Hopkins is a diverse university where an incredible mix of cultures, academic interests and personalities coexist and thrive. Here is the section where you can publish your unique thoughts, ideas and perspectives on life at Hopkins and beyond.
Am I doing this right? This question trailed me throughout high school, as I revised a single email twelve times or stared blankly at my math test. As an overthinker, I let that mantra play on repeat.
I wait outside of Remsen 101 at 9:49 a.m. Once the clock reads 9:50 a.m., the students from the room flush out, some munching on their breakfast, sipping their coffee, talking to friends, some waving at those waiting in the hallway. I patiently wait until I can trickle inside, then I find my seat and set up my laptop and tablet.
Scattered amongst the alleys of my hometown’s characteristic brick houses are its numerous hole-in-the-wall convenience stores. Finding them requires a good eye and a lot of patience. With their rusted storefronts and yellowing strip curtains, they’re often built as extensions of family homes, and even referring to them as “stores'' is rather generous. Instead, we affectionately call them “Xiao Mai Pu,” which translates to “small concession stand.”
As I wait for the exams to be carefully distributed row by row, I remain patiently seated; at least, that is how it appears on the outside. However, internally, my heart is pounding as if it wants to break through my chest, and my mind is at war, scrambling thoughts running frantically around.
It seems like most everyone tried out new hobbies during the pandemic to fill up their time, and many left them behind once “real life” started back up again. But as someone with a creative streak and an overconfidence in trying new things, I’ve stuck onto my various useless activities, and I fashion myself into a bit of a hobby veteran.
Linda McDaniel is a giver. As she puts it, the day she had her firstborn, she set her own needs down on a chair and devoted the rest of her life to making her children happy. In my first few hours with her, I already felt welcomed like her own grandson.
I want a Labubu desperately. Ever since I saw those furry creatures adorning bright pink backpacks while scrolling through Vietnamese TikTok, I knew I had to have one.
In biology, a key method for determining the function of an element in a complex biological system is, perhaps counterintuitively, to inhibit it. See, when an element is working as normal, it is near impossible to separate it out amidst the jumbled and interconnected cocktail of life. Yet when once inhibited, its absence is unmistakable and only then does its longtime role clearly emerge.
The first time I was ever complimented for my spoken Chinese was about two months ago as I sat cross-legged on my maternal grandparents’ bamboo rug.
This year’s Hispanic Heritage Month feels different. It is filled with not only the joy and orgullo of celebrating our culture, but also the weight of fear, this fear of being othered, of being silenced, of being chased.
As it turns out, good things are supposed to come in pairs. That’s what they tell you. Two sweet cherries sharing a stem. Two shoes that make a set. Two sides of an argument. Or, as Dr. Greenberg recently educated us in Introduction to Organic Chemistry I, even molecules seem to prefer balance in pairs: enantiomers, mirror images that only make sense alongside each other.
This summer, I had the wonderful opportunity to study abroad in Shanghai. And while my mind was preoccupied with the exciting prospect of being in a new city, learning and growing from this month of exploration, there was still a nagging hesitation in my heart.
She sees her classmates quietly reading and writing while listening to the random classical music the teacher left playing from her Pandora playlist. But what about her? She just sits there, eyes on the gray page. She can barely make out a word on that dull piece of paper.
Unpopular opinion: I don’t like warm drinks — whether that’s tea, coffee or the like. They never feel soothing, and if I have a sore throat, I would prefer to down a glass of ice water, letting the coldness spread throughout me and numb the pain. When I came to Hopkins, that didn’t change about me.
Just like that complex Ikea shelf, the final product (no pun intended) wasn’t ideal but by the end of the month, I had constructed something that held together, learned to appreciate the process and even discovered a new perspective to enjoy the madness along the way.
I’m living The Simple Life. You read that right. I don’t mean to mistype, and I don’t mean to be artistic or pretentious, pulling proper, italicized nouns with definite articles out from where they don’t belong.
It’s been about a week since I packed up my suitcase and flew across the Atlantic to start my study abroad journey in St Andrews, Scotland. In the few days that I’ve been here, I’ve met a good bunch of American students who are studying something related to politics or diplomacy, and lots of English students who wouldn’t dare touch politics with a ten-foot pole.
The first time I felt void of meaning was in my bedroom, hidden somewhere between the third and 86th pages of my sloppily written stanzas. A blank document that had brimmed with possibility was now filled but shapeless; I was a writer with nothing to say.
There are too many conversations that start with hostility and the need to reach a consensus. But why do we have to give up our beliefs or push our beliefs onto others? Is there a way we can have conversations which start from a place of understanding and listening, rather than rushing to prove a point?
Over the summer, I read Tess Gunty’s novel The Rabbit Hutch, which was a wonderfully weird and captivating read that left me heartbroken at the abuse of a teenage girl at one moment and giggling at the concept of a man drenching his entire body in glow-stick juice the next.
