called Azguard. I feel so appreciated!

IAP is now over :-(. Classes started yesterday and so far everything is going well. I will talk more about my classes in the next entry.

Annelise came back from Italy. She had a great time but was happy to be home. That night we went to a science fiction movie marathon in 26-100. We saw Serenity (very good, especially for fans of the series!) and Twelve Monkeys (really really bizarre, but good). I was falling asleep during Twelve Monkeys, which made it even stranger than it was. My last week of IAP consisted of trying to finish up lots of things, but not really getting anywhere. My GRT is still trying to help with my Matlab program, so my research is not completely ready to submit yet. I also had sorority recruitment from Wednesday to Sunday. (I know what you’re thinking---why on earth would a girl like me want to join a sorority?). At MIT, sororities are different than other schools. Whereas a stereotypical sorority has lots of parties and the girls don’t get much work done, MIT sororities are dry and they are more like a network of friends. I would never even think about joining a sorority at another school. Throughout the week I visited the 5 sororities at MIT and talked with the girls. Each day you are invited back by fewer and fewer sororities, until you end up with one or two that want you in their group. After it was almost over, I decided that a sorority wasn’t for me (I didn’t want to put too much time into it and I felt it was lame to pay to meet people every week, I already have a close group of friends and I can make other friends easily). If you want to learn more about sororities though, go here, because they are very different at MIT and you should at least check them out. http://web.mit.edu/panhel/www/recruitment.html

Last weekend Amanda, Gus, and I decided to go to the Galleria (mall). I still had to drop off my defective speakers at UPS, so we (meaning mostly Gus), hauled the package around Kendall Square for a long time. We were sent on a wild goose chase trying to find the UPS store. When we were FINALLY in the right area, we had to go all the way around the building to get to it. Guess what!? It was closed!!!! Gus called his graduate student friend (who has a car), and after pleading with him (and bribing him with a free dinner), he came and picked up the package and we drove to the Galleria. We had wasted almost two hours trying to find the UPS store, so we didn’t have much shopping time. It was very fun because we went into stores and forced Gus to try on clothes. We made him buy $15 jeans at Old Navy (great deal, isn’t it?) and then he tried on a $140 outfit at Express for Men (pic below).After this torture, we decided reward Gus by going to eat at California Pizza Kitchen. All in all we had a good time and now have a funny story to tell people (although, I don’t think others really find it very exciting….oh well). The last day before classes Gus and I went to Target to buy school supplies. It took us a little while to get there, but at least we could take a series of buses and not walk outside in the cold (although, we still can’t complain much about the weather). Afterwards we went to the COOP to get books.

I wish it were still IAP, but I have definitely had a long enough vacation. Hopefully this semester won’t be too hectic.

IAP=Fun

2006-01-27T12:55:00.000-05:00

I’m almost done with formatting my research paper! The other large step is preparing the computer program I wrote for my project. Luckily, one of the GRTs (Graduate Resident Tutor) in Simmons is helping me. I have been attending special lectures, too. The whole point of IAP is to explore, since there are so many classes and lectures of varying length, it is really easy to do this. I went to an hour long class about Athena, our computer system at MIT. I don’t know much about it, and I learned some basic commands at the session, which was good. Gus knows a lot more about this (he is Course 6 afterall), so perhaps he can teach me more about it. I also went to seminar on “Teaching Engineering to Kids,” where we played around with Lego Mindstorms kits (you can build robots and program them to do certain actions), it was extremely fun. We had to build a little car and then figure out how far to let it run so it didn’t run into a group of figurines. There was also “Taming the Borg: Design Principles for Transparent Use,” which was a very long, but interesting, seminar about how to analyze consumer products and make them better. (Like looking at a cell-phone case and finding all it’s annoying qualities and how to improve it). Then I also went to a seminar on teaching kids about science.

For the past week I have been attending 6.091 (Hands-On Introduction to EE Lab Skills--
Introduction to basic EE and components and lab techniques: resistors, capacitors, inductors, integrated circuits, power supplies and more. Hands-on experience constructing simple projects, using multi-meters, oscilloscopes, soldering, and other construction techniques.). Our final project is to build either a motion sensor or a digital lock. I chose the lock, thinking I might be able to find a good use for it somewhere (although after some more thought I realized the sensor would be better, since I can’t see the door from my desk, and sometimes if my music is too loud I can’t hear anyone either). I have learned so much in just a week! It would be better to have the class be longer and get more repetition and more detail on all of the components, but that’s okay. The class has an hour long lecture and then lab afterwards. The professor is very easy-going—all we need to do to pass the class is attend one lecture and attempt one of the labs! I’ve been to all of the lectures and I’ve done the labs too. So from 2:00 to about 6:00 in the evening I’ve been an electrical engineer! Gus helped me out one day, and instead of being impatient at how slow I was at stuff, he asked me questions so I would better understand what was going on. He even tried to trick me (that or he had a temporary lapse), into placing a piece into the electric board incorrectly, but I told him he was wrong :-)! My last class is today.

Next week is sorority recruitment. I would never even think about joining a sorority at another college, but this is MIT. Frat rush was tons of fun, so I hope sorority recruitment is on par.

I’ve been ordering lots of things online lately, so we have new things in our room! For Christmas, I got new speakers. They are Altec Lansing speakers, and sound very nice. The first set I ordered had something wrong with them, so I ordered a replacement, and they work fine. Gus and I were trying to figure out what was wrong with them, since the subwoofer had a very loud buzzing sound coming from it that was not the normal 60 hertz buzz from the electricity. If there wasn’t a warranty on it, we would have opened it up and taken a look inside. Since I was running out of room on my bookshelf, I ordered a cheap one off of Target that is working well. I also got a Sponge-Bob Squarepants shower curtain, which brightens up our bathroom considerably.

