Key of Translation

Iterations

It’s interesting to see the direct correlation between going from one concept to the next. This is something that I learned during the first semester of arch school. Going from a collage, to a chipboard model, and then to a MDF model taught me the simplicity in the process of translation. The problem that can arise sometimes with this process is the excess of iterations. Sometimes there are so many directions that you can go, that the resulting iteration totally loses it’s initial concept. In this sense, when you look at the original collage, the final model doesn’t look similar. 

However, Iterations are key to getting new ideas. Even if the end result doesn’t match the initial collage, you still bring the memory of the work you produced. If the story is justifiable, then in the end the iteration is a success. By repeating the same process with a simple change, you get a different result. This result’s success all depends on the user’s justification of what the process meant. New ideas come about through experiementation.

My Experience

When I created a collage, for the first time, as I got into Temple, I had no idea the complexity it would represent. But as I slowly got different iterations and drawings, I realized how complex ideas can become just through repetition. 

i started my collage with a bunch of pictures of buildings that Morphosis built. I collaged their work together to create an image that I was satisfied with. Afterwards, I picked a distinct section of the collage, and created a physical chipboard model. The light and darkness created diversity in height throughout the model. This allowed the 2d space to become 3d. The first time I did this, I was amazed at the translation process because every step was dictated by my thoughts.

The model I created after the chipboard model had a similar translation system. But this time, we created a a more complex 3d model from a small 3d model. By using MDF, the thought process behind the initial chipboard model had to be thought out beforehand. Because MDF could only be cut in the wood-shop.

Occupants and Iterations

One concept that I didn’t explore is the idea of iterations with the integration of occupants. I was really encapsulated by the shapes that I designed during the iterations. I forgot to include how people would react to the different shapes. Maybe shape is a too simple a word to describe form. Form is better than shape because then you can start to understand that rectangular shapes don’t have much form. They’re just spaces for living. Not spaces that affects the mind.

What is form?

I’ve been describing space as rectangular. This is the best way to surround space to create shelter. But I want to move from just creating shelter, I want to create space for the sake of progress. If space is understood as a way of automatic detection for certain activities, then the space has to accommodate that activity. Space has to have a fundamental role in preserving nature. Artificial space needs to mimic nature so that it can be a place for us to grow. If we don’t have access to actual nature as we know it, we have to create that nature in our shelter. The definition of what a shelter does has to evolve.

Natural Shapes

There are some really cool shapes in nature, they’re mostly patterns that exists as a result of evolution. Since mathematics seem to explain a lot of different phenomenons, I think the way we behave can be explained by how we perceive the world. That’s where the idea of natural shapes, things like the golden ratio, can have an effect on creativity. I think it’ll be pretty cool to introduce natural factors into actual buildings. 

What is the Golden Ratio?

The golden ratio seems to demonstrate the constant growth in nature. When something has 1.61 proportionality growth, that means it’s growing at an even rate. The growth seems to symbolize the fundamental effectiveness of the organism. So their DNA is in good form, thus allowing for constant growth. The constant growth shows the complexity of nature. The replication process that exists in nature is beyond comprehending because it starts from such a small scale. The patterns that are detected are seen from a large scale.

Senior Year Bauhaus Dilemma

How can one achieve creativity?

Hexagonal Model

During my last semester in architecture school, I was given the task of creating a Bauhaus School, a school that enhances creativity. I began my project, wanting to play around with shapes, with the idea about how hexagonal shapes could potentially be morphed into an interesting design.

I didn’t want to just make a design based on ideas, I wanted to explore shapes before coming up with an idea. That’s been the most difficult process of this whole ordeal. Architecture school allows for a lot creativity. But that creativity can become lost as we start to think about actual buildings. For me, I didn’t really understand the full capacity of the freedom that I learned during the first two years of arch school. After all the exploration, during the two foundation years, I went back to what I thought was the norm in Architecture.  Unfortunately, the design eventually turned static, as a result of being critiqued, and it slowly turned into rectangular spaces. 

