Week 1 in review:
The very start of the week I was incredibly lucky to be able to attend a class at University of Washington Seattle, on Comparative Animal Behavior and the Evolutionary background of animals, a 200 level Psych class. We learned about Altruism, which is a common behavior trait of animals. This is the behavior of risking yourself for someone else, which also includes parental care, and kin selection. Although the class was set up in a huge lector hall and I did not speak to the professor at all, all the students are involved in the class by voting through a software called, “Poll Everywhere” and do a short quiz on the material they learned. I was also lucky to be able to attend the University at a time all their Cherry Blossom trees were in full bloom.
My first day of my internship of ecology restoration started on Monday, and I was able to go in and first go on a “safari” learning about the potential work sites, and learning about the projects, species and importance of the land we would be working with. Afterwards, I went to Earthworks Sustainability, a part of the base where they make compost, and do projects in their woodworking shop. I was able to help with two different styles of bat boxes and had the chance to work with different equipment in the woodworking room.

My first day at the food bank consisted of seed sorting. This was a much needed project, and seems crazy to spend six hours sorting seeds, but I spent the entire time there doing so. I was able to go through all their large sized storage bins and help organize packets, separating them by different vegetable and flower varieties. The bank itself wasn’t open that day for providing food, so everyone else there was listening to music and singing and working on projects, which was a fun and comfortable environment to be a part of. The last day of the week, I went to seminar with Food, Health and Sustainability and we reflected on the book “Cooked” by Michael Polan. The day ended with a lovely first week of the quarter potluck with the class, where we were able to share good food and stories.

Featured images: Seed Packets from the food bank. Heading photo: Marsh from one of the many restoration sites.