It’s been strange for the past week because Annelise is in Italy with the history professors I had last term. She will return on the 28th, just in time for a science fiction movie marathon! The room is sooo quiet, I miss her :-(.

I have really been enjoying IAP. All my friends and I have just been relaxing, watching movies, playing video games, going out to eat, cooking (which is fun with more people), sleeping a lot….you get the picture. Amanda M. introduced us to The OC (Orange County), and we’ve been watching the first season on DVD. We watched so many episodes in one day that Gus and I had the “California” theme song stuck in our head and could not take anymore! It’s a pretty good show, very soap-opera-like, but without the really cheesy acting. This weekend I hope to go out somewhere in Boston, maybe shopping, and then getting together with some Harvard friends. The weather is still very warm for January! It snowed again, but only for a day, and now it’s all melting. You can go out in a light coat and get warm…..very odd winter.

Finals, Christmas, New Years, and back at MIT again

2006-01-13T10:09:00.000-05:00

Weather.com said that it was 45 degrees today. That’s warm for January in Boston, but I actually think it was even warmer! I started overheating in my (non-winter) jacket and took it off when I was outside! Annelise and I even opened the window to let in some air. It’s been beautiful. I’m sure we will be getting more snow soon, but for now, I’m enjoying the California-like weather.

There’s an important announcement that I have: My research is going to be published in the Journal of Chemical Education!!! I found out just a little before finals. I’m sooooo excited! I’ve been working on this research for the past two years, so this is a great way to end it. If you want to learn more about it you can go to the right hand side of this page and click on some of the links there, I submitted my project in a lot of science competitions.

Finals went pretty well. They were difficult, but I must not have done too badly because I didn’t get any C’s for my final grades! I got A’s and B’s at my first semester at MIT, so I’m very happy, especially since I wasn’t even studying to my full potential! Technically it doesn’t even matter though, as long as you get a C or above you pass, and you get a “P” on your transcript. The physics final was frustrating because it did not test what we learned throughout the semester, only the last few weeks. Almost the entire exam was on angular momentum!!!! We never had a test on it and we only had a few homework problems on it. But it did not affect my grade in the class, so that’s okay. This first semester has taught me how important it is to be organized and manage my time well. I did this in high school, but it is much harder in college. There are so many distractions! I’m used to having my own room and not having anyone around except for my parents. Next term I will do a much better job organizing myself and I will also work more on weekends (something I did not do enough this semester). This is something that any college student must learn, no matter where you go to school.

Before finals, it was Gus’ birthday so we bought a cake and decorated the Schrodinger Cats lounge. We all had a great time dancing to music and being hyper.

The weekend that it snowed, Kaitlyn, Amanda M., Gus and I made a snow gnome. (Kaitlyn and Amanda bought a gnome who they named Ralph, and so they decided to honor him with a snow sculpture). Then we had a snowball fight and buried Gus in the snow. We also saw Narnia at the theater with Andrew and a few other friends, which was cool. I read the books when I was little, but I didn’t remember them very well. Before we went I reread The Lion the Witch and the Wardrobe.

After finals were over I was soooo happy! Annelise and I jumped up and down. Right after our Greek History final ended, we went Christmas shopping at the COOP (the MIT bookstore, associated with Harvard’s book store). Then we danced around to music in our room, relieved that we could finally relax. Our shower was clogged, and it was gross to have water wash up to our ankles and flood into the rest of the bathroom, so I went and got some Draino, which solved the problem quickly. The drain was very disgusting!

I was so excited to go home! My parents and I had a very nice Christmas. I got a new digital camera (A Nikon D50, 6 megapixels!), and I got money for computer speakers (now Annelise and I won’t have to listen to our tinny laptop speakers). Our Christmas tree was real, but it looked sort of like a pipe cleaner. We have a high ceiling in our family room, so my mom wanted something tall, I guess there were not many trees left. All my relatives got MIT related gifts, but they seemed to enjoy them well enough. A few days later we traveled down to Southern California to visit my Aunt Uncle, and two cousins. My grandparents were visiting them, too. My grandpa always makes all the girls jewelry for Christmas (he's a mechanical engineer, and can do pretty much everything he sets his mind to); we were oohing and ahhhing over them. Great job Grandpa! I got to test out my new camera, which was fun. It’s a very nice camera, easy to use. My dad’s Nikon D2X (12 megapixels!) is similar, but mine is smaller and less of a hassle to carry.

After going back home, I just relaxed. I’m finally caught up on Lost and Desperate Housewives. My mom got a Tivo for her birthday last August; I really like it. The entire setup is extremely easy to use, the only problem I had with it was recording things to DVD. Sometimes I thought the DVD was done burning, but it wasn’t really. Lost is getting extremely exciting! Desperate Housewives is also getting interesting. I’ll have to catch up again during the summer.

New Years Eve I hung out with Amanda B and her roommate Steph (she came out to visit). We wandered around Carmel and had lunch on the beach. It was soooo pretty! Luckily I have the skyline of Boston at MIT, so I don’t miss the ocean quite as much. That night my family went over to Amanda’s house and had this ginormous (a new word that people are starting to use quite often, it’s a combination of “gigantic” and “enormous”) crab! Very yummy. We played Pictionary which is always funny since people cannot draw. When New Years hit we pulled a bunch of party poppers and had confetti all over our hair.

I went to two Stanford Men’s basketball games while I was home. I’ve been going to games since before I was born :-). They won for both of them! The team isn’t very good this year, so we’ll see if they improve. I met up with an MIT alumni named Alissa. Even though she is an adult with a PhD and she runs her own company, we connect so well. I suppose it’s because she is the generation after my parents. It was a lot of fun chatting with her about my experience at MIT.