The irony in all this was that we were trying to achieve creativity for the students. Because I was losing creativity during the process, I felt the design was also loosing its end goal. How were the students supposed to be creative when the architecture doesn’t exploit its own creativity? This is one of the reasons why I was disappointed
with my Bauhaus School. I wanted the students to notice their environment, but because I lost my initial exploration, the project became stale.

Complexity

Exterior Back Render

Exterior Model View

Building a school that has a museum, a concert hall, a library, a tech shop, a food court, a tech lab, and studio space was a monumental task in itself. I also had a lot of limitations during this process. This is because the space that I was building actually already had exteriors. So we were using the old rectangular hollow space and then adding an extension that could be any shape. Now that I look back, I do like the space that I created, but I wish some of the space had more dynamic elements integrated.

Thus I didn’t have the time that I wanted to have. So for this blog, I’m going to slowly experiment and create some designs that will showcase what I mean by organic creative space. Since this is a school, I propose that the students are the primary occupants of this space. Even though there are teachers and other community occupants who will visit the library, I want to focus primarily on the students that will be learning at the Bauhaus school. This school is for honing one’s creativity. So by understanding how natural shapes can enhance the creative experience, I’m going to argue that, one’s creativity increases based on the surrounding that one is exposed to.

Hypothesis

My hypothesis comes from the fact that, natural shapes are more interesting visually, thus the consciousness well recognize and care for the surroundings even if habituation takes control. If the body unconsciously associates the natural shape positively, then the students will have a better time in the space. By pushing the limits on the shape, the whole experience for the students will become more positive. At least that's what I hope the experience to be. But regardless, I think it'll be an interesting experiment.

Organic Arch Realization

Organic Persuasiveness

Being persuasive in design is a difficult process. As I look back to my last semester in college, I’ve realized how difficult it was for me to convey my ideas to my professor. My professor, during the last semester, was a new professor that transferred in, so he followed his own philosophy and everything that I’ve learned in Temple, up to that point, became that much harder to convince him. That’s one of the reasons why it’s taken me so long, at least to convince myself, that I want to design sustainable organic architecture. I’ve been saying for awhile that organic, because of Frank Lloyd Wright, is the way to go, but I didn’t fully realize what the concept was. So I’ll be exploring in this blog about "what is organic?"

Wissahickon

Wissahickon Planer Model

Wissahickon 

My first ideas about organic shapes came through when I first measured and created a model of a rock in the Wissahickon forest. At the time, I wasn’t sure why measuring in delaney triangulation was so important. But that measurement process allowed me to recreate the rock in model format. Afterwards, after some design decisions, my triangulation model transformed into a planer model. Five years later, when I look at my planer model today, I see the potential of the shapes I created. I understand how a simple rock can have the potential to be an organic living space. At the time, I was just following a method of measurement, but this is a great method to recreate nature, and create architecture that flows organically instead of creating boxed architecture.

Choreography Model

Choreography

My ideas for organic shapes continued to evolve during my fourth semester, when we measured a choreography and then created space from it. This is also very organic because the shape that we created was a movement of the body. The human body is part of nature, and how it moves is fundamentally a supreme mechanism since we still can’t replicate the human body. But that’s difficult because the human body is made out of trillions of individual cells collectively controlling the body.

Movement

Hand Movement Space

Furthermore, during my second semester, I had a digital course, where we had to design a physical movement. Now that I look back, I realize how truly organic that simple design process was. The process started with, each of us, documenting a movement. I chose to pick up my cellphone as the movement. After taking dozens of images of the process, we experimented with collaging the process to make it cohesive. Afterwards, we made line drawings of five main images. This allowed for experimentation because I was able to transfer the drawings into Rhino afterwards. As a result, we were able to create an organic shape from the movement. This space was eventually integrated with our arch studio. 

