Eta Chapter ~ Christmas 2000 Newsletter

This is Desiree Bowes, acting as Pub. Rep. for ETA Chapter this newsletter. I am one of three membership candidates this winter, and as membership candidates we are sharing the duties of the Pub. Rep.

A little bit about me: I am a third year Mechanical Engineering student at The University of British Columbia (UBC), Vancouver Canada. This is my first year living in Vancouver, and also my first year at UBC. I transferred to UBC this fall from the University of Saskatchewan in Saskatoon, Canada.

Vancouver is a terrific city! I've been having a ton of fun. There are no sororities at all in Saskatoon, so an organization as wonderful as AOE is a new concept for me. It's great having a fun group of engineering women dedicated to each other and the profession.

I'm looking forward to hearing from some of you. I'd love to hear AOE stories from across the continent. For now though, here are some updates from the sisters of Eta Chapter.

For those of you who didn't meet me at convention this summer, I'm this semester's president for Eta Chapter. This term has gone really well for Eta. We've made some changes, started some new traditions, gotten a little more organized, reached all our goals (!) and most importantly, invited three new great girls as membership candidates. Some of our most important accomplishments this semester include putting more of a focus on our sisterhood (the reason why most of us joined in the first place!), and doing more things to promote professional development, like holding a coop presentation meeting and helping to organize an engineering wide event for our association for engineering women. As my term as president comes to a close, and I pass it on to Donna, I'm sad because it was such good leadership experience and I learned a lot, but look forward to a new president bringing brand new perspectives and ideas to continue to make Eta a better chapter. I hope to hear from some of you soon.

This term I'm an active co-op, and every Wednesday I drive like mad (no no, I'm very safe) from work to UBC in order to make the Chapter meetings. In January I will be returning to school and beginning my third year in Electrical and Computer Engineering, Computer Specialization. I'm am able to participate in almost all AOE events, and have had a blast at things like The Halloween Ball (where Erica and I won second place for our carving skills) and the Founder's Day Celebration (all-you-can-eat-dessert buffet!!). I'm looking forward to the Food Drive, Christmas Caroling and especially the Christmas Formal.

Duty wise, I was nominated and voted in as Secretary for this term only, because the actual secretary landed an out-of-town co-op position. Next term, Erica will go on co-op and I will take over as president. As you can probably tell, many of our positions and a lot of our structure is governed by who has co-op, when, and where. I had a great time in L.A. at Convention this past summer, and I am putting everything I learned to good use. Hope to hear from all of you soon!

I just got back from a co-op work term in mid-October, so schoolwise I'm doing absolutely nothing. I was working from January to mid-October for the Shell Research and Technology Centre in Amsterdam.

It was pretty wierd at first, not being able to understand a random conversation on the street. Most people there spoke english to some extent, though, and I learned enough dutch to go grocery shopping and read the instructions on an 'automaat'. When I got back to Canada it was weird being able to understand everybody again!

At work, almost everybody spoke dutch but switched to english if they wanted to talk to me. By October I could figure out just enough of what they were talking about to drive me crazy.

I had one room in a 5-room house rented by Shell for their international students. That was an experience in itself. Wood-frame houses are extremely rare - brick is the norm. Stairs are extremely steep, and kitchens and bathrooms are quite small, due to the high cost of land, especially in Amsterdam. There's a reason the houses lean against each other.

I bought a bike there to get around. It's probably faster than a car because the roads are narrow, frequently one-way, and parking - especially downtown - is hard to find. There is a network of bike roads next to but separate from the car roads, with their own road signs and traffic lights. I wish that kind of thing existed in North America. Bicycles over there are a lot more comfortable, because bikes are transportation and sport, not just for sport like they are here.

So overall, even though I'll be taking 6 years to complete my degree because of my trip to Europe to work, it was worth it, totally worth it.

Hi! My name's Jenn and this is my first year as an active in AOE. I'm in the second year of the Metals and Materials Engineering program at UBC. We've had a good year so far. Some of us went to the play, Frankenstein, and everybody enjoyed our traditional all-you-can-eat dessert buffet on Founder's Day. We have also continued to be involved with the community through such efforts as the annual food drive and organizing a memorial for the victims of the 1989 massacre in Montreal.

We have a lot planned for the coming term and hope to hear from the rest of you. Happy Holidays!

My name is Leslie Lewis, and I'm in my third year of mining engineering at U.B.C. I've been having a great time being back at school after a year away on co-op, but now that exams are here I'm starting to get a little bit stressed. However, it cheers me up when I realize Christmas is only a month away! Isn't it wierd how all the stores start playing Christmas music at the beginning of November? Talk about commercialism! Anyway, I'm going off on a bit of a tangent here, so I'll end by wishing you all good luck with your final exams, and happy holidays!

I never knew school could be so demanding. I enjoy what I'm learning, but this workload is brutal! Enough about school... We've got three fantastic membership candidates this year. I'm really glad Desiree, Sun Jin and Poonam decided to become membership candidates as it has been great getting to know them. Best of luck with the pledging process! And to all, I hope that everything is going well and wish you good tidings for the holidays.

I was just initiated into the sorority as a membership candidate and so far, everything is still going pretty smoothly. It has been better than expected. I thought that this would be a serious/solemn sorority but now I know that I have been so wrong. The girls are vibrant and lively and seem to be totally dedicated to this sorority and I have been quite, quite impressed by their actions and have banished all my uncertainties about the sorority. Even though the sorority is so vast and I doubt that sisters in other chapters around all North America can meet up with everybody, I'm sure this sorority is one of the coolest organizations that I've ever joined and I'm looking forward to get initiated as one of the actives.

ETA CHAPTER

ALPHA OMEGA EPSILON

6239 ST. CATHERINES STREET

VANCOUVER, BC CANADA V5W 3G7