Iron ring! And summer plans

I promise - here on this blog - to update at least once a week for the rest of April! But wow, this last month has been crazy. The final race day for the robots; finishing my multiculturalism inquiry; the Kipling pranks (make sure to spot the Eng Phys ones - we rocked this year's Kipling), ceremony, and formal; and the piles and piles of paperwork for final reports. But it's finished now - hard to believe! - and I've just got a few short weeks to write some exams, make plans for the summer, pack up my stuff, and move out of my home of four years. But I like exams, because my time is my own and I can schedule it how I please. And there's a lot of social stuff organized, spending time with friends before we disperse and it gets much more difficult to meet up.

I also have travel plans for the summer, which are exciting! After running away for the past few summers to work overseas, I feel like I've missed out on learning more about my own country. This was part of the reason I chose to do my inquiry on multiculturalism, and Canada. So throughout May and June, I'm going to do a week-long roadtrip with Liz, Adri, and another housemate; visit a friend in Ottawa; and then head off to northern Quebec for five weeks to practice my french with the Explore program - at Alma, where there is a school with a music focus. Music and French were the two skills/interests I worried most about losing when I chose engineering, so it's kind of a perfect way to cap everything off. :)

Where do I begin...

Okay, so final year right now feels kind of overwhelming. I'm trying to juggle a heavy courseload, domestics, spending time with friends, and keeping in touch with family - all while making plans for next year, which is a whole lot more difficult than in high school. Despite any difficulties, enjoy the OUAC process while you've got it; dealing with rolling admissions for graduate school and job applications is a lot more challenging than having an earliest date for a required response set for Ontario universities.

Anyhow, I try and keep my head up through all of it and I have to admit it's a really exciting time!...as long as I manage to get through the last wave of final projects for the term and my exams. But the highlight of the week is Iron Ring sizings at the Alumni Office; and this isn't just any ordinary school ring.

The Iron Ring is a tradition in Canadian engineering schools that takes place in a ceremony called The Ritual of the Calling of an Engineer (nicknamed Kipling, for the author [Rudyard] who developed it). At these ceremonies, graduating engineers undertake an obligation to society to do their best work. The iron ring is worn on the pinky finger of the working hand, the idea being that the contact with surfaces as the engineer writes will remind them of their responsibilities. The mythology of the iron is that it comes from a bridge that collapsed twice during construction due to engineering errors, and killed over 70 workers - but today the rings are made out of stainless steel. The ceremony is private and only open to those receiving an iron ring, or who have worn one for ten years or longer.