Every semester or so, the MIT Press (located to the Eastern edge of the campus) hosts a legendary Loading Dock Sale where several rooms are lined wall to wall with moderately new books at prices reduced up to 90% off. How could they afford to sell them for such low prices? Apparently, the books are mainly MIT Press overstock, or with minor damage, or out-of-print. But these factors are no deterrents!

Students, educators, and other segments of the MIT community crowded room after room, carrying baskets filled to the brim, and accumulating checkout sums of several hundreds. It could get crazy in there and it wasn’t hard to see why.

The content range was incredible. From computer science to political science, to architecture, to music, philosophy, linguistics...you name it. I tried very hard to tame my hoarder instincts. My friend walked away with an impressive coffee table book on the art of Duchamp. But here’s what I ended up with - I had to stop myself before it got out of hand, and so I can hurry off to the CPW Activities Midway.

Honest Signals is written by MIT Media Lab professor Alex (Sandy) Pentland on the significance of our nuanced ways of interaction. Inventing American History investigates historical events written to serve specific political interests. Designing Media is a collection of interviews with media pioneers, probing media of the future. And lastly, Ai Weiwei's Blog is a translated collection of blog entries from the Chinese artist/activist/true-multi-hyphenate.

I am still giddy about these purchases this very moment. 

So If you love books and will be at MIT, this is a quick public service announcement! There should be another one of these events this coming fall.

What are you reading these days? Any recommendations?  

The MIT Society of Women Engineers would like to invite local high school students to participate in the exciting annual engineering competition, BeaverDash. BeaverDash is an event specifically designed for high school students and is held each year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT). No previous engineering experience is required, and male and female students of all science and math levels are encouraged to participate.

This year the date is set for Saturday, May 5, 2012 from 9:30 am to 4:30 pm. The topic of the competition will remain a mystery until the morning of the competition. When students arrive on the day of the competition, they will be assigned to small groups and matched with an MIT undergraduate student mentor. During the competition, students will learn about practical engineering techniques and will be encouraged to practice their creative thinking skills. The students will engineer and design their contraption within the constraints of the competition to compete later in the day for great prizes. Free t-shirts and lunch will be provided!

For students interested in science and engineering, Beaverdash is a unique opportunity to gain hands-on experience and interact with MIT student mentors. Students can fill out the registration form at http://swe.mit.edu/highschool/beaverdash.php

Please sign up by Saturday, 4/28. If you have any questions or concerns please email Jennifer Li at mitbeaverdash2012@mit.edu. Thanks and we look forward to seeing you at the competition!  

-----

Get on it if you're close enough to MIT! :)

Thanks for reading! If there are other aspects of MIT you'd like to learn more about, let me know in the comments below!

And finally, here are some resources that address the support network at MIT:

• GRTs and other forms of residential advising 
• Academic, Personal, and Spiritual Support 
• Residential Life Programs 

- J

I'm sure we all fall victim to surrendering minutes and hours to the Internet - aka procrastination. But is it me or are we all getting desensitized to the negative connotation of procrastination so that now it has become you know, a staple part of our day? 

- Hey whatchu up to? 

- Procrastinating. 

I don't blame us. The Internet these days is filled to the brim with appealing content - things to make us laugh (memes), things to make us react in one way or another (Linsanity), things to make us stalkers (Facebook)... just kidding.

But sometimes!

When I stumble upon neat stuff about my professors, I feel just a tad bit redeemed.

Two examples from this past week. 

ONE.

I was scrolling through my Tumblr dashboard (Tumblr is a micro-blogging platform by the way).

Usually it'd look something like this:

A New Yorker cartoon and a Jay-Z&Beyoncé picture (I'm a big fan.)

But on one very exciting day last week, I saw this:

Ok so Beyoncé is still there, but SAY WHAT? What is that interesting looking house with a seemingly robot face on the siding? 

I follow several Tumblrs that post pictures of fresh designs in architecture, etc. Usually I just look and admire, but this one I recognized. It's a design by my current architecture studio professor William O'Brien. Needless to say, I was excited and promptly took a screenshot to share with everyone I knew. (You can read more about this work and others here)

Then I went back to work. Possibly.

TWO

Several days passed and I was frolicking about online. Then someone tipped me off about a MIT professor in Fast Company's article, "The World's 50 Most Innovative Companies".

I flipped and flipped and flipped through the pages until I saw this:

(Images belong to Fast Company)

Jan Wampler! My studio professor from last semester! If you've been following my posts, you might remember that I wrote about how one studio project last semester had us build our own shelter out of bamboo and canvas. Well, Jan took that project one step further in light of the Occupy Movement and worked to figure out shelter possibilities for Occupy protesters. 

And that's the story of how procrastination doesn't get your work done - at all. But it does bring up points of interest.

The End. 

According to a recent New York Times blog titled "The Rise of the Toilet Texter", 91 percent of people between 28-35 have used their mobile devices while on the toilet. Blame it on all those apps for everything you can think of.

As our Internet culture continues to mature, words such as "social media fatigue" are becoming legitimate concerns. 

I wasn't fully aware of this problem in my life until our trip to Seoul in my last week of IAP in Korea. 

South Korea may be the Starcraft capital in the world (with its own serious Internet addiction problem to tackle), but it is also a country with such distinct and concentrated culture that upon exposure, inspires many thoughts about the differences in the ways we live our lives. One such distinction is the 찜질방 (jimjilbang), which refers to a Korean bathhouse. And it is my encounter with the jimjilbang that showed me...it might be time to pencil in some downtime. 

Although the first public bath house opened in Korea in the 1920s, the Korean bathhouse has a history dating back to the 15th century. The most traditional element in these jimjilbangs are the hut-shaped charcoal kilns with varying temperatures. (I remember going into one that was 50 degrees Celsius or 122 degrees Fahrenheit, which isn't even high in sauna standards; but I was nevertheless taken aback by the number.)

The New York Times ran an article last summer on jimjilbangs, and for visual reference, here's a photo from that story. 

(Photo credit: Woohae Cho for the International Herald Tribune)

While today's bathhouses boast restaurants, spa services, arcades, Internet cafes, movie rooms, etc., the focal point of the jimjilbangs are still the heated kilns that allow hardworking Korean men and women, young and old, to escape the fast-paced demands of modern life. That night in Seoul, our group of MIT students were among the many locals who retreated to the jimjilbang, happy to be sheltered from the brutal winds of winter at the very least.

Admission was just 10,000 won, which is a little less than 10 dollars. The entrance fee also came with a set of cotton t-shirt, shorts, and two towels.

The bathhouse is open all 24 hours of the day, but signs specify that you can only stay for 12 continuous hours each visit. That's still pretty darn long. We wondered if and how the Korean bathhouses filter out the homeless population. I wondered if and how similar jimjilbangs can work into American culture. It's also interesting that while many Americans pride on going to the gym regularly, the Koreans go to the bathhouse just as often to relax and sweat toxins out. Americans are notorious workaholics - we get 10 vacation days with an additional 10-15 days for full-time employees, which is still almost 10 days fewer than the 34 that South Koreans get. And it's not like the American economy is performing extra stellar.

We had arrived at 10:30 PM, and there were still families trickling in. Grandmothers, mothers, granddaughters. Young men. Old working men. Another foreigner looking for an authentic Korean experience.

