Author: b.li5

Building my horizons at the Pop Up Makerspace Event

Posted on by b.li5

While walking down the hallway of the second floor of the vertical building, my friends and I were confused of where the Pop Up Makerspace was taking place. As we entered the room after going through a long and meandrous maze, we found ourselves in a small classroom of three other students and two older men. Two of the students were on computers learning how to use a program to create 3d visuals so that they could later print it at the 3D printing machine. Because we didn’t have a computer, we decided to head to the back of the room where there were several gadgets and instruments that we could use or play with. At first glance, we played with the tiny little 3D printed objects such as a tiny T.A.R.D.U.S, the phone booth from Doctor Who, a sofa chair, several phone cases, a puzzle cylinder, a few fidget cubes and spinners, and some other cool printed replicas of icons or logos. After a while, one of the adult men came up to us and started to talk to us about the simple google carboard virtual reality box. He told us that we could use our phones to look at beautiful scenery and pictures in the world and experience it as if we were there. We started to look at places such as the Great Wall of China, the Taj Mahal, a beautiful sky lit up by the northern lights, and the breathtaking view of the blue ocean. While attending this Pop Up Makerspace event, my creative and inner passion for innovation and engineering was rekindled. Baruch College is known for its wonderful business programs, but Baruch College is not known for its wonderful resources and opportunities for students to broaden their horizons and interests. Attending this event really made me enjoy the community that Baruch College offers to its students. 

Going to the Whitney

Posted on by b.li5

On Wednesday, we went to the Whitney Museum of American Art. Before we arrive, we had to walk many long blocks from the L train to the museum. As we approached the museum, we went up to the front desk to acquire our free tickets since we are CUNY students. As this continued, the woman at the front desk kindly gave us white and beautiful tickets that displayed generic fonts of admission to the museum. The lady then told us that we had to go through baggage check in; however, my group and I decided to take the elevator that we first saw and it was the elevator that skipped the basement floor, which was baggage check in. Instead, we immediately arrived at the third floor where I had to urgently use the bathroom. Afterwards, we had gone to the 8th floor to see what was up there. When we arrived, we did not feel satisfied of the certain pictures and displays that they had. So we decided to go down to the 7th floor where we saw more paintings to our liking. I found an oil on a canvas painting which was primarily colors of black, beige, and maroon while it had little streaks of grey, dark blue, light blue, yellow, and orange. When I looked at the picture, it reminded me of a pizza slice because of the yellow and maroon colors. However, this pizza slice picture elicited emotions such as confusion, mellowness, joy, and a hope for a new beginning. After looking at this painting, we decided to head down to another floor where we saw more abstract art of propaganda during the cold war era. We saw uniforms of soldiers laying on the floor as if they had been positioned the way that dead people would be. This entire experience I would say was a very unique experience because we were 2 minutes late to sociology but overall it was good since we saw beautiful art.

Just us in front of a sculpture

Vietnamese Student Association

Posted on by b.li5

Roaming through the halls of the 9th floor, I heard screams and cheers through the door of the Vietnamese Student Association club. As I entered the door, I was approached with warm welcomes and friendly smiles from the executive board, many of whom I have met before through my sister who is currently VSA’s vice president. As I walked further into the room, I saw familiar faces from both my high school and students from my classes.

On this first General Interest Meeting, we were given a very brief presentation of who, what, where, and why VSA. We watched a video of the many past events and things that VSA did such as fan dancing lessons, sports day events, and many philanthropy events like earth matters. Joining this club was not because of my sister forcing me to but because of the supportive and awesome community that it came with VSA. It was a community that accepts and loves people from different backgrounds. It was a community that I can see myself calling family years down the road.

After the brief presentation of VSA, we separated into many different groups where we had engaged in awkward ice-breakers. One of the two ice breakers was to introduce ourselves with a certain action and we had to repeat everyone else’s action and name before we executed it. The other ice breaker was to follow certain rules such as “GET INTO GROUPS OF 4 AND EVERYONE SQUAT.” This game was to see which group could obey the rules the fastest; the incentive for winning was that the first group would get their food first. That day they were serving Vietnamese sandwiches of many different choices of flavours ranging from smokey barbeque pork to juicy tender chicken. Sadly, I did not have any of these sandwiches because I previously ate lunch.

I am circled in yellow.