Whats been going on lately

I apologize for my tardiness in posting as always... School is finally finished with taking over my life... which I suppose means time for a new blog title. Anyways! Here is what has been going on the last month or so

Capstone modeling building & group sanding parties

Learning how to small-scale fiberglass

Pre-assembly and fitting

Final crit - that happened

Then Daapworks happened

Destroying my old favorite middle school bracelets for my project

Mom and Dad came to the big fancy opening reception

The rest of Daapworks was just amazing as always

Ross bought a puppy - Oakley

We all graduated

And our speaker was terrible

Even Raph dog was dressed for the day

Lots of photos were taken

I rocked a pretty sweet cap

Gabriella got MARRIED! 

Had a pretty crazy graduation party

And stayed up wayyy to late waiting for the Megabus with my bestest Chicago buddy abetti

A racecar was built

Then fixed

And raced at Michigan International Speedway

with a team of 13 graduates without running water for three days, but it was a great time, we finished 36th overall out of 120ish teams. 

Now, I'm frantically working on packing up all of my life once again and applying for big kid jobs as the Cincinnati summer sets in. So much going on but so much more in the weeks to come. Traveling will include Ontario, Virginia, NYC, Nebraska, Colorado, and Georgia and I just cannot wait for all the new adventures :) 

Shoeeeeeees

My first venturing into shoes for a Reebok job application, felt like posting it here

Model is coming along! but its still going to be a race to the finish, 4 weeks until crit. 

its a bit small here, but bigger version -http://aabechtel.carbonmade.com/projects/4051699

Published!

http://globalinksabroad-blog.org/2013/03/11/the-first-week-5-quick-ways-to-combat-culture-shock/

Here is an article I recently wrote for the study abroad company I traveled through. 

The First Week : 5 Quick Ways to Combat Culture Shock

By Anna Bechtel -  Anna is a GlobaLinks Learning Abroad Alumni Ambassador who completed an international internship in Wellington, New Zealand.

Unlike studying abroad at a university, an internship abroad may jolt you out of your comfort zone a lot quicker than you will expect. For most people, it is being taken out of two major environments at the same time, the home country environment and the university environment. Being one of only two interns at the time in New Zealand, I felt simultaneously grown up and very much alone when I first arrived, not having that instant friend network built into my life that comes from the university. This doesn’t mean those friend networks aren’t there, it just means you have to search a little harder to find them. Here are five quick tips to combat that first week culture shock abroad.

1)      Don’t isolate yourself.  As easy as it may be to just sit in your room as you wait for things to get better, don’t do it. It is critical to get out and interact. Meet new people. The bridging cultures program is great for this, because you will at least have someone else who is going through the same emotional rollercoaster that you are right there next to you, but even after it ends it is important to be out in the community. I went to the public library the couple days before starting my job, there was free internet and an excellent view of the Wellington Harbor, but most importantly there was people abundant and no pretense about fitting in or not.

2)      Establish your familiars. If your mind is like mine, immediately after my orientation ended I went into survival mode. But by locating the grocery store, post office, phone store, and a couple coffee shops I was able to map out my new home and feel more comfortable going out from one place to another, not feeling like a tourist but more like I belonged. Comfort food is a big one for me, so a coffee and kebab (almost like Chipotle… almost) really calmed me down.

3)      Explore! Once getting yourself calm, it’s time to focus all that negative energy into positive by getting out and exploring. Finding all the little nooks and cranies of Wellington city was such an adventure and so easy on foot. It even got me excited about exploring more places further away from my housing complex and I felt more and more confident doing so on my own.

4)      Remember to laugh. The first thing I unpacked when I got to my room was a surge protector to charge my electronics. Upon plugging it in, I immediately shorted out the circuit in my room and fried my cord. The difference is voltage was something I completely forgot to look at, and I just had to laugh and think about what a great story this would be to tell when I get home. Don’t let the little stuff get you down, remember : This is a learning experience J

5)      Plan what’s next. You chose this program for a reason, remember? To get out and try new things!  So get online, ask around, make your to do list and find all those new experiences you want to do. Planning adventures makes the time fly.

As scary as it may be to be alone in a big city, never forget that your family is only a call, text, or email away. Not everything will go perfectly as you plan, but you will certainly have some great stories for when you get back! 

Yes, I'm still alive

School is just massively kicking my butt, as expected. But here is our senior class website for your enjoyment.

Nearly the home stretch! 

A bit of a holiday from blogging.... but I am now back in school so project updates are to come. Here's another New Zealand photo though, my dad and I both toured the South Island and Franz Joseph Glacier valley and took a picture with this same sign. Same place different times via photoshop

Dockside days and Goodbyes

Well its been long enough of me being back here that I should update about the goodbyes and my last days in the beautiful NZ. Its been difficult to readjust to the time here and I have found myself getting to bed around 3:30 am and up around noon each day. It doesn't help that the days are much shorter here, the sun setting around 5 pm compared to almost 9 in Wellington. As per usual, temporary life change depression is occupying the majority of my days. Being sad from leaving such a wonderful place and a schedule I'd grown to love and being thrown back into a different life at a different time where nothing is clean and organized and I have to stress about it. At least everything is unpacked and sorted now *deep breathes* But mostly I just want to be left alone to think and reflect, or sleep.

Its been so great to catch up with everyone stateside, being able to text again on a touchscreen and not having to scramble for internet at work or the library. Here are some highlights from my last days in Wellington.

UPDATE: I have fixed the google doc link if it was not working before. Also, I got my luggage ^_^

Last week of work, I got a pinwheel.

I had a good list of things I wanted to do before I left and one of those was going up to Mt Vic again for the sunset. Kelly was nice enough to drive me up there so I would not have to walk, She was amazing that we'd picked one of the only non gale wind nights to come up and watch it. It got chilly pretty fast, and even though Wellington sunsets usually aren't the best, it was nice to look out all over the town that I'd spent my last 3 months of life in. Beautiful clouds, but it started to get too dark to see anything or photo pretty quickly.

Thursday night was my goodbye, we all headed to Havana Bar after the meeting, what a cool place, and a great kept secret of Wellington. It was a bit small though for our large group, so we ended up over at Southern Cross again, outdoors with heaters and big booths, can't beat that.

That awkward trying to get the whole table in the shot thing...

Friday afternoon Pania and I decided to do that thing that everyone talks about doing but usually doesn't do, jumping into Wellington Harbor. It was a back and fourth joke that turned into a "you're going to do it? alright. I'm going to do it too!" It was pretty breezy out and we actually had a considerable crowd of tourists interested in what we were doing. I'm sure we'll end up on a whole slew of Chinese vacation albums...

The Warf..

Kelly was nice enough to count us down... and we decided to hold hands so that we both actually jumped, haha. The water was not as cold as I had thought it would be, but immediately a whole bunch of salt went up my nose and mouth and was quite disgusting. We were shivery, but happy. The french boys are next! 

Saturday, all the goodbye photos started. 

Sandra took me to the airport for my flight and Kelly met us there, we hung out in style. The Wellington airport is such a cool place. It was done half vacation like and half middle earth for the Hobbit premiere. 

My last delicious coffee until I can get back... 

A glimpse at the Hobbit plane at Auckland Airport, on its way to London to load up with fans for the premiere.

Annnnnd back at LAX. That big thing in the middle. Uhg, I hate that airport so much.