We laid inside the kilns, napping, chatting about economic theories (I was just a listener to that conversation), eating hard-boiled eggs, comparing our temporary dwelling to summertime in Las Vegas. We moved from kiln to kiln that escalated in temperature until it was too much to handle. I also clumsily tripped a little on the way out and brushed my forearm against the inner surface of the kiln. Of course a mark appeared soon enough; it would be my souvenir of the night. 

During the whole experience, I felt like a baked pig. I've never paid to go somewhere to relax, sweat, and frankly, do nothing.

Paying to relax and get pampered may be on the calendar for the affluent or grown-ups working in the real world, but for a student like me, this seemed nonsense. We should be on the go! All the time! Multi-tasking! Weaving in and out of the constantly refreshing feed of life. I closed my eyes and tried to adjust to this mode of doing nothing.

Soon I found myself thinking...

Dear jimjilbang, I respect you for being a time-honored cultural tradition that not only sustains an impact on an entire nation, but also challenges the frenetic way of life we're accustomed to today.

After the endless flights, we finally settled in the dorms of Jeju National University. Then we went outside... 

The sky was overcast, but I spy with my little eyes...OCEAN. 

And then there was fried chicken. SPICY fried chicken.

On December 31, the teachers gathered with the program coordinators and Korean teaching assistants for a banquet reception.

Here is my friend Maggie'12 and I. 

Don't let the business casual fool you. That's not how the night ended. The Korean people did not forget that 12/31 was the night before 2012 and we were about to find out how Jeju does New Years'. (I apologize in advance for the screaming. :X) 

Holy cow. Considering how I spent last new years' eve watching TV and painting my nails, this was quite refreshing!

Since then, our Jeju experience has been a mix of Korean kids, Korean food, and Korean...language; yet once in a while we still pause and realize, Wow, we're in Korea. Merp...

Bibimbap! 

Kimbap!

And then it snowed X_X.....

...

But food was still nice

Some kind of bulgogi (beef) stew

And of course, students!

Trying to float their boats and 

Will M. '12 poses for a photo with his debate class.

Oh, it gets dark here, too.

But occasionally we wake up to blue skies

and the biggest mountain on the island 

Then one day, we went South and it suddenly felt like Orlando in Korea...

Where there is a Teddy Bear Museum!

And two teachers explore the coast...

And sunset...

Not to sound corny or anything, but the beauty in all this has me in awe. 

That said, IAP has officially started, a lot of my friends are back in Boston, and a part of me REALLY misses MIT. 

But heyho two more weeks on this island - plenty more to see :] 

For one reason or other that I cannot fully explicate, this semester has been a blur, passing by faster than I could process. While one always needs a certain level of conscious judgment to go to classes, carry on coursework, etc., I feel like this semester, I've been putting school on cruise control. This functionality might come from having been at MIT for a while already - from becoming an "upperclassman" and developing a programmed rhythm for handling a semester, all the way from pre-registering classes to finals…

A parallel (or antithesis?) to this apparent cruise control on the school side is a burgeoning urge to just LET. LOOSE. and jump on everything not class related. I'm not sure if this makes sense, but basically this has been an impulsive semester.

Early in the school year, I kept getting emails about spending IAP  all-expenses paid in Korea, teaching kids science/English. I never gave it a second thought, because it's just not something I imagined doing during IAP. But one night in September, I was checking my emails, writing down my French Word of the Day and then Korean Word of the Day, and then a lightbulb literally went off in my head. I could be learning Korean from these emails...or I could be learning Korean in Korea... !? I mean, why CAN'T I be on the other side of the world during IAP? Why MUST I do something completely career-related (the career part of which I'm not totally sure about yet anyway)? So I just grabbed a notebook, jumped on my bed, wrote down ideas, and sent in an application. 

So here I am on Christmas Day, putting together several weeks' of teaching materials for this Jeju Global Initiative, which is a very new project aiming to connect MIT students with talented young students in Korea who already have some experience in English. The bigger goal here then is to inspire an interest in science, technology, debate, and thinking-out-of-the-box in general. Twenty-two students, myself included, will be heading to Jeju Island, Korea and teaching courses on site at Jeju National University. Over the month of January, I will be teaching a three-week class on the impact of design and a one-week class on the power of modern media. We're also doing night-time lectures on random, fun topics. Some of my topics are: typography, American slang, hip-hop, and rapid prototyping. 

And Jeju Island itself isn't too shabby :P

But we'll be going in January...so maybe it'll be more like this. 

Anyways, side story -

This semester, I also got my ears pierced for the first time. You know, if you're a girl and you didn't get your ears pierced by your parents when you were a baby, or before 7 years old, or during that preteen phase when everyone did it - it's going to take some convincing. Or maybe I just think too much. Anyway, I've been considering getting my ears pierced for several years now, but  just couldn't go through with it. 

The first phase of doubt was simply pain. (But I didn't want to admit to being a baby and got over that.)
Then it was the practical concern of too much maintenance and inconvenience. (Again, this seemed lame.) 
And most recently, I preoccupied myself with a more high-brow excuse: I don't want any part of my body altered from the way it originally was. (Yeah….ok.)

Despite this towering pyramid of the stages of psychological defense, I went to a piercing parlor with my good friend Juhee on a random Wednesday and got it done. (Shoutout to the Juhee who got the industrial piercing that day and made sure I did not back out).  At the turn of November, I haven't really gotten over all those previous concerns but getting my ears pierced suddenly felt like somethingIjusthavetodonow. Inexplicable, but I did it! And it's done! And there's no going back! And I'm very happy about it :) 

I was chatting with a friend in studio in the middle of the night about one thing we've both learned this semester - so much can change in just one week. It took just a minute or two for me to decide I want to do the Jeju program, and another to decide on pierced ears. Live anticipating nothing but surprise, often from yourself. :)

On that note, I am leaving on Wednesday and will update from Korea!

Have good winter breaks everybody ~ 

As a junior, it's imminent that I think about what happens after MIT. In fact, the thinking has already been brewing. As I'm talking to my peers, it seems like "post-college plans" are a dreaded can of worms that no one wants to open. Except I tend to be the one prying at it until everyone around me is stressed and apprehensive - sorry, friends. But really, "life after college" is a scary but also exciting topic to think about.

Because for the first time in our lives perhaps, there is very little structure. We grew up knowing that 3rd grade came after 2nd, middle school came after 6th, and of course, college after 12th. College. Something so important and life-changing. Some people even get engaged in college - how scary is that? As much as our high-school selves may put "college" high up on some kind of maturation pedestal - and it is worthy of the hype I can tell you - but college is not a destination. And more than halfway through it, we are necessarily confronted with the fact that crap, there is still a whole life of decisions to be made.

It could be graduate school - but for what? Or work - in which specific industry? Gap year - will it really be productive? Volunteer? Start your own business? "Post-college" is such a vulnerable frame of time in which everything seems possible, still unjaded by the responsibilities and consequences of adult life.

As much as the central decision-maker in this situation is ourselves, we can't help but be influenced by the people we care about. Parents, for one, is on the top of my list. Expectations of parents. What a struggle. Given MIT's prestige, I think I can safely say my parents expect me to either go to an awesome graduate school, followed by a Ph.D pursuing something hard and technical, or on the other extreme, get a stellar job with stellar pay. It feels like that's the MIT way. As if it's not one of those two options - I'm missing the point of going to MIT. Obviously, I object to that sentiment. I believe thoroughly that like the college application process, the actual college experience is a holistic process - whose lasting and far-reaching impact we won't be able to escape. 

