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I first learned about in the botany major’s room, as the regulars banded together to help fellow major Morgan Brown prepare for her experience in British Columbia. So, needing a capstone project, I decided to apply as well. I knew Morgan had applied for the Hulet Scholarship to help with the hefty tuition cost and that she had gotten help acquiring gear from others in the department. I could do these too. Still, I struggled getting myself to apply in the first place. I wrote an email to ask professors for letters of recommendation and let it sit in my drafts until the night before the application was due because I was worried my email wasn’t good enough. (Tip: do not do this. My professors were extremely kind and wrote letters anyway, but it was rude of me.)

Once I was accepted, I found myself overwhelmed. I’d never left the country before, nor done any fieldwork. Plus, I wasn’t certain where I was going to come up with the rest of the money. I’m extremely grateful to everyone here at Weber who supported me through that: to Morgan, who put up with my questions; to our lab manager, Sonya Welsh, who spent days helping me get prepared; to Dr. Hilbig, who secured funding for me so I could get paid helping her research; and to dozens of others. I’m an introverted bundle of anxiety much of the time, so reaching out to these awesome people was difficult.

I know what you’re thinking: you’re that anxious and you expected to go to a foreign country with people you’ve never met and spend over a month with them doing research? Yes. The awesomeness of getting to go to Mongolia and do science was a strong motivator and I am so glad I did. Over the course of the trip, I collected, identified, and pressed 246 plants; helped teach the park rangers how to use the GPS and camera traps in English; and taught the park rangers systematic plant collection techniques and taxonomic identification basics. Everyone worked on all of the projects, which was cool because I got to expand my horizons. It was a lot of work but was even more fun.

For example, early in the trip, we had our first overnight hike. The hike was strenuous as we needed to set mammal camera traps in a 2 km grid over rugged terrain with a lot of elevation change. I also needed to collect plants. By the time we got back to our temporary camp, it was already dark.

I was tired, I’d hurt my ankle and although I felt I could sleep it off, I did not. It was sprained. I hadn’t had safe water to drink in four hours. I also hadn’t eaten for about as long. I was desperate to get some cold water and pass out in my tent. When a man introduced to me as Gonzo (short for Gonsukh) offered me tea, I stupidly said “no thanks.” I should have taken at least a sip of the tea, which I was reminded of by an instructor. Fortunately, when Nyam-ochir offered me soup, I got it right. Sidenote: all of the food there was amazing. Including the sheep intestine.

The group sat around the campfire, chatting about the day and enjoying each others’ company, translations provided as necessary by our instructors Badmaa and Rebecca. By the time I limped to bed, I was in such a good mood I didn’t care that I was still somewhat dehydrated and limping. The next morning, we were told that “Gonzo” was actually the Ulaan-Taiga SPA Director Tumursukh Jal, a pretty important person to the project. He and Badmaa were playing with us, just one of a few mild pranks over the trip. This kind of humor should give you an idea of how close we got as a group.

It was an incredible experience and I highly recommend it to anyone. Don’t be afraid to reach out and get help pursuing your goals. I guarantee you won’t regret it.

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