Underground Tunnels, Dumplings, and Dinner with the Trustees

Dear readers,

Set yourself up—I’ve had a long and involved week. Rules: this is in chronological order, if details are omitted later about MIT they will be included in later posts, and enjoy!

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Last Friday I was still on “vacation”—that ultimate vacation of doing work while on campus surrounded by friends. Wellesley classes had started that week, but I was only signed up for one class instead of the usual four. Instead, I was taking three classes at MIT, and MIT didn’t start until next Tuesday. Given that I had been in a total of two MIT buildings, I thought maybe I needed an MIT dry run.

So on Friday I planned a trip to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. I woke up that morning, had a brief meeting with my boss at the Admissions Office, then got sidetracked by the opportunity to go on a Wellesley Admissions Tour. By the time that finished, the bus had left, so I ate a leisurely lunch at Wellesley before the next bus arrived. I didn’t end up in Boston until 1pm, but that was quite all right; vacation is a wonderful thing.

I had a grand time for the next three hours. I had set it as my mission to find all my classrooms (check), all the libraries (I found one), all the printers (I again found one), and all the dining areas where my Wellesley affiliation would get me free meals (absolutely check.) I then discovered that the Stata Center, where one of my classes was held, goes up nine floors and down three, and that there’s an underground system of tunnels running underneath a few of the buildings. Now that’s a siren’s call, and I figured out how to go from one of my classrooms in the Stata Center to my other class in the blue building without going outside. Quite an accomplishment, as it took me around an hour, the tunnels didn’t work out, I had to find and search madly for the skyway, and the distance that I would actually have had to walk outside is something on the order of 50 feet.

Sweaty and accomplished, I then made the bus to Harvard Medical School, where I dropped in on my lab with the comment: “I just came in to say hello.” Our post-doc, Mela, and our newest lab member, Josh, seem to be getting on very well, and it was fun to chat with them and hear about their newest adventures as the responsible parties for getting a nonfunctional computer system to work. After the customary Friday evening Beer Hour at HMS (don’t worry, I don’t drink, just eat chicken wings and this time an entire bowl of shredded cheese (I like cheese)), I headed home on the bus to Wellesley. I sincerely cannot remember what I did on Friday night, but it involved hanging out with Suman and Erin and practically falling asleep on a couch :).

Saturday was a work day, and I dutifully filled in my summer applications while awaiting dinner at Tiffany’s house. It was Tiffany’s youngest sister’s birthday, and also approximately her grandmother’s birthday, which corresponds with the Lunar Cycle and thus not exactly with our calendar. We made dumplings (I’m improving every time), had a fantastic meal, watched the SuperBowl (second time in my life), and had much cake before returning to Wellesley. I love Tiffany’s family, and how they’ve adopted me and others into their home. (The hallmark of being adopted is that Tiffany’s grandmother can remember your name. I totally achieved that sometime early this year.)

Sunday morning Tiffany, Suman and I checked in with Gabby. Gabby is abroad in China, and when we talked to her she was just about to relocate from Beijing to Xi’an for a week. One of her amusing anecdotes was the difficulty of finding a FedEx in Beijing. Sketchy alleys and warehouses were included.

Monday: last day of freedom! In a wonderful turn of events, I had been assigned to read and reflect on a book for English class, so I sat down and read “Drown” by Junot Díaz. Reading books in one sitting is an immense pleasure of mine. So too was finishing up what I wanted to do for research, and sitting down a long dinner, both of which occurred :).

Drumroll please for Tuesday, because it was my first day of classes at MIT! Having never taken a class at MIT, I decided to jump in headfirst and take three. You’re not actually allowed to do this, because Wellesley only lets you take two classes there per semester. Fortunately, Dean Stephan helped me discover the exception that we have one “overload” semester in which we can take more :).

The day started out strong, with 9.40: Introduction to Neural Computation. After introducing myself to anyone within sight, I settled in for a lecture—with math. Now, don’t get me wrong, I enjoy math, but I wasn’t expecting quite so much of it, or more importantly that it would come at me quite so quickly. After a few panicked minutes (AH I didn’t get that AH I need to look at that a little more closely AH I’m falling behind!), I settled on a solution. “Monica, you’re an MIT student,” I repeated over and over. Interestingly, intellectually I knew that I’d actually had more or just as much math preparation as the majority of the MIT students (sophomores) in that class. I was just being affected by the stereotype of MIT vs. Wellesley. I hadn’t thought I’d internalized it, but there it was.