Last month, Huffington Post published an article called "America's 'Brain Drain': Best and Brightest College Grads Head for Wall Street". This article really struck me, particularly the argument that smart people such as MIT grads are responsible for cooking up crazy ideas like credit-default swaps (the insurance policy much blamed for the great financial meltdown of 2008.) It makes sense, i think. Not everyone can manipulate numbers like that - I can't, and that's why I've had no problems resisting the lure of Wall Street. Amidst all my considerations of what should happen after college, this article touched upon some of my concerns. This is a difficult time in the American economy. College students, even those from the best institutions like MIT, can't take it for granted that there's that stellar job with stellar pay waiting after graduation. How are these peculiar circumstances influencing our career choices? And the harder question, do we pursue something we love or something society needs? Ideally those two values would coincide but it''s not difficult to understand why the health sector is more in demand today than say, comparative literature. 

Is there a perfect post-undergrad plan that makes the best use of my MIT education, that I love, that is also socially-responsible!? Does the arrival at this "perfect" combination finally constitute "success"? In the meantime, how do we prioritize? 

Just my thoughts. Feel free to discuss. 
 

Truth be told, RUNE is traditionally small, with a staff never far beyond 10, and low-key; think of us as a weekly reading club …that produces a beautiful magazine at the end of the school year. I personally like the mellowness - that way, it's easier to avoid bureaucracy, value each staff member's opinions (which do often conflict), and focus on the creative works. To me, RUNE is at once a bigger mission to support the arts @ MIT as well as a weekly relaxation session. We meet every Sunday at 2PM, on some cozy futons in a small room in the Student Center. Packed into the hourly meetings are art and literature submissions that paint places as close and mundane as MIT and as far-away and unfathomable as the limits of fantasy allow. Certainly a change of rhythm from the chaos of the same old coursework during the week. 

Here are some scans of artworks from our latest issue. 

(See more works by Dorian '11 here) 

What do you think?

In any case, just putting it out there that there are two things we constantly need at RUNE - and they are submissions and funding. We need submissions to compile a quality magazine, and funding to keep it free for the MIT community.  So if you're a member of the MIT community, feel free to submit your best creative work. For literature:  rune-lit@mit.edu.  For art:  rune-art@mit.edu ….. And if anyone has any leads on relevant sources of grants/funding, please let me know in the comments. Thanks! 

Lastly, while RUNE captures the art in text and images…there are some incredible living breathing instances of natural art that must be savored live-action.

OMG! 

So two weeks ago -
…the assignment was to construct a bamboo-and-canvas shelter to be erected on the lawn of the Endicott House - MIT's private mansion used for conferences and fraternity/sorority semiformals, etc. Our structure has to

• provide sleeping area for the 10 people in our class and
• provide shelter in rain or shine
• be designed and built in one week 

And this is what went down. 

We slaved away at the woodshop day and night to prepare the bamboo structure - 

Then slipped on the canvas roof cover sewn by ourselves - 

And built 5 sets of double "beds" so that there'd be 10 beds in total.

--

Before the entire process began, our professor warned us "Anything that can go wrong, will go wrong."

We didn't WANT to believe him, but we still held our breaths as everything unfolded. And for good reason, because who knew that the night before we were supposed to go camping, the sewing machine would stop working when we still had to sew a whole set of beds as well as parts of the roof cover?? Or that the week before our camping date, the weather forecast predicted sunny clear skies with only 20% chance precipitation... but when the time actually came, Tuesday - our camping day - would be the only rainy day that week?? 

Personally, I was perversely excited by these emergency obstacles, because really, it was the closest I've ever come to Project Runway - and being confronted with a Tim Gunn "Make it work" moment. (any Project Runway fans?) 

Did you guess? We made it work. I'll let the pictures tell the rest ~ 

Moving in at last! 

And the cots were surprisingly strong enough! 

Er...so what's the moral of the story....ANYTHING THAT CAN GO WRONG, WILL GO WRONG! 
Maybe that's not the best takeaway, but just so you know, it could all happen. :O Pay attention to detail, and be prepared for the unexpected! Everything that goes wrong...can work out after all. 
   

I'd like to pass along a message from Jennifer Li, the Event Outreach Chair of MIT's Society of Women Engineers (SWE) - one of the most active groups on campus.

"We are pleased to invite all high school students to participate in an exciting annual event presented by the MIT Society of Women Engineers: The Exploring Majors Fair.

"Through this interactive, engaging event, high school students will have the opportunity to explore a diverse number of science, math, and engineering fields and work on career development. The students will be able to network with current MIT students in a casual environment and discuss how MIT students chose their respective majors, research and internship experiences, and college in general.

This year the date is set for Saturday, October 29, 2011, from 2:30 to 4:00 pm in Lobby 10 at MIT.

Students can fill out the registration form at http://swe.mit.edu/highschool/exploringmajors.php If you have any questions or concerns, please email exploringmajors2011@mit.edu

Thank you and we look forward to seeing you at the fair!"

If you're a high school student living somewhat close to Cambridge, MA, be sure to take advantage of this great opportunity! :)
 

As soon as we got on the bridge towards Boston, I knew it was going to be a good time. Walking along the river at sunset was definitely an unparalleled dose of relaxation. 

Before we knew it, we arrived @ the Hatch Shell

And then there was You and Me. 

It doesn't even really matter that we couldn't see the dude performing; I just really loved being among random Bostonians. 

(Sorry the video is so shaky but hey, he told me to wave my cell phone in the air.) 

Despite sleeping something like 16 hours this past week, classes went over fine and we're on to the next one.  Amen to "Time enjoyed is not time wasted". 

--

While on the note of random funtymez, I've been meaning to share this since the end of summer...

I had heard that Steven Holl, the architect who also designed MIT's spongey Simmons dorm, recently designed an award-winning residential complex in Beijing called Linked Hybrid. 

Of course I had to see Simmons' sister in Beijing before I left, so I looked up the coordinates on Google Maps and found a way to get there via public transportation. But once I got "there", surely I see a trace of Linked Hybrid, but it's hidden behind highway overpasses, cars, random trees - in a phrase: see but can't touch. 

At this point, I'm wandering along this empty sidewalk, shuffling through options in my head - I could go back to the bus station, go find a subway station, or a magical carpet will come and give me a lift me over this traffic junk...

As I'm walking, Linked Hybrid sometimes looked closer than before, and then all of a sudden, went into hiding again - my mood turbulently tumbled between being hopeful and pissed.

And then I walked some more, and while no magical carpet came to the rescue, a "skybridge" did. (In retrospect, I should've expected it; a "skybridge" over the highways is just so China). Linked Hybrid looked still very far away from the other end of the skybridge, but despite the fact that it was rainy and getting dark and far, there was a skybridge! And wasn't getting to the other side all I ever wanted?

So I took off and it was indeed a very very long walk to Linked Hybrid, but every step closer was just an exponential growth of awe. These pictures don't do justice to the power of this bizarre but beautiful monstrosity. And I loved loved loved the fact that some of this is in Bejing and some of it is with us at MIT.

Sometimes when things feel impossible … or you can sense something great in that distant place but is afraid of difficulty or disappointment or starts feeling that maybe that thing wouldn't be worth it anyway - go on with it. Maybe even go on just because you can.

You knew that, didn't you?

So did I, theoretically, because that's what we're used to hearing. But we're all capable of doubting, and it's really the doubting that's not worth it. 

