Magic + Science

I believed in magic. At 11, I excitedly swiped through various contents of the Book of Potions, an alternate reality videogame by fictional wizard Zygmunt Budge. The closest person in my life—my grandfather, a Nepalese palm reader—often encouraged me to believe in inconceivable things that could occur in the future, even if there wasn’t a rational explanation for them. So, that’s exactly what I did.

I wanted to make Felix Felicis, a good luck potion, and Zygmunt Budge’s crowning achievement after decades of concocting magical elixirs, in real life. I puzzled over the ingredients: shwinder egg, horseradish, squill bulb, Murtlap, Thyme, Occamy eggshell, and powdered common rue. I was crushed. I didn’t have those items, but perhaps I could reinvent the potion and develop skills on par with those of Zygmunt Budge! In my tattered science notebook, I quickly jotted down my steps. I attached a wire gauze to a Bunsen burner for heat. In a crucible, I added my substitutions for the wizardly ones—egg, radish, lemon juice, and curry. Finally, for magical flare, I waved my wand (AKA a stick from the backyard) over it in a figure-eight pattern, shouting “Felixempra!”

In retrospect, those ingredients mixed together made little sense, and I should have been more careful when combining random substances. However, the risks I took made me feel alive and became an integral part of my personal journey to do things that scared me. In high school, I forced myself to audition for public declamation. Despite being rejected at every attempt, I was more proud than disappointed. I learned to speak freely with a rich voice, intonation, and purpose. More importantly, I broke the barriers that hindered me from voicing my opinions with confidence rather than fear of others’ judgments.

This confidence has led me to pursue challenges that allow me to be creative in new ways. While I haven’t experimented anymore with Book of Potions formulas, I’ve become fascinated with creating mixtures, witnessing mind-blowing experiments, and understanding the science behind them. Instead of DIY kitchen potions, I now perform lab work with a spectrometer to determine the concentration of a solute, mix acids and bases to reach titration, and stir various chemicals to attain equilibrium.

I’ve also branched out into the world of marketing, designing posters in Adobe Photoshop for an international conference on infant neural tube defects. I never realized how the act of distributing information to various healthcare professionals around the world requires significant effort on behalf of government relations team members inside hospitals themselves. Delving into a new part of the hospital sector, spending hours listening to the whir of the copy machine, and choosing colors and layouts for the posters and pamphlets was a thrilling change from my regular internship duties.

That same youthful desire for adventure and knowledge has only grown. I’ve taken my intellectual curiosity to an MIT biology lab and used modern technology to uncover the identification of various bacteria. I help researchers make spreadsheets to understanding trends in infant nervous system health in Bangladesh. I step out of labs and into hospitals to shadow healthcare professionals. Outside the hospital, I walk into classrooms and teach elementary students how to create mini volcanos. From classrooms, I go to volunteer at Community Servings, a non-profit organization that prepares affordable food for ill low-income families.

As I walk out of my shift and sit on the noisy train, I realize that I still believe in magic, but not in my grandfather’s palm-reading kind. I believe in the magic of science and service. I’ve learned to implement all my knowledge to contribute to society, whether it be packaging food, advocating for nuclear disarmament, or organizing slides for labs. Learning and applying such skills are the keys to explaining those supposed “inconceivable” ideas my grandfather told me about. Now, I can confidently say I don’t need the power of the Felix Felicis any longer.