Goals 27, 38, 58 & 75: Another 'Semester' at Stanford

There's really no reason to be worried about not updating this too often, as I'm sure you only check to see if I've updated it once or twice a year maybe. Probably less now because I update it less now. This post marks me at 58% complete on the 101 goals, and only 136 days remaining. My odds are not too good for completing the entire list, so I might have to hedge some of the goals, or declare them prematurely. That, or I need to get my butt in gear this summer.

The last two quarters at Stanford have been exciting, but also challenging. I'm facing a lot that I never have before, and I'm not just talking about schoolwork. It's been an intense few months that has left me in a new place that I'm trying to navigate, but the waters are unknown, and there's a hidden reef. I've been on this trajectory for too long, believing these days would come but not preparing for them. Now it's as if the I've been duped, tricked by my own thinking into thinking I was unflappable, that I could prevail.

The trick there is that I can prevail on this course, but this was never intended to be permanent. I've enjoyed the scenic route, but now I'm afraid I'm lost; too far off the map to make it to my destination in time. They say the journey is half the fun, or something like that, but that means there's still another whole half out there when you get to wherever you're going. No matter how much fun you've had so far. 

With that, I guess I'll talk about some fun I've had so far...

Goal 38: Replace Something in my diet with Something Healthy and Natural

I admit right now that I haven't totally replaced anything in my diet, but I've gotten pretty close. Over winter break I had a conversation with Annie and Matthew about the morality of eating meat. Annie has been a vegetarian for 11 years or something impressive like that. Matthew thinks that animals were made to be eaten. The argument was put forth that if you can survive without taking a life, then you should... and I guess that made a lot of sense to me.

Now, I haven't fully replaced meat with not-meat, because most of the food I eat is acquired at group meetings and events. But what I have replaced is purchased meat. Meaning simply that I don't buy meat, and I always opt out of meat if asked before hand (to affect ordering). I go this route because I think my impact on eating a scoop of meat-food at an event is magnitudes less than if I directly buy it. I guess I'm just justifying myself though.

Goal 27: Make my Product Design Portfolio

For finding a summer job I created my portfolio. Feel free to take a look and tell me what you think. I like it, but I know it needs improvements. I got feedback from one place I really wanted to work at this summer that it was 'too busy.' So I guess I'll be revamping it next summer.

Download it here.

Goal 58: Gain and Keep Three Industry Contacts from Different Companies

I guess I could go into a bit here, but I don't really want to. Patricia is a contact from Walt Disney World that I took a course from called "Creativity and Innovation: Gaining the Edge." It was a really cool course, and I've been in contact with her ever since, seeing her every time I return to Florida. Jason is a contact from Sandia National Labs who is an extremely smart guy, and was my manager while I worked there. I loved him, and for some reason he loved me too. I was really sad to leave Sandia for Disney last summer just because of him. Adam is part of top management at SAP, and I met him through my tablet project at Stanford. I almost accepted a job from him at SAP for this summer, but decided not to because I had already accepted another offer. I will be keeping in touch with him about future opportunities and connections. Done.

Goal 75: Visit Disneyland Hong Kong 

So this is exciting, yeah!? Yeah. Because of my design project with SAP and Stanford for ME310, I was flown to China. I booked my flight a week early so that I could spend some travel time seeing the country before it became business time for the project. I went to Beijing, Hong Kong, Guanzhou, Shanghai, and Hefei. It was lovely.

I spent three days in Hong Kong, which is certainly my favorite city in China so far. One of those days was at Disneyland with Annika. 

Look at that. It was really hard to take in. It was so similar to the Disney I know, but then it was also quite different. Fewer coasters, slightly different rides, and a different feeling in general. It's strange going when it's not busy also. The parade was to be expected.

The castle, of course. The fireworks show was not as moving as Wishes or Illuminations.

Shoalin Goofy. Also featured is Annika and I in our matching panda shirts that Qingyi bartered down for us in Beijing.

The mountains that surrounded the park also made it a new experience.

Hong Kong

Beijing

Shanghai

Status: You know that part when Steve Zissou is wandering around the ship after Kingsly (Ned) dies, and before they pick up a homing beacon signal?

Goals 1, 45 & 83: Saying Goodbye to Sweden

So I've gone five months with barely a word about the place I've been living...

