Coming Home to Grand Forks

 I first came to Grand Forks in early January 1974.  Imagine me living in tropical Singapore all my life, never own a jack because it never gets below 70F in Singapore, then landing in Grand Forks right smack in the middle of winter.  I get asked this question a lot:  "Why North Dakota(ND)?"  I came here to attend the University of North Dakota (UND) because I met a mutual friend in Singapore who studied here.  My big criterion is whether I can support myself through four years of college because my family is too poor to pay anything for me.  The answer from my friend is that yes, you can work on campus and support yourself.  

With about US$1,000 in my pocket I just had enough for the first semester of school.  I remember out-of-state tuition was about $562 so the rest went to room and board in the dormitory.  A few days after I arrived I asked people I met where I can find a job.  By US Immigration Rule I was only allowed to work on-campus.  I was told to call a Paul Clark, who ran Plant Services for the university.  I called Paul and he told me to meet him at the Winter Sports Arena at 10pm on a Friday night.  He told me we would be cleaning up after a hockey game.  The pay?  $1.80 an hour.

Over the next 3 1/2 years I'd work several low-level jobs:  dishwasher, custodian, janitor, waiter, etc.  The official minimum wage was $2.30 an hour but since they are university jobs, they were allowed to pay $1.60 an hour.  In the summer I worked full-time to save enough money for the coming school year.  I scraped with barely enough to spare.  There was no life-line for me.  Either I swim or I sink.  

My focus, though, is getting a degree.  Specifically, a degree in Mechanical Engineering.  This is why I am in Grand Forks in September 2022, for the 45th Reunion of the Mechanical Engineering Class of 1977.  Most of my classmates were from small farm towns in ND.  Most have never met or met very few foreigners in the 70s'.  I was truly a foreigner.  I look different.  I speak different.  I act different.  They didn't know how to treat me or talk to me.

It's a different world today.  Some have had jobs that took them around the world.  Many had interactions with others from different backgrounds.  Mostly, all of us had matured and have a different outlook.  This time around they felt more comfortable talking to me.  We had many opportunities to mingle and catch up on our lives.  There are only 13 out of about 20 who graduated, attended the reunion.  

First, we had an Open House with the Mechanical Engineering students.  It is nice to see so many interested in studying engineering.  They have many questions about what it's like out there in the workforce.  How to be successful.  We toured the Engineering Labs.  We also toured the remodeled Memorial Union, a center for student activities.

Tour of the ME Shop

The newly remodeled Memorial Union

On the second day we toured the School of Aerospace Sciences.  This program offers majors like Air Traffic Management, Aviation Sciences, Commercial Aviation, Unmanned Aircraft Systems Operations, etc.  It is a nationally known program and attracts students from all over the world.

A Drone Instructor

Drone Workshop

Finally, we had a tour of the Ralph Engelstad Arena, the University's hockey arena.  It is named after Ralph Engelstad, who played briefly for UND and went on to make his fortune in the casino business in Las Vegas.  UND's team, formerly known as the Fighting Sioux, now the Fighting Hawks, won 8 NCAA Division 1 Hockey Championships.

Ralph Engelstad Arena

I will be remiss if I don't mention UND's best known athlete - Phil Jackson, best known for coaching the Michael Jordan-led Chicago Bulls and the Shaq and Kobe Bryant Lakers.  He won a total of 11 NBA Championships.

However, the highlight of the trip has to be a visit to a farm.  In my almost 4 years in Grand Forks I've never visited a working farm.  A classmate learned that we were interested in learning about farming in ND.  So he took us to visit a sugar beet farm.  Many Americans are not aware that almost half of the sugar produced in this country come from sugar beets.  Most think that sugar comes only from sugar cane.  

Kevin, our farmer, runs a 500-acre farm, growing sugar beets, soy beans and other crops.  When we visited him the sugar beets were almost ready for harvest.  He showed us his farm equipment, how they work, and dug up a sugar beet to show us what they look like.

What a sugar beet looks like

Farm Tractor

The Harvester

Look at the size of the tractors

Farmland in the middle of North Dakota

The farm is highly mechanized.  They have GPS to guide where they go.  Even with such a big farm, there are only 2 people running it full-time.  During harvest season they hire migrant workers to help with the harvest.  They harvest around the clock and is finished in about a week.  

After harvest they take the sugar beets to a nearby factory where they are process into sugar crystals.  The factor is a cooperative, meaning all the farmers share in its operations.  The farmers are paid based on how much they harvested.  

Here is a YouTube video showing the harvesting and processing of sugar beets into sugar:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ksN7h-ZpFWc

Road Trip to North Dakota

I started my travels this summer on July 4, flying to Quito, Ecuador, for the Galapagos cruise with Hurtigruten.  On the way back to the US I stopped in Bogota and Cartagena in Colombia.  On the way back from Bogota to JFK in New York City, I caught COVID.  That cancelled my planned travel to the Canadian Maritimes with Caravan Tour.  Instead of just hanging out in NYC until our family vacation in Maine in late August, I asked my girlfriend, Doris, to come to NYC in mid-August.

