Caltech

Follow my new blog!

Hey Everyone!

Thank you so much for reading this blog about my summer internship and travel! I hope you enjoyed it!

Follow me on my new blog..."Class in Session: E/ME 105" where I will be blogging about the engineering course I am taking this term. The course is a continuation of the research project I began when I traveled to Guatemala this past summer. In addition, you can read about how I adjust to my busy senior year and get an inside look at what my life looks like when I'm at Caltech as opposed to a working in a different part of the country, or traveling to another part of the world!

Hope to see you at my new blog!

Moving into Braun

Hey everyone!

Sorry it took such a long time for me to post----I have been super busy moving into my new room and beginning my senior year at Caltech!

My month at home in San Diego was the best! I spent a lot of time with my family, celebrated my birthday, and got to relax after such a hectic summer. I even got to help out for Caltech undergrad recruiting by visiting some high schools in San Diego---including my high school, Westview High. All in all, I really enjoyed myself.

Moving back to school was pretty rough----but I was so excited to finally settle in since I have been relocating and traveling so much these past 3-4 months. My dad was able to borrow a big truck from the engineering company he works at to make it easy to haul all of my stuff over. Thank goodness for the truck--because I have no idea how we would have done it otherwise!

This truck was humongous!---just what we needed!

After driving 2 hours up to Pasadena from San Diego, we had to unload and start moving into my new room in Braun (off-campus housing). It was unfortunate that we arrived around lunchtime, because the sun was really hitting down on us, and the heat was almost unbearable.

Thank goodness that we found a parking spot right outside the building!

The room was so much bigger than the singles I have had in Fleming---and I was so excited about all the storage space! In my new room, I put in a fridge, microwave, and food cabinet since I will be eating off-board; I also wanted to put my couch that I've had since sophomore year into it too since I had all the space. Let's just say I had a lot of stuff I wanted to have in my senior room----I like to live comfortably!

I loaned my couch to some freshman in my house last year since it didn't fit into the room I had when I was a junior. The deal was, however, whenever I needed to move the couch into a new place, they would be the ones to be responsible for carrying it wherever it needed to go. So when I called them to let them know I was moving into a second-floor room in Braun, they knew what they had to do.. :) We did have some problems getting it in through my door---It was really a puzzle, and there was a point when we all thought we wouldn't be able to get it to fit through. But then, where would I sit?!?---eventually we got it to go by temporarily removing the wooden feet on the bottom of the couch...

Thanks, guys!---it FIT!!

Anyway, a lot of moving/hauling/lifting/organizing/unpacking has happened since I arrived in Pasadena this past weekend---but I am FINALLY moved in! I want to really thank my wonderful parents and younger sister for helping me out during this move---I know it was SO HOT outside and I had soo much stuff...I really could not have done any of it without you guys! You are awesome!

It turned out great! Take a look for yourself...

Exploring Antigua

It was back to Antigua for us for the rest of our trip. We spent the days driving to the work sites to work on our projects, and the nights going out in Antigua.

The city was so pretty and historic, I felt like I was in a different world when I walked around. I was happy that we got a chance to be tourists in addition to working on the research. Of course, I did some more shopping in the markets and ate at a lot of great restaurants.

But the days flew by, and before we knew it, the 4 days in Antigua came to an end so fast. Here are pictures from the time we spent sightseeing around Antigua.

Gorgeous little town, huh?

Ixichme ruins

We left our campsite at Lake Atitlan by boat back to Panajachel. We were smarter this time and took three boats instead of only two. We did some shopping around the tourist market in Pana before packing ourselves into cars to see Mayan ruins.

So many people were on the shore when we docked the boat! Such a beautiful day on the lake! Camping was definitely tough, but I will certainly miss waking up and seeing volcanoes and the serene landscape.

Look how packed we are in the luggage van! In my opinion, we had a better deal than the other van which had about 15 or 16 packed in it! We are on the way to lunch and the Ixichme ruins. The drive was pretty rough, so I made sure to take some motion sickness medicine to help me cope with the bumpy ride.

Ixichme ruins!

Projects in Pasajquim

While we were camping by Lake Atitlan, we also took some time to visit Pasajquim. Pasajquim was the small village that hosted Caltech & Landivar students last year. Paired with the Caltech Y, the E/ME 105 class last year stayed with the families in Pasajquim and provided work and service to the small community. So we went back to visit the people and look at the improved stove that was built, and also test some projects for this year.