This post is dedicated to the current seniors, stressed and potentially freaking out about how this long, arduous college application business will eventually pan out. Take a break, let's see those cell phones up in the air sometimes. There are no magic carpets, but life really has a way of sorting things out. 

Anyways, besides just missing things outside the bubble, I'm increasingly feeling like it's also easy to get too-focused inside bubble. People who come to MIT are usually ambitious, have goals and dreams, and are willing to commit to making those dreams happen. For me, "being an architect" was not my childhood dream, or teenage dream. I've just always loved art and design and cities, and in the last year of high school, somehow synthesized those likes into "architecture" ...and thought studying architecture @ MIT would be really cool. (And so far, it has been really cool.) But still, it's like, I've been trying so hard to do well in school, be productive in the summers and you know, keep moving towards that "architect" goal. But this summer, interning in China allowed me to really step back and re-evaluate what I want to do.

And I finally understood the appeal of a semester or year off. Because once you get into the MIT momentum, it seems like there's only pushing forward. You don't want to ever feel like you're falling behind. And really, you can't afford to (with the default fear of not graduating on time, etc.) The fast-paced nature of MIT makes "big changes" an intimidating task. 

But being in China this summer was really inspiring in a way, because this was a country with soooo many people (still an understatement) in a wide variety of career fields. People are really practical but also "literal" in terms of their career choices. People who want to cook learn to be chefs, people who like to draw practice to be artists, people who want to make a lot of money go into the financial sector, people who care about research or want job stability go into academia and people who find out they don't like a field or said field is not faring so well change fields in a moment's time. I guess that's basically the case everywhere, but it was just highly visible in the current Chinese culture - where people are reconciling the pragmatic need to be employed with the newer, perhaps more modern/Western mindset that one can and even should follow his or her passions. 

It's not that my internship made me like architecture less. In fact, I actually really like and admire the process of designing and turning concepts into real constructed spaces where people can use. But the fact that billions of lives in China were changing every second just reminded me how it's never too late to be in charge of what you want to do. And that on the flip side of fearing "falling behind" is being constrained by the pressure of following a well-planned path that may or may not still be what you want. 

I picked Architecture before I came in to MIT, looked around, and liked it. I declared course 4 with no hesitation and was relieved that the decision came so easy (whereas my friends were having dilemmas with 7 or 10 or 20 or 15 …or 21 or 2? or some combination of those). I'm not even a senior yet, but at this half-way point, I would tell my freshman self to explore more and don't be rigid for convenience sake. Right now, I'm enthusiastic about finishing my major in Architecture, minor in Management. But I'm also looking into Comparative Media Studies. There are so many possibilities with all of those. 

I met with my advisor yesterday, and at some point he said, "When the time comes, I'll tell you why it's better to work before grad school". I think he by "time" he means registration day in the spring term. Meanwhile, it's going to be a constant calibration process.

P.S. I'm not especially advocating a gap year or a semester off, but just that don't let the fear of falling behind keep you from stopping to explore other options. I honestly really love the entire design process, especially the design mentality of looking at things through different lenses and rehashing them until they're just right. And it's exactly this mentality I want to share with everyone.  

I interrupt the great back-to-school flow of these blogs to deliver a semi-personal, semi-existential rant.

I am THIS close to ordering an e-book reader (the brand of which I will not specify but you should have an idea.)

And then I dwell on the fact that you can soon checkout books from your public library via said e-book reader. 

First I’m like - HEY! That’s great!

And then I remember, the public library IS MY NO.1 MOST FAVORITEST THING ABOUT THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. It's an uniquely American institution. 

At a time when budget cuts across the nation are slashing public libraries’ staff, programs, hours-of-operation,

Do I really want to help undermine the value of the physical public library - an air-conditioned, wifi-ed, water-fountained, educated, cultured - safe haven?

All of these consequences are fast-forwarding through my head like a scary movie, rolling like a fireball towards Fahrenheit 451.

-

On the flipside, said e-book reader will be so convenient and I know I will love it. At this point, I am really scared of technology. It’s chasing away so many, so many things for convenience, efficiency, and power.

And that’s also one thing you can’t change about technology: it won’t ever stop. You can stand back, observe - but eventually fall behind and become obsolete like a floppy disk.

I can hold my reservations about said e-book reader and put off buying it, but it won’t stop the Kindle 3, 4, 5, Nook Color, Metallic, Convertible, or whatever from coming out.

It can only keep going, or we wouldn’t be where we are today.

IN CONCLUSION: I wish I had a conclusion to this rant.  

--

And here I am, going back to Massachusetts Institute of Technology in less than 2 weeks. 

What tradition-bending innovations will arise in the upcoming year??

brb, figuring out life. 

Last week, MISTI-China interns in Beijing welcomed Malgorzata Hedderick (Associate Dean of MIT Undergraduate Education), Melanie Parker (Executive Director of the MIT Global Education and Career Development) and Sean Gilbert (MISTI-China coordinator) to Beijing. Sean makes a trip to China every summer, but this is a brand-new cultural experience for Malgorzata and Melanie. We gathered at a restaurant that specializes in the Peking Duck - Beijing's most famous dish. 

Over dinner, we discussed our most memorable experiences in Beijing so far.  I talked about the agonizingly stressful yet undoubtedly invaluable process of apartment hunting... Others talked about meeting lots of different people from Chinese and international universities. Our conversation seems to suggest that MISTI is one mens et manus answer to the "study broad" buzz word in higher education. MIT calls it "applied international studies." 

I want to call it going off the leash.

MISTI internships have no set itineraries, so we get to manage our time for work, travel, leisure. (At the moment, some of us are planning a trip to Inner Mongolia). And no constant bubble of interactions, so we get to manage our contact with co-workers, local students, foreign students, neighbors, etc. (I just hope i don't have to call my realtor or landlord again.)  It's about trying to survive and thrive in another country, in an experience that hopefully differs from person to person - and that which we can call our own. 

"My own" today involves these mysterious lotus seeds. 

- which come from lotus flowers:

Every morning i bike through a cobblestone path, and everyday, an old lady sits on the side with a pile of green things in front of her. She's very old, 70-years at least I'd say. She's not very pushy, as is often the case with other Chinese salespeople. But if you turn in her direction and make eye-contact, she starts advertising in Chinese, "Buy some lotus seeds!". Every time I see her, i want to stop by and buy some, but I haven't…because I'm insecure about my Chinese and also... I don't even know what to do with them. 

Biking through that path today, I made eye-contact with the old lady, rode past her… and then in a brusque, awkward fashion, stopped and turned back…

Our conversation carried on for a few minutes. I understood 65% of what she was saying (she had an accent from a different dialect of Chinese), but this is what I found out:

1. You're supposed to eat them.
2. They're only "in season" during the summer. 
3. You can buy 4 of them with 5 RMB (which is roughly $0.80).
4. They help prevent inflammations in your system.

Thank goodness I asked her how to eat this, because really, can you guess where the edible part is??? I couldn't be sure.

Here's a demo:

You have to first break out the "seed". 

Which is this:

But wait -

You have to find the real seed. And eat that. 

--

The taste caught me off-guard. 

I feel like the lotus seed is symbolic of many things I see embedded in Chinese culture and modern China. Multi-layered. Bittersweet. These are still observations brewing in my mind. 

A few days ago, an article was passed around in a Beijing interns email thread, introducing the 10 weirdest restaurants in the city. Naturally, we started at the top - House of Poo Poo it was.

Welcome to House of Poo Poo, aka Toilet Special Restaurant.

