Summer 2010 - Mahidol University, Bangkok, Thailand

For this summer, I wanted to up the ante from the previous year. I've done domestic research at the home university, I've gone to another domestic university, and now I wanted to travel outside the country and see what it's like. For this, I applied to three sets of programs:
-University of Florida: going to Brazil, Argentina, or France (in that order of favorites)
-University of Syracuse: going to Austria
-University of Carolina Santa Cruz (UCSC): going to Thailand
Initially, I had wanted to go to Brazil. There I would be able to hang out in the rainforest and pick up on Portuguese (Brazilian-style). US and UCSC were both sort of second place contenders with Austria as more of a third place since it's kind of creepy over there and the euro is beating up the dollar now.

The transition for the Thailand trip to the first place spot was due to several things:
-If UF could not maintain a website and give the proper information or contacts, how were they supposed to keep me alive in another country? They switched coordinators and everything the day before applications were due and I made several phone calls which went unanswered.
-The Thailand REU coordinators were constantly in contact and available to answer questions.
-The Thailand REU responded first and I was uncertain about whether I would get into any other program. I had a week to accept so I did. Brazil came second (I was accepted) weeks later and Austria last (wasn't accepted, who cares?) even later. For last summer I had only applied to UMass's CURE program and its general REU program.

If you're curious about the program, check it out here:
http://www.chemistry.ucsc.edu/projects/thaireu/

So now we reach the present in the story so far. I've got my passport. The new ones are horrifically American - flags, eagles, and the red, white, and blue all over. It definitely screams 'insecurity'. Plus it comes with some kind of electronic tag in it which is supposed to who-knows-what in some nifty high-tech fashion. Now comes immunizations, I guess I have most of those already. The visa application is in the works. Once all that goes through, I'll be instructed on what airline to use (NSF-funded trips require an American vendor - fun fact). I'm also going to use my UConn Presidential Scholars fellowship toward giving me a stipend for food.

With all of this, I'm looking to gain the experience to be able to get into graduate school and pursue a Doctorate. I'm not sure whether that will be in just synthetic organic chemistry or something like polymer science. I'm leaning toward the latter by this point. I'm currently looking at institutions in the Connecticut/Massachusetts area of New England. And I'll have to take the GRE and GRE for chemistry before then. That should be after I come back, so October or November of 2010.

I think all undergraduates should take on one or more REU programs during their careers. It looks good and it does a lot toward helping you become a more independent member of the scientific community - dare I say, scientist or chemist? I'm not sure I'm at the point where I could be called either of those, but I try. Plenty of people I talk to about these programs don't even know the exist. A lot of the trip is paid for and you make several thousand dollars on a stipend with room and board paid for and travel is usually covered. Whether or not food is covered depends on the grant behind the program and there was one group at UMass that had an NSF food stipend of $20 a day which is astounding. We didn't, so you can see the diversity in how programs are run and what is available. From what I've seen, chemistry has many of these programs to offer as the chemistry community seems very well connected. And once you get into subfields, there are even more acquaintances.

Abbreviation Guide:
PLA = polylactic acid
ACS = American Chemical Society
CURE = Collaborative Undergraduate Research in Energy
REU = Research Experience for Undergraduates (or something like that)
NMR = Nuclear magnetic resonance (spectroscopy); it's essentially an MRI for molecules. Also, if you're a pre-Med/pre-Pharm know-it-all taking Chem 2444/5, then the NMR tech will destroy you if you sass them about the perceived hazards of a superconducting magnet 200k times more powerful than Earth's. I've seen it.
GRE = Graduate Recor