Now I’m finally back in Simmons! It was great seeing all my friends. I gave Annelise a hug when she came through the door. Gus was nice enough to pick me up at the airport (we’re going out, by-the-way). I’ve been working on my research paper, formatting the text and images. I love IAP!!! It has been so nice not having any stress. I hope you all had a great holiday!

Getting prepped for finals!

2005-12-11T23:14:00.000-05:00

I made it back to MIT safely after Thanksgiving and I have been studying furiously these past few weeks. I have finals on the 19th-21st. I can't believe the semester is almost over! Then it will be Christmas and IAP (we get the whole month of January off, it stands for Independent Activities Period). I'm very excited! I will update with more things after finals are over with. Hopefully they won't be too bad.

Thanksgiving Break

2005-11-26T13:44:00.000-05:00

I'm finally home for thanksgiving! It almost feels like I never left in the first place. I've lived in CA for so long that it feels natural to be here. I am enjoying spending time with my parents and being in my old room. The past few days have gone by too fast! I can't believe I leave tomorrow to go back to MIT. I have homework to do on the plane....some "break." I also noticed that finals are only in a few weeks! At least I've been relaxed. Some old high school friends are coming to visit me in a few minutes, so I'm excited to hear what they have been up to these past few months. Hope everyone had a happy turkey day!

Elephants, Parties, and Rubber Ducks: The Past Month

2005-11-25T19:10:00.000-05:00

So I am finally updating about the past month! Wow, so many things to talk about. This update will focus on all the fun things I have been doing, and then the next entry will be about school.

A few weeks back I went a party at Wellesley, which was quite fun. I went with Amanda B and some friends from Phi Sig. Getting to Wellesley was quite an experience. It turns out that you need tokens in order to use the bus, and all the places that sold tokens near MIT were sold out. Amanda and I were frantically calling people to find out if they knew what we could do. Luckily one of our friends from Phi Sig had a car and we ended up driving there. The traffic was insanely slow (Fenway had a game that night), but we made it eventually. It was awesome because I saw my “bestest best” friend Maggie (I’ve known her since I was a baby) and Ilang, a good friend from my home town, who both go to Wellesley. My friend Peter from Harvard was also there. This was my first official college party and it was a blast. I had a great time dancing and talking with people. After the party I got lost trying to find Maggie’s dorm, but we found each other after a half hour of wandering around and I got to meet her roommate.

Maggie and I at Wellesley

After the party we drove back in the car to Phi Sig. Everyone was still pretty wide awake so we proceeded to watch Super Troopers until about 5:30, and at that time most people were falling asleep. Then we went to Dunkin’ Doughnuts for breakfast and then it was back to Simmons to sleep. I had told Annelise I’d be back around 3, so in case she woke up before I got back, I left her a text message on her cell phone. At first I was going to have it read “I’m staying over at Phi Sig”, but seeing as how we still didn’t know each other that well, I instead wrote “staying with friends, be back in the morning.” (I didn’t want her to get the wrong impression of me :-). That was an awesome weekend even though I was tired the next day.

Random Phi Sig people sleeping

Annelise and I went to see the Ig Nobel lectues. This is a spoof of the Nobel Prize, it is for research that is just really random and funny. We got to throw paper airplanes at the speakers and when their 5 minutes were up everyone was allowed to ring their cell phones, so that might tell you a little about how goofy the atmosphere was. To see more information, go to: http://www.improb.com/ig/ig-pastwinners.html

One night I went out with Amanda M and Amanda B and her friends to see Just Like Heaven. Cutest movie ever. We really liked it, but the guys that came with us went to see Serenity though :-(. Afterwards we trudged through the pouring rain and went to eat at Uno’s (not the pizza place though, a different restaurant). When we got back Amanda M and I proceeded to watch Pirates of the Caribbean but were too tired to finish.

A great thing about MIT is that you get quite a few long weekends. These are called “Student Holidays” but to joke about the rumors and difficulty of MIT people call them “Suicide Prevention Days” (remember, this is jokingly, many people think that MIT students are always depressed and that a ton of suicides happen all the time---this is not true!). We took advantage of one of our five day weekends to go out shopping (I got new earrings!).

One of the most random things that happened the last month was that elephants walked down Mass Ave right in front of Lobby 7! The circus was in town and as a tradition the elephants walk to the circus though the streets. Very very cool! There were a bunch of people waiting for more than two hours to see them, and luckily I had a long time before my next class.

Elephants!

My parents came and visited me during Parents Weekend. It was really great to see them (I couldn’t believe it had already been more than a month and a half!). I have been fortunate not to be homesick. I took them to the science museum and also to my chemistry class. We also went to an acapella concert (MIT has a bunch of really wonderful acappellas groups—I have some of their CDs). Some of the names are really funny, for example, the “Logarhythms” is a popular all-male group that is very entertaining. It was a very relaxing weekend and I had fun spending time with my parents.

For Halloween MIT has yet another quirky tradition: the “Pumpkin Drop.” Pumpkins are thrown off MIT’s tallest building—the Greene Building—to explode into tiny pieces when they hit the pavement. The same weekend there was a Simmons Halloween dance. There were only about seven of us dancing, which was sort of sad, but we had a great time anyway.

Me with wings at the dance party

It was very exciting because a student from my high school, Michael, came to visit MIT. Amanda and I persuaded him to apply, and after talking to us he even said MIT had become his first choice! I hope he is accepted!