The first thing we see inside the narrow entrance.

This was our table, with toilets for seating and live lizards in the glass table.

They're real!

Interior decor.

Curry served in a table toilet.

My mango juice in a turd mug.

I ordered a House of Poo Poo variation of pineapple fried rice. It wasn't a large serving and tasted average, I'd say. But I think everyone was preoccupied with finding every manifestation of the turd motif the restaurant had embedded in the dining experience. Let's just say, at the bottom of everything was a turd.

That would be me and the signature poopy ice cream.

Apparently, there are many other toilet-themed restaurants in cities around the world, including New York and Tokyo. We were also discussing if a House of Poo Poo near MIT would be successful…

What do you think - would you go for this kind of humor and strange dining experience?

Personally, it's nice to be able to say "been there, done that" …and I would probably do it again, but only if in a different country each time.

-
While I'm here, a few more interesting sights on the Beijing streets.

I was drawn to the "indie music" sign, but this little store had far more than indie music. It had everything from Michael Jackson to Katy Perry to LED shirts … ...as well as a whole shelf dedicated to "experiment & noise". Hmm.

Until next time ~ from Beijing.

I arrived in China almost two weeks ago, and spent the first week in the comfort of my relatives’ home and care. They took me everywhere - seeing other relatives, shopping, touring, eating lots. There in Chengdu, capital of the Sichuan Province, I had a stress-free beginning to summer. :)

Picture-time~

My kindergarten! I tried to go in, but got kicked out after 2 seconds.

QinCheng Mountain - Fun Fact: The scenery in Kungfu Panda is based on this mountain.

To get to the peak, you have to pass through something like a dozen temples.

and

this would be the view from the top!

and

Found in the traditional streets of Chengdu...

are not statues! ;P

Moving on... the real reason I’m in China is to intern at an architecture atelier at Beijing’s Tsinghua University. So when I arrived in Beijing, everything got just a tad more serious. But that’s also when the real adventure begins.

The first of which is apartment hunting. Bane.of.my.existence...for most of this past week.
I've never had to rent an apartment before, so I'm about as clueless as a mango. Me and another MISTI student I'm sharing an apartment with decided to go to different brokers. We looked at something like 10 apartments over 2 days - all in 90-degree weather. There were all sorts of problems such as: 1) landlords don't want to rent short-term 2) landlords don't want to rent to foreigners to avoid paying tax 3) the apartment is too far from school 4) the apartment has no bed 5) current renters can't move out soon enough. You know, problems that I learned are common in the temporary housing business.

So when everything converged to a single-choice that seems to clear all those aforementioned issues, we had second-thoughts about the broker we were working with...because we sort of pulled up his listing from online Beijing classifieds...and we only know his last name...because apparently he is his own boss of a company of three people...located somewhere we don't really know...

I hope it's not as sketchy as it sounds! But after consulting most of the Chinese people I know in China, we decided to take a leap of faith. After all, the contract is with the landlord, and if the landlord is authentic...we should be okay...So we set up an appointment.

The landlord is kind of sassy. She owns both apartments on that floor. From what I can read in Ms. Landlord, she seems like one of principles...something about her sass.

If I got deceived in any way, I will let you know. But hopefully I won't have to...because for the moment, let's have more faith in people :).

So we signed that contract.
And I can finally think about something else.

Yesterday, I went to Houhai, an 800-year-old lake in the center of Beijing.
This looks like a typical Chinese backdrop, and it is...but do you see something strange?

Apparently, you are allowed to swim in there...Despite knowing it's a lake, I still thought he was a shark at first.

And this is Houhai at night.

That's all for now! Most of the group I'm working with have gone on a short trip for business. Next week, the real work begins!

MISTI (The MIT International Science and Technology Initiatives) matches MIT students with all-expenses paid internship and research opportunities at various top universities, institutions, and companies around the world. Currently, there are 11 branches of MISTI (China, Japan, France, Brazil, Italy, Germany, India, Israel, Mexico, Spain, Africa). This summer, I have friends going to India, Japan, China, France, and Spain.

As for me, I’ll be going to Beijing, China. I’ve been looking at MISTI since CPW/orientation days, and it’s always been between China and France (although it's actually possible to do MISTI multiple times!). You see, there is usually a language requirement to the MISTI programs and the two languages I’m really interested in are Chinese and French. Since I ultimately decided to concentrate in Chinese , MISTI-China was the logical follow-up. From mid-June to mid-August, I will be working with a professor in the architecture department at Tsinghua University (colloquially called China’s MIT), helping with public facility projects like schools - which is a hugeeeee contrast from normal coursework at MIT.

In a few days, I’ll be turning 20 years old. In my last days as an official “teenager”, I’m preparing all I can to travel alone internationally for the first time. Of course I’m excited about experiencing a different stream of architecture than what I’ve been exposed to at MIT...the food...the attractions...the shopping...and everything distinctively-Chinese China will have to offer. But as I anticipate the trip, I find myself looking forward most to reaffirming the reality of certain memories. So far, I’ve lived half of my life in China and the most recent half in America. But for some reason (probably by the essence of how memory functions), my memories of “China” are blurred. I recall images and dialogues sometimes...only to find that my immediate attempt to grasp harder leads to doubts of whether the memory had been real or just some vivid dream sequence from the past. So I’m interested in finding authenticity – the feeling of being in a completely different world...that’s also completely tangible... where my memories may have actually happened.

Hoping for favorable Internet conditions in China so I can blog there. :)

Edit: I just read Jess Kim('10)’s entry about MISTI Japan, and I really appreciate her point about valuing the ethnic diversity in America. That’s something I think about all the time and recognize as uniquely-American. I haven’t really tried to articulate this thought in anticipation of my trip to China other than blurting out randomly “There will be Chinese people… in China… speaking Chinese…all the time…” My friends look at me with the no duh face…but what I really mean to say is Jess’s point about how homogeneity vs. diversity is such a strong force. I’ve grown to like being just another ethnic flavor in America. Homogeneity is so unfamiliar to me now - I can’t imagine living in a country composed of predominantly one kind of people, one shared heritage. But that is what I’m expecting to see in China and I can’t wait to see how reality measures up.

Well I’m here to share some photos from this past weekend’s celebration - FAST Light (Festival of Art Science & Technology...and LIGHT!) All semester, professors, graduate students, researchers from the Department of Architecture, Urban Planning, Media Lab, and more have been filling up the campus with incredible installations showcasing the result of MIT’s technological prowess meshed with the most creative minds. It all culminated this weekend in the light festival all over campus. See a full list of installations here.

Without further ado, LIGHTS in the river!

LightBridge

Liquid Archive

Light Drift

(Those orbs in the river actually correspond to orbs on land. My friend and I are sitting on a land orb as it changes color.)

I have to say, I wish every year was MIT150.

But now for the cute... the other day I saw this installation in the Infinite Corridor.

(You can see me awkwardly on the side taking a picture; the camera's hiding my face. harhar)

Basically, there's a camera somewhere recording students going through the Infinite and tracking the intensity of smiles passing by. Students walking through can look up to a screen and see if there's a hysterical green face (smiling!) or a mellow yellow face (not smiling...)... plastered on their face.

This mood meter is part of the MIT150 Festival of Arts, Sciences, and Technology (FAST) and is one of four mood meters installed by the Media Lab. The other three locations are the Student Center, Stata Center, and the Media Lab. (You can read more about the mood meter installation as well as check out a live tracker of smile intensity at all four locations here)

Here's a video of the mood meter in the Infinite. Man, we need to get that happiness barometer up.

