People make me tick. I like learning about everyone I encounter, and I love hearing snippets of people’s lives and piecing them together to gain a better sense of who a person is. Learning about how people choose to interact with others due to past experiences and about how others handled various challenges in their life is fascinating, which is why the informational interviews required by GSBF have been so fun for me. I get to learn about people and hear their stories! I often wonder why I didn’t major in humanities, because internally, I’ve always known that social issues are what I am most passionate about. However, I think a part of me has always intentionally neglected to allow that side of me to fully develop and mature in fear of not following the expected path of going into STEM. As I’ve gotten older, it’s become more difficult to squash that calling for my work to surround people. As Bryan Stevenson said at the 2016 Carnegie Summit, “You cannot be an effective problem-solver from a distance. There are details and nuances to problems that you will miss unless you are close enough to observe those details.” This theme of proximity is echoed throughout many of Stevenson’s other writings and speeches, and it amply summarizes how I feel about any engineering work. Getting close with a community that engineers are attempting to solve problems for is so important, as can be seen by the many humanitarian project failures that have occurred because time was not taken to understand the cultural and historical roots of systemic issues. Additionally, getting to know people is just pure joy. Adapting to every individual’s idiosyncratic form of expression is almost like a puzzle; to effectively communicate with new people, I need to take all verbal and nonverbal cues and interpret them together. Seeing eyes light up, smiles widen, and facades fade brings me such fulfillment—it means I’ve found the key to interaction and unlocked it. Space for mutual vulnerability is created, and heart-to-heart conversations are possible. Below are some documented instances of inspiring and heartwarming interaction from this summer. This fellowship has underscored the importance of proximity to me firsthand. Without the endless amounts of time spent with various stakeholders in Three Wheels United’s business, Gavin and I would not have been able to understand the auto drivers and their families, their needs, their glories, and the areas for improvement. We would not have been able to create our deliverables, which will hopefully help Three Wheels United impact more auto drivers. It seems like a no-brainer that we must understand the problem before we try to solve it. But, being in the School of Engineering for the past four years, I have seen far too many times the failure of the implementation of truly understanding a client’s desires. Instead, we often manipulate the identified problem into what we, as educated Westerners, perceive to be the issue. This realization combined with the amount of fulfillment I felt with genuine, unadulterated human interaction this summer is why I want to be a social engineer; an engineer that emphasizes community engagement and fieldwork in the design process. When in India, we traveled to Chennai. I had already noticed the dearth of adequate infrastructure in Bangalore, but it was in Chennai that I observed its consequences. When we arrived at the end of June, it had already been over a month since Day Zero of the Chennai drought. Part of our research consisted of visiting auto driver’s homes to learn more about their family, their daily life, and to possibly record some footage for our video deliverables. We visited Muthuvel’s and Shivashankaram’s homes, as they both lived in the same apartment complex. Families left their doors open, curious women peered out at us from their balconies, and children darted from door to door. Muthuvel described his home as a slum, but I would describe it more as government subsidized housing that is not luxurious, but enough. Every apartment had two rooms with a small bathroom and utilities. However, when we arrived to the apartment complex, the first thing we saw was a huge government tanker squeezing through the complex’s narrow alley to deliver water. Proceeding the delivery, we saw women frantically coming out of their apartments with colorful buckets to stand in line for the water pump. I knew about the drought in Chennai, but the areas we were staying in were nice enough to afford water from other places. Our hotel still had running water, so we were shielded from the direct impacts of the drought. Right before me were the disproportionate consequences of poor water resource management on already underserved communities. Meanwhile, the heaviest flooding of 25 years was occurring on the opposite side of India, claiming over 1,600 lives. As a civil engineer, I felt dispirited. I felt frustration towards the lack of equally accessible and adequate infrastructure. I felt disheartened, as the effects of insufficient policy and planning were on full display. Later that summer, I found myself drinking chai with a Tibetan monk and a German teenager in the Himalayan mountains. As I translated between this unexpected pairing, the profundity of the situation struck me. Being bilingual allowed me to create understanding between vastly different people. Feeling the excitement in the air as a result of two unlikely parties communicating with each other was so invigorating. Although small, this interaction demonstrates the strength of vernaculars to establish trust and forge unlikely relationships. When applied to academics, the power of