Another funny thing that happened this past month dealt with rubber duckies. Simmons’ strange architecture lures many architects to visit our dorm (they are only allowed in with a guide). One of the pieces of art we have is a ying-yang pond area. To make the area a bit more fun and welcoming, students have a tradition of putting rubber ducks into it. Unfortunately, a woman that organizes the art on the MIT campus, thought that there were altering the artist’s original meaning. We actually had a meeting with her (complete with pink peeps, save the ducks T-shirts, and duck-crossing signs). Luckily she agreed that we could keep the ducks in most of the time as long as they do not affect the sculpture in any way. We argued that this is our home, not a tourist attraction, and perhaps we could remove the ducks for architect tours. Right now there is an official duck committee that is in charge of making rules for the ducks. Really random….isn’t it? That’s MIT and Simmons Hall for you.

The Schrodinger Cats lounge went to see “Proof” a few weeks ago. It is a very good movie about an insane mathematician’s daughter and how she might be insane too. We appreciated a lot of the nerd jokes and MIT references. You should go see it!

I can also officially say that I saw the first snow of the season!!! One Sunday I saw white flakes drifting from the sky and got very excited. Annelise and I quickly grabbed our coats and ran outside. It only stuck to the grass, but we were able to eat a few snowflakes. After that day the weather became warmer again, and we have not had snow since. Hopefully this means we will have a relatively mild winter! The snow was gorgeous, a white blanket across the field outside.

Eating snowflakes

The last thing I want to discuss is the Star Wars Musical I saw last weekend. It was HILARIOUS!!!! They used songs from so many different musicals it was insane! There were even references to movies, like The Princess Bride and Pirates of the Caribbean. Our favorite line was from the Empire Strikes back, when Luke is battling Vader and is about to tell him he is Luke’s father. This is a reference to The Princess Bride when two men are battling each other with their left hands to be modest. When both realize that they are right handed, they switch hands.

Luke: I know something you don’t know.
Vader: And what is that?
Luke: I’m not left-handed!
Vader: (Cuts off Luke’s hand). You are now!

The show even had tap dancing storm troopers….how could that not make you laugh? I am soooo glad I went to it even though I was swamped with work. That’s what pass/no record is for, right?

Rearranged Room

2005-11-20T17:41:00.000-05:00

Annelise and I wanted to reconfigure our room when we first moved in. Finally, the facilities staff in Simmons helped us do it! Now my bed is lofted by my closet on the right and four drawers and a bookshelf on the left. We have a little sitting area where people can hang out with two chairs and a "table" (really Annelise's plastic box with pretty towl on top). My desk is now under my bed, so I have my own little cubby hole :-). We also moved our fridges to the corner of the room. Now when you walk in it is a very narrow hallway, but then once you get past that it is all bright and large! We are very excited. I put up two Stanford Basketball posters under my bed and an ISEF poster. We also have a Star Wars poster near the front door where my closet was earlier. It looks very nice, and we have a lot more room.

Kaitlyn and Josh enjoying our new setup.

Harry Potter!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2005-11-19T17:55:00.000-05:00

I went to see Harry Potter and the Goblet of Fire on Thursday night! In order to do this, I stayed up until 4 on Wednesday finishing psets, but it was sooooo worth it. Most nights I go to bed around 12-1 and wake up 8-8:30, so I'm still getting plenty of sleep.

Ilang, Amanda M, and I took the T to Boston Commons to see the midnight showing. There were Harry Potter fans all around us! (In order to show her spirit, Ilang wore a black pointy hat with the Hogwarts' symbol on it). The movie was very well done and I enjoyed it. Each movie the acting gets better. The director had to cut a ton out from the book, but he kept in the most important things. It was very fast paced, the dialogue was spectacular (very funny and even sexual....which is why it's PG-13), and the visual effects were really cool. And I must say, the guy who played Cedric Diggory is HOT (see for yourself http://imdb.com/gallery/ss/0330373/11r.jpg), truthfully, a lot of the people in the movie are really cute. It's so much fun to see a movie with fans because they clap, scream, "Ohhhh," "Awwww," and a lot of other things through out the whole movie; it just makes it more fun. Unfortunately, we missed the first 5 minutes because the theatre people screwed up the reel, but it was still okay (the crowd was VERY mad about that...). We were shoved into the movie, but once we got into it we all forgot about the blunder. After the movie we took a taxi home and went to bed around 3:30. Luckily I didn't have class until 1 the next day, so I was able to sleep in and finish my chemistry pset. It was strange seeing a movie on a school night, but this is college, and I got all my work done!

Yesterday I watched Casa Blanca with Amanda M and Annelise, and then we bugged our friend Dan who works at desk. I went to bed around 12:30 to make sure I could be efficient this weekend. Sunday we are going to see the Star Wars Musical, which should be entertaining.

Beauty

2005-11-17T03:20:00.000-05:00

Most people do not think MIT is beautiful. Compared to Princeton or Dartmouth, there isn't much competition, but MIT has it's own beauty.

Today I had a meeting with the writing tutor for my HASS class (she has to sit down with every student and talk to them about their paper). The meeting was all the way in E51, which is about 10 minutes past the Great Dome, which means it's about a 20 minute walk from Simmons. At first I was annoyed that I had to walk so far, and I was worried that the weather would turn nasty. It was windy outside but not cold. But as I walked to and from E51 I realized how amazingly beautiful MIT is. The wind swept through my hair and pushed me gently, making me feel like I was flying. The leaves swirled around me, making intricate patterns. The Charles river and the Boston skyline were to one side, the Great Dome to my other. Absolutely gorgeous sight! I felt like I was dreaming.

This is the true MIT, the one most people would look right past and never see. I am so glad I came here, I love this school.

Fall Formal. Dance the night away!

2005-11-15T23:10:00.000-05:00

I am writing up a very long post that I will post during Thanksgiving break but to tie people over until then, I will tell you about our Fall formal. We had a three day weekend!