Potentiality 

The end images don’t actually justify the capacity that this method can produce. I think if I kept using this process, I would have had organic designs throughout all of my years at Temple. But, I didn’t apply what I learned effectively into my design. I started thinking about the required spaces that was essential for the architecture. And those required spaces became boxed spaces because of limited time. I started focusing on visualizing the space through digital programs. Interior architecture became more of a focus because I was thinking about how height and color of the space affected one’s perception. The programmatic value that I wanted to focus on for the occupants became a symbolic perception. 

By focusing on colors and digital interior designing, my main objective became convoluted. Because ultimately, the program of the architecture is the most important part of the space. That’s where people will be walking through everyday. People don’t always look at their surroundings. Habituation shows that people tend to completely ignore what’s happening around them because consciously thinking is a very difficult process. Most people, everyday, follow routines in order to live day by day. And when time doesn’t allow for wondering, a person automatically follows the said routine without thinking. That allows for tremendous work to get done, however, the exploration that is possible dissipates. People actually look where they go when they’re in nature. Part of the reason for this is the uncertainty and natural life. When you don’t know what’s in front of you, the conscious brain becomes alert, because who knows, maybe a squirrel will bite you. That’s why creating space that is organic can open up the possibility for conscious action. I want people to pay attention to the spaces that they walk through. I don’t want to scare them, per say, but being uncertain about how the space will change while you walk through it can definitely enhance the spatial experience.

Philadelphia Library

Community Library

During my senior year at Architecture school, I designed a library located in SE Philadelphia. A library is a community building that allows access to books and electronic resources. After coming from Tokyo, the semester before, I was intrigued by how different types of people would circulate in the space. After being critiqued about my focus on just the space in Tokyo, I decided that focusing on how people really move along the space was more important.

Allowing for people to move requires the ability to know what types of people would be coming into the library. So I began my project by drawing some sketches portraying the types of people that navigate through the space. 

Types of Spaces

Level 2

Level 1

I came up with 3 different groups. The first would be the children, who need the most freedom to access the space. I figured the children should be on the first floor so that they wouldn’t get lost in the library. Then I figured adults would be secondary, so they could be on the upper floors. Allowing the adults to have access to the children also seemed important. So I had open visual access from the 2nd floor. And lastly, I figured people would also probably want to collaborate, so I had a space designed for collaboration, I wasn’t sure where that would go yet.

After figuring out with the groups, I made some sketches for how they would look in the space. I drew 3 different types of spaces. Afterwards, I built some models to showcase how the space could potentially look. I wanted curvature spaces for the children and the adults. I wanted people to have more organic atmosphere. 

Afterwords, I tried meshing the models together. But in order to make room for the staff area, I designed an internal space that would act as the focal point from where the staff would come out. I thought this was important because this allows for interaction between the staff and the people without interrupting the library guests.

Digital Manipulation

Render East Side

After understanding how the people would interact in the space, designing the facades became a priority. I wanted a big opening on the South side as it will receive the most sunlight. The children’s area was also on the side, so that was plus since exposure to the sun would be beneficial for the kids. I was also starting to develop the model at this point, playing around physically and digitally. I made some decisions in Revit that allowed for to have a second floor vertical louvers so that the sun could be partially blocked. 

Model SW Side

The Review

The review went well for the most part. I was more adamant about my design than the previous semester, when I felt a little taken aback by how people moved in the space. This time, knowing that the people had designated areas and they can perform certain activities in each space convinced me that the location of each space was sufficient. However, having large openings could become a problem did come up. But overall, I was content with the review.

Tokyo, Japan

Exploration

Akihabara, Tokyo

I studied abroad in Tokyo, Japan in the spring of 2013. Visiting Tokyo was a very culture opening experience for me. I was prepared for going to Tokyo, I studied Japanese for a couple of years prior, but the magnitude and scale of the culture and architecture was beyond my scope of understanding. When I first arrived in Tokyo, the amount of activity that I witnessed was new to me, I lived in Philadelphia in college but I didn't exactly live in a big city while growing up, and Philly was tame compared to Tokyo. 

