Hey y’all, I’m Jason Gu!

If you ask any of my friends to describe who Jason Gu is in a couple of words, the majority would respond with something like this:

“Tryhard physics nerd.”

While the connotation is more negative than the truth (at least I hope), I would be lying if I said that the above description were anything but spot on. I pride myself in being an extremely hard working, passionate student who is obsessed with the subject of physics. Well, not physics specifically, but rather any challenges and problems that make me think. But to understand that better, we need to start where you’d start any story: the beginning.

“Mommy—get me a screwdriver. NOW.”

I was generally a happy 5th grader, don’t get me wrong, but that day I meant business. Grabbing the Rubik’s Cube and twisting the top halfway, I jabbed the screwdriver into the gap, prying with all the strength my eleven-year-old body could muster. The plastic began to crack, the stickers slowly scraping off, but that wouldn’t stop me—I was on a mission. With one last jerk and “pop,” I couldn’t help but laugh triumphantly at the fruits of my labor.

26 colored cubelets and 1 black core, splayed out messily on my desk. 

The rest of the story wrote itself. Piece by piece, layer by layer, I restored the puzzle back to its original form. Sitting back to view the rainbow-faced cube before me, I couldn’t help but feel captivated by the process I’d just undertaken. Let’s be honest here, it was nowhere near perfect. It was banged up, scratched, and it barely even turned at that point. But was I proud that I’d finally solved the problem that had perplexed me all weekend? I’ll quote my fifth-grade self to answer that.

Fudge, yeah.

 

 

For the rest of that school year, I became infatuated with the ins and outs of the 6 Colored Cube. From solving it in front of a mirror, blindfolded, using my feet, and even butt-naked in the bathtub (I don’t want to talk about it), each new iteration brought invigorating challenges that I tackled passionately. Whether it was in a blindfold, in bare feet, or in my birthday suit, solving that Rubik’s Cube thousands of times gave birth to my insatiable hunger for problem-solving.

While my Rubik’s Cube solves have become sporadic as of late, my intense love for thought-provoking problems has endured a steady presence in my life. Namely, my desk is now decorated (albeit, still messily) with the puzzles of a more intricate topic: physics. 

Physics offers me now what that first Rubik’s Cube offered my curiously frustrated 5th grade self. When faced with a puzzling problem, the layers of the question are often scrambled with complexities. My first option is always the simplest: jab and pry at it using tools like calculus and trigonometry. While messy, constructing this solution, piece by piece, can deconstruct a problem into its simpler components, revealing the core of its solution. But, after doing it once or twice, what’s the fun in that?

 

 

I’d like to think that my palette for physics is a bit more elegant. Through twisting and turning through SS Krotov’s Problems in Physics and Max Tegmark’s Our Mathematical Universe, I appreciate the magic of physics and what lies under its sleeves. Mirroring my studies, I immersed myself into dark matter search projects (XENON) and theoretical physics programs (ISSYP). Just as I had blindfolded myself or used my feet, I adore the intense handicap of timed physics contests, engaging in fierce competition at the international level. 

 

 

Solving Rubik’s Cubes—understanding the nuances of a discipline and endlessly seeking challenge—defines my identity. It’s led me to spend minutes naked in the bathtub and years working tirelessly on my craft, characterizing the minutiae of my life and molding the sculpture of my future. People often ask why I don’t appreciate things at face value and enjoy the bliss of ignorance. To respond, my 5th grade and current selves would say the same thing.

Screw(driver) that.