Junior fall
I’m back home in Arizona. It still amazes me how yesterday morning I was on the M2 to Harvard but I went to bed more than 2000 miles away at home. Flying is crazy.
A couple of people have urged me to write on here more so here I am. This is going to be a long post as well since I feel like so many things have happened in the last 3 months. I will also be writing an analysis of an ancient Chinese poem on my more formal website sometime this week.
Overall I’d say this semester went well. For a lot of people I knew it was quite hard but for me somehow it was pretty good. Academically my courseload wasn’t a lot despite being enrolled in 5 classes. Socially I had my ups and downs but I ended on a high note. The biggest takeaway for me this semester has been in my personal development, specifically my internal compass. Read more about it below.
Table of Contents
Academics
I took 3.091 (PNR), 6.UAT (9 units), 6.002, 6.804, and CHNSLIT 114 this semester. On paper it looks like a lot but actually I had a lot of free time this semester.
3.091
The most work I did for this class was showing up to my 9 AM recitation and making my cheat sheets for the three midterms. I came into this semester imagining that I would actually try because materials science has always sounded cool to me. Then I realized I simply could not. The class was basically condensed AP Chemistry plus more. There was a material structure unit that I never learned before but somehow still passed. From my glances at the syllabus, I learned that the organic chemistry unit was very involved.
My biggest takeaway from this class is that I am jaded. The problems on the exams and homeworks were very simple, AP Chemistry-level questions. I remember acing those questions back in high school and finding the material very easy. Now though, it’s not that I’m incapable of solving those same questions but more as if I’ve stopped trying to. I can’t bring myself to find that same motivation to learn about materials, solubility, and organic molecules. It’s so sad how much internal drive – the edge, as a friend likes to call it – I’ve lost since high school.
6.UAT
I thought this class would be a walk in the park since I did public forum debate in high school. Little did I know it would not be. I was actually resolved to accept a B in this class until two nights ago I decided to look at my grade on the final presentation, which I didn’t try much on given that I thought I knew I was going to get a B, and manually calculated out my grade to find I snagged an A by 0.025 points. I entered the grading equation into my calculator twice just to make sure I didn’t see that wrong. Turns out, I somehow managed to get an A. I’ll attribute this to my amazing TA who definitely pulled hard.
Basically grading for this class is extremely subjective, and the lead instructor has made a set of criteria each talk will be grad ed on. Personally I’ve crafted and given my fair share of technical talks and presentations thanks to my science fair days in high school so I didn’t struggle much on elements such as storyboarding, signposting, and responding to audience questions. I was graded extremely harshly on my lack of gestures, my tendency to end my sentences on an uptone, and my use of filler words.
This class is a lot of busywork, which reminded me a lot of high school classes. I should’ve done a SuperUROP or taken another CI-M.
6.002
Circuits. I told mysel f this was going to be the first class I tried to really understand at MIT. The past four semesters I felt like have been just me trying to complete a class to get an A. 6.002 was going to be the first class I put my heart into. That I did.
I made sure I understood each pset problem, studied my butt off for the exams, and went to office hours each week. Originally during the labs I was just rushing to get my checkoff in time but then I realized what we were doing in lab was actually content covered in lectures (and therefore exams) so I slowed down and tried to conceptually understand what was going on.
I liked to joke with another friend of mine in this class that circuits were therapeutic. Throughout the course of this semester, I learned they really are. I cannot stop solving a circuit once I’ve started. Before I only learned about these circuit elements from the context of physics. I never un derstood how electrical engineering could be any different. Now I see that electrical engineers manipulate t hose elements to create exceedingly complex devices that basically run our everyday lives. It’s crazy how altering something as simply as the ratio between two resistors can completely change the behavior of a circuit.
Circuits have been the single constant of my semester. Once during a particularly bad week socially during the semester, solving circuits was the only thing that got my mind off the outside world. I ended up doing great on the midterm that week.
Needless to say, I’m making a hard EE pivot. Thanks MLL (I know you’re reading this) for holding me accountable on being a real 6-2.
Also I got to meet a lot of new people through this class. Shoutout to women in STEM!
6.804
I signed up for this class because I thought I would be learning about how to design smarter neural networks. Then I realized this class had nothing to do with machine learning and in fact disregarded machine learning in favor of probabilistic programming. This sounds cool on paper but honestly I was very disappointed.
