When brilliance meets brilliance 🧠✨

July & August Newsletter - Part 2

The Rise Residential Summit 2023 took place from late July to mid-August in London and Oxford. Finally meeting in person most of my fellow winners and spending time with them in Europe was an unforgettable memory that will live with me forever.

Want to get into the details and reflection? This will be long, but if you want to know more about my experience, then let’s get started!

Welcome guys 🎉 I’m Allison, a Peruvian Rise Global Winner and incoming freshman at UCSD. I’m interested in climate change, energy and water issues, and nanotech. If you want to be updated of my day to day, follow me on Ig!

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Accommodation and Location

At London we were staying at Sketch House (my favorite accommodation of the summit), and at Oxford we stayed at Brasenose College.

Both cities were beautiful, but overall, my favorite one was Oxford. It has all the vibes of an academic town, so it was the perfect place to wear all my dark academia outfits. The city was way safer than London (which allowed me to explore it with my friends) and very beautiful. I love ancient architecture and Oxford made me feel like I was living in some kind of Pinterest Board inspired by one of Donna Tart’s novels.

Did food passed the test?

Coming from a country where food is one of the things we respect the most, I was raised to be excited every time that I can taste something new.

So I was completely shocked when I tasted Convene food.

I can’t say I liked their food most of the time, but I want to be as objective as possible, so I still want to highlight that they served an amazing breakfast. But lunch was definitely a no for me.

At Oxford our breakfast was served at Brasenose College, and although it was good, I am not a big fan of eating the same thing everyday. However we had our snacks and Lunch at the Rhodes House and they really cook and bake amazingly.

And we had some opportunities to eat at local restaurants too. The first one was a Peruvian restaurant and I was (obviously) quite excited to eat there. Although the food was great, I have my complains since the way they prepared and served the dishes was completely different of our original recipe (Honestly, Causa is not purple 😭). Even thought the restaurant didn’t had the representation I expected, I still enjoyed it.

Then during our union day we went to a Mexican restaurant and I fell in love with their gastronomy. It had the level of spicy I was looking for, but hear me out: do not eat jalapeño without something else, I usually have a high tolerance for spicy but eating jalapeño by itself (and chewing it instead of swallowing it) was something even I had trouble with 🌶

The last restaurant I went was one that offered MENA food. And I swear I loved every single thing I ate. It was also my first time trying this type of gastronomy and I hope I have the opportunity to eat it again.

Union Day

As part of ULatam, I took part in activities along with other Latin American Winners, including having lunch at Las Iguanas (Yep, the restaurant I mentioned in the previous section) and doing graffiti at Leake Street Arches.

Me painting part of our ULatam mural

It was my first time doing graffiti and it was a great experience to show our creativity and create really good memories. It was really fun having all of us marking the city where we are from in our map of Latin America, me drawing a llama (and then Socrates placing the Peruvian flag in a cuestionable place of my draw 😂), we both finishing our radioactive guinea pig, some of us winners trying to figure out how to place correctly the Andes Mountains, and taking a lot of pictures with each other.

Working together with my friends to create something that represents all of us made me proud. And now, I smile every time I remember that somewhere in London, there is a wall that serves as a testimony of our bond.

Rise always gives us opportunities

The purpose of the summit was not only to help us meet each other and develop strong connections, but also to help us growth in a professional way.

We participated in a series of lectures in topics such as climate change, entrepreneurship, engineering biology, astrophysics, AI, etc. As you may guess, my favorite ones involved the Climate and Entrepreneurship lectures, since it gave me new perspectives about topics that I was already working on, and gave me enough knowledge and connections to keep developing those ideas.

The networking events were definitely some of my favorite activities during the summit. Maybe my social battery was almost inexistent after each one of them, but it was worth it. I met incredible individuals that otherwise, perhaps I wouldn’t have been able to meet, and I received the most inspiring pieces of advice I could ever have asked for.

And finally, the capstone project. It allowed me to explore an interesting topic, propose a solution, and meet amazing teammates. Atharv, Mohamed, and David, thank you for being part of the Acidification Avengers with me. Yes, I was stressed most of time, I had too much caffeine in my system, and I admit that taking selfies of the team every single day was my coping mechanism BUT I’m really happy I got to work with you for Reef Revive.

Don’t be fooled, our team didn’t have only 4 members. Our 5th acidification avenger was for sure Chat GPT.

