Ciba: Day 4
I didn’t talk much today because people brought in cards and Uno and other students were playing with those during our off time. I thought it was boring because I don’t enjoy playing Uno unless I know the people really well and we can make jokes about it. I remember last time I played Uno (not counting this one), I was playing it with a group of friends and we would accidentally skip someone and there were people who weren’t the brightest in putting down the cards, so it was a fun game. But in this game, the rules were kind of messed up (they weren’t the official rules so it didn’t make much sense) and it wasn’t fun playing with the group of people for me. There were too many people. At the end of lunch, I started playing a card game with Brittany and Katie, but we had to go back to the lab. I was going to play Zheng Shan You (or whatever that really popular Chinese game is).
The Ciba program was boring and fun today. Ha! What a combination! In the morning, most of the time, I almost fell asleep because it was three hours of lecture about plastics. Some of the things were interesting, but I couldn’t pay much attention and I think I missed out on a lot. All I know is that there are certain strands called poly-stry-something and it can melt in acetate. This is because it’s polar and water can combine with certain things…. But, I took more out of what certain plastics can be used for. Like, plastics that can melt in water can be useful during laundry (you don’t have to take the clothes out of the bag before throwing it into the machine) or other such situations. (I think I need to learn a better study habit; in all my classes so far, I usually have to learn science through notes or the textbook, and I can never pay attention to lengthy lectures)
After lunch, it was all labs! Which I loved. We were separated into three groups so we could go to three different stations (it’s more efficient). The first station, I embedded my seashell and fake pearl into resin and created a “spilled milk” type of structure. Basically, we put catalysts into resin and after mixing for a while, we tilted the cup so the resin would spill out and when it hardens, it would look like some liquid spilled out of the cup.
The second station included making slime, silly putty, and a bouncy ball. I was the messiest person of my group! When we were making the bouncy ball, we mixed water with Borax powder then, we slowly added in vinegar while stirring. Whenever I stirred, the milky-white Borax solution would fall out onto the table. It was quite nasty–especially when it got all over my binder! Later on in the day, I lost my bouncy ball because while I was waiting for my mom to pick me up from the school, I was trying to dry out my bouncy ball but it fell and bounced/rolled down a very big and curvy hill. It went really fast and when I tried to find it, I couldn’t see a trace of it anywhere. However, I’m not so upset because the bouncy ball smelled really bad–it smelled like very strong vinegar.
At the third station, we made foam cups. We basically mixed two solutions and dye together. The two solutions created an exothermic reaction and creates a foamy structure from the cup. It’s cool and the cup became hot afterwards.