The professor, Josh Tenenbaum, is a legendary figure in the field of computational cognitive science. Each lecture was essentially a recap on one of his papers. I can count the number of lectures I attended on one hand. I virtually learned nothing in this class other than how to program in WebPPL. It is a super chill class though (3 psets, 1 optional pset + final project).
Shoutout to my 2 project partners for letting me tag onto their project and carrying me. They are pretty cool and can model nearly anything.
CHNSLIT 114
This was the first, and hopefully not the last, Harvard class I preregistered for. This class was also the reason I never attended any 6.002 lectures.
I originally planned to take this class last spring and as such have been in contact with the professor since nearly a year ago. However she told me in January that she would be pushing this class to the fall instead. As a result, I found myself commuting to Harvard twice a week.
A lot of people look at me weird when I tell them I’m cross-registered at Harvard. “Isn’t the commute so bad?” is what they usually ask. To be honest, no. I have a Harvard library card so I take the M2 shuttle for free there and back. The trip takes 10 minutes. I told another friend that was taking a class at Harvard about this halfway through the semester, and her life completely changed. She had originally been paying to take the 1 to Harvard, which took about twice as long and was also unduly unreliable (the bus sometimes misses you even though you’re at the stop). Sometimes I regret telling her about the M2 because she won’t walk down Mass Ave anymore.
Back to the class. Harvard lecturers hit different. Prof. Tian is an amazing lecturer. Maybe it’s because I’m actually interested in the subject (premodern Chinese literature) but I’m sitting on the edge of my chair each class. Originally I had imposter syndrome because the class is mostly grad students, international grad students who grew up in China. Also to top it off it’s a Harvard class and the Harvard kids are leagues ahead of me in humanities right? Sometime throughout the semester though the imposter syndrome slipped out the door. Sure there were some students who had crazy insightful commentary into the texts that I would never come up with on my own but I realized that my writing and analysis wasn’t that bad either.
For the final project I could’ve made a powerpoint presentation or written a play or short story or poem in the style of one of the works we read this semester. I knew everyone would be writing something so I decided to do something different and make a short film instead. That was an interesting experience. I taught myself how to use a camera properly, plan shot sequences, and how to properly edit videos. My end product is still jank but my professor loved it at least.
I’m excited to take more classes at Harvard. Even if I’m not that interested in the subject I feel like the lecturer matters a lot more. Plus why not take advantage of the fact that I’m allowed to cross-register at the best liberal arts institution in the world?
Social life
Socially I’ve been on a roller coaster this semester. A lot of things happened in the first two months so November I decided to chill out and spent more time to myself. It’s also why I went home for Thanksgiving on a whim. I just needed to get away from MIT for a week.
Every weekend there was something going on for me during September and October. Hack, friends visiting, ring delivery, birthday, parties, etc. It was a lot. I talk about some major events below.
HackMIT
I alummed after HackMIT 2021. I was on the fence about alumming before the event but once it happened I made up my mind.
A couple factors played into this. The thing that pushed me over the edge though was mostly the lack of involvement. Second, I wanted to explore more things during my time at MIT.
Planning life after Hack is a lot like planning your retirement. What are you going to do with your time? Who do I even hang out with now?
I decided to join The Tech and this NASA build challenge after Hack. Generally speaking I’ve been happier since.
People
I got closer to a lot more people this semester. On the flipside though, I’ve also decided to cut ties with some others.
Bad news first. I essentially don’t talk to anyone I talked to freshman year anymore. This was true at the start of the semester and the entire 2021. But midway through the semester I also decided to cut ties with some of my oldest friends. I won’t speak much on this but essentially what I realized is that people grow apart. Or sometimes one person grows and the other doesn’t see that growth or doesn’t respect it and still treats the other person as someone they’re not anymore. Moreover, friendship should be mutual. If one person isn’t reciprocating then why should it even continue? It was a tough decision but ultimately I’m sure I made the right one.
Good news! I am happier with the people I hang out with now. There’s no toxicity and there’s mutual trust and respect. I feel supported. I have more in common with them. They push me to be better. I think part of why I have such great friends is because of myself. I’ve changed a lot since freshman year and even the beginning of the semester. I’m less impulsive and more in control of myself. To others apparently this looks like I’m “calming” even. I was so surprised when I heard myself described as that because throughout most of my life people have told me the opposite, that I need to chill out. I’m honestly quite happy about that though because it means I have become more like the person I wanted to be – cool, calm, collected.