I found out later that the problem was that I hadn’t taken Physics II, which is a requirement that most MIT students take as freshmen. Easily solved—I just print out the lecture slides and look over them at my own pace, and then they make sense. Still, these moments of panic are quite funny to me—I’ve felt it in Wellesley classes too, when I think “I’m not an English major, so my writing skills are probably worse,” but as far as I can remember, it hasn’t applied to math or science courses. It really makes me appreciate the mindset in Wellesley—that you can do anything, that you’re prepared for everything, and why would you even question yourself?

Regardless, I’m incredibly pleased I’m taking all these math and science courses at MIT. This is a friendly and welcoming environment that more mimics what I’ll encounter in the future, and it’s best to get my biases and fears out of the way now. Most Wellesley students take humanities classes at MIT (especially business and entrepreneurial classes, which aren’t emphasized at Wellesley), and maybe that has contributed to my irrational mindset. I’m sure I’ll notice the little influences more later, but for now I’m happy with the challenge.

After lunch I went to 18.05: Introduction to Probability and Statistics. This is going to be an awesome class—I have a great group of people (so lucky!), the teachers are excellent, and I like the content. 8.02: Physics II was later, and I wasn’t very successful on making friends the first day. But fast-forward to Thursday, and now I hopefully have three problem-set partners :).

I was so tired on Tuesday that I feel asleep on the bus, which never happens :). So it was good that the next day was Wednesday, my Wellesley day, when I could stick around on campus and be surrounded by familiar environs!

Wednesday I had a wonderful English class—I can already tell that I’m going learn an immense amount about writing this semester from Prof. Cezair-Thompson. Then I had lab meeting with Professor Conway, in which I, Evelyn, and Isabelle got a new project! After, I tutored the second half of the computer science (CS) lab, before squeezing in a few hours of homework. That evening I had my drop-in hours for CS, went back to my room and worked out on the ellipticals, finished and cleaned up my speech for Thursday, picked out nice clothes for Thursday, did more homework and fell asleep, finally, in my warm and sheltered bed.

By which we come to Thursday, which was the day of the week I most wanted to tell you about :). After my classes at MIT (9.40, 18.05, and 8.02), I took the bus back to Wellesley, and quick-stepped it to Wellesley College Club, where students almost never venture. I rushed into the bathroom, changed into pants, a nice shirt, and boots, and then stepped up to my poster at the Trustee’s meeting.

The theme of this Trustee’s meeting was summer research at Wellesley. Last week, around 10 students had been invited to present at a small poster session and talk with the Trustees over dinner. Five science faculty had also been invited to attend. Moreover, Prof. Kolodny, Hailey (a senior who works in Prof. Mattila’s lab) and I (a junior working in Prof. Conway’s lab) were invited to give 5-minute speeches. I’d written a sort of poem, and I was to speak last.

It was fantastic, and just the sort of spark I needed to remember that my life isn’t only about turning homework in on time, that the future is expansive, and that I need to appreciate how far I’ve come sometimes instead of just focusing on what I need to improve. Hailey’s talk was beautiful (I want to rave about it for you, except I’d need to analyze  all the components that made it so skilled, and I’d rather just bask in how enjoyable it was), and my poem was also well-received!

Over dinner, the Trustees and I talked about gender identification, cataract surgery (I’m told to look forward to this in the future), the culture on campus, jobs, family, my future. None of the Trustees really wanted to tell me what they did—they were all such smooth conversationalists that they kept on asking me about what I did. I went through an entire poster during the poster session, answering questions and not worrying about anything, before I learned I was talking to Wellesley’s President’s husband. He’d introduced himself as a retired sociologist in the beginning, and then revealed that gem at the end. It makes me laugh now, to think of it.

There were a lot of things I want to say about that night, and I’ve written a substantial journal entry to myself about all the thoughts it raised. It’s a whole different world talking with freshman 8.02 students, and talking with the people who fund a college like Wellesley. Yet I’m out of time, so I’ll only say a few words.

I think what we miss the most, being in college, is the generational difference in perspective. The attitudes and lenses of people who have experienced the world, watched cultures change and stay the same, who have lived for far longer than we have—they show me completely different ways of seeing commonplace issues. They’re aware of so much (event, opinions, changes) that I’m not, and conscious of immeasurable facets of life I can’t hope to understand. I get the sense, when I’m talking to them, that I’m not even brushing the surface of the wisdom they could share with me. College is wonderful, and so too is spending time with people like the Trustees, and I wish I could spend my whole life doing both.

I’m off to MIT again, for recitation in 18.05 and 8.02. Great love to those who soldiered through, and comments and questions are welcome as always. See you next week!

Monica