My life changed the day I went to a doctor’s appointment. There were the same familiar measurements, polite questions, and pens scratching against clipboards; rinse and repeat. But instead of a lollipop for my cooperation, I received a book; any book of my choosing from the towers of books in the cabinet of the Tufts hospital. Of course, I had gravitated towards the book with the most familiar cover: Harry Potter.   At this point, I was nine and Iâ€...

An MC hosting the Super Show at Voices changed my hoping for an acceptance letter to imagining a future life at Tufts. She reminded me of myself: Asian, a science major, but most importantly, she looked deeply uncomfortable on stage hosting for the first time. I wondered if she felt as scared as I would be. Yet, even when some of her jokes fell flat, everyone in the audience good-heartedly cheered anyway. I realized that she wasn’t afraid at...

Tufts: Let your life speak: I have a running tradition of handing out Tearable Puns during finals week: sheet of paper with puns that I tear and give out. It’s usually followed by a deadpan look, my expectant face (because, come on, that was good), and some comment about how I’ve successfully shortened their life by three years. Puns have a certain place in my family. My stepfather loves Dad Jokes of all kinds, and the rest of...

Tufts: It’s cool to be smart. Tell us about the subjects or ideas that excite your intellectual curiosity: The most complex and beautiful process in life is our ability to perceive and process stimulus. There are billions upon billions of neurons in the human body—interconnected and committed to send signals to and from every other part of the body. Their elegance derives from a series of chemical reactions: receiving a stimulus, opening its guarded channels, flooding the cell...