Goal 45: Live and study in a foreign country

This one was basically a given completion goal, because by the time I joined the Day Zero Project, I was basically on my way to Sweden. Regardless, I did live in a foreign country, and I did study (sometimes). I would like to add a bit of validity to the goal, mentioning that until the final month or so, I wasn't really living in Sweden at all, just surviving. So what does that even mean?

Well, most of my time in Sweden was spent under the oppression of a few of my peers, and one night, Ariel, Kenneth and I all joined together in a pact to live it up during the final days of our Swedish residence permits. This decision single handedly saved my impression of Sweden.

We started by climbing the roof of our school. We started out with minor mischievous pranks such as making cup pyramids and turning all of the microwaves on. When I found an open window, we achieved the high point of the school, and relaxed in our discussion of our final days.

The first big win was in the vehicle class. We found derelict bikes, fixed them up, and used them as a new, and primary, mode of transportation for our adventures.

Although Kenny mostly disappeared from our adventures, Ariel and I lived it up at a Spanish Omelet Competition, that included a beautiful view, an epic toast, and loads of delicious food.

The study portion of the goal is an interesting thing to note. Sweden does the courses much differently from the US. They have two periods for every semester, and courses can take any speed. Full time is considered 30 credits. Courses can be 7.5 credits and take the whole semester, or just one period, depending on their speed. I could continue to explain, but as long as you have a total of 30 credits over a semester, you're full time.

I specifically chose my courses in order to have the maximum amount of time free, every week. I took one online course, one course in each period, and one class that started in the middle of the first period, and ended in the middle of the second. Long story short, I had at most 2 classes a week, and little work to do, which is how I managed to visit ten other countries while studying.

Ariel and I then teamed up at a Beer Pong party in which we went 9 for 10 in drinking games. My favorite play was a two-balls-one-cup move that 'sploded all but one of our opponents' cups into their bellies.

Food was a common means of gathering in the final days. We barbecued, we made cornbread, we had birthdays, and we made cookies.

(no comment)

The final days were also filled with flag signings and goodbye toasts. Many friendships deepened as we all realized that this thing was coming to an end. It was really beautiful to share parting stories with so many great people.

Graduation in Sweden

Graduation is super awesome in Sweden because all of the highschoolers dress up and take to the streets. Many of them were carrying around boomboxes, or had choreographed dance routines. It seemed like so much fun, and I wish so badly that the US had some great community events such as this and Valborg, where everyone gets out of the house and on to their feet.

My personal favorite was the crew of colored spandex suits. They reminded me of the Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, and made me wonder where I find a suit of my own.

The Final, Final Days

For about a week before I left Sweden, my days were packed. One of the most exciting things I did was swim to an island in the middle of Mälaren lake. I did this with Aaron Kahn, and it proved to be harder than we expected.

It was about 400m or so from shore to the island, but it was 400m of freezing cold. We got to the island with almost no problem, but once we could touch, we had to wade through another 50m of sharp reeds. Once we got through that, we had to fight off mass quantities of mosquitos and ants until we found a nice spot overlooking the lake with a bit of a breeze to it. We warmed up a bit and began to swim back without much delay.

Once we got in the water to go back, we tried to push a stockpile of reeds together, with two floating logs underneath in order to create a raft that we could possibly paddle back to shore. Our raft quickly deteriorated, leaving us with a soccer ball and an old buoy for floatation. These turned out to be lifesavers (possibly literally) because the swim back was severely more difficult. We lost more than our fair share of body heat and energy getting across the first time, so it was a tough cookie getting cramps and wanting naps on the return swim.

Goal 83: Learn basic Swedish

By this time, I found out that I had passed my course, 'Swedish for Foreign Students,' with ease. Jag talar inte flytande Svenska, men jag talar Svenska.

(Photo courtesy of Kenneth)

At the very end, I had to leave a bunch of stuff behind. Mostly stuff that I got with my room or found along the way, it was too good to throw away. In order to make someone such as our Finnish friends less unnerved about taking abandoned things, I left a note that said 'This stuff is all yours' on the soccer ball.

The final month was filled with reflection on what had happened. It had been quite an experience, and there are a few very important things that I've learned from my trip. Firstly, that it doesn't matter if most of the people you know are lame, you should always find the ones that aren't, and stick with them. Secondly, every city in the world is almost the same. The sights are good for seeing, but towns and countrysides are good for experiencing. The third thing is part of Goal 1: Send a postcard to Postsecret, so I won't mention it here.

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