Simmons and a few other dorms put on a very dressy formal dance last weekend. It was a ton of fun! We got to get all dressed up. I asked a sophmore named Gus to the dance. Annelise and Kaitlyn went together since they both have boyfriends (Kaitlyn was the guy, as can be seen with her hat). Amanda and the very tall (6 feet 9 inches!) Adam went together. We all had a great time dancing and talking and getting hyper off of coffee (all the food was gone by the time we arrived and the only free drink besides water was coffee). The hotel where it was held was very ornate and pretty.

After the formal, which ended around 1 am, we went back to Simmons and watched the movie Hackers (hilarious for MIT students, it was very cool). Then we went to bed around 4.... It was an awesome time and I think everyone had fun.

(Left) Gus and I. (Right) The girls all dressed up! (Kaitlyn, me, Amanda, a friend, Annelise in green)

The gang afer putting on some more comfortable clothing.

The next night I watched Fight Club with some people and Ilang came over. That is a really bizarre movie, but very good. Then on Saturday night I watched Harry Potter and the Prizoner of Azkaban with Amanda B and our friend Jason. Then we watched music videos, very fun.

It has been a bit stressful the last few weeks, but Im staying sane and looking forward to thanksgiving break.

Enjoy the pics and I will have a HUGE update soon.

And totally separate....HARRY POTTER AND THE GOBLET OF FIRE COMES OUT THIS THURSDAY....OR RATHER FRIDAY MORNING AND I AM GOING TO THE MIDNIGHT SHOWING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! SO EXCITED!!!!

Haha, updating....yeah

2005-11-07T02:45:00.000-05:00

Oh I 'm soooo sorry I haven't updated in a while. I promise next weekend I WILL update! It's a three day weekend so I don't have any excuses. The past few weeks have been very busy for me and when I actually did have free time I completely forgot about my blog.....so yeah, I will update next weekend.

Update soon!

2005-10-25T23:35:00.000-04:00

Sorry I haven't updated in a while. I promise I'll update soon! Check back at the end of the weekend.

Classes

2005-10-09T00:40:00.000-04:00

I’m taking four classes this term, plus an advising seminar. At MIT, everything is referred to by number. We love numbers at MIT. All the buildings are numbered, all the courses are numbered, and we use the numbers all the time. For example, many of my lectures are in 10-250. This means building 10, 2nd floor, room 250. Each course has a number (5 is chemistry, 8 is physics, 18 is mathematics etc.) I’m thinking about majoring in course 10, which is chemical engineering. Many people (about 23%) major in course 6 (electrical engineering and computer science).

So far I have had a steady workload, but I still have some free time. I actually don’t mind the work too much. I’ve noticed that having a positive attitude really helps things. It depend upon the class how long each problem set (pset) takes me. I spend most of my nights doing homework, but I’ve been able to take almost a day off on the weekend (not last weekend however, as I had a paper and a test to study for). I’ve been able to go to bed around 12 and wake up at 8 (my earliest class it at 9, and sometimes I don’t have class until 12 or 1!). So getting sleep is not a problem if you pace yourself. Waiting until the last minute to do things is definitely NOT a good idea. If you come to MIT, prepare to work your butt off. So far though, it’s really not that bad. I’m enjoying myself even with the work. The first semester at MIT is pass/no record, so all you have to do is pass all your classes and you’re fine! It’s a great help in adjusting to MIT and college life in general.

At MIT there are a certain number of core requirements you must complete to graduate. These include:

-2 semesters of calculus (18.01/18.02 or 18.012/18.022 or another variation)
-2 semesters of physics (8.01/8.02 or 8.012/8.022)
-1 semester of biology (7.012, 7.013, or 7.014)
-1 semester of chemistry (5.111, 5.112, or 3.091)
-8 Humanities classes

For each class, if the number is a 1 after the main course number, it is the first level. (After taking 8.01 physics I will take 8.02 physics). In general, introductory classes with a higher number than 1 after them mean that they are more challenging. For example, I have a few friends in 8.012, which is pretty much the same curriculum as 8.01 physics, but they give you harder problems. Same for 18.012/18.022. Annelise is taking 18.023, which is the same as my class but with practical applications, supposedly it is a little easier, but that is open to debate.

Chemistry 5.112:

I’m taking 5.112 (five-eleven-two) which is the advanced introductory chemistry class. The psets for this class are easier than the ones for my other classes (partly because some of it is review, and partly because I seem to have a knack for chemistry). I think this pset only takes about 3-4 hours for me to do. I have one pset per week. The teacher for 5.112 is really enthusiastic and she’s easy to understand. It’s nice because they give you the lecture notes before the lecture, so you can just add to them and actually pay attention to the professor. I have three lectures per week and two recitations per week with a graduate student. So far I have found the TA to be helpful in the recitation.

Physics 8.01:

For physics I’m taking 8.01 (eight-o-one). This is the basic physics class for mechanics (8.02 is electricity and magnetism). I really like physics so far. The physics problems are challenging on the psets, but they are not impossible. I have fun doing the homework because the problems do more with things in real life. We have one pset per week and also problems online twice per week (they are in a program called Mastering Physics). My AP Physics B class was great preparation for 8.01, since most of it is review. Our classroom is really cool because there are screens all over the walls so that the professor can be viewed any way you are seating (there are many round tables throughout the room). We do many experiments with the help of software, and we also have challenging problems to work on in class every Friday.

