Quote - Malala Yousafzai

"I don't know why people have divided the whole world into two groups, west and east. Education is neither eastern nor western. Education is education and it is the right of every human being." -Malala Yousafzai

Amidst Heavy Pollution, Beijing Takes to Televising Sunrise

Smog in China's capital city has thickened to dangerous levels, while public concern over environmental health seems to have led China's President Xi Jinping to take action against the dizzying accumulation of pollutants in Beijing and Shanghai. Shanghai is expected to close 500 of its most heavily polluting and hazardous facilities, and Beijing has drafted a plan to implement fines against businesses, construction sites, and residences which exceed emission limits, reports Bloomberg.

ChinaFotoPress / Getty Images

Much of the recent increase in global air pollution has been from the burning of coal in developing countries, China included. Despite the "clean coal" movement in the U.S., coal is the primary contributor to global warming and is also a leading cause of smog, acid rain, and toxic air pollution; there are methods to limit pollution by coal in coal-fired power plants, but they are often neglected due to cost.

The Guardian describes the rise in coal emissions as resulting in part from outsourcing by the U.S. and U.K., citing the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's recent report on global CO2 emissions and warning that this is not only China's problem.

Meanwhile, the citizens of Beijing and the other 10 provinces warned this week by the China's Meteorological Center of hazardous smog conditions are left peering through the gloom at an LED sunrise, waiting for their leaders to heed the warnings scientists have been giving for the past decade.

Quote - Marie Curie

"You cannot hope to build a better world without improving the individuals. To that end each of us must work for his own improvement, and at the same time share a general responsibility for all humanity, our particular duty being to aid those to whom we think we can be most useful." - Marie Curie

Winter Road Trip - Northern California, Cont.

On the road trip I took all over Northern California, I shot a few rolls of film. These are some of my favorites. Oh, yeah. That girl on the log is me, so I didn't take that one. 

Lizzie Velasquez on Defining Yourself

Lizzie Velasquez, a 24-year-old motivational speaker and author, was born with an extremely rare medical condition that does not allow her to gain weight. She has 0% body fat and must eat once every fifteen minutes or so to sustain her energy. 

Lizzie has been the subject of bullying because of her appearance since she first started attending kindergarten. The worst of it came more recently when some online bullies made a video labeling her "the world's ugliest woman" which received over four million views and to which some commenters responded asking Lizzie to "please, just do the world a favor: put a gun to your head and kill yourself." Instead of letting bullies like this tear her apart, she chose to define herself not by her condition, not by their hate, but by her own successes. In her own words, "I can't see out of one eye, but I can see out of the other. I might get sick a lot, but I have really nice hair." 

Her perspective is so beautiful and inspiring, and her message is so simple: define yourself according to your own goals and your own successes. Don't let other people define you, because ultimately, their opinions don't matter.

Hear and share her story below. We only need 361,645 more views to reach four million. 

Quote - Amelia Earhart

I heard this quote on television yesterday and it really stuck with me:

"Women must try to do things as men have tried. When they fail, their failure must be but a challenge to others."

Winter Road Trip - Northern California

My boyfriend and I moved from Santa Cruz to Los Angeles in June of 2013, and we have been missing the Northern California wilderness. We decided to take a two-week vacation over the holidays to visit his family in Mill Valley and to spend New Year's in Yosemite with one of our best friends and her parents. I took the opportunity to practice photography; I learned in college on a Pentax K1000 film camera, and I am trying to master digital photography with my boyfriend's Canon Rebel XS.

The first trail we hiked on our trip was Coyote Ridge in Mill Valley.

We followed up with a walk along the boardwalk through Richardson Bay, where I admired the diversity of wildlife. 

We then drove to Yosemite to spend a few days over the New Year's holiday with our friend and her parents in a rented Yosemite West condo. We stopped on the way to visit with my brother and our podcast co-host in Manteca.

After Yosemite, we returned our friend home to Santa Cruz - I drove and it had so much fun. I love curvy mountain roads. We then traveled back to Mill Valley for a few more days and one incredible hike with my boyfriend's brother to Alamere Falls, one of the few tidefalls in the world.

When I went back to work for my final week before graduate school, my co-workers noted that I had been "revitalized." I think this was in response to me dropping the f-bomb every few sentences and making at least one crude reference to inter-generational love-making. Anyway, I think they're mostly right. This trip made me feel great, and I am so looking forward to my next road trip; perhaps Yellowstone?

The Birth of Oxytocin

I decided to write a blog to mark the beginning of a new phase in my life - I've just begun graduate school for a PhD in chemistry - and to detail my thoughts, feelings and activities along the way. I've tried to include a cursory self-introduction in the blog description, which I don't think does a very good job. Hopefully if you spend some time reading here, you'll get a better idea for who I am.

I look forward to spending time writing for you.