I feel like something most college students across the country would agree on is that good food in college tastes even better when it’s also free. There’s just nothing like being offered free food at events. This past week, my friends, most of whom are from similar-ish cultural backgrounds as me, and I had an event through Wellesley’s Orthodox Christian Fellowship where we celebrated all of our Name Days. I know that those are not really a thing in the US, but at home your name day is kind of like a second birthday—who wouldn’t like that! We went to an Eastern European store nearby in Framingham and bought some food (with the org’s money! so practically free!). This is me cutting this version of banitsa (it’s a cheese filled pastry that has many different names and variations across regions and countries):
Another cool thing from last week is that I went to a physics conference at Brown University. It was the New England branch of the American Physics Society (APS) Conference. Brown’s campus was gorgeous!
I went there alongside three other Wellesley students who were all presenting their summer research. It was honestly so cool to see so many people, talk to people from different fields, and get to present my work. I actually saw two of the other interns I worked with over the summer, so that was exciting! I also met with a former Wellesley physics professor who taught at Wellesley 30 years ago. This is me with my poster:
Where does the free food fit into that you might ask? Easy! One of my classmates at the conference and I are a part of the Collaborative Research in Energy Science Traineeships (CREST) program at Wellesley. CREST is a collaboration between Wellesley, MIT, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, and Brookhaven National Laboratory (BNL) to support the development of future physicists, engineers, and energy scientists. It’s a 16-month long research and mentorship program that I have been a part of since my junior year and through which I got the opportunity to do research at BNL last summer. The program also supported me to go to this conference, including covering the travel, registration fees…and the food. We had amazing Indian food in Providence after the event. Look at all the amazing naan!
That’s it from me for the week! See you again next week!