Narrator 0:00 This episode of Tell Me More: Coffee with Chris Yip was recorded in November 2021. For the latest health and safety information, including current COVID-19 policies on our campus, visit engineering.utoronto.ca. Chris Yip 0:15 Welcome to Tell Me More: Coffee with Chris Yip, the official podcasts of the Faculty of Applied Science and Engineering at the University of Toronto. In our second season, I want to focus on the journey; how people got to school, what they did during their time here, and where they've ended up after graduation. You will meet students, professors and alumni, and learn what places them at the heart of designing bold solutions for a better world. My guest today is Diana Virgovicov, a second year computer engineering student. One of our international Pearson scholars, Diane spent her first year learning remotely in her hometown of Pezinok, Slovakia before joining us on campus this fall. Her story is a great example of our global reach. Diana, welcome to the podcast. Diana Virgovicova 1:10 Thank you so much. Chris Yip 1:11 It's really great to meet you in person actually and this is our third time meeting? Diana Virgovicova 1:16 Yeah, it is, yeah. Second time in person. Chris Yip 1:18 Second time in person. I remember our first time was actually a virtual coffee and it was a ton of fun. So a little bit of history, tell me about growing up in Slovakia. Diana Virgovicova 1:28 Yes, so I'm coming from Slovakia. Slovakia is a small country in Central Europe. So I grew up in this town called Pezinok. Pezinok is a very small village so compared to Toronto, it was a very big shock when I came here, because we have - in my village we have around 800 people. Chris Yip 1:52 I noticed - I mean you've actually had quite a bit of international experience, like international travel. I mean, you've been around the world. What made you choose Canada as the destination? Diana Virgovicova 2:03 I'm going to start to tell you a little bit more for Slovakia. Chris Yip 2:05 Sure. Diana Virgovicova 2:06 I would say Slovakia is a pretty conservative country in the way that we are not that open minded about other cultures so I don't think many Slovak students would choose to come to Canada. Most of the people stay in Slovakia or they go to Czech Republic. So that's one of the reasons why there are not many Slovak students here at U of T. I think you mentioned it was like five students in all programs and undergrad and grad school. So I really like traveling and one way to travel is you can search for error flights. So those are the flights where the flight companies forget one zero at the end of the price. So for example, the flight ticket is supposed to cost $1,000 but it's like $100 because they miss one zero. Chris Yip 2:51 Okay. (laughing) Diana Virgovicova 2:52 So I - like sometimes I searched for these flights and that's why I traveled a lot. Me and my mum usually we go to some place, pick a place, go there for cheap and then we traveled like, take like 10 countries around. So far we visited by like extremely low budget was around 80 countries. Chris Yip 3:10 Wow. Diana Virgovicova 3:10 I chose Canada because it has so many great opportunities, you feel the freedom on the streets, and it's so open minded, not like in my country. Chris Yip 3:19 Yeah, one of the things I'm passionate about for undergrads in particular is giving them that sort of international experience. I'm not sure we'll have all of our undergraduates visit 80 countries during the process of their undergrad but I would like them to all have an international experience before they graduate. It's amazing to think that even in our entering class, we have students from over 50 countries. It would be interesting to try and map which countries they're from, and have you actually been to every single one of them, I think that'd be kind of a fun thing to do. Can you give me a sense of how you discovered that engineering really was kind of your passion? Diana Virgovicova 3:53 During my travels when I was backpacking India at the age of 14 with my mum, we were taking these trains all around India, we went from north to south. And we made a stop in some major cities in India and I saw the black rivers and very, very polluted rivers. So I was thinking about how we can find a solution for this problem. I decided that I would like to start working on the research so I contacted a professor at the University in Slovakia. It was a Department of Physical Chemistry and they were working on photocatalysis, like trying to find photocatalysts, which would help clean polluted water. Chris Yip 4:32 Terrific. Diana Virgovicova 4:33 They were using quantum chemistry software. They were doing some modelling in the software and when I was working with them, I decided that I would like to use this modeling software to model new types of molecules of photocatalytic molecules, which would be able to clean polluted water after observing wavelengths of visible lights or because it's usually based on UV radiation or UV light. So if we were - and then we need like UV reactors to clean quality water, and those specific variables and so I wanted to find the solution, which would be to move it to the wavelength of visible light. So I was working on this, I wrote a research paper, which had like the modeling I was working on. And there was one of those molecules that I modeled was very close, and was working in the wavelength of visible light. So then I got a scholarship to study in England, where I did some research at University College of London and I got accepted for a water competition in Stockholm, Sweden, which is founded by a Swedish royal family, and I won the award from the Queen and King of Sweden, and yeah, that's why I was always thinking whether I should do science or engineering, and then I was like, "Okay, this is more creative," so - like I can actually build - work on the real life problems. So I applied, and then I got the scholarship to study here at U of T. Chris Yip 5:57 Terrific. That's a great story. I think it's always inspirational to see how students - and just the experiences people have - right? - in their daily lives or in your trip to India, that can become inspirational and really drive new ideas and new projects. That's a terrific story. We love to hear that sort of, you know, it's almost entrepreneurial, what you get from those experiences, and it really sort of sets you up well for what the opportunities you can now have at the University of Toronto. So congratulations on that, I think it's terrific. You mentioned earlier that five students from Slovakia in all of U of T. I imagine, right? A lot of your friends probably want to stay in Europe. What made you choose U of T Engineering versus staying in Europe? Diana Virgovicova 6:37 So I don't think that many Slovak students know about U of T, about its existence, so I think - because I went to England, I didn't want to stay in London, so I wanted to go a little bit further. That's why I chose - yeah, because of more opportunities, I think there are more opportunities than Europe. Chris Yip 6:59 Okay. Diana Virgovicova 6:59 And also, it's a diverse city, so many different cultures, even though you're in one place, you're like traveling around the world every day by meeting new people. Chris Yip 7:09 Yeah, that's one of the really compelling stories about Toronto as a city is that it is really viewed as the most culturally diverse city in the world. There's sort of 140 different languages spoken here. We'll talk about food a little bit later but it offers some opportunity, right? Not just inside engineering, where we have so many students from around the world, but the fact that you're just surrounded by this cultural mosaic, that is Toronto so that's terrific. We sort of mentioned it a little bit earlier, and you hinted that you did receive a pretty prestigious scholarship and just for our listeners, you are one of about 37 annually. University Toronto gives out about 37 Lester B. Pearson scholarships, and this is an opportunity for outstanding international students to study at U of T. Emphasis is really on the impact that the applicant has had on their school and community and their future potential. What does that mean for you? Diana Virgovicova 7:59 Definitely, it's the opportunity to study here because it's a very expensive school for international students. I will not be - otherwise I will not be able