understanding various jargon and epistemologies is unrivaled. Participating in discourse across disciplines is crucial to solve our world’s most pressing, multifaceted issues. Therein is where my vocation lies: To be a bridge that connects disciplines that individually have extensive knowledge, but when united, have the ability to enact sustainable and inclusive change. Upon this realization, I looked far and wide for role models. Although I had just applied for a Fulbright in New Zealand to a Master’s in Climate Change Science and Policy, I knew I could not rely on it being a viable option. Fulbrights are already competitive, and New Zealand is even more so. I scoured for policy makers with civil engineering backgrounds on LinkedIn, I searched for civil engineering companies that valued community engagement and solving systemic issues, and I learned about potential fellowships in climate change, all for a chance to fuel the inspiration I felt throughout my time in India. Alas, none of the routes I found were the right fit. I felt like I was settling with every option. While the people I talked to were understanding and supportive of the work I want to do, none of their jobs nor research excited me enough. It reached a point to where I wondered if I was simply too naïve and eager, wondering if my dreams were too abstract to pin down. For a while, I thought I was going to have to settle for the rest of my life and vocation! Dramatic, I know. But, it’s disheartening when the work I want to do does not exist yet, at least commonly enough. That is, until, I talked to Dr. Carroll. Due to his work with Science Education for New Civil Engagement and Responsibilities (SENCER), he recommended to me a few people at University of Hawaii at Manoa to email. These emails quite literally may have changed my life over the course of a week. Upon receiving names of professors to contact at UH Manoa, I spent a Saturday afternoon asking for informational interviews. Four of the five professors responded within a week and set up a time to call, which was much higher of a response rate than I expected due to past attempts at informational interviews earlier in the quarter. This was my first inkling of insight into the approachability of the professors at UH Manoa. Of the five I emailed, there was one professor specifically in the civil engineering department whose research I felt aligned perfectly with my aspirations--Oceana Francis. Her research focuses on climate resilient infrastructure, coastal engineering, and sustainability. When I conducted my informational interview with her over Zoom, we discussed our shared values of community engagement and field work. Not only did I find Oceana’s research fulfilling and compelling and everything I wanted, I also felt a genuine connection that allowed unfiltered expression of my passions and concerns, which prompted her to share her advice and outlook on vocation. This one-hour call was that pure, genuine human interaction that reminded me of my summer in India. I left the conversation buzzing with excitement—I had finally found the role model I’d been yearning for! Not only do I have a role model now, but I also potentially have an advisor. Over email and the Zoom call, Oceana offered me a fully-funded graduate position to do research with her at UH Manoa. From when I first sent out an email to when I called Oceana, only five days had passed. Within five days, I went from having a very unlikely Plan A with no Plan B’s to having two equally fulfilling Plan A’s. I am still in shock. Is this really my life? Do I deserve this? In discussing my options with mentors and learning more about the UH Manoa Master’s program, I am leaning towards the UH Manoa graduate program even if I am awarded the Fulbright. It’s crazy, I know. I never expected myself to even remotely consider anything but the fellowship, but I think if I have learned anything from GSBF, the Fulbright application, and this UH Manoa experience it’s that life doesn’t always go as planned; that when doors swing open for you, it’s usually meant to be; that I will be okay. I used to think that I had to plan my entire life. I know it sounds silly when I say it, but the culture of career planning in high school and college is permeated with absolutism. It’s difficult not to internalize. Thinking back to almost a year ago when I was applying to GSBF, I remember the term “ambiguity” repeatedly coming up in my 1-1s and application questions. I’m pretty sure I discussed my fear of ambiguity in both my essays and interviews. Here’s an excerpt from my application: “I am a planner. Ever since I can remember, my mom drilled the importance of scheduling and time-management into me. My calendar is meticulously upkept, and I pencil in deadlines the day I receive them. However, I know that GSBF does not always have concrete due dates--there is frequent ambiguity, particularly in the field. Without guidelines, I feel like a fish out of water and have a difficult time prioritizing and completing projects to the best of my ability. Although planning has taken me thus far, I can foresee this tendency becoming an obstacle in GSBF.” I look back upon that time with fondness. All of what I wrote was my truth. I was very nervous about the potential lack of structure. I like structure. I like planning. But, because of the GSBF, I have a healthier relationship with structure and planning now. I depend on it less. I celebrate unknowns more. Resulting from classroom experiences to informational interviews to field research to networking at the accelerator, I feel comfortable in the face of ambiguity. In fact, I even welcome and revel in it. Ambiguity is scary and exciting. It’s scary, because ambiguity implies a muddled path with multiple options. It’s exciting, because ambiguity gives me, us, you the power to choose. It’s time to take hold of your dream and turn it into your future.