The best part is walking the opposite way and seeing people look up to the screen and smile... and make faces. SO CUTE. The green and yellow faces are kind of haunted-looking though...those huge circle eyes.

Anyways, smile! At least for the camera :P

Before decisions came out, I felt like writing something like:

Have faith in the fact that everything you’ve put forth has been a decision you’ve made/
You’ve put a stamp of approval on every part of the application/
Whatever happens, know that you’ve put forth YOU.

After decisions came out, some of you were happy and would have found the above message totally agreeable and your lives totally rewarding, but some were sad and would have no doubt felt indignant... as if your “best selves” went unnoticed.

I feel the message still stands though - for you, for me. As Emad and Anna have said, undergrad admissions is but a phase and it’s so important to hold on to your dreams.

Here’s my anectodal addendum:

It was the day of the final review. I left several hours in the morning to draw up diagrams and export drawings from my 3D model - which I spent all night coding... before review time @ 2PM. But soon, I realized a fatal catch-22… while coding allowed me to produce geometry exponentially... it also, well, created too many lines for computer programs to handle!

ahhhhhhhlineslineslines

The 3D version of this literally has millions of lines that the program could not flatten and export into Adobe Illustrator as drawings...heck, it essentially went to "Not Responding" every 30 seconds. The professor expected 12 drawings of our 3D models, but I couldn’t get the program to process a single line...

So what happens when I couldn’t get the model I spent all night making (and that actually shows all sorts of interesting effects)...to produce one drawing? Which is what is actually printed and presented to the professors and panel of jurors at the final review???

Panic. Panic. Panic.

But I remembered a general lesson I learned in the past couple months as an architecture student, summed up in a quote from Joel, my studio professor from last semester:

“If you’re going to spend that much time on something, commit to it”

(He was trying to make me explain and defend my project more robustly.)

So here I am - with a huge 3D-model file, unresponsive software, and no drawings to show. I could sit there some more and wrestle with the program to try to get a drawing or two out. Or I could screw it and straight up REPRESENT my project as comprehensively as possible...

Last semester, I might've chosen the first, but this semester...choice 2 is the obvious way to go. Choice 2 meant screenshots (like the two pictures above). 12 giant screenshots and then some more. I’m pretty much committing a presentation sin, but if that’s the only way I can show the model I’ve been slaving away for and the concept that I’ve cultivated for weeks... then I’ve gotta get over the huge embarrassment of presenting only screenshots.

Presentation time...and I nervously prefaced with “I apologize for all these screenshots...”
And my professor smiled a little and said, “Yeahh...this is pretty bad...”

WOW! GREAT START!

But whatever, I went on and explained. Throughout the presentation, my professor and the jurors were itching to rip away the screenshots and see some clean line-drawings... but in the end, they were excited to see the results produced from my system, shown in the screenshots. Although the screenshots were a sin, they still allowed me to articulate the details of my concept and explain my decisions when they were being questioned - this ability to really represent my work is empowering, as if I held the steering wheel.

Sometimes, unimaginable 'end-of-the-worlds' might spring up and stop you dead in your tracks, blurring your vision for a while, until you realize what it is you’re ...actually here to do. What it is you have to show. What it is you’re arguing for. So don’t let go of that steering wheel - feel in control and accountable for where you go. Even if you’re somehow unable to deliver what’s expected, find whatever works to get your thoughts across and help others understand them. Be responsible for your ideas and defend your decisions. Put your stamp on things and stand by them.

Spring semester so far, the new battle for architect majors in my year is ... CODING.
Yeahhh - What the...

I’ll be first to say that when I planned to major in Architecture @ MIT, I thought I’d be drawing pretty pictures. From my past entries, that’s clearly incorrect, but I’ve also had an exciting, adrenaline-rushing - albeit tiringgg - time learning all about model-making, 3D modeling, 3D printing, etc.

But now for 4.113 - Applied Architecture Design Studio I, we have to code...with programming languages. A few of us have some programming background, but for the rest of us (me!) it’s like … I don’t know, catching up with the rest of MIT. (Just kidding, architecture pride.)

But seriously though, for our first project in 4.113, each one of us had to thoroughly research a natural example of self-assembly or self-organization. I picked oscillating chemical reactions (reactions that oscillate in time and space), so I had to pore over chemistry textbooks and scientific journals for information on the mechanism of these reactions. The idea is to extract how self-organizing mechanisms occur in nature and adapt them into ways architectural elements can populate and self-organize in any given space. So basically, I’m trying to write code that aggregates geometric elements in a defined space as if chemical reactions are adding a certain ion in a petri dish...and pray that what I create look as interesting as this:

An oscillating chemical reaction. Source

It would be a pain to manually draw recurring shapes over and over on a 3D modeling program, so that’s where the coding comes in. We’re using Python for the Rhino modeling program. While I’m totally intimidated by coding, I’m also genuinely excited for what I come up with...because chances are, it will help me. (Last semester I spent 6 hours drawing line segments, and 6 more raising them to different inclines).

How would you feel if MIT had a programming requirement for graduation - like the swim requirement? Just saying...so many majors need it here anyway...And as far as I can tell, it’s quite useful :P This is what I've been playing with in Python for Rhino:

Not sure how I'm going to make it more oscillatingchemicalreaction, but that thing would have taken eons without programming.

Anyways, the second class I’m taking is 4.302 - Introduction to Visual Arts for Majors...Let’s just say this class makes me put on my artsyfartsy hat and speak all I feel about emotions, identities, parts and whole, bodies, the familiar vs. unfamiliar - also known as, the abstract thoughts that run through my head abberantly, and often unnoticed. So I thank this class for teasing out some of the artist juice I’d like to think I have inside me. Our first project is about body-extension, which means building something that when engaged with the body creates a meaningful SENSORIAL experience. I also thank this class for ‘sensorial’ - my new favorite word.

The third course in the architecture repertoire is 4.605 - Introduction to the History and Theory of Architecture....This is like a history class but with much more visuals. While we look at slides of ancient villages and cities, a TA is hovering around Google Earth on the side trying to show us what the present day locations look like. This class makes me want to travel everywhere - I’m really tempted to just drop everything and go live in a historical African village for a while, like this:

In addition to these three classes, I’m also taking 15.812 Marketing Management in my effort to complete a minor in Management. I’m really liking it so far. The lectures and case studies are immediately applicable in real life; I mean, my shopper IQ went up by like 50 points after the first lecture. Lastly, I’m taking 21F.108 Chinese II Streamlined as a part of my HASS Concentration in Chinese; Chinese I Streamlined was easy, but now the essays take me 2 hours a piece … :( But anywaysss

Thanks for reading this rambling interlude of my spring courseload!

Let me know if you have any questions about anything I mentioned;

Yay school!

<3!

(full credit to whoever built these!)
--
P.S. I'm currently scrambling to finish the Sketchbook Project (introduced in this post),
and this is my Blizzard Burrito [a collage].

I’ve been home for winter break for almost two weeks, basking entirely in food and sleep.

A few days after I got home, the “Snowpocalypse of (dec.) 2010" hit.
New Jersey was smack dab in the middle of it.
Where I live, we got 2 feet of snow overnight.
The blizzard crippled transportation in the Northeast for a good few days...
And I was pretty much snowed-in...

Butbutbut - a few days later,
sledding!