The town was at such a high elevation up in the mountains, it was immersed in clouds

This is the improved stove that was built last year by the Caltech Y/Landivar students

The water filtration team took some samples of the water that the people were using, and tested the effects of the prototype.

Being on site in Pasajquim will definitely give them more insight on how to improve the product

This town that we visited was the most rural village we would see during our entire trip in Guatemala. It was shocking to see how people lived here and how different it was from my life back in California. The people were so nice and made sure to answer all of our questions and give feedback on our various projects; they also invited us to a lunch at the community's town center.

In addition, here are so more pictures from our campsite by Lake Atitlan and along the drive to Pasajquim. Guatemala was so beautiful!

Stay tuned! Coming up: Mayan ruins and Antigua!

Camping at Lake Atitlan

After lunch that day, we got ready to leave Panajachel in boats for our campsite on the other side of Lake Atitlan.

TTYL Panajachel!

In retrospect, the boat ride to Lake Atitlan was pretty dangerous. Not only because the waters were slightly rough during the time of day we were on the lake, but because of the amount of stuff and people we had on two small boats.

This is only part of it!

We made the mistake of loading the first boat with most of the luggage into the bow of the boat in addition to about 12 people. When I stuck my hand on the side of the boat, the water was halfway up my forearm. The second boat held the rest of the group and almost no luggage. I was pretty nervous the entire boat ride---which took maybe 45 minutes (but felt longer!), because I didn't feel comfortable with how much the tiny boat was carrying.

Sorry so dark! but can you still see how much stuff is in the bow!?!

Are we there yet?

At least I knew were to find my life-vest if necessary...

Even though our boat wasn't as fast as the other since we were carrying more weight, the other boat didn't get to the campsite before us. That's because they ran out of gas and had to wait for us to catch up and pass them an extra tank of gasoline. It was literally a handing-over of a gas tank between boats in the middle of the lake! lol

We're coming to the rescue of the other boat!

As soon as we got to the campsite, we unloaded our gear and started setting up the tents. I am usually really good at putting up tents, so I wasn't expecting it to be too difficult. But when I opened up the bag and took out all the parts, I was shocked to discover that I had no idea how to put it together since the type of tent was one I had never encountered before. There wasn't even any instructions or anything---there was just a whole bunch of disconnected metal rods and a huge wrinkled, folded up tent that I didn't know what shape it was supposed to look like. After a lot of tries and confusion, we FINALLY were able to get it together...

How many Caltech/Landivar/Art Center students does it take to pitch a tent??

We stayed at the campsite for two nights. We swam in the lake, took boat rides to visit the other villages for dinner, stargazed (I saw 2 shooting stars in one night!----more than I have in many years!), toasted marshmallows by the fire and just bonded.

There were also a lot of huge scary spiders, no electricity and no running water. I shared a tent with 4 other girls, and all of our luggage. But each night, I slept so well since I was so tired from the long days.

5 girls + their luggage in this tent = VERY TIGHT

Camping by the lake was a wonderful experience! It was so peaceful and the view was breathtaking. More pictures to come in my next post!

Cuanto Cuesta?

Our huge group of 20 left Antigua at 6am to drive an hour to the Solola Market and the town of Panajachel.

The marketplace was full of tourists and Guatemalans selling and buying everything from food to vegetables to handmade goods. We broke out into pairs and perused the market to observe the market and also do some quick shopping.

The clock tower that is in the center plaza of the market where our group designated as the meeting area after exploring for an hour

The tents in the distance cover the marketplace which goes on for a few blocks--It was so hectic in there!

All of these textiles were handmade by these people! I was absolutely captivated by all the colors and intricate patterns. I made a few deals on some souvenirs to bring back for my family---but the Landivar students assured me that this would not be the last opportunity for me to shop.

These women are wearing the traditional Mayan clothing.

We got back onto the bus to drive up the windy roads and mountains of Guatemala to reach the town of Panajachel. It was a very tourist-y type place since it was right on Lake Atitlan. Here, we grabbed a nice bite to eat before we loaded all of our camping gear onto boats for a weekend of roughing it by the lake.

I was absolutely mesmerized by Lake Atitlan--the water was so clear--and the three volcanoes that surrounded the lake.

Am I in a postcard or what?

Getting past the souvenir stands to get to lunch....

Mallika and I both ordered the fresh, mixed Ceviche at this great restaurant  overlooking the Lake--YUM!

Coming up: The (risky!) boat ride to our campsite for the weekend!

Visiting workshops and partying one night in Antigua

Hey everyone!

