Roudy Reunion at AIM and Turtles

What is a Roudy, and why would you be having a reunion?

• A Roudy is a participant of the Roots of Unity workshop, of which I was a participant last year. Since then, it’s spun off other similar conferences in applied mathematics. Roudy is short for “Roots of Unity”. I was one of 30 participants picked in the first cohort ever last year, to be placed in the Arithmetic Geometry group. So we had a reunion this year at AIM, which is the American Institute for Mathematics at Caltech.

The Journey

• But first, Lincoln, Nebraska. We ended up here en route to Denver, where I was supposed to have something like a five hour layover. However, because of some severe weather conditions and the need to refuel, I ended up having something like half an hour before my connecting flight at Denver to LAX, which was the last flight to LA for the evening. However, I sat next to these super cool guys from SF and Austin, and when we got to Nebraska, the air stewards gave us water and orange juice while we waited, so three of us decided to say cheers to our great first time (and hopefully last) time in Nebraska.
• Once I got to LAX, I connected with three other Roudies, and we shared a ride to the hotel (which was in Pasadena), and got there a bit after midnight.
• The following day, our agenda started at 8am, so we all left the hotel at 8am (because why not) and walked to Caltech. For some strange reason I remembered the PIN to AIM once we were in the lobby, because my mom has awesome number genes and remembers patterns and I got some of that from her, which amused everyone that it worked on the first try.
• The spread was amazing, and we had a series of updates from everyone in our group; some good, some bad, but everyone grateful to be there and connect again in-person; we were all so happy to share each other’s company. Apparently there is happy hour every day at AIM (probably because of Michelle lol), so we did that too, and had professional development sessions and spoke about perhaps even having future special sessions at JMM.
• Oh, we took a walk over to see the Turtle pond at Caltech, and later on, we took a group photo at the bridge near the turtle pond and I almost lost a slipper (which could have totally been a first story about how wild things are at Roudy reunions!).
• The group continued for food at El Portal, but I wanted to reconnect with my long-time friends in LA, and to find out about the movie strikes and all of that. A group continued to hang out in the pool but I ended up soaking in the tub in my room (apparently my room had both a shower and a tub, and the accommodations were nothing short of amazing; I felt so valued and loved here, as always with this group!). Finally, I checked out at 3am to head back out, to my next trip in Banff.

• My long-time friend, who is like family to me. She is a huge geek and knows everything Hogwarts, Dr. Who, etc.

• We had indian food! Mine was a paneer dosa! It’s been a while since I’ve had good indian food. I was just in Texas (so I ate myself full of TexMex, tacos, etc), so opting for good indian food was a great choice as I don’t know when I’ll experience that again!

• View from AIM in the afternoon; earlier it was very sunny, but still beautiful view!

• Happy hour at AIM

• Our guest speaker from IPAM, who I coincidentally met at IPAM earlier this year! She’s lovely and gave such awesome advice! She didn’t have the greatest time during her PhD, and is first-gen, but she went on to have a great career!

• Turtle pond at Caltech

• I really did make it to AIM

• Such a beautiful space to think and reflect and do mathematics!

• The pool at our hotel. I actually took this on the way to the fitness centre. I got in after midnight (went to bed around 1:30am), as I mentioned, and actually got up at 5:30am to work out lol.

• View from our window fuelling up in Lincoln, Nebraska. My first time there!

Onwards

• I’ve been juggling quite a few research projects (and I got into the Pre-AWS, specifically into the abelian varieties group! Hooray! That’s the one I wanted!), but things are a lot better after this workshop. It’s a nice reminder that I do have a space where I am supported and seeing so many mentors who are living the dream and helping us to achieve ours, too, was super inspiring, in spite of the obstacles we inevitably faced at our home institutions.

And that’s it