A couple members of the CUAUV project team were kind enough to lend a few of us a tour of their team’s lab space. In Upson there is space, tools, and equipment allocated to many project teams including CUAUV. I honestly expected the tour to be a little uncomfortable and intrusive. I mean, we were going to walk around a place where people had competitions to prepare for, machines and systems to build, and of course final exams to study for. I didn’t expect to see any welcoming or smiling faces there. But I was wrong. As our CUAUV guides described their work and showed us their space, the rest of their teammates were hard at work, but they seemed so passionate about what they were doing. Some people were fine-tuning circuit boards, some were analyzing data, and some were putting machine parts together. All of them gave us intruders kind gestures as they continued to do what they had been doing. There was so much friendly, collaborative energy, and I could tell that for them it’s more of a family than it is a team. There was a massive whiteboard with all sorts of notes – thoughts, supplies to order, problems to solve, and funny messages alike. As stressful as it may be for them to spend hours on end working on their project, it was clear to me that they truly enjoy it. As the guides talked about the culmination of all their work, I realized how diverse of a learning experience they get. Sure, building an autonomous underwater vehicle does involve circuits, gears, nuts, bolts, all that typical stuff. But they emphasized that there is all sorts of cost and marketing analysis behind the vehicle. Not only is it expensive to build, but it is also expensive to test. They bring the vehicle to Teagle Pool for testing and analysis. If there’s anything broken, wrong, or inefficient, then they will have to incur the cost of replacing it. So they have to balance the efficiency and functionality of what they build with the costs of doing so. As someone who is considering the path of a tech entrepreneur, I found it very interesting when the guides talked about their team from this angle. It was a pleasure to talk to the members of CUAUV, and I’m sure that at their competition this summer they will be tough to beat.
Author Archives: mjc473
When your passion calls, you better listen
GRF Sara led a productive discussion about the grad school process and helped many people in the room to formulate their own thoughts and plans. But for me it was most thrilling to hear how she paved her way to grad school. She worked in the consulting industry for many years before she had an epiphany. When she wasn’t consulting with clients, she was diving deep into literature, reading book after book of all sorts of genres. That’s what she wanted to do at the end of the day. So she figured, why wait until the end of the day? It’s a passion, not a hobby, so it should be ever present in life. She was already reading and writing extensively in her work for the consulting firm, so it wouldn’t be that dramatic of a shift. From that trail of thought she decided to consider grad school to pursue a career as an English professor. It was clear from the way she articulated her epiphany that she had made the right decision and that she is very happy. Tips can help in the near future without doubt. But sometimes it is a journey into the unknown that can be most rewarding in the distant future, the future we cannot picture in our minds even if we try.
Why leave gifts in the dust?
When I read that Julian Schnabel’s “Before Night Falls” is about Reinaldo Arenas, a homosexual Cuban poet who struggled under Castro’s revolutionary government, I had expected something very political. I had expected to see more of an ideological war between those who were with Castro and those who were not. But what I saw was an almost dreamlike take on the life of a man who just wanted to express his ideas and thoughts no matter who came across them. Arenas found the gift of poetry as a child, when one of his teachers in school noticed his talent and imagination. But to his grandfather and the rest of society, what Arenas had was not a gift but a shame. But that didn’t stop Arenas. He didn’t care for his writing instrument – he would even carve his words onto the bark of a tree if that’s what it took for him to be able to exercise his passion. This early battle between Arenas’s passions and the voice of society continued into the Cuban Revolution. To Castro’s government Arenas was an enemy not only because he was homosexual but also because of his ideological threats as a writer, so Arenas lay in prison. I found the prison scenes interesting because they reminded me of Martin Luther King Jr.’s time in prison. Even in prison, Arenas wrote and wrote for both the public and his fellow inmates. Just as prison did not deter Dr. King, it certainly did not deter Arenas. Of course, unfortunately, to see Arenas escape from the oppressive Cuban government to New York and wind up with AIDS was tragic to watch. I thought after bearing all the opposition and torture back home that Arenas would no longer suffer. But if he had listened to his grandfather and left his artistic and intellectual potential in the dust, never to show them to the world, wouldn’t he have suffered even more? I think so. Amid quite a bit of hate, he managed to be himself and no one else.