Akihabara Crowd

I got to explore Tokyo pretty well during my 4 month stay, we were always traveling from one district to another, trying to understand Japanese architecture along the way. Our site for our architecture project was located at the heart of entertainment in Tokyo called Akihabara. That’s where we spent a lot of time taking pictures trying to analyze and understand what it was that made Akihabara so special.

Akihabara is special because it’s the electronics capital of Japan. Games, Anime, Manga, and anything Japan related that pops in the mind probably exists in Akihabara. It's a small area, but the buildings are tall and the crowd is non-step at all times.

Tourist Hostel

Kanda River, Akihabara

Our architecture class was assigned the role of creating a spa hostel for tourists that would potentially visit Akihabara. Japan is known for it’s Sentos and Rutenburos which are indoor and outdoor baths. So this allowed for exploration of Japanese culture while we designed the hostel. One of the advantage the site has is the Kanda River, which was located just beside.

My plan for the Spa Hostel began with the idea of creating collages to represent a scene that I could picture happening in Tokyo. This was still only my third year in architecture, so I felt a little lost with all the freedom that came with studying in Tokyo. As a result, I decided that just being able to imagine some scenarios into pictures would help ease the transition.

The Events

Sento

My collages started with an idea for a lobby. I found some pictures and decided that I wanted a big open lobby that connected to all the other main parts of the hostel. So there would be access to the sento, the rutenburo, the restaurant, housing, and event opening spaces along the way. 

Rutenburo

The Rutenburo was the second event that I collaged together. I figured having a natural outdoor bath that highlighted Japanese culture should be a big event. I also wanted connection between the Sento so the transition between the indoor and the outdoor was seamless. Thus I collaged together the sento as another event.

Eventually, I started working on combining the spaces so that they would work together to create one big space. I made simple mini models to get an idea for what the events would look in 3d space. This allowed for a clear understanding of how the spaces would fit together. After having an idea for how the spaces would go together, I started thinking about some of the other essential spaces that the hostel required. A dining area, a small shopping area, and housing was also added into the overall space of the 3 main events. These spaces were secondary because they would be revolving around the main idea of Japanese culture. I imagined the tourists that visited the hostel should have a traditional Japanese experience as the focal point for creating the architecture. So the openings that happen in the architecture also reflects how the residents could explore Tokyo from inside the hostel.

The Review

River Side Model

Tezuka-san from Tezuka Architects came to our Review. It was a bit overwhelming because he was a famous architect that made spaces like the Fuji Kindergarten which was very organically kids focused. One of the critiques that I received was my obsession with the events as being too focal, and not enough consideration in how the people actually interacted with the space. I described the spaces as a way to experience Tokyo, but I didn't explain the interaction between people sufficiently.  However, it was a very good learning experience because I learned how important the people are in architecture. The freedom of movement in space is crucial to how people experience space. This gave me the idea that just having rectangular open spaces with openings was not the best option for space interaction. Having natural pathways that canopy's over important events probably would have improved the atmosphere for the hostel guests.

Role of Emotions on tasks

Intro

I've always been fascinated by psychology ever since I took AP Psychology in High School. I've always wondered whether I should have studied more psychology and less architecture. But because I studied architecture, I actually learned more about human behavior. Because human behavior occurs in space. And architecture accommodates for human space as shelter. That was what motivated me to get my Bachelors in Architecture. 

Honeycomb Space, Kengo Kuma

But not being able to fully understand all of architecture, I've read a lot of books about human consciousness and how we perceive as a result of our selective attention. At one point, I became really interested in the psychology of color and how that affects the conscious and the unconscious mind. But it seems like it only has a limited application because most of the time we become so self-absorbed with what we do that we actually don't look enough at our surroundings to think about it. We do pay attention to our surroundings to an extent, however, if the surroundings are too complicated, it seems like the unconscious automatically disregards the complicated details that surrounds us and fixates on the surrounding as a whole. But as time passes, this same fixation seems to evaporate even further and the space becomes just shelter without regards to the surrounding. This means we become so accustomed to the space that we really don't pay attention to it anymore. This is specially true for narrow linear confined spaces that are the norm for our current society. 