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This past summer, I wrote sporadically. I know in my “About” page, I talked about my love for writing and proclaimed that I was going to try to write consistently and frequently. If you look at my posts, there is only one; the first one that I wrote during spring quarter before I left for the summer. However, that does not mean I didn’t write. I wrote plenty of stream of consciousness blurbs whenever I felt compelled to do so, but I just didn’t feel the need to share them during the summer. If you keep reading, you’ll learn why. Now, a month and a half after coming back from India, I feel ready, sort of. I still need more time to fully process all that occurred in India and I don’t think I’ll ever quite fully internalize every moment of the eight weeks. I do feel comfortable enough now to share the lessons I’ve identified that I learned from this summer. However, I haven’t yet found a way to connect all of them into one cohesive essay, so here are a few glimpses into my mind from this past summer with some commentary: A Hectic, Jumbled, Frenzied First Week June 16, 2019 This was written the day before I left for India and refined in a heavily air-conditioned Starbucks nearby our hotel in Bangalore. The past 24 hours have consisted of good-bye's in parking lots, repeated hugs with "See you later"s and "Love you!!"s, loading the rental car until it is chock-full with an impenetrable trunk, buying $4 lottery tickets, Father's Day brunch, Black Mirror binge-watching with Flamin' Hot Cheeto Fries, explanations of this summer's plan to my sister's husband's parents, and dining at the only Chinese restaurant in all of Moraga, California called "Chef Chao's." It was here, over orange slices and steamed fish and eggplant and tofu and the awry coconut walnut shrimp that I opened a fortune cookie that said, "Travelling at this time would be a good investment of time & money." My lucky number, 17, was on the back as the second in the series of six. I’ll admit, I am a symbolic person with a slight (okay, moderate) belief in superstition and horoscopes and personality tests and energy and inexplicable intuitions. But, even if I were not, it is such a happenstance that I cannot help but clutch onto this fortune. This small piece of paper is safely tucked away in the clear cover of my 2018-2019 planner, joining the five others I’ve collected over the past year. “You will find an outlet for your creative genius and accomplish a great deal.” “A treasured friend will soon visit you.” “Indulge your ambitious nature.” “You have made a brilliant choice today.” “You will make many changes before settling satisfactorily.” I don’t remember the exact scenarios in which I cracked open an orange cookie to find these fortunes, but these aphorisms all hold intense significance, whether it was in the past or presently. I’m not sure why I am so readily eager to plunge into the depths of believing these commercialized, deliberately vague slips of white paper, but I feel it is of great luck and a tinge of destiny that I received that fortune. June 16-20, 2019 I was very stressed and overwhelmed, and I needed to recapitulate what happened during this week for catharsis. An absolute whirlwind.
June 21, 2019 My first and surprisingly only panic attack. Like all mornings since being in India, I naturally woke up at 6:30 am. This is unnatural for me. I love my evenings. I tried going back to sleep with limited success. So, I watched some Shark Tank, hoping for Mr. Wonderful’s voice to lull me back into sleep. As I laid there, half-asleep, I could feel tinges of anxiety creeping from my stomach up into my throat. I tried every single distraction, my phone, self-compassion meditations, everything. Trying to ignore and squash all signs of anxiety, I started getting ready for the day, following my morning routine. I only got so far as to brushing my teeth when it started. I uncontrollably started heaving and crying, experiencing my fourth ever panic attack. Showering didn’t help. So, I called my significant other. Hearing his voice talk me down from my irrational thoughts grounded me, and although it felt as if the same panic lay just below the surface with anything remotely stressful threatening to release the panic, I was okay. I went to work, had a great day, visited the Microsoft Research campus to see TWU’s technology, and we went to an ex-pat party full of InfoSys interns the same day. I suppose the anxiety was bound to occur. In retrospect, I did not take good enough care of myself with all the sudden changes and constant stimulation. All the comforts that I was used to were all taken away from me, and I was suddenly unable to interact with people on a level that I’m used to. I was not prepared for the isolation within the second most populous country in the world. June 23, 2019 I felt more healed from this panic attack a couple days before, but I was still being gentle with myself. Today, we went to the Banerghetta Zoo and ate lunch at a brewery in Electronic City. Today, I feel okay enough to write a bit. Today, I am allowing myself to recognize my weaknesses and remind myself to ask for what I need and take care of myself. Today, I am feeling more like myself and breaking out of this haze that I’ve been in for the past five days and truly start living and being okay with being here. Today, I am holding on to