Sunday, June 16, 2019
By:
This week was all about trial and error. Being in a totally different environment like DC means that I have to experiment with many different experiences and opportunities. I found this to be a common theme both at work and outside.
I started this week by making more Jello and experimenting with ways to film the demo working. This process was surprisingly long and complicated. I locked myself in a dark room and started recording multiple videos of my demo. I quickly realized that it is really difficult to use my phone to record and do the demo at the same time. I needed to get the video from a high angle so decided to tape my phone to a chair and have it record the whole thing. This worked for a while, but it was too much of a hassle especially since the chair would not stay still. I ended up asking Andrew to help me film the videos and that made the process go so much smoother. So, lesson learned! There is no shame in asking for help when I need it.
On Wednesday my “homework” was to bake a cake and brownies to do experiments on them, which I think gives me the right to say that I have the coolest internship ever! So, I spent all of Thursday with the cake, the brownies, and some ball bearings. My goal was to see how they reacted the pastries reacted to being hit by the balls. The cake was up first, and I went to take the cover off of it, I realized the mistake I made the night before. The top layer peeled off with the cover which means that I had covered it when it was still warm so as the steam reached the foil, it condensated and fell back down onto the surface of the cake and made it soggy, Yikes! I still went forward with the experiment of dropping the balls on the cake but that was messy process because every time the ball hit the surface of the cake it got stuck and actually lifted some cake with it. Luckily, I had anticipated this problem with the brownies, so I had a layer of paper towels between the surface of the brownies and the aluminum foil. As one can imagine, the brownies experiment went A LOT better!
This theme of experimentation extends beyond the walls of ACP. On Saturday we were invited to an Orchestral concert at the National Orchestral Institute, and as a person who is not into classical music, I was skeptical. To be completely honest, I was 90% sure that I was going to fall asleep during the 2-hour concert. To my surprise, I was genuinely invested in the show! I ended up enjoy every bit of it, and it reminded me of how fun it is to perform music.
This week I learned to:
- Ask for help when I need it
- Never wear brand new heels to a walk on the trails of the Teddy Roosevelt island
- Try new things, even if they might seem lame
Nour Ibrahim