A Long Day

My day starts with the alarm clock going off 3 times before I completely wake up. My first alarm goes off at 7:00 AM, the next one at 7:30 AM, and the final one at 7:45 AM. I look around around the room for clothes and finding the right fit, I put it on and head off to class. I have minimal energy in the morning thus I shower mostly in evening.

Ted, the class TA, started the morning with a lecture on whatever the students needed help with. He went on to talk about externalities and monopolies. He wrapped up the day with a brief talk about the experiment we conducted in class yesterday, regarding taxation. 

Professor Min started the morning by discussing Public Goods. This lecture was taught very conceptually, which I greatly enjoyed. He talked about how public goods are both non-excludable, and non-rivalrous. This means that people are not restricted to enjoying a service given by the government and they can all share it. Take 4th of July Fireworks for example - everyone can watch it without a fee. 

Following up from lunch, we went over how charities can make more money. I found the lecture sort of boring but it was interesting. 

My teacher gave a lot of word problems for homework and I hate it. Mixing intuition with math makes the course very difficult. Crazily enough, we don't practice a lot of word problems in class but are given a lot of word problems for homework. As difficult as it may be, I love that because it is getting me out of my comfort zone. Adjusting and adapting, as I mentioned in my previous blog, is one of the most significant skills to have while attending college. 

Mingjia Wang!

I have been working with my whole group to solve word problems for the past few hours. I was not expecting UChicago to be this difficult but it is what it is. Mingjia Wang, one of my colleagues, explained to me various problem set questions, and I feel more knowledgeable, as compared to before. I have been struggling a lot but I'm working as hard as ever. 

I was originally planning to go play soccer but due to limited time, it was very difficult. While my friends went off to play soccer, I spoke with Ted Hartel about various Economic subjects. He taught me about Average Variable Costs, Total Cost, and Average Fixed Cost graphs, in a way where I completely understood. Ted is not just my TA but also one of my best friend. We don't limit ourselves to conversations only about Economics but also about other Artificial Intelligence and Communication Analysis.

Later on, I printed more of my Economic assignments. Ashley was kind enough to lend me her card as I did not have a debit card on me. Though the price was over 50 cents, she was unwilling to take money from me in cash. 

Francesco Chiappe, my mentor, has helped me build a better economic intuition and further introduced me to Calculus (with Econ). Tomorrow, I do not have class, and I will be spending the majority of my time in the library, learning more concepts.