This is one of the reasons why I want to explore organic architecture and see how human beings behave in organic shapes rather than linear shapes, of course thresholds also definitely play a role, but the curvature role of nature can potentially have an even more significant role. 

But this blog is about emotions and how that affects our process to get things done. So I will explore organic shapes some other time and will discuss how emotions are critical for our performance. 

Fear and Contentment

Content

Fear

Being scared of how other people will perceive you will pump up your adrenaline if you can convince yourself that it is a dire situation. As a result, your body will automatically go in fight or flight response and you will accomplish tasks.

When there’s no outside source to pressure you, you go in content mode. Where easy tasks become incredibly hard to do. Thus if you want to write an essay, you won’t want to because you’re not fearful about the situation, thus you will find excuses in order to evade writing the essay. The process isn’t difficult but convincing yourself that the situation is dangerous if you don’t write will be difficult. But if you are able to convince yourself, then the situation becomes easy to handle, you won’t think about how your body is responding to the situation, but rather you’re just writing because you know internally that you have to. The outside pressure, in this case, is the fear that if you don’t write you will fail. This failure has to be crucial in your mind or else your body won’t accept the argument that you really do have to write an essay. When you actually are able to write, you will notice your body going into work mode, in my case, my legs are crossed and I’m unconsciously using force with my back since I’m next to a wall. However, if the situation somehow isn’t important enough, you will lose this unconscious body focus. If you become unconsciously content, you won’t be able to write the essay. This may seem a little too meta because you may ask, "how does one actually become aware of what the body is doing?"

Explanation

Meditation actually helps in getting close to your emotions. The book 10% Happier, by Dan Harris, has a good outline of how meditation affects the brain. The unrelenting thoughts that flow through can actually be controlled. When that happens, the mind really does expand, and you can become aware of what the body is doing if your conscious allows you to. Thus the power of emotions can be amplified.

However, in the beginning of all this, I didn’t know what was happening to my body. But as I slowly study, reading books, I’ve realized that what happens to your body is actually very simple. It’s your unconscious that controls your body, but if you can consciously control what you think and what you want, your body will conform to the situation. It’s not something that will come automatically. But if you’re certain that the situation demands it, the body will comply. 

Arch Reviews

Arch Review

I know this from personal experience because I was able to do massive amounts of work because my unconscious knew I had a deadline. Architecture reviews are some of the most helpful hardships that one can encounter in my opinion. By spending a semester on analyzing every step that you have to take in order to create a building, your unconscious slowly realizes the potential of what you’re capable of. This potentiality grows as you receive criticism during class. The criticisms help you gain a better understanding of what needs to be done. And the fact that a studio professor is with you for around 10 hours a week only facilitates the process. That’s why during reviews all the archi kids always end up doing all nighters. For the lucky few that don’t, they are able to sleep a couple of hours.

Thank you

If anyone has any questions, feel free to leave comments below, I will do my best to answer.

Ritual House

Salat Ritual House

Beginning

Example Ritual Steps 1-2

When we first started working on the Ritual House, I wasn’t sure what to make of it. This was one of our first projects after 2 years of conceptional foundation courses. It’s supposed to be a sacred place of worship. I had no clue how to make architecture out of ritual steps. Thankfully, we had Bernard Tschumi help us guide our process. We were given a ritual from a religion. I was assigned the ritual of the Islamic Prayer called Salat. Our goal was to examine each crucial step that guided the prayer. Thus the ritual starts with a person entering the mosque. Afterwards they would take their shoes off, place their shoes in a shoe rack, and step-by-step until the prayer process was finished. I had 14 full steps in this process.