Multivariable Calculus 18.02

Since I received a 5 on the AP Calculus BC test, I placed out of 18.01 and I am taking 18.02 (eighteen-o-two). This is my hardest class at the moment since everything is new to me. I’ve found that reading the textbook before going to lecture greatly helps me absorb the material (this is good advice for any high school or college class in general). The last two psets probably took me around 10 hours each (for the most recent pset, I spent an entire night trying to solve the last problem by myself…..I should have asked someone for help. I got it eventually though). 18.02 is interesting and I am glad I am challenging myself by taking it. Many people opted to take 18.01A which is an accelerated course that leads into 18.02A. They cover the same material, but they review some single variable calculus and finish the class during the January independent activities period (IAP).

The Ancient World: Greece 21H.301

You have to take about 8 HASS classes (humanities arts and social sciences) in order to graduate at MIT. This equals one per semester. I’m taking a Greek History class. I always loved Greek myths as a child, and so this class is fun for me. We are reading ancient texts such as Herodotus and Thucydides and the Iliad. Both Herodotus and Thucydides are actually quite easy to read, and they are very interesting. The HASS classes are supposed to be easier than your other classes, and I’ve found that the reading does not take me very long (I’d say at most three hours per week). I have to write four seven-page papers though, which I’m not looking forward to. I love reading, but I don’t generally like analytical writing about literature.

The Magic of Magnets Advising Seminar

At MIT there are many types of advising:
-Traditional advising. This is regular advising, you have an adult assigned to you and you meet with them every so often
-Residential Based Advising (RBA). Certain dorms have RBA. This is similar to regular advising there is more of a community atmosphere, so it is more social.
-Advising seminars. You are assigned an advisor and you meet as a group each week to discuss a certain topic. In this way you get to meet more people and you get to learn something.

I really like my advising seminar. My advisor is very enthusiastic and funny. He wrote the book we’re reading: The Magic of Magnets. I would suggest that anyone interested in learning more about science should read it. Even if you do not have a strong science background, it is easy to understand. You will learn so many things, like how a VCR and TV work, how we get electricity, and a myriad of other things you probably did not know about magnets (they don’t just sit on your fridge, we depend on them for many things in our everyday lives!). Each week we have a short reading and writing assignment, so it doesn’t take much time. I have met some cool people and I am also learning a lot of really neat science, so I’m glad I decided to do the seminar.

I think that’s it for classes, at least for now.

Simmons: My Crazy Dorm

2005-10-01T03:30:00.000-04:00

Simmons is called the “Giant Sponge” and the “Silver Waffle.” Why? See for yourself:

If you think the architecture on the outside is crazy, wait until I post pics from the inside.

I love Simmons. It is one of the farthest dorms from classes (about a ten-fifteen minute walk), but it is so worth it. It is located across the field from where all the other dorms, so we are sort of by ourselves. We have the most free food out of all the other dorms, we are the newest dorm, and the people are really cool. Although some people say that since Simmons is new, it doesn’t yet have a personality, I disagree. We have our own quirkiness and social atmosphere. There is a large variety of people: we have jocks, studiers, partiers, East Campus-like people, and of course, all of us are nerdy is some form. Our pride in Simmons unites us. Simmons isn’t a party dorm, but we do have social events, which I will describe later. In general I would say we are all relatively laid back: we work hard, but we also have fun. My Graduate Resident Tutor (GRT) is really sweet. She keeps giving us study breaks! Amanda (the girl from my school) is also in Simmons, which totally rocks.

Simmons is on the west side of campus. There is also the east side of campus. East and West both have stereotypes associated with them. East Campus pulls all the pranks and is considered the stereotypical nerdy student residential area whereas west campus people are more “normal.” And I would like to emphasize that normal is relative at MIT. To make it more confusing there is a dorm called “East Campus” on east campus or “EC” as we like to call it. When people refer to East Campus they are normally referring to the dorm.

I really like my roommate, Annelise. We are so perfect for each other it is scary. We have the exact same computer, the same lamp, and some other objects that I can’t remember, we also like to go to bed early and get up early, we both get headaches if we don’t get enough sleep, and we are both moderately neat, the list keeps going….etc. Annelise is really into anime and chemistry. She plans on being a Course 5 (Chemistry) major. Although she is from a small town in Minnesota, Annelise does not have a Minnesotan accent. We have been getting along really well so far. My two other good friends are Amanda (a different Amanda than from my school) and Kaitlyn who live in the temporary room we had during orientation. Amanda is from Philadelphia and Kaitlyn is from Maine.

Our room rocks! Since we are on the 6th floor we have a great view of the football field and the Boston skyline. We have 18 windows in our room! Crazy isn’t it? That’s Simmons for ya, tons and tons of windows. We also have our own bathroom that is right outside of our door. This means we have to clean it, but it’s not like people really clean public bathrooms, right? So it will be way cleaner than most bathrooms! I actually enjoy cleaning, since it is a break from studying and it looks (and smells) nice when you are done. We have lots of colorful thing in our room, and even better, everything matches! My bed is red/orange/green and Annelise’s is purple and blue. We have a very bright carpet by our beds that ties all of these colors together. I must say that our decorating skills are brilliant! :-). Annelise brought posters, so we also have a wall covered with various pictures.

Annelise's bed/wall. Our closets.

My lovely desk and bed.

Our many windows, and the view from our room. The other dorms are across from us.

