In Memoriam (Ghost Bike)

Some of you might have seen the ghost bike set up in memory of Phyo on the corner of Mass Ave & Vassar St about 3 years ago right after the collision on Dec 27, 2011. The ghost bike was originally set up by Andrea, Phyo's co-worker and, in preparation for the winter, was taken inside and stored by MIT Facilities with Norman's help.

Today, we set this bike back up again, in memory of our friend Phyo -- and all the other cyclists out there who have fallen victim to traffic/truck collisions. In fact, thanks to Directing Samurai's prompting, we realized that we wanted to get a bike up in time for the Ride of Silence Boston event this evening (Boston City Hall Plaza, meeting at 6:45 PM).

We hugely thank Chief DiFava for helping us to propel this effort forward and reclaim the bike. I was contacted shortly afterwards by Mr. Ron Nestor who then proceeded to show me his creative engineering genius (and generosity with time!)

Ron tells me the great news about having found the bike and we're ready to go set it up now!

So I ride in their little licensed golf-cart-like vehicle that can go up to 20 mph on the driveway or even up sidewalks (always wanted one of these).

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We lock it up (Ron got a chain with a padlock and everything!) -- buuuut we notice the sign is a bit dilapidated. JUUUUUST a bit.

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So we decided to make a new one from scratch. In this case, scratch = vanilla folder + laminating sheets + scissors + ruler + pen + pencil + your imagination (of course).

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While I was cutting and measuring things to scale and stenciling, Ron made sure I had all the tools I needed! I had a sharpie, pen, pencil, ruler ("Do you need a ruler?" "I think I'm good" "Here's one -- just in case"), vanilla folder, laminating sheets, scissors... He even brought in zip ties later. I was honestly touched by how invested these people were in a project that was not theirs -- I mean, I knew that the MIT community is one, and that Phyo was part of all of us, but the entire experience felt like we were all one big tag team.

Voila! Beautiful. (And waterproof!) And then we realized we were missing holes (for when we attach this sign to the bike). So while sitting there, pondering how I might be able to hole punch this thing, I hear drills in the office nearby where Ron's at...

 

So Ron comes out with a power tool. Standard.

Using the holes from the back of a chair to drill holes through this laminated sign was probably, safe to say, the only time this has ever happened in the MIT Facilities office.

So excited to have this back out in the sun again -- with zip ties!

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Voila! Work of art. And now we just need to replenish with more flowers 🙂

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Thank you so much Ron!! We truly appreciate your help and that of MIT Facilities and Chief DiFava in helping us to keep this ghost bike on MIT property in tribute to our friend Phyo.

Ye (aka Chief Jedi) & PN2K team

 

STEAM #4: Fire & Glass

What happens when you combine fire, glass, a bunch of curious high school students, Amphibious Achievement, and PN2K? You get an awesome STEAM field trip (#4). For those of you new to the scene, we invite you to read about the history of PN2K's collaboration with Amphibious Achievement to better understand the "youth educational/academia" component to PN2K's mission in our PN2K for Youth page.

May 3rd wrapped up our fourth and final collaborative field trip with Amphibious Achievement for these past two years. Phyo N. Kyaw, for whom this foundation is set up, believed in the importance of education and empowering children. Our field trips are designed to have a large hands-on focus, with the overall message geared towards inspiring students to pursue their dreams and career goals through higher education.

But why take our word for it? See for yourself! Watch the video produced by our historians, Dingfang & Yaoming, and learn more through Dingfang's personal account below. 

See full album for STEAM 4: Fire & Glass (Glassblowing) field trip here.

Visiting MIT Glass lab

By Dingfang Zhou

A group of high school students and their MIT student mentors attended the workshop in MIT glass lab. The workshop is initiated by Amphibious Achrivement, a MIT student-run service organization and is aimed at introducing the high school students in Amphibious Achievement to new applications of science and math.

States, one of the mentors led the group walking across the “Inifite Corridor” in MIt Building #4. When arriving the glass lab, Patrick Barragan, instructor of the day has already waited outside the lab. He handed each visitors protective goggles and gave a brief introduction of the glass lab.

“I made this one,” said Barragan, pointing at a transparent glass vase with white stripes on the body, which was placed on top of the shelf in the display case outside the studio. He has been working in the glass lab for 7 years since his first year in graduate school in MIT.

“I went to the lottery and got really lucky. The first time I went I got in and I have been doing it ever since,” said Barragan. Glass blowing has been one of the most popular extra curricular activities on campus. Getting into the glass lab is almost as hard as getting into MIT itself.

Before entering the lab, he told the students: “If you don’t know specifically if something is hot. Assume it is. The floor is basically safe to walk.”

His colleagues in the lab were busy making a glass pumpkin together which will be sold at a fund-raise later. One of the crew dipped a metal pole with a molten blob on top into the furnace, and then pull the pole out and dipped the blob into a cement mode in order to give the glass pumpkin shape. Next, he gave a gentle blow at the other end of the pipe to puff the blob. After coloring, adjusting the shape and adding a vine, the glass pumpkin was put into a cooling cabinet for a night.

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Peter Houk, director of glass lab dips the metal pole into the furnace and get some molten blob on top of the pole. The blob is dripping into a tube with cold water underneath for the annealing process. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

 

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A glass lab staff is blowing air into the glass pumpkin, which will be sold at a fund-raise later. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

After the glass pumpkin demo of making glass pumpkin, one of the students volunteered to join with Barragan and Peter Houk, director of glass lab, for the “annealing” process-- a process of slowly cooling hot glass to relieve internal stresses after it was formed. Houk made two glass columns, one annealed and the other not. The student could easily break the latter with bare hands, however, he could not break the annealed glass even with a hammer.

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Workshop participant broke the glass column with bare hands under the instruction of Houk. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

 

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Workshop participant tried to break the annealed glass with a hammer. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

“It’s because of the stress,” said Houk. Annealing glass will increase its durability since the glass retains many of the stresses inside and becomes durable.

Then, each students got a chance to involve in glass production process such as glass blowing and shaping. The glass lab workshop is “once-in-a-life-time opportunity, even for MIT student,” said Michael Lu, a sophomore student who is also the mentor of Amphibious Achievement.

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A high school girl blows air into a glass blob at the other end of the metal pole. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

 

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The glass lab workshop is “once-in-a-life-time opportunity, even for MIT student,” said Michael Lu, a sophomore student who is also the mentor of Amphibious Achievement. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

“They(students) seem really interested and they seem engaged. I’m glad that all of them got to interact with glass physically so that they can see the importance of that physical interaction. MIT ‘Mens et Manus’ (‘Mind and Hand’) type of model is always important. Not only you are learning things but you can also working with them and trying do it yourself so you can really get a solidified understanding,” said Barragan after the workshop. 

glasslab-22“They(students) seem really interested and they seem engaged,” said Patrick Barragan, the instructor of the MIT glass lab. (photo by: Yaoming Duan)

A huge thanks to the MIT Glass Lab and, in particular, Patrick for your coordination with MIT Amphibz. Thank you Achievers for your enthusiasm and curiosity! We hope you continue to channel this into your future undertakings and use college as a means to achieve your desired career goals. 

To see what PN2K has planned for future youth development initiatives, please check back on our PN2K for Youth page.