Personal growth
I owe a large part of my personal growth to my friends. It’s quite obvious that you’re influenced by the people you surround yourself with. This semester for me has been monumental in the setting of my internal compass, for lack of a better word.
Finding myself
This semester I got to know people who are actually passionate about what they’re doing. Their dreams come in all shapes and sizes but the key thing is they have dreams and they’re willing to chase them. Previously I was in a very preprofessional mindset, focused on the next big internship or UROP. I was in preprofessional clubs that contained people who were pretty similar to me in that sense as well. I thought that was normal.
This semester though, I found myself. I joined The Tech and realized
- I had thoughts I didn’t even realize.
- I had a platform to voice those thoughts.
I found the person the MIT admissions office probably thought they admitted.
If you know me, you probably know that I’m a history geek. That I’m greatly moved by Buddhist notions of transience and embarrassingly emotional over movies and quotes and anything that is meant to be felt. Mountains are my solace. Classical Chinese poetry calms me, building a city in space entices me, and books define me. I’ve never been content with a career as a software engineer at a tech company or a management role at some large corporation. I’ve always wanted something more fulfilling and impactful.
Unfortunately I forgot that side of me existed until this semester. All of a sudden it felt like a gauze had been lifted off my heart. I could write about how Boston’s autumn image reminded me of an obscure poem in an obscure language. I could write about how a book got me reckoning with my Asian-American experience. I could write about so many things and so much more. Moreover, joining The Tech has also kept me accountable on my reading and writing. Now I have to read in order to have something to write about. And I’m just more motivated to share my thoughts on a variety of subjects through writing.
I used to be scared to tell people I read. Most people I’ve met have told me they haven’t read for fun since before high school. Now I’m more proud of the fact that I read. I’m also not as scared to tell people anymore that I like history and foreign poetry. People may judge me but I don’t care anymore.
What I came to college for
On Sunday I went to Harvard with a friend to meme around and interview some Harvard students about their thoughts on MIT and first impressions of us. By some stroke of luck I somehow managed to interview a Rhodes scholar. When he first said he was concentrating in applied mathematics and economics, my first thought was “Oh, he’s into quantitative finance.” Then he began talking about how he’s interested in applying quantitative methods to make better policy decisions and how he wants to eventually work in public policy or economic decision-making. I was like “Whoaaa”. When I asked him to describe the typical Harvard student, he answered that there was none and proceeded to describe his friend group, a group of 6 studying subjects as varying as cellular biology and film. That was when I realized I should have tried harder on my Harvard college application. Just kidding. No, but seriously. That’s when it really hit me that this is what I came to college for.
I wanted to meet people who had all sorts of goals and motivations. It could be curing cancer or reforming public education or writing books. It could also be as small as going back home and giving back to the communities they came from. Bottom line is I wanted to meet people who are motivated, cool, and different. Like I mentioned earlier though, I realized most people I had met so far at MIT were quite content to color within the lines. Settle after graduation with a comfy salary at a quant shop or tech company and live a stable life.
This is not to discredit those who do because honestly those are valid goals. Who wouldn’t want stability and security and a life at the top?
For me though, that’s not enough. I could never be satisfied with that. I’m just crazy and refuse to settle for such, contrary to what my immigrant Asian parents raised me to believe. I’m cursed with this need for more – more meaning, more fulfillment, more straying off the beaten path.
At least that’s what I used to believe. Now I see it less of a curse and more of a source of pride. I should be happy that I’m more willing to take risks than others. I should be happy that I have a passion for things. It’s not something to be ashamed of.
People (again)
Because it’s all about the people. Before I talked to the Rhodes scholar, I realized the people I got to know better this semester were different. More motivated by intrinsic intangibles than extrinsic awards. They might be majoring in the classic course 6 but there’s something more driving them. They want their own robotics startup, make an impact on the world with their technology, become a filmmaker even. I’ll probably be writing more about them in my 2021 recap post later so don’t want to say too much here.
My future?
It’s all got me thinking about my own future plans. I don’t really know exactly what I want. I do know I want to work at a space startup after graduation. Build some cool things but also learn what the business side of such a venture is like. Hopefully I’ll be able to build my own cities in space one day.
I also want to be a hermit. Live alone in the mountains. New Zealand, the Canadian Rockies, and the Alps all sound nice. Only my personal library to keep me company.
But I also want to travel the world and see all there is that can be seen. All the vestiges of past civilizations, see the lives and dreams of people who have since passed. I want to see and hear and live more human stories. Also I’d probably get to see more mountains.