Our front door and pantry/fridge area

Simmons has its own dining hall. We have to pay for every item we eat, but everyone who lives here gets a discount, so it’s not too bad. On the first floor, there is also a little café. There’s no breakfast or lunch in the dorm, so I’ve been eating power bars and milk for breakfast and I make my own sandwich for lunch (there are places to eat on campus but I enjoy being in my dorm room). Simmons is unique because it has a “Lounge” system. Throughout each floor there are lounges spread about. These are used as study areas, but some have kitchenettes and TVs. Certain lounges have a group associated with them. For example, I signed up for the “Schrodinger’s cat lounge”. Here’s their description: “We're the superposition of study and lounge, work and play, pain and pleasure. Bring us your impossible problem sets and we'll feed you. Who knows, maybe you'll even get salsa lessons from or serenaded by some of our members.” (And if you want to learn more about what a Schrodinger’s cat is, go here: http://whatis.techtarget.com/definition/0,,sid9_gci341236,00.html)
The lounges are essentially like clubs. Each lounge gets $30 per person, so we get to go out and do fun things! We haven’t done anything yet but I’m sure we will soon.

Another cool thing about Simmons is that ANYONE that lives in Simmons can attend the government meetings. It is similar to a town meeting, where everyone gathers together to discuss issues in the dorm. We discuss anything from giving out money from the house funds for DVDs, brooms, hiking trips, etc. No other dorm has this unique government.

The day we moved into our final room assignments, Simmons had a mini “Mystery Hunt.” During Independent Activities Period (IAP we get the whole month of January off!) there is a week long series of puzzles that people stay up for days trying to solve. The people who solve the most get to organize the next year’s Mystery Hunt. We stayed up past twelve trying to solve some very tough puzzles. One of them Annelise solved because it was a beefed up word search with anime characters! After solving these puzzles, we had to use the answers to solve an even larger one. Our team did very well—we got second! This is what MIT is all about: problem solving. Once I come out of this place I will be able to look at an “impossible” problem and solve it.

More about classes will come later, so stay tuned.

The First 2 Weeks

2005-09-26T02:40:00.000-04:00

So much has happened in the past few weeks, I don’t know where to begin. I’m going to put everything into chunks: pre-orientation, orientation, rush, and the past two weeks.

Pre-Orientation:

I went on a red-eye flight from San Jose to Boston with my friend Amanda. At the airport, my parents were very well behaved. They did not kidnap me so that I could not get on the plane, nor did they sabotage any of the plane’s equipment. JetBlue is quite awesome I must say. Individual TV screens and the crew was very friendly. Everything was clean. And best of all—no layovers!

We arrived in Boston at 4:30 in the morning with maybe 2 hours of sleep. After hauling our duffle bags to another terminal, we waited for the MIT shuttle for almost two hours. It turns out that they thought it would be easier to pick us up at the JetBlue terminal (which makes sense), but we had followed instructions and walked all the way to the official meeting place. It took them a while to figure out that we had gone there. Somehow we were able to fit all of our luggage into the shuttle, and we finally arrived at MIT, exhausted.

Me dead tired at the airport. Not a pretty picture.

Before orientation starts, freshmen are able to choose a pre-orientation program. These programs range from camping, to sailing or arts. Mine was “Discover History in Boston” (DHB). During the program I met a lot of cool people. The first day we went the Musem of Fine Arts and the Boston Public Library, which was actually more exciting than it sounds. In the museum we saw many old Greek pots which all told a story, mostly about Troy. I met the professor who will teach my Greek history class, he is very enthusiastic. At the library we got to see the first book printed in America, as well as John Adam’s personal library (he annotated many of the books). It was REALLY cool to be in the same room with such old artifacts. That night we went to a “Hatch Shell” concert. The stage looks like a quarter of a sphere. The New Philharmonia Orchestra played some really fun songs, including the Sound of Music and Stars and Stripes Forever.

The next day we visited Salem, where the Salem witch trials were held. Everything has to do with witches in the town (there were sooooo many tourist shops that sold Halloween type stuff). The trials were very sad because so many were killed who were innocent. Much of it had to do with politics and not religion. The court system back then was very different from nowadays; there were a group of girls who claimed to be bewitched by certain men and woman in the town. They even started twitching and making strange sounds; this was taken as “proof” that the girls had been bewitched. Nowadays no one would be trusted for something like that.

Salem graveyard. Spooooky. Lowell linen machines.

We also went to a museum in Salem. My Pakistani friend, Saad, explained much of his history as we went through some of the artifacts. It is amazing how many different cultures were represented in the museum. There was also an old Chinese house that was moved from China and rebuilt there. I cannot believe that the Chinese used to bind their women’s feet!!! They would bind them in cloth and force them into small shoes so that they grew deformed; small feet were considered beautiful. If your daughter did not have small feet she would have a very hard time getting married.

Our last stop was in Lowell, a major milling town. We saw a lot of cotton weaving machines. Unfortunately, most of the information they had at the museum there was social, there was nothing how the machines functioned. We’re engineers! We want to know how it works. Oh well, it was still interesting. That night we saw a professional baseball game (low in the professional levels) with the Lowell Spinners. Lowell won. I really need to get into baseball—go Red Sox!!!

One of these nights some of the girls from DHB came over to Simmons (my dorm) and we played a very strange (but very awesome) card game called Mau. I’m not even going to try to explain it. It’s so crazy I will though. Basically, for each card you lay down, there are certain things you have to say for it. You play by suit and there are many rules (which you can add onto). For example, let’s say you put down a king of hearts. You would have to say “I love (insert something). He’s a nice old man….oink. A red rose.” (the “love” part is because it is a heart, and we also had to say an object that was red for any red card.) The funniest thing someone said was: “I love Orlando Bloom. He’s a nice old man….oink.” That was pretty hilarious….maybe you had to be there.

For our last day my friends from DHB and I traveled around to Quincy Market (good shopping), Boston Commons (very green and pretty), and Newbury Street (good shopping). Now I have gone to some of the most touristy places in Boston! Yay!

Orientation:

Orientation was pretty fun, too. Unfortunately, I was the only one in my group who showed up to everything, but that was ok. Some upperclassmen did a skit about drugs, sex, and alcohol, and it was very entertaining. There were also discussions about diversity (racism, sexism, etc.) and sexual assault, which was serious.