I'm finally back in the states after spending 9 days in Guatemala---what an adventure! I didn't have any substantial access to internet or time to blog---so I will be blogging about my travel from the comfort of my home in San Diego.

The first few days of the trip were spent seeing the workshops where some people in the group would go to work/observe in the following days of the trip. First, we visited a small roadside brick/tile workshop where there were a few men mixing mud for the bricks with their feet and molding and shaping them into perfect bricks that would dry in the sun and then be fired in a big oven. They make about 800 individual bricks a day and work from 5am to 9am so they can work before the sun heats up.

You can see the guy mushing the huge mound of mud around with his feet

Here I am standing in front of the big oven that fits about 20,000 bricks and involves a process that takes about 35 hours of burning and constant fire feeding. With every batch of bricks fired, about 500 break because they are too close to the fire and they are supporting the weight of the other thousands of bricks on top of them---the oven could use some major redesign to increase the efficiency, so that is a solution the brick/tile team could try to conquer for their project.

We also visited a shoe workshop that day, where we got to see a group of people making hundreds of work boots.

After a long day of visiting workshops, we spent our first night in Antigua---the well-preserved colonial city/tourist town. We had dinner at a small restaurant, walked around Central Park at night and partied at a salsa club until super late.

The fact that we had to wake up super early the next day to leave Antigua to catch the Solola Market didn't stop us from having a good time!

More to come....

First post from Guatemala!

Hola!

It was hard, and it was tough...but I have made it to Guatemala! And it has been non-stop since I arrived. Thank goodness I had a good night´s sleep last night...

I am writing from my Guatemalan partner´s home and computer--and having a little bit of difficulty typing since the keyboard is a little different...everything is in Spanish over here!

There are a total of 5 Caltech students, 4 Art Center students and 7 Landivar students on the trip.

So far, we have visited a Ixchal textile museum, visited the University, had many meals together and have spent the night at our partner´s home in Guatemala city. I am about to leave in about an hour to meet the rest of the group and leave for Antigua and visit the work sites in the villages.

I gotta go!---So here are a few pictures until I have more time to blog.

Stephen and I within hours of landing in Guatemala, and about to eat breakfast here with the entire group---he doesn't even look awake yet!

Here´s the entire group at the textile museum---I <3 the Landivar students, they are so much fun!

Here is my awesome partner Sophy

Landivar University!

All right guys, I´m off to Antigua..we´ll post again soon!

In California for a few hours...

I'm finally back in CA---but not for long....my flight leaves at midnight tonight!

The CRAZIEST thing happened to me!----So, I'm trying to maneuver my 3 heavy bags through LAX on my way to catch my super shuttle---and who do I randomly bump into?

Dr. Jean-Lou Chameau, PRESIDENT OF CALTECH and his wife, Dr. Carol Carmichael!!!

What a crazy coincidence!! Out of all the people to run into at the airport upon minutes of arriving back in California...lol. I think they were just as shocked to see me as I was to see them! They had just flown back from a few days out of town, and were surprised when I told them I was headed back out to Guatemala the same day after coming back from Houston.

Had to snap a quick picture with President Chamaeu for proof!

I don't think I've had the opportunity to actually explain what my Guatemala trip is all about...so let me elaborate....

In the fall, I am enrolled in a course called: E/ME 105: Product Design for the Developing World, taught by Professor Ken Pickar. It's a course that focuses on designing products for the 2 billion people that exist on less than $2/day. The main focus is on the people within the rural Mayan community of Guatemala. Past projects have included designing a corn sheller, portable water filter, vegetable carrier, etc. The class is a collaboration between Caltech, Art Center College of Design and Universidad Rafael Landivar; and the trip will have participants from all schools. The research trip I am about to take will involve observing the lives of those who we are designing for, exploring Guatemala and working with the Guatemalan University students. I am working on the hydroponic/vertical farming project which will hopefully provide a solution to the lack of land that families have in Guatemala so they may grow their own small crops and vegetables. For more information about the project and course, check out these websites:

http://www.pickar.caltech.edu/me105/projects/vertical.html

http://www.pddw.org/community/viewforum.php?f=8&sid=1cc198a3be970a7d0ed2f0e8671c58c7

Since I will be without my laptop for the next 10 days... I will try my hardest to keep you all updated with my whereabouts in Guatemala. I gotta go meet my group soon to leave for LAX (deja vu??). I'm so excited about this trip---and can't imagine what new adventures will be in store for me!