my fortune from Chef Chao’s. If there has been anything I’ve learned in this constant, dizzying travel, it is the importance to be tender with yourself. Particularly if you are a naturally sensitive person, like me and especially when it comes to travelling, self-compassion must be prioritized. There is no shame is taking care of yourself by not being productive. There is no shame is just being. A State of Being This was written on the eight hour drive back to New Delhi from Agra after seeing the Taj Mahal and Fatehpur Sikri, which was near the end of our eight weeks. Being. To be. To have been. One of the most confusing yet important verbs when I was learning Spanish. It asks of me a certain passivity to new and uncomfortable experiences, all within a framework of non-judgment, compassion, and understanding. India, being so vastly different in many ways than the US and in not all ways bad, requires, demands, commands, mandates me to just be. And in being, I have come to appreciate and deeply love all of the parts I've encountered and am learning about the country, even the not so glamorous ones. It is heartbreaking to me that Gavin and I are halfway through, but this reluctance to leave is also surprising and welcomed. How secularly blessed I am to be able to travel and bud this love for another country so far away than my own. I have not been wanting to write because to write means to reflect and to reflect means to temporarily take myself out of this life I'm now living that is so beautiful and interesting and vibrant and messy. And I don't want to leave. I don't even want to be out of this immersion for even a second, let alone a few hours. I want to stay in this mentality of just being. I am enraptured by India and its beauty and imperfections and disorder. I am beholden to this life. Earlier today, I visited the Taj Mahal. I am still in disbelief. The delicacy, elegance, and softness of the Taj resembles a Renaissance style painting. I wanted to capture the tomb’s effervescent essence, not the hard contours and angles that inspire regality that I have seen in other photos. The Taj, in person, was approachable, ethereal, dreamlike, unreal. If I believed in God, I would even go as far to say that the Taj looked like a work of God. When taking in all the grandeur of the structure, I even temporarily forgot about the unrelenting and unforgiving heat that caused beads of sweat to wet my hair, drip down my face, and roll down my neck. It was all worth it to see and to be in that moment, just like how being has been the most enlightening practice I've undertaken this summer. I have had the luxury of just being the past five weeks. But, it is finally time not to be, as the visit to the Taj Mahal has shaken and disrupted me out of the tranquility I lived in the past multiple weeks. I recognize the importance of writing and reflection, so here I am. Here is a poem that provides snapshots into small, poignant moments of beauty: Being, in an aromatherapy shop with our new friend Samir and relaxing into our unfamiliar yet comfortable kinship, as he plays Bob Marley and Led Zeppelin over his Bluetooth speaker system, drinking chai, chatting about our lives and travel, writing on his aquamarine walls to join the dozens of other notes and drawings from people who have visited all over the word. Being, while in Mysore and our new auto driver friend, Babu scoots over on his chair and teaches me to drive an auto. My hands are sore from gripping the clutch and accelerator, but I am loving the wind in my hair and the freedom of control. Being, as we exit a TWU auto driver's house in a rural village in the taluka of Challakere in an already smaller district of Chitradurga, and we are suddenly surrounded by dozens of children and adults watching us in curiosity. Being, while sitting and drinking hot chai or kaapi in the monsoon heat with drivers in the offices or their homes from tiny aluminum tins. Sometimes, it’s served in small ceramic teacups. Being, as I sit crammed in the back of an auto with myself, Swati, and the CEO of Three Wheels United for a twenty-minute ride, ending in Cedrick and I sprinting to the metro to catch the train. Being, as I translate back and forth between a Buddhist monk and a German teenager in Dharamshala. The Buddhist monk, Gong Mei shows me photos on his phone of his home in Tibet over tall cups of hot chai. I still message Gong Mei to this day on WhatsApp. Being, as Gavin and I race through Havelock Island's one main road on our two-wheeler mopeds, through the lush forests and palm trees and glowing markets. Being, when things happen that I don't understand or have control over and learning to trust that all will be alright--that India just works a bit differently, a bit looser, with more wriggle room than I'm used to. Being, in the long car rides to Agra with our driver Raul from Nepal. Being, in Chitradurga when we explore a fort, only to find a beautiful temple that leads to dewy greenery and freshwater ponds. Being, as I see piles of trash being burnt on urban street sides as the inner environmentalist in me screams in resistance. That is how many currently manage their waste here, because they don't have the affordable infrastructure to manage it effectively. Being, as I lay in bed, curled up in fetal position and clutching my stomach as waves of nausea and pain hit from eating a hastily washed starfruit. Being, as Swati, Gavin, and I sit in The Park hotel restaurant at 12am and throw masala peanuts in each other's mouths and fold our napkins into Christmas trees per Gavin's instructions, in a sleepy stupor. Being, as we try not to inhale the dark fumes being