2023 has been a very interesting years and I’ll recap from beginning all the way to the end
January
New year, new me! I didn’t have any concrete goals set up for 2023 but what I remember was continuing the hackathon grind, and that’s when I went to UofTHacks X.
Since this was the finals time I didn’t intend on participating but I just had the urge to jump in and participate anyway (which I did) and I helped my team win the Best Mental Health Hack Award winning UofTHacks X
This is also where I met Kristina Stephan
February
February was also another interesting month, this was the time period where my family intended to move back to the United States of America, the timeline of the move was unclear and as a result I did not participate in the CCC as I had missed the deadline to sign up.
I had the opportunity to mentor @ ElleHacks this month which was a very fun experience, like always met a lot of fun people and running into some familiar faces like Sophie Yang and Kristina Stephan
I also participated in MakeUofT 2023 largest Makeathon in Canada and won the Best Music Hack.
Went to Canada’s largest autoshow
February 24ish I was back in the United States
March
March was a pretty boring month, I started to miss Canada quite a bit because of the friend group I had built from hackathons and school and I was missing the city lifestyle (which had relatively good public transit). This was sort of a bittersweet month, I had come back to a lot of “friends” but had this feeling of not belonging there mainly because it had been a year since I had last seen most of them and they weren’t all the same person they used to be.
I continued to work on my organizations TeenTechSF and JAMHacks
I joined Dr.McEwen’s lab Emerging Technologies and the Arts Lab, and helped develop https://etal.vicu.utoronto.ca/
April
This was another month with a few excitements.
I won LosAltosHacks VII, I developed an AR application using Niantic’s 8th Wall which allowed you to play MarioKart in AR (or as close as we could get to MarioKart). My team of 2 won $1500 USD and a tour to Niantic’s HQ
Through some exciting series of events I was offered to work at Cohere over the summer although I eventually had to decline this opportunity (literally the weekend before I started) because I did not have proper work authorization in Canada
I also went to LAHacks and ate at UCLA dining hall (good food) and slept in the UCLA dorms (sort of). So can I say I am a UCLA student??
May
This month is my birthday month! I attended HackDavis and met some cool people, other than that I continued to work on TeenTechSF and JAMHacks. Continued working on school and enjoyed the last bit of my junior year.
June
- School ended!
- I rejected the Cohere offer!
- Couldn’t attend in-person JAMHacks!
I was disappointed when this happened, but I think I learned a lot from these experiences especially learning how to persevere through bad* times
* = not really that bad I am exaggerating it
Participated in UC Berkeley AI Hackathon
July
Continued with summer school chemistry and enjoyed the summer
Visited Toronto
August
- School started again some interesting events took place
- I joined UC Berkeley Aerospace
- Visited Canada twice (went to Vancouver)
- Got my Canadian Work Authorization for Summer 2024 :)
- Bought my Miata
September
- Mainly focusing on school and College Applications
- Fulfilling my Extracurricular commitments
- Working on my car
- Visited Niantic’s HQ
October
- Mainly focusing on school and College Applications
- Fulfilling my Extracurricular commitments
- Met with Steven Gong
I genuinely didn't do anything in October that's why I picked a picture from November
November
- Mainly focusing on school and College Applications
- Fulfilling my Extracurricular commitments
Participated in Immerse the Bay XR hackathon held @ Stanford University
December
- Mainly focusing on school and College Applications
- Fulfilling my Extracurricular commitments
Moved into my new house and played the Wii
Reflection
I believe I did well in 2023, this year passed by very quick but I accomplished a lot and had a lot of fun. I have a clearer focus on where I want to go in life and have goals for next year. One thing remains the same, to genuinely give my 100% in everything I do.