Interviewed by Luke Coleman and Sumant Shringari
Where to start? In 1993, I was born in Richmond, then moved to Salt Lake City, Utah. I am the baby of the family: two older sisters. I am young, but I am part of the generation that remembers 9/11.
From my childhood, I could tell you that it was no surprise that I ended up in the military. As a kid, I would pretend to be Chuck Norris and Rambo. I remember that there were huge rats running in the mountains. So, I did what was only natural—I built traps… holes in the ground with spikes. A bit gory, but I was meant for the military.
School was okay. The Utah public school system was not very motivating and so I was an average student. My family were hard working-class people that never went to college, so it did not seem feasible for me to do so either. For me, my dream was to be a marine. I was always taught marines were the best of all the armed forces.
At 17, I tried to join the military. But I could not join without my parents signing off. They did though. I was initially denied because of hearing issues—I have really bad hearing. They sent me off to another place to have a “combat hearing” test, which is just being able to hear in bustling café. I passed that and was then able to join the military with two of my friends.
Initially, I went to San Diego for boot camp. 3 months… it sucked… it’s boot camp. After that, I went to Marine Combat training. The thing about Marines is that everyone is trained for combat. I mean everyone, from a marine at a desk job to one in combat. That’s why I wanted to be a Marine—valuable anywhere, anytime.
Everyone talks about the middle east, but Southeast Asia is where it is at. After graduating in 2013, my first 2-year assignment was in Okinawa, Japan. It was a culture shock. I had never been outside the US, nor did my family go on vacations. Regardless, I had to learn about Southeast Asia because my job was an intelligence analyst. Well, Japan was weird. Sometimes there were protesters at the military base. I think by us being there, we were bringing stability to a hotspot region.
I was assigned to a task, where I was part of a team that went around Southeast Asia to train the locals, learn from them, and develop friendly relations. Thailand was my first “give a shit moment” because it was the country that I was assigned to know everything about. When we landed in Thailand, it was a tense moment. The government was corrupt and so people were protesting. I knew from studying the history of Thailand that when the gov’t is unpopular, the military steps in and takes over. This might seem scary, but it usually was a peaceful and calm process—a bloodless coup. The purpose of the military coup was to restore order.
That knowledge came to use. The situation was so tense that a coup was imminent and we started evacuating, but the navy ship left our team in Thailand. I became the point person. I told my boss that according to the history, the coup will be bloodless, so we should sit tight. It actually happened in the way I predicted. After then, I knew the importance of my job. One wrong prediction by me could have harmed my team. I was proud.
Afterwards, we went to Malaysia. There the locals taught us jungle warfare. We learned what we could eat and drink. They brought us turtles, fruits that I have never seen before, and anything else. There were no showers, so we stank. When rain hit, imagine a group of men dancing and scrubbing soap to get clean. The locals were funny in that they tried to barter for our guns. Of course, we couldn’t do that. Our trip ended with a combat simulation for the locals. I was part of the bad guys… that was fun. There were explosions and blanks shot. But it did not end completely uneventfully as my buddy was bitten by centipede. This guy was massive and ripped. But his body became numb and collapsed. I carried him to tent and we gave him antivenom. He was fine, but he almost died.
My journey then brought me to Australia. Australia changed my life. I was thinking about moving on from the Marines, but they told me to wait because a trip to Australia was next. There, I was the collections officer. My job was to manage all the assets. It was a lot of down time; I had nights to myself so I got really good at Rummy, you know Blackjack, and Spades. The city I went to was super friendly, everyone was so nice and so happy. Everyone was travelling abroad and studying so the atmosphere around the city was something so vibrant and new. Unfortunately, I had an 11 o'clock curfew. I remember the tent I slept in was maybe the size of a small table and was so hot and I shared it with someone else. The experience was unforgettable, but the constraints and close quarters left me wanting something different.
From there, I wanted to leave the marines so I started studying to go back to school. I went to South Korea for about a week and a half and then we went to North Korea and saw the demilitarized zone (DMZ). Tensions have eased a little bit, but you know it’s still rough over there. In Korea, we all went to the Korean war museum and it was very humbling. I remembered being thanked by all the South Koreans. It was an example of the American military having done something great to a country, rather than in other cases in which other countries that have more or less collapsed. The appreciation I received there and the new things I learned about the region rounded out my time abroad.
After Korea, I came back home for a month and then I became an intelligence analyst in California for two additional years. From September of 2016 to March of 2017, I drove around and secured base intel until I was promoted to air base Chief of Intel. I was sergeant at that time and it was like the best position in the Marines. You know what you’re doing and no one fucks with you. Thankfully there were no serious issues, a little problem here and there, but nothing major.
After California, I studied and went to Harvard for a week. The experience was a life changing moment. These guys with PhDs were just teaching us. I read Plato’s “Man in the Cave” and that changed my life. It was about taking a step back and seeing your own shit for what it really is. It was like the cave was the military. You knew there’s no free thought and I was glad I got out. Following the time at Harvard I wanted to learn more.
I had my mind set on UPenn. I looked it up and it was like wow this is amazing. I had an interview through IPS, which was a great opportunity and they helped me push through to UPenn. After I got my interview done finally, I sent it in. It all paid off and I remember my acceptance so clearly: the night I got in there was a huge lightning storm. I opened the email and it said “congratulations!”. It was so emotional because I was never conditioned to go to college, much less an Ivy League. In the following weeks I finished out deployment and prepared by going home to Salt Lake City. I got my eyes corrected and started looking for apartments in Philadelphia.
I have my mind set on studying cognitive science after I switched from economics. Cognitive science is great because it is a fantastic way to understand my own mind as well as helping others. More recently I had an internship at the FBI over the summer.
I love UPenn, but it’s interesting being older. To have classes with 18 year olds is super different. I did a completely different path from them and I wanted to come in with an open mind. So far, the first semester has been the hardest. Making friends in class is really difficult sometimes. The biggest thing with the military is it takes so much from you that you have to find yourself when you get out. I still sometimes struggle with things that I’ve seen. I just started going to the VA hospital and it’s going really well. I feel much better about things. Looking back at my time at Penn I think my biggest regret was that I hadn’t joined any clubs. I didn’t put myself out there like I should have, but I’ve found that there are a lot of resources for veterans, and I think that’s amazing.