As for fun stuff: I can sum it up in one word, “orange.” MIT has special “secret” tours called “Orange Tours” that East Campus puts on. I don’t want to give much away, except I will say that the view on top of the dome is breathtaking. (“We are going to Baker House…..ermmmm we took a slight detour”). Let’s just say that East Campus has sort of a secret society that knows the underground (and rooftops) of MIT very well. If you ever get a chance to go on an Orange Tour, YOU MUST GO ON ONE!

Another night we went to East Campus to see the water slide that they build. Yes, they built a water slide. They also had lots of other strange contraptions, like a machine that spun you around and then there was a rope that they could attach you to and you could swing across some of the trees. Of course, it had to start raining, and we went inside. But then it stopped! And we watched some people spaghetti wrestle, evidently it is a tradition or something. Quite hilarious.

Spagetti wresting: a new trend?

At the end of orientation, there was a 2009 boat cruise. I was extremely tired, so I mostly sat on a chair looking really out of it and listening to my friends talk. I suddenly got a huge rush of energy off the boat though. My friend Ilang from Wellesley met up with me at the carnival afterwards. It was so good to see her. I also ran into my friend Mike from ISEF (International Science Fair).

Rush:

We got our class picture taken in front of the Great Dome. It was very warm sitting in the sun, and I got sunburned. Afterwards, rush started.

The Great Dome. (From the left) Annelise, Kaitlyn, and me.

I felt very ignored as all of the fraternities were trying to recruit guys for their house (sororities recruit in January). All of my guy upperclassmen friends could only talk to me for a minute or so and then their duty was to talk to boys. I hung out with Phi Sigma Kappa guys a bunch (I have upperclassmen friends there). One day we went to the beach (yes, there are beaches here! And they are actually similar to the one near me in CA) and tried to throw people into the freezing cold water. Phi Sig also had a “Cage Rave” party one night. We danced a ton. Phi Sig is really an awesome place, if I were a guy I would definitely pledge there. They have a gorgeous view of Boston on the top of the frat, and they can display movies on the side of the building. We watched “Hitch” one night. At CPW (Campus Preview Weekend at MIT) Amanda and I hung out at Phi Sig almost every night. One day for dinner they served steak and lobster (the lobster was VERY messy). Seriously, frats go all out in order to recruit people, it’s insane.

We got some shopping in at Target (I got a bike….which I really need to practice riding. I’ve never been very solid on a bike, and I haven’t ridden one a long time). There is also a large market near us called Star Market (cheaper than the campus one, of course). It is a short walk from my dorm.

MIT has many quirky traditions, including hacks (pranks http://hacks.mit.edu/Hacks/by_year/), the Orange Tour, and the Sodium Drop. The Sodium Drop was really really really cool. I don’t know if anyone has ever put some sodium or potassium in water in their chem class—if you haven’t you need to. Sodium reacts violently with water. We hurried off to East Campus (that’s where all the quirky stuff is :-). Some guy in a robe was talking about a deity called Krotus and dropping potatoes into the river for good luck (don’t ask me…..I live on West Campus, thank you very much….I’m just kidding, although EC is very different than West Campus, it is still very cool). A group of a few hundred walked to one of the bridges and lined all the way across it. After throwing in the potatoes and some spam (again, don’t ask me), they finally threw in the sodium. It was the loudest explosion I have ever heard. Water shot up from the river. And even better, they threw in MULTIPLE hunks! Water reacts violently with sodium. Why?

Here’s the chemical equation:

2 Na + 2 H2O ----> 2 NaOH + H2

The reaction produces hydrogen gas. The reaction is also exothermic, so it releases heat, and the hydrogen self-ignites. For more info, click here:

http://www.pc.chemie.uni-siegen.de/pci/versuche/english/v44-1-1.html

I have to wonder what the people passing by in the T (the subway) thought. Loud explosion = omg terrorists! My friend Darren was almost deaf afterwards. The Boston Police took quite a while to react. We saw some police as we were walking back to campus. I think they were about to roll down their window and ask us what was going on but decided against it (honestly, is there anything strange about seeing a few hundred people walking back from a bridge that there was just a large explosion? Didn’t think so :-).

One night, Annelise (my roommate), Kaitlyn (my neighbor), and I went to Random hall to play the game Settlers of Catan. It’s a cool strategy board game. It was amusing because it everything was in German. Random is a very interesting hall. Basically, anything you can say about Random, you can describe by the world “random.” Their house mascot is a disintegrated carton of spoiled milk that is over ten years old. Very cool place, just really random. While walking back to Simmons, we got caught in the rain. It has been proven that if you run in the rain, you will not get as wet. But, since Simmons is so far away, it would not matter much if we ran or walked, and so we proceeded to have some fun and get soaked.

All wet.

I think that’s about it for the first two weeks. I have been having a blast! I know there are some things I forgot; if they come to me I will put them in a later entry. I’ll update later with info about my my classes, dorm, parties, and whatever other crazy things I run into.

First Post

2005-09-25T23:28:00.000-04:00

My name is Amber Hess and I am a freshman at MIT. I will try to update this blog at least once a week but we'll see how that goes :-). My goal is to show people what MIT is like socially and academically. So, if you are a prospective student or you are just curious about MIT, you've come to the right place. If you have any questions please post them on the blog.

As for the name of the blog, "Smoots" are an actual measurement of distance. During rush a while back one pledge was used as a measuring stick on the Harvard Bridge. His last name was Smoots. The bridge measured 364.4 smoots and 1 ear. I thought that it would be a cool name for a blog, and it is one of many eccentric things at MIT.