spewed out of two, three, four-wheelers, and buses, on all sides of our yellow and green rickshaw as we sit idly in traffic like a duck in a flock. We narrowly avoid anything moving in traffic with each vehicle’s honk almost indistinguishable among the layered cacophony of constant honks. Being, at Cafe Kaara, which Gavin and I must've frequented 5 out of the 9 days we have been in Bangalore for either lunch or dinner, where we discussed anything ranging from weighing the risks of ordering a green smoothie (it was worth it, we were alright) to what we would do if we were the richest people on the planet to questioning the ethics of humanitarian work in foreign countries to discussing what life means to us for hours on end. Lessons with Ashwin This was written the morning after a four-hour long dinner with Ashwin, the ex-COO of Three Wheels United, where he asked us about our time in India. This was at the end of our time, when we were to leave in a couple days. Working and living in an entirely new and drastically different country has now made the option of working in a different country a much more foreseeable, pursuable one. Living and growing up in the US, I grew up believing that the US was the best place to live, to work, that everyone wants to move here because of the feasibility of the American Dream. I assumed that anything was possible, that the best jobs were here, that innovations were the best here. I had always known that this belief was Eurocentric and likely false in some areas, but I had fully internalized the idea that “America is number one.” Not until after living and working in India did my worldview suddenly balloon and expand to one that realizes all the benefits and endless opportunities in living and working in a different country, including India. This was reinforced especially after asking the CEO of TWU if he would ever work and live in the US. He said no, said that there are way better opportunities abroad, that the US is too boring. Hearing this from someone I respect was shocking, particularly because we are all indoctrinated with nationalism from a young age. And as Rosemary had said earlier, once you’re out of the US, you’re out. I’ve also learned that I have to work with people. I want my work to surround people. I recently got my tarot cards read, and the very first answer the reader told me was that I need communication in every aspect of my life, especially work. I already knew that I didn’t just want a technical job, but this summer has reinforced that. I want more. Lastly, I’ve internalized the idea of “shanti shanti,” to slow down, to be okay with having things be out of your control. This especially negates our American and Silicon Valley tendencies of timeliness and promptness and control, but it is a good lesson to learn. It decreases stress, it allows us to take in moments, it allows us to be. It allows us to be compassionate for ourselves and others. This brings to mind a moment at the airport in Dharamshala. It had already been half an hour after planned time for boarding but there had not yet been any announcement, so I turned to the two men sitting next to me and asked if they knew if we were boarding soon. With unwavering calm and trust, the older man with long, white hair donning a white dress shirt and pants said “Don’t worry. It will come. Just wait.” Even though the plane never did arrive due to inclement weather and low visibility, the resoluteness with which he answered was almost transcendental. I am a stress planner. If I don’t plan, I stress. When things don’t go to plan, I stress. Especially if things are out of my control, I stress! But, being in India, I have learned to be okay with things I cannot control. Talking to Ashwin in Watson’s, a longstanding neighborhood bar in Bangalore over margaritas, Kingfishers, and Simbas, Ashwin told us that the best lesson he’s learned from India is learning to let things go when they’re out of control; to be compassionate. Ashwin quoted the Ender’s game, saying “In the moment when I truly understand my enemy, understand him well enough to defeat him, then in that very moment I also love him.” By understanding another culture and their differing relationship with perception of time, I am able to be more compassionate towards others and understanding, therefore dissolving walls rather than hardening them. I owe my mother my life. She first came to the United States in 1989, as a master’s student in sociology at University of Illinois at Chicago. My sister, who was four at the time, and my father followed a few months later. Without this transatlantic migration, I would not be here, due to the one-child policy in China at the time. Over the next nine years, my father would start as a bus boy and end as a computer hardware entrepreneur, selling out at weekend PC shows due to his low prices and generous customer service, even with the language barrier. My mother would graduate from her master’s program while working as a teacher’s assistant and go on to be a data analyst at United Healthcare. Together, my parents began in a small apartment in Chicago, living on $300 a month, all while taking care of my toddler sister to moving into a suburban home located in a nice neighborhood and conceiving me. This is just one paragraph out of the book of sacrifices my parents underwent. This is the story that steels me when I am weak. This is my backbone. Combined with my family’s history, my childhood is another source I draw upon for resilience in fighting against social injustices and racism. Growing up first-generation was hard—to live in a successful school district meant living in gentrified areas