Experiments

This, however, didn’t make the confusion of making an actual ritual house any easier. I was perplexed by how we would create space from a bunch of small drawings that laid out each of the steps from the prayer. The drawings mainly represented a conceptual space of each prayer action and the action taking place itself. It was a difficult process because a bunch of prayer steps could happen in the same place. So the configuration of the hypothetical space didn’t really have much variety. As a result, we had to play around with each space to accommodate more hypotheticals like change in wall heights.

In the end of this process, I managed to sketch out a detailed drawing of all the 14 steps with accommodating spaces. The next step for the process was even more difficult. We had to translate the space we created and input it into the computer. This was then exported into rhino, each of the 14 spaces having their own individual layer. I managed to lay out the 14 spaces accordingly to how they would actually happen inside the prayer house. This was trial and error because everything that we did in this process was based on our own perception of how the ritual works in space. This allowed for a very interesting combination of spaces to mesh together to create the architecture. In the end the process was successful because each of us were able to get an interesting ritual house based on our own idea of what the ritual entails.

Afterwards, we had to create volume from each of the sectional space layers. This allowed for the actual translation of the 2-d drawings into 3d volumes. It was a demonstration of what is possible process by process. Afterwards, we did actually start making real plans, sections, and elevations. There was a lot of discussion regarding circulation, ease of access, room placement, and the overall impact the space has on it’s surroundings. When I created the model of the ritual house, everything that I did up until now definitely seemed worth it at the time. 

Review

Salat Ritual House

The review was when I realized the potential and the flaw of my design. Architecture reviews are the most helpful parts of the design course. The critiques may be shocking in the beginning but once you analyze it, the possibility that comes with the critiques open up a whole new world. But that’s only if you don’t take the critiques personally. My critique ended up, traditionally, with me being proud of what I accomplished but wishing I did more to improve the overall complexity of the project. The downside to Tschumi’s process is the argument that the project only focused on a specific process. The space itself was confined to the rules of the volumes. Obviously, you can play around with the volumes as much as you like, however, the output is a reflection of the process and not a total brand new creation. At least that’s how I felt with the limited time that I had during that semester.

Architecture's Nature

Role of Architecture

Roots

Tin House

Skyscrapers

When I first started studying architecture, all I wanted was to build homes for people. Architecture is definitely a lot better in America than in Bangladesh. I grew up in Bangladesh, a very poor country compared to the rest of the world. When I first saw architecture in America, at the age of 8, I was astounded by the height, the sheer magnitude of design everywhere. Even roads were designed. I didn’t know the complexity of any of this when I first started studying architecture.

I started architecture because of a small carrom board that I built senior year of high school. I loved the flow that came with building something. I knew that I wanted to stick with something that allowed me to focus and grow. And I thought architecture was the perfect medium to focus that energy. And I was right to an extent. Architecture school has taught me something that I will never forget for the rest of my life. I discovered that architecture isn’t actually about just building in the real world. It’s actually about persuasion. I was stubborn enough that I was sure I could persuade anyone as long as I worked hard enough. And that is how I got a bachelor of science in architecture without actually learning anything about architecture.

Analysis

This realization may be surprising to some, “how did you spend four years without learning anything about architecture?” That’s a question that might pop up in people’s head. But I’m convinced to a large extent that this is reality for architecture, at least if you’re only getting a 4 year bachelors. However, you will learn how to persuade people to a large extent by learning about the design process. You may not know how to apply that design persuasion in everyday life in the beginning, but as you grow, you will realize how many more ideas you have as a result of studying design. As for me, I didn’t think I was qualified technically, I couldn’t even get a good job in architecture design when I got out of college. I settled for a job where I thought learning more technical aspects of architecture would do me some good. And I worked for around 6 months trying to understand how foundations work, the concept of framing plans, and using section cuts to determine materiality position. The job, however, was not stimulating at all. The stimulation that architecture school provided was something that I started craving. I wasn’t satisfied with just knowing where things go, I wanted to design and implement ideas for why things go in different places. So I left my job with an understanding that I would take some time off to refocus what I wanted to do. I was not enjoying the process anymore so that convinced me it was better to pursue other opportunities.

