About me
My name is Chia-Yi Hou. I have a B.S. in Biology from Bucknell University and an M.A. in Conservation Biology from Columbia University. This blog is an amalgamation of all my many interests! I’m a science person in an interdisciplinary setting so I am intrigued by the interactions between science and human interests. I like to play ultimate frisbee and also enjoy going to museums. My favorite place to go is the American Museum of Natural History, where I have had a few internships from 2008-2009.
A few areas that interest me are: conservation, environment, ecology, neuroscience, psychology, economics, policy, and others. In this blog I will explore these topics and intersections of interesting things and attempt to bring new insight to some of the issues they bring up.
About the blog
The “Before Breakfast” part of the name of the blog comes from a friend of mine. Here is how he explains it:
“If you’re wondering where the “before breakfast” name comes into everything, it comes from a certain Japanese expression, “asameshimae” (朝飯前, or literally, “before breakfast”), expressing that something is extremely easy to do. Kind of like “a piece of cake.” The expression is indicating that something is so easy to accomplish, it can be done before someone eats breakfast.”
This blog is about science and how it relates to many other topics, so “Science Before Breakfast” encompasses that thought that science can and should be a part of daily discussions and life in general.
The other part, “chewbear,” is a combination of two nicknames that I have acquired in my life. The first being “chiayibear,” because I reminded a friend of CareBears, and “chewy.” I’m not too sure why for that one but it does sounds very close to my first name.
Entry topics in this blog range from miscellaneous things or events I’ve attended, to musings from day-to-day interactions, to feature length pieces about specific issues.
A few entries have an accompanying song embedded at the end of the post that I have picked out to go with the topic or the mood I was in when I was writing. In these cases, the title of the entry will often be the title or a line from the song. Enjoy!
