Monday, June 24, 2024
By:
Back in DC with a week full of BBQ, games, and more fun with my fellow interns. I flew back Thursday morning, excited to celebrate Charles’ 21st birthday, his complete becoming of the Alpha Wolf. After a long day of meetings and fun, we decided to have a little pre-game before going out to celebrate, which always results in some competitive activities. As the night began, we headed to Decades, my first-ever nightclub experience. Everybody was hating on it, but I enjoyed myself. The music was decent, and it was fun to dance with everyone. We ended the night with a trip to WaWa, which is a bigger 7/11 with actual food.
Friday was a much-needed day of relaxation as I had only gotten 3 hours of sleep from the night before and needed some recharging. Most of the other interns headed to the french embassy for a night of performances, wine, and cheese. I, on the other hand, chose to enjoy the comfort of my air-conditioned room as I was trying to decide which courses to take in my first quarter at UCI. I’m feeling very bittersweet about the engineering courses in my future as I think most people do considering that the concepts we learn are so cool but they hurt your head like hell trying to grasp.
Saturday was the grand prize of the week. We started with the 32nd annual BBQ festival, where we stood in long lines under the scorching sun, but it was all worth it to try some fantastic BBQ and many other types of foods, some from local vendors and others from large corporations. The highlight was the food, but a bonus was that they were giving out all kinds of snacks, produce, and other packaged groceries for us to take home! They really know how to cater to broke college students. After almost becoming like Spongebob in that episode where he had no water, we took an Uber back to Shenkman to get ready for Astro On the Mall. We arrived at the Smithsonian Metro stop and walked over to the venue while admiring DC's beautiful architecture. Once we made it, we began to set up and explore the venue, which was full of many informative and demonstrative physics booths. Aside from that, there was a DJ booth playing some EDM and House Music, which I enjoyed, but it was way too loud for the type of event. I loved seeing the kids get so excited when showing them the different light and sound demos we had set up for them, which were the boom whackers, light diffraction through prisms, and also a “thunder tube,” which was a spring connected to the bottom of a tube with a diaphragm to amplify the sound. It was great to see the parents happy as well, taking their kids to events like these for fun but also trying to spark their interest for their future. It warms my heart, and I love seeing parents who care like this. Overall, this week has been one of the best so far, and I can’t wait for what the rest of the summer has in store.
Mujtaba Khalid