Pulling that sled up the hill many times has literally been the only exercise I’ve had this break.
That’s okay - lot’s of physical activity planned forIAP; stay tuned.

ANYWAYS,
Good luck to those finishing regular decision apps!
And Happy New Year!

c:

I’m not going to lie - it’s actually because I’ve been doing architecture stuff and that’s like, most of it.

Haven’t really gone to any big new events. Haven’t made any profound life discoveries.

Just surrendering hours and hours and hours to various software and machines and spray paint and glue...and meeting deadlines.

I won’t say too much about that because my blog has been so coursework-dominated this semester- I don’t want to stress it out. All I know is, no pain no gain.

The work has been painful. But yeah, so much learning going on - that's what we're going for right??? Haha.

--
And nowwwww, to bring some holiday spirit in hereeee;

Yesterday was Burton 1 (my floor)’s holiday party/gingerbread house making contest.

Each class gets to build their own; the 2013s were feeling pretty funky and we agreed on a ‘famous art’ theme. I don’t know why other people agreed, but I certainly did so to avoid ARCHITECTURAL THOUGHTS, STRUCTURAL FOUNDATIONS, ETC. and just make pretty pictures...

Can you see which pieces we recreated with frosting?

Haha.
Answers Revealed.

(ahh so blurry :( ...sorry)

(credits to Evie'13 for the titles of these masterpieces - and for the whole "let's make artttttt" idea actually)

--
the Burton-Conner housemasters were the judges...
and...

WE WONNNNNN.

It’s actually really heavy; there's lots of candy inside. The 2013s will probably schedule a pinata beatdown sometime during the upcoming finals week.

heh.
--
Ok, and finally - GOOD LUCK TO ALL EA APPLICANTS!!!

i can’t tell you not to worry, to relax, because whether you’re on the "excited" side of things, or the “freaking out” end - that's just unrealistic. But you’ll be okay. This semester has reminded me again and again that

a rose is a rose is a rose (things are what they are...)

So ride the waves of life.

--

So anyone who knows me knows that I have strange computer habits/superstitions such as keeping the laptop charging even though it’s 100% charged - which I’ve been told is actually bad for the computer, but whatever - Ineedtobeliterallyandfigurativelypluggedin (typing without spaces is another idiosyncracy).

My left [shift] key was also set as some function other than being [shift]. That drove my architecture studio professor crazy. So I finally changed my mind.

AND ONE THING I REALLY HATE IS USING SPACE ON MY COMPUTER - via you know, installing software and things. 100 MBs?? 4.1 GBs?? GET. OUT.

Yeah, it’s pretty irrational - computers are meant to be used, aren’t they. But still, I want my free space.

So that’s why architecture has been such a pain in the derrière these days. (Also, the programs just suck - yet they're superstars at sucking away all my time.)

Apparently, we're so deep into the digital age that I can't take an architecture class without having to install a billion types of software. Over the last few weeks, I've had to partition my macbook to install Windows, so that I can then install AutoCAD, Rhinoceros, 3D-Max and soon to come vray and wufi. I am so distressed for my computer. The upside is that I'm actually gaining some concrete skills for the industry.

Some visuals:

So I spent literally 6 hours drawing those lines on Rhino.

- and then 6 more hours making all those lines 3-D; Note: every line has 10 segments, each segment has to be moved a specific distance individually. So yeah...

For design computing, we got to make 3D models. Basically, we modeled a cafe on AutoCAD and sent it to a big, expensive 3D Printer ...

in this scary room:

This is the printer:

So the printer makes marks back and forth like a regular printer, except replacing paper with ... powder...After the printing is done, we have to excavate the model like an archaeologist, with tools and everything...

- and then it gets baked in the oven!

(Mine's the one in the middle; all the people I put into the model died...well, there's half-a-torso left on a bench.)

Wheeeee.

--

ALSO I was just reading about Hamsika’s calendar and wanted to follow up with mine...

Look at that sea of blue...

But don’t worry; read this gchat convo I had with my friend --

Wendy: lots of stuff to do
ahahah
me: yeah
man
i'm iCal-ing
right now
x_x
Wendy: XD
any white areas? i'm guessing not many :P
me: oh i never do
cause i schedule
sleep
and shower
Wendy: ahahha OH
XD
thats funnyyy XD XD
11:00-11:05 - go to bathroom
me: you're jealous of my life
i know
Wendy: ahahaha
yahrrp

Haha, have a good day people :)

--
ALSO. Seniors-who’ve-applied/applying-soon::: stop stressing out about SAT scores....!!!

1) They’re done and over with and the scores won’t change.
2) They will most likely not be the factor to get you in MIT or keep you out.

So think about something else :P

in plain English: school got harder.

We're in rough terrain - first wave of exams, or in my case, reviews (as you will see...), etc. Apparently, there is a sophomore slump for college students i.e. performance drops compared to freshman year due to a lack of motivation…or something. But I don’t think it’s a motivation issue here. There’s just actually more work (especially courses in your major) – and more pressure to be uh, mature and serious.

(Also: I’ve had to accept the fact that at MIT, there’s only freshmen and upperclassmen. Well…I’m not freshman no mo’…so… TIME TO GROW UP.)

I’ve had a few late nights every week since school started, involving going to the architecture studio sometime during the day/evening and leaving somewhere between 1 and 3 AM. Weeeeee. But this past Wednesday was the first “final review” of the semester – which means everybody presents their design projects and the professor and TAs critique them…and which also means an all-nighter. Since I knew it was going to happen, I brought along my camera to document things…(brief preface: the first project is about using folding operations to construct a bridge) --

[Getting started] I've got a variety of beverage options:

(OJ, vanilla frapp, water, or Elmer’s???)

[~7PM] So I rushed to the art supply store to buy materials that I didn't end up using...oops. And it was raining...and the boards were almost my size...and I took the bus; that was interesting.

[1:43 AM] Emily and Justin debating "What is architecture, really..."

[2:07 AM] Xenia and Nicole testing their bridges on the site model. (Still in good spirits, apparently!)

[5:46 AM] A Shakira playlist starts blasting…Anyways, there's fatigue, but also anticipation to see everything come together.

[7:00 AM] Finally getting started on the drawings…

[9:08 AM] Bridge…done… drawing done… time to go home…yayyy. Note the skylight - it is actually morning! :) (Clearly, I did not attend the 9AM class.)

[Sidestory: I called my mom sometime after the review, because I’ve been neglecting certain parts of real (read: non-studio) life for a while…and she said something like, Why don’t you just manage your time better and make decisions quicker so you can finish quicker and go to sleep? and I’m just like, yo, mom, that’s not how it works…there’s always something to redesign/fix… but she just told me to drop everything and sleep.]

This type of architecture studio course, which demands some late nights every week, and some all-nighters every semester, is no doubt a requisite to Course 4. While I love having my little home away from home away from home, it is pretty isolating in a way. I’m always away from my dorm, where the spontaneous greatness happens. My suitemates have joked about, for instance, saying hi/bye to me for a week. At the same time, studio bonding is pretty amazing – I would definitely go crazy if I had to work till 9 AM, alone. So a goal of this year is definitely striking that magical balance – and NOT neglecting things/peoplelikemom.

