Thread: why why why...?
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Unread 23-06-2002, 22:12
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My story!!!! hehe :-)

Posted by colleen at 12/30/2000 10:42 PM EST


Engineer on team #190, Gompei, from Massachusetts Academy of Math and Science and WPI.


In Reply to: why why why...?
Posted by Ken Leung on 12/30/2000 10:05 PM EST:



My story: (similar as that given in my speech at my teams' FIRST banquet the year I graduate hs)

When I was in 8th grade, I had NO clue what I wanted to be.. doctor, teacher, lawyer... My brother was a freshman.. way into computers and all that 'geeky' stuff. As January rolled around, he was out til midnight/1am every night.. gone all day on weekends.. I was loving it.. but I began to wonder.. Word was he was down at Nypro doing something called US FIRST.. some engineering thing. I didn't even know what an 'engineer' was outside of conducting a train... and anyone who knows my brother and what a barrel of information he is:
'What do you do down at Nypro?'
'Stuff' was always his reply.

So I picked up the dictionary, looked up engineering and tried like crazy to figure out what it was. Still clueless, I laughed at my mom when she got up at 5am one wintery March Saturday to drive to New Hampshire to catch the seeding matches for the Clinton team before the competition started (yes.. 1995.. the first year nationals were large enough to move to Disney.. but the regional was still small enough to run seeding and competition in ONE DAY!).

My dad had said he'd head down a little later to watch what was labelled the 'competition' part of the afternoon. Little did I know I was to be dragged along. My dad decided he didn't want to make the hour trek alone and decided to invoke his parental right to make me go. I pouted the whole way there like 12-year-old girls do and dreaded the afternoon I was in for. Bunch of my brother's friends hanging out doing Star Wars things with R2D2 and like sabers and whatnot..

I never thought walking into a high school gym would change my life..

The place was packed and we snuck in the back door as someone was leaving cause they weren't letting anymore people in. Teams of kids were screaming and cheering and out on the field were these... things... bopping balls over a football field goal.. it was crazy.. it was amazing..

I knew that instant it was for me...

I jumped up into the stands and cheered along.. I looked around me and thought..'all these kids took their brains and their ideas and their hands and abilities and made this... wow.. and I can do this too!'

March to October never seemed to take so long... the summer couldn't fly by fast enough.. At school.. I bragged about this.. I told all my friends.. they thought I was crazy... They showed a video to try to get people in the school interested and I got even more antsy than ever...

The greatest part of it all... in 1995, the first year of nationals, my team had decided no freshman would travel to Florida.. it would be a learning kind of year.. make sure they are there for the right reasons.. So when I hopped on the wagon in 1996, we all assumed it would be the same deal.. no freshman to Florida.. I was there EVERY day.. I thought, strategized, painted, designed, mocked up, anything and everything they would let me do... I was told a thousand times by other teammates.. 'don't waste your time, you won't go to Florida.. freshman don't go..'.. but I never thought of it a waste of my time.. so I just said 'oh well' and continued on..

And I made it to Florida that year.. as a backup driver nonetheless... and I knew I had made it there cause I earned my spot.. and did enough to prove that freshman did belong at nationals too..

Long story short: Someone tries to drag me somewhere I don't want to go.. or introduce me to something new.. I keep my mind open.. you never know what wonderful world you can be exposed to..

:-) :-) see y'all at kickoff.. so begins year #6!!
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