Today I woke up, slightly confused and slightly in pain. My back still really hurts from the train ride here; I’m starting to wonder if I pulled a muscle. I grabbed a bag of chips for breakfast, still not having gone to the grocery store, and headed out to further explore campus. Last night the graduate student who will be in charge of me this summer, Stephen, let me know that he would also be in the lab today despite its being Memorial Day. I had wanted to stop by Dr. Tovar’s office today already to meet him, and this added extra incentive. Unfortunately, upon arriving, I found the Chemistry building to be locked. On a side note, however, the lab is not far at all from my dorm: perhaps a ten minute walk. Not having to take a shuttle or bus to get to work this summer is a HUGE advantage for which I am very grateful. I sent Stephen a message letting him know my troubles getting into the building, and then proceeded to make the best of my trip and explore the West area of campus. Here are some pictures I particularly like:
Partly due to the humidity, partly because I reached the end of campus, I returned to the dorm. I found that Stephen had sent me his number so that I could get into the building today after all! Of course, I rushed back to the Chemistry building. Stephen was very nice, and we made our way up to Dr. Tovar’s office. There, Dr. Tovar explained the general research that the lab group has conducted and the direction which my research will take. He had a number of pictures to aid the explanation, and I was able to follow everything and furthermore found it quite interesting. What I’ll be doing involves the synthesis of peptides through solid phase reactions. Afterwards, Stephen took me through a tour of the lab. Needless to say, the lab completely blew me away. Elon is not a science research university, and Johns Hopkins definitely is. The lab area consists of two rooms, with about four or five hoods in each. Stephen introduced me to a number of people in my lab group, but I have to admit I don’t remember their names. I’m sure I’ll pick those up quickly though. There was so much going on in the lab, so many pieces of equipment being used and so many machines. I was almost intimidated, but even more excited. I’m even going to have my own desk (at least for a couple of weeks)! I am so glad that I was able to meet the two of them ahead of time – I wish I could get started tomorrow rather than going to safety training. They were both incredibly nice and I left with a distinctly positive vibe. Since I couldn’t exactly snap pictures along the way, here is the official website of the lab group, directed towards a virtual lab tour. Very cool 🙂
http://www.jhu.edu/~chem/tovar/Tovar/Lab.html
Heading back to my dorm, I was just in time to meet some friends and head over to the bus. The program had arranged an hour long Memorial Day Cruise in the Inner Harbor. There were so many students that wanted to catch the same bus that it took a full twenty minutes for us all to get on, pay and get seated. Although we held up traffic, we still arrived at our bus stop with plenty of time. It was a very, very hot day and our wanderings along the Harbor quickly deteriorated into resting in the shade. The cruise itself was good in that lunch was provided and we were able to go to the top level and look all around the Harbor, but unfortunately the commentary was difficult to hear. I, of course, snapped a number of picks before, during and after the cruise. One of my favorite sites was the Barnes and Nobles bookstore, while another was the half submerged submarine.
After the cruise, my friends and I headed over to the mall and then the Barnes and Nobles, whose inside proved nearly as interesting as its outside. At that point, we were rather worn out by the heat and so caught a bus back to our dorm. A number of us, including myself, lacked food and so we figured out a route to the closest grocery store via bus and made a trip. I’ve really been craving vegetables, and so most of my groceries contained fresh items (we were, after all, limited to what we could carry reasonably). On the way back we discovered the escort service, available to students after five, and snagged a ride. I expect that that service will become useful this summer.
All in all, today was another thoroughly exciting day. I already feel like I am adjusting, and yet there is so much left! Tomorrow is safety training, which I hope will not span the entire day. Hopefully I can write more tomorrow about what I will be doing in lab!
Mary Catherine Bedard 