of little diversity. Being aware of my “other”ness came early. I remember the isolation I felt during lunchtime in elementary school, when my table-mates would make fun of the smell and appearance of the traditional Chinese food my mother had lovingly packed at 6 am before she left for work. Whether it was soup, dumplings, moon cakes, all would spike disgusted curiosity from classmates and shame from me. Even if it meant settling for a tasteless PB&J, Kudos bar, and Goldfish, all I wanted was to be normal. This desire to fit in at the cost of silencing my culture would follow me to high school. After years of an internal tightrope walk between my household Chinese culture and the stifling American one, I emerged as an advocate for my heritage and all others at risk of extinguishment by whiteness. As a first-generation, educated woman of color in STEM, I feel that it is my responsibility to create spaces for other women of color to be welcomed into and succeed in. It is for my parents that I run so fervently in my pursuit. Another struggle that has shaped me is my mental health. My mental health is two-edged blade. It gives me resilience and takes it away. I was diagnosed with depression my junior year of high school, and I did the whole shebang. I went to therapy, went on antidepressants, the works. I thought I had sufficient coping skills when it came time for college, but my first year was one of the hardest I’ve ever experienced. It is in college that I’ve had the lowest of lows and most rewarding of highs. I didn’t realize it at the time, but my stability before coming to college came from the security of my home, family, and friends. Once all those support systems were abruptly 1,800 miles away from me, I had only myself. After a particularly rough night, I checked into outpatient therapy for the last few weeks of spring quarter during my first year, while still continuing my studies. Through this program, I overcame many triggers and found value in journaling and meditation, which are coping mechanisms I still fall back on in times of need. Most importantly, I found value in myself and my work. My self-love is still not quite as solid as I’d like, but I’m only human. I will always have growing pains. No matter how hard it gets, I am not ashamed of my diagnosis. Although it can be my worst enemy at times, I am grateful for the deep introspection that comes with depression. The sensitivity to internal conflicts and suffering around me invokes a relentless passion to help however many people I can in whatever capacity. It is why I chose civil engineering and why I applied to the Global Social Benefit Fellowship: Both have potential to redistribute power and redeliver autonomy to those who have been forcibly deprived of it through colonialism. With all this in mind, my travels abroad to Costa Rica have largely influenced the path I’m traveling. Shortly after my depression diagnosis, I went to Costa Rica during the summer after junior year of high school through Rustic Pathways, a travel and volunteer organization. The first nine days, I partook in various community service projects, such as paving roads to remote villages and painting houses. The latter nine days, I stayed with the indigenous BriBri community to help build a chocolate factory. A source of their income was farming, collecting, and roasting cacao beans, which is a highly labor-intensive process. Since the community had no access to a machine to produce their own chocolate, they sold large bags of cacao for a mere five dollars to a middleman, who then made a large profit by selling the beans to Hershey’s. Rustic Pathway’s goal over the summer was to construct a local chocolate-making machine so the BriBri tribe could sell products straight to consumers, increase their income, and directly partake in the market. In this work, I felt pure contentment and fulfillment for the first time in my life. I have been chasing after this feeling ever since. Four years later, I traveled again. From July to November 2018, I studied abroad in Auckland, New Zealand. While my visit to Costa Rica created a direction for me to follow, my time in New Zealand modified it. Taking a quarter away from SCU while deep into my studies provided me freedom to question my vocational choice of civil engineering. Because I was thrown into large lecture halls filled with students already familiar with each other, I suddenly had no friends in the classroom to study with. Not yet assimilated to large lecture halls and lack of support from my peers, I began to struggle in my courses and question my major. Do I enjoy civil engineering in itself? Or, is my interest in it transient and only because of my friends and faculty at SCU? What am I going to do if I find out it’s the latter? It’s too late to switch majors. I’m stuck. These uncertainties only grew, and in their crescendo, I realized that I had so passively been following this predefined path to ensured “success.” I was plodding through the check list of receiving good grades, obtaining an internship, and was planning on pursuing graduate school or securing a technical job upon my return to the US. Going to New Zealand disrupted this trajectory, and the resulting questions are what led me to this limbo of re-examining my vocation. Since New Zealand is in the Southern Hemisphere, I came home mid-November. This left me with almost two full months of winter break, giving me a wealth of time for reflection. After late nights of journaling and processing with friends and family, I realized I had internalized three thoughts during my time abroad:
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