14% of a life
What would it be like to live only one day a week? To spend six claustrophobic days in hiding, not asleep but eagerly waiting for the bell to ring and for recess to start? To find happiness and peace in a world that seems to regret your very existence? Sure, before I watched the Netflix original “What Happened to Monday”, I’d heard these questions elsewhere. I’d imagined a post-apocalyptic scenario like that, nothing new. But this film made me experience what I’d imagined. The scenario is not too complex: a one-child policy in a world suffering from overpopulation. Seven twin sisters, each named a day of the week, swap lives every day to wear the figure of Karen Settman. When one sister is out in the world, the others are stuck inside monitoring her and making sure nothing goes out of hand. It’s a precarious life – one slip in behavior, people get suspicious, and it’s all over. How can this happen in a world so crowded with people? Well, in this society phrases like “give me some personal space” and “mind your own business” draw investigation from the authorities, the people who spend their lives searching for and detaining people who in their eyes should not have been born. And their prime target(s)? Each seventh of Karen Settman. For me there is always a sense of discomfort in this film. The irony is that while the seven sisters spend their days protecting their existence, they don’t ever get to reveal their own personalities. So it’s almost as if they don’t truly exist themselves. I certainly hope the world never becomes the one depicted in this film, but it was thrilling to peer inside the crystal ball.
Box of chocolates: take ’em or leave ’em
“Life is a box of chocolates; you never know what you’re gonna get”, says Forrest Gump recalling his mother’s advice. He’s talking about serendipity: bumping into someone who becomes a lifelong friend, winding up in situations that grant unforeseeable opportunities. It’s when everything seems to work out, but how is almost a mystery. Such is Forrest Gump’s life. The guy literally runs out of a physical disability, meets the love of his life in elementary school, plays championship football at Alabama, earns the Medal of Honor in Vietnam, meets multiple U.S. presidents, marathons across the country, starts a lucrative shrimp restaurant corporation, and makes all sorts of connections and friends. In pursuit of his mother’s advice, when Forrest faces a sample of chocolate from the box, he takes it without hesitation. Through bullets and bombs in Vietnam he rescues his lieutenant, his dear friend Bubba, and the rest of the men he can find. When Jenny meddles with the wrong crowd, Forrest protects her from getting hurt. When his mother becomes fatally ill, Forrest supports her and heeds her last words. He’s almost like a computer program – run it and Forrest will do everything he can for the people he loves, always putting himself last. While this characteristic of Forrest is admirable, it also reveals him at times to be naive. Until her final days, Jenny clearly doesn’t reciprocate Forrest’s feelings for her. But Forrest doesn’t get the message, so time and time again he picks her up when she falls and reenters her life. Jenny doesn’t appreciate Forrest’s commitment, duty, and care to her and to everyone else around him until the end of her life. At first glance Forrest may not appear to be very bright, but he is selfless to the bone. He takes advantage of the resources and opportunities at his disposal. He collects and harvests bits and pieces of wisdom from those close to him. He runs. And when it’s all over, that box of chocolates is just an empty box and the life of Forrest Gump a real treat.
Game, Life, No Difference
I’m a tennis fan who used to be an avid football fan. I’ve criticized football plenty since I stopped following it. But there’s nothing I can criticize about Friday Night Lights. I mean, what a movie. In a West Texan town where football is everything, the Permian Panthers, a competitive high school football team, don’t just play for fun. Every time they step onto the clean-cut grass of a field they wear the label of their hometown. The whole school knows each and every player. It’s a ghost town whenever there’s a game – local businesses close as everyone heads to the bleachers. College recruiters and cameramen left and right. All eyes on the Permian Panthers. All the time. But it doesn’t take long to realize that the pressure gets to each and every one of the players. This is clear in just about every scene involving Mike Winchell, the 17-year-old quarterback. From his ill mother to a past state champion and alumnus asking for a photo with his baby daughter, Mike battles with expectations and with his own self-belief. Other players, such as Boobie Miles, relish in the spotlight, fame, and potential, but Mike is different. No matter how well his team is doing on the field, he holds onto a pessimistic belief that somehow he is bound to fail. Fail them, fail his coach, fail his mom, fail himself. Gaines, the coach, eventually notices what’s going on inside of Mike. There’s a scene where Gaines urges Mike to let go of his doubts, and throughout the conversation Mike fiddles with a toy car. What I love about this scene is that the way film portrays it, it’s as if Mike and that toy car are one in the same. A toy car is a symbol of both innocence and immaturity. All of Odessa depends on Mike and his team to win the state championship as if life would end otherwise. But in reality Mike and his team are just a bunch of toy cars. They’re young. They still have years to learn, grow, and succeed. A toy car is also a symbol of enjoyment. They just want to play football under lights on a Friday night. Sure, their futures and careers may depend on the team’s results. But not at the expense of the joy they’ve had since they first picked up a football. By the time the state championship comes, the team is no longer there for the hedonistic pleasure of winning a game. They’re there to put their hearts into one final game regardless of what happens. So when they lose the closest game they’d ever played, they don’t pout. They don’t throw their helmets at the ground. They don’t talk smack about the other team. They smile, embrace each other, and acknowledge that they got to play the game they love under bright lights on a Friday night. And that’s all that matters.