Having fun

At London, I have amazing memories of going with my base group to explore the city in a scavenger hunt and spending the afternoon at the Thames in a Boat Cruise. But the plan wasn’t only to take a look at the landscape, we also got a party. Needless to say, I had the time of my life.

During the nights at Sketch House we usually gathered in the common room to play table games, play Just Dance, or to chat. I even got a chance to share my culture with the other winners at Peru’s independence day on July 28th!

On our first day at Oxford we went punting, and considering that we were constantly crashing, got involved into a water war, and some people even fell into the river, we definitely had a fresh start.

Some days before the end of the summit, we had an “Open Mic Night” at the Rhodes House, where we all had the chance to show our talents. It was for sure one of the most fun nights of the summit.

Finally, our Leisure day at Oxford: I spent the morning shopping with my friends and visiting bookstores. Then I headed to my Leisure Day Track, which consisted on eating at Oxford Market, having a tour in one of those red buses, visiting the Oxford Castle and Prison, and going to a escape room.

By the way, Oxford has books for AMAZING prices. I got an original and new copy of Iron Widow for only 3.99 pounds at Book Stop. Insane? Yes, but my inner broke reader was crying in happiness.

Good people, good cries, goodbyes

The last day was one of the most memorable ones. The closing ceremony took place at Mansfield College, where we got dinner and watched presentations by the winners, including flute performance and poetry.

I loved the desserts, going around the tables just to chat with as many people as possible, and singing randomly while waiting for the rest of the food.

Going back to Brasenose made me sad. I spent more time at the bar —even though I still needed to pack— only to be with everyone for the last time. Signing flags, giving goodbye hugs, recalling memories and even crying in the process was nostalgic. But at least it made me realize that the bond in this community is real, and even though we may not see each other in a long time, I hope to see them once again in the future.

Friendships, memories, and brilliance

The summit brought together people from all over the world for around two weeks, and I find fascinating how even in that short amount of time I was able to create deep connections with different people.

My RAs, facilitators and the rest of the Rise staff are incredible individuals who gave me cool opportunities and always offered their help. Greg, Madison, Mark, Olivia, Kareen, Farai, Korede, Janet, and everyone else, thank you for being there for us.

When it comes to winners, I don’t think I have enough words to describe the emotions that arise when I think of them.

They all made me feel at home.

I‘ve met once again my Ocean Youth Summit besties: Jacqueline and Efe. I’ve found my Swiftie community in Cyra, Sarvz, Tony and more. I found a fashion icon in Ila, a personal photographer in Wael, the best cameraman in Risanga, and a selfie buddy in Marrieta.

I’ve found language exchanging partners in Velislav, Peony, Ada, Elif, Idil, and Jessica. I’ve found a shared passion for menstrual health in Lena. I’ve found reader buddies in Alex and Ruby. I’ve found my punting team in Ana, Antonio, Gerardo, and Luciano and I found my Acidification Avengers team in Atharv, David, and Mohamed.

I learned how to dance India songs with Arya and Kpop with Nathan. I’ve learned incredible dance movements from Emrullah, and how to dance “payaso de rodeo” with Mariana. I found my Festejo dance partners in Mafer and Socrates and I found the way out of a escape room with Ikenna, James, Antonio K. and Reese.

I’ve found a role model in Maneeza, a prospect Coachella buddy in Thounie, and (what I’m most grateful for) I’ve found my sisters in Lau, Ale, Luci, Sofi, and Mariana.

And last but not least: the latino winners. Among them, I have found my best friends, sisters, and brothers. All the time we spent together, all the laughs, the late night calls, the improvised parties, the jokes, the group chats, the WhatsApp stickers, the hugs, and the goodbye cries… all of that will stick with me for the rest of my life. You were part of the very rare group of people that might not share a single drop of blood with me but that I still consider my family. Thank you Laura, Alejandra, Sofia, Luciana, Mariana, Mafer, Estefanía, Socrates, Luciano, Antonio, Gerardo, Kesney, and Arthur. Thank you guys for making my winner experience one of the best of my life.

There are so many people that I still need to thank to, but space is simply not enough. Just know guys that all of you have a special part of my heart and that I will forever be there if you ever need me 🤍

This is what brilliant looks like ✨

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I wish you an amazing new month and don’t forget to follow me on social media <3