We decided to take a Flix Bus to Boston, stayed for 4 nights, then rented a car to drive to Montreal, then drive to Portland, Maine, to meet the rest of the family.  It was Doris' first trip to the Northeast.  We enjoyed walking around Boston and Montreal and ate a lot of lobsters in Maine.  We walked the Freedom Trail in Boston and enjoyed the Jean Talon Farmers' Market in Montreal.

We came back to Phoenix on September 4, stayed 2 days, and was ready for a road trip to North Dakota (ND).  Why go to ND?  I am attending a 45-year reunion of the Mechanical Engineering Class of 1977 at the University of North Dakota (UND).  Instead of flying to Grand Forks, ND, Doris wanted to take a road trip.  I thought that was a good idea and planned on a month-long trip.  After ND we could go through the mid-west and take a big circle back to Phoenix.  

Our first stop was at my condominium in Flagstaff, AZ.  We haven't been there for a while so we want to bring a few things up there and spend the night.  The next morning we headed for Santa Fe, New Mexico.    It's about a five-hour drive, first going east on I40 towards Albuquerque, then to Santa Fe.

The Cathedral Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi

Palace of the Governors, where Native Americans would sell their crafts

After spending 1 night at the Best Western in Santa Fe, we headed north towards Denver.  According to the map it's a 6-hour drive.  However, we were told about the very busy rush-hour traffic around Denver.  Fortunately, the GPS took us around Denver, on a toll-road towards the airport.  We spent the night at a DoubleTree Inn in Thornwood, just north of Denver.  

Our next destination is Mount Rushmore.  Driving north of Denver we passed through the State of Wyoming.  Most people associate Wyoming with Yellowstone National Park but the eastern part of Wyoming is mostly farmland.  It's beautiful rolling pasture.  Wyoming is the least populated state in the Union and you can see why.  We saw very few cars and when we stopped at a small town for lunch, there was hardly anyone at all.

A small town in Wyoming

We crossed into South Dakota and soon we approached Mount Rushmore National Memorial.  There is a lot of hype about the place but once you get here, there's not much to see.  The highlight is just the heads of the four presidents.  We then drove about 30 minutes to Rapid City where we were planning to stay a couple of nights for a well-deserved rest.

L-R: Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln

It was an ambitious plan.  After 2 days of driving, we started to get tired of the driving.  Driving about 6 hours a day gets tiring after a while, even if the scenery is beautiful.  Rapid City gave us a chance to recharge ourselves.  We took a leisure drive to the Badlands National Park the next day. We also stopped to checked out Wall Drug Store, a popular tourist trap.

Badlands in South Dakota

Not a Drug Store.  All kinds of Souvenirs and Trinkets are sold here

Leaving South Dakota we took a slight detour to visit Devils Tower Monument in northeastern Wyoming.  It was featured in the movie "Close Encounter of the Third Kind."

After Devils Tower we drove north through beautiful farmlands of eastern Montana and then meeting I94 at a small town called Wibaux.  A quick rest stop and we head towards Medora, ND.  This area is made famous by President Theodore Roosevelt, where a National Park is named after him.  He spent his younger years ranching here before he became president.  He came to have an appreciation for nature and wildlife and when he became president, he started the National Parks System.  As it was getting dark we did not drive into the park.  We did, however, went into the park on the way home from Grand Forks.  Instead we had dinner at a  popular local restaurant.

It was almost 9pm when we drove into Bismarck.  A quick night's rest and the next morning we started heading towards Grand Forks.  I94 cuts through almost the middle of North Dakota.  It was a beautiful drive through rolling farmlands.  At one point along the highway we stopped to talk to someone we thought is a farmer.  Indeed he is a farmer but he was working part-time for the Department of Transportation mowing grass on the side of the highway.  We asked him what they grow here.  He said soy beans, sun flower, wheat, etc.  

We thought the GPS would take us to Fargo, then head north on I29 to Grand Forks.  Instead it took us on some two-lane farm roads.  We stopped a few times to see what they grow because we couldn't see from the car.  They were mostly soybeans and sun flowers.

Soy Beans

Sunflowers.  Hands are to show how big they are

It was an interesting experience driving through the breadbasket of America.  This is where America's most productive lands are.  It's acres after acres of farmlands.  Later we'd have an opportunity to visit one of the farms, courtesy of one of my classmates.

We finally drove into Grand Forks, a very different place then when I was studying here 45 years ago.  I could not recognize the town at all.  There are several new shopping centers and the university itself has transformed.  We checked into the Best Western Hotel, which happened to be next to a Japanese restaurant called Sakura.  Almost fifty years ago when I came to Grand Forks, you could not even buy tofu or bean sprouts in town.