Diana D'Souza

I started off easy with Ling Ling dumplings. I boiled them in a pot for ten minutes, drained the water, and then fried them in oil for two minutes on each side. Overall, I was pretty pleased. We got that nice browning, a bit of crunch, and best of all, it wasn’t raw. I helped myself to a side of blueberries and a cup of cranberry juice. 

Today, I warmed up frozen samosas (filled with chickpeas, potatoes, and peas) in the oven. Chopping up the onion was a painful experience. It certainly wasn’t a fine dice, but I persevered despite tearing up. My mother ended up mixing the onions with the chicken (pictured at the top). 

This salad was by far my proudest achievement. As an avid salad eater, I ate a salad at least once a day at Dartmouth; I highly recommend the Hop’s Kale Chicken Caesar Salad. For today’s salad, I chopped up a head of lettuce, tossed in a handful of cherry tomatoes, and attempted to julienne a carrot. I also gathered the croutons, dressing, parmesan cheese, and extra carrots on the side. 

I start my weekdays with Chinese class from 9:05-9:55 AM. Professor Li, a visiting scholar from Beijing Normal University, teaches us vocabulary sets and grammar, but our readings are more complex than last term’s. We have read about Amy Chua’s book Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother, China’s one-child policy, and environmental laws. Professor Li also challenges us to read news reports and watch interviews (such as in the picture above) to better prepare us for our study abroad program in Beijing.

My Introduction to Chinese Culture course is taught by Professor Levi Gibbs and Miya Xie. The class is asynchronous, which means I listen to pre-recorded lectures at my own pace. In addition to the hour lecture, there are about 150 pages of reading and 3 discussion posts each week. As someone who has exclusively studied the Chinese language, I recently realized that I love learning about Chinese religion, art, music, and dynasties. This week, we learned about the Ghost Festival, a holiday wherein people bring out tables to the streets and then burn foods and paper artifacts to feed wandering ghosts. I am definitely interested in taking more courses in the Asian Societies Cultures Languages Department, especially calligraphy!

I am not a STEM gal, so I immediately jumped at the chance to fulfill my science distribution with Professor Granger’s First Year Seminar on Brain Evolution. We meet twice a week on Tuesdays and Thursdays from 2:25-4:15 PM. The class revolves around Striedter’s textbook Principles of Brain Evolution, so each student is responsible for teaching the class half a chapter. Professor Granger steps in to clarify difficult concepts or to review writing strategies. This term, we will write four essays, which will undergo a rigorous revision process. I just completed my first essay about bilingualism, and I am excited to explore the effectiveness of antidepressants.