During this past year, I’ve come to this realization that design matters, and it's applications are boundless. Now back to the topic of "what is the role of architecture?” I think architecture school is great, it does teach you some life skills that will be paramount to survival in the long term. However, the methodology behind how other classes are taught with foundation has to change. Looking back, I didn’t use any calculus or physics that I learned in college in my studio courses. I think that’s a huge mistake because what we learn isn’t actually implemented but rather imputed into our brain as a way to say that “here you go, you need to know this,” but you’ll never use it. I don’t think that should be the role of architecture school. The role of architecture school should not be just about persuasive design but also to develop that design so that the structure actually has some foundational sense. Thus knowing how your design is actually built should also be a bigger part of the curriculum. But a semester is too short for any of this to happen. Each semester passes without developing enough fundamental ideas. That’s how I felt for the 3rd and 4th year of architecture school. And this was especially true when I went to Tokyo. 

Predictions

Guggenheim Museum Bilbao

Toyo Ito Library

The main topic of what is the actual role of architecture has to deal with people. Ultimately, it’s the people that determine what a building is for. With advancing technologies that are capable of making any shapes. the perception of what is the norm will have to change. People need to understand that architecture isn’t just about boxed spaces. It’s about interacting with space in a way where the body can glide and perform all the activities that a body needs to perform. My initial perception of architecture, from tin houses to massive skyscrapers, have all been destroyed. I believe that architecture should be more organic in shape. It should act as boundaries to accommodate activities. I think architects like Frank Gehry and Toyo Ito are playing that role. Thanks to Gehry’s Bilbao, the idea of an icon is also changing. The complexity of shapes that come out through Gehry’s work exemplifies what is capable with modern technology. The magnificent thresholds that come through Ito’s work also show the power of organic openings. I think the role of architecture ultimately is to mimic nature so that the body can fluidly move without any hindrance.

Pokemon GO

Pokemon GO Thoughts and Tangents

In the last few weeks Pokemon GO has started dominating the world. This Pokemon phenomenon is an interesting adaptation of modern society. This is from a 25 year old who grew up playing Pokemon. I think society has started adapting to the digital age in a new profound way. And this is just the beginning of how society will proceed into the future.

I used to play a lot of games when I was younger. Pokemon Ruby was one of the first games I played. And I was absolutely hooked at that time. As I  grow older, I’ve realized the initial exploration that was so profound when I was around 10 has started to dissipate. I think that’s because real life takes over and the initial excitement isn’t really exciting anymore when you think about all the other things you have to do. Thus I haven’t played the newest generation. And I don’t even know if I’m going to play Pokemon Sun and Moon.

However, Pokemon Go has changed my attitude towards whether I’ll play Pokemon in the future. Pokemon Go’s augmented reality has placed a new meaning behind catching Pokemon. Just by the sheer fact that the Pokemon is superimposed in your environment recreates the nostalgic memory of my childhood. "They’re real man," that’s the reaction that captivates my mind again. This excitement is allowing millions of adults to go back to their childhood. And I think that’s exciting for the future. And because it’s in the real world, adults are actually running around outside and catching Pokemon.

One of the problems that the modern age has brought upon the world is car traffic. I think the highway system that has arisen in the last 100 years is a huge problem to society as it grows in population. And people just drive everywhere because all the destinations are so far way. Roads have taken so much space that it’s ludicrous. But this is in Pokemon tangent, so I’ll leave with this. I want to believe that by allowing people to wonder around the world, Pokemon Go and it’s successors will allow the world to change in a way where people can walk everywhere. If people explore their neighborhood because of Augmented Reality, the pathways have to change to accommodate the walking people. People didn’t originally have cars, thus people are meant to walk. Road systems have to accommodate transitioning people, not cars.

With that, I will begin my journey into writing. Pokemon Go is a catalyst for change. I believe anything can happen, but why not create that future by putting thoughts into words. I hope I can keep writing and I want to hope that Pokemon changes the world for the better.