In other news, I’m taking 4.75 classes. So that's, 3 architecture classes: 4.112 (the studio), 4.401(building technology, where you learn …you know, the practical sides of architecture like foundations and insulation and all that), 4.500 (design computing, where you learn digital fabrication and autoCAD – the ultimate time warp). I’m also taking 21F.107 Chinese I Streamlined, meaning Chinese for native speakers who can’t really read or write. To complete the repertoire, I’ve got 15.668 - People and Organizations, a 9-credit class in the lovely new MIT Sloan School of Management building. (Fun fact: we have a food fund for this class – yay healthy snacks.)

Oh yea, also!! I’m taking P.E. Stress Management. HAHA. Best class ever. We discuss how much sleep we’re getting/not getting/how there seems to be a competitive energy at MIT to be the most hardcore and not sleep (Which I do believe is true...as evidenced by this post...x_x). But the best part! We almost always end with a 6-minute “relaxation/yoga” segment, during which I essentially take one nap and dream two dreams.

Yay lifeeeeeeeeee. How is everyone else doing this autumnnn.

I was just thinking about last August … wondering how I felt a year ago … so somehow I ended up digging up my 2009 Guide to Residences … (it's still so pretty & so exciting to look at)...

I looked at the empty i3 DVD slot on the inside cover … and flipped to the Burton-Conner page (which is where I live now) … and reminisced a whole lot -- and then

OH-MY-FRICKEN-G’ – I know all the people on this page!
This is actually a group shot of Burton 1 - my floor!

This kind of revelation is strange and mind-boggling to me. Last year this time, I looked at these pages with no particular attention to faces – they were just students, yadeeyada….but now I know them all?

So I guess my point is - all of you heading to MIT soon, GET EXCITED 'CAUSE THERE WILL BE LOTS OF CHANGES. New People. Places. Psets… HA.

Really I just have two other relevant things to say- 1) Seriously don’t get caught up on first impressions… I’m constantly in awe at how different someone is once you actually meet them … or talk to them outside of the classroom … etc. and 2) Open up! …I can think of a handful of situations where had I decided …not… to put myself forward (e.g. HEY DO YOU WANT TO HAVE DINNER??), I wouldn’t have met some good friends.

And just for fun, I dug up a personal blog post from a year ago –

HAPPY BACK TO SCHOOL !!!

(P.S. One of my favorite moments of the day is seeing all the people in western business attire standing beside the lonesome bus stops in the middle of nowhere, waiting for the suburban Coach bus that will take them to work. Inspiring!)

I’m interning at ETS – the Educational Testing Service, a.k.a. producer of the SAT, GRE, TOEFL, AP Exams, etc…Yeah. Anyways, I’m not working on the previously mentioned exams, but rather, a newer test called the TOEIC – Test of English for International Communication – a.k.a. English for the business setting.

So…..my job is basically developing test questions for the TOEIC. And for confidentiality reasons, I think that’s pretty much all I should be saying about that. I can’t talk about what goes on exactly, but I will say a couple things I realized about my job and ETS. 1) This is really serious – People take the TOEIC to get jobs, seek promotions, make their lives… 2) This is really hard… a question is not just a question. Now I’m just thinking how in the world the SAT – which has nearly 200 questions – is put together… D: 3) Essentially, ETS may seem like a big blackbox (hahaha first learned this word in 8.02 ), but nothing's arbitrary. :P

--

Remember the Sketchbook Project mentioned in my last post? Several people I know have also hopped on the wagon – it’s a movement! So…. I’ve worked on a grand total of…dun dun dun… 1 page. :X I know, I'm ashamed.

I didn’t want to doodle any old thing, so I was waiting for thorough ideas to just come to me. But thankfully, one Sunday morning, I just decided to start something.

This one’s about how jaded I am about buying things…or just generally, the saturation of material goods all over the place... or the fact that you're almost expected to "spend" after a "payday" but really - there's nothing that tempting. Or maybe too many things. O.....KAY

Anyways,

It’s hard to believe tomorrow's August! There’s still a whole month until MIT begins once again, but for some reason, I’m homesick already.

It’s not that MIT is not exciting – on the other hand, it's probably a little too exciting. Everything is new and everything is your decision. Everything is A LOT. I just wish there would be more minutes in between to “miss home” and remember where i came from. Don't know if that made any sense. But this is the "growing-up" we've been asking for.

Well, soon enough it’s on to the next world: MIT. Is anyone (ever) ready?

Like in a Sketchbook, it's gonna take a certain dose of courage to start marking on every new page.

* Finished 1st year!!! Woop woop! It was crazy hard, no lies, but simply the wide/fresh variety of faces and experiences makes it all worthwhile.

* Came home to find my bed upgraded from twin size to full size (!!); makes me scared about the transition back to twin size in September though – heh.

* Drowned in all the sports championships I care about (or in the case of the World Cup - pretend to care about in spirit of global love): French Open (Vamos…); NBA Finals (aww Boston…; next year!); Wimbledon (Rafa!!!); and yea, the month-long World Cup – I don’t have much knowledge about soccer or the patience to watch it, but seeing a goal finally being made and all the fans in pandemonium of national pride is pretty exciting – I like, and want to join, so semi-arbitrarily: Viva Espana!

Let’s just move on from here.
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To me, summer has always been the time for some self-improvement in all areas of life – and that includes going through a summer reading list and catching up on a whole list of movies (recommendations?). Basically, it’s the time to become a Renaissance Man! – someone with skills/substantial knowledge in many different fields. So besides reading and watching movies and all the summer bummin’ I can categorize as “catching up with culture and society,” I also have on the list reacquainting-with-French, cooking/baking, paint, budget, and exercising (once again).

But I’m excited to share another project I have for the summer; I bought it as a challenge for myself on my birthday. (It actually extends beyond summer, into January 2011).

It’s called the Sketchbook Project; 2011 Tour. (Tagline: “It’s like a concert tour but with sketchbooks). Essentially, you pay $25 to get a blank Moleskine cahier sketchbook, which you're supposed to fill up by January and send it back to Art House Co-op, the organization that runs this project. (You pick a theme to somewhat guide the pieces you create.) The nationwide tour starts in February at the Brooklyn Art Library in New York, and then brings thousands of sketchbooks to six other cities including San Francisco and Chicago.

I’ve kept many sketchbooks/notebooks in the past, but to date, have completely filled up none…:( I want to finish one!!! This will be the one:

The theme I picked (from a hat) is inside/outside (which could have strong architectural implications so that’s something to think about...hmm). So far, I’ve only done something on the cover. Like I wrote in my bio, even though I'm probably going to be "Jenny" for the rest of my life, I really want to be a Chlo√©....so see if you see what I did there. :P

Anyways,

so many creamy pages...LOTS. OF. WORK. TO. DO....need. inspiration.
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Hey, Hi Inspiration! My parents decided a trip northbound through upstate New York to Niagara Falls and into Canada would be great for “getting in tune with nature and getting inspired”. Off we went for 4th of July weekend.

Some sights along the way:

This was literary my view for hours.......Did not realize these United States had so much farmland...and corn...

Niagara Falls illuminated @ night. Breathtaking.......wrath of nature.

In the daytime. I was on a boat like that. And I felt vaguely like Columbus discovering America.

2x the rainbow. :)

As great people have described before, traveling does wonders. Lots of thoughts are flowing in my head right now...Trying to translate those into words and pictures. And brainstorming for more trips. ;)

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2014’s! Hope your summers are going swell – perhaps indulging in some quality r&r before the hectic times @ MIT officially begin? So yea – if in your glorious, final pre-college summer days, you brew up any specific questions about life@MIT, feel free to post them here. Same goes for ’15?s ’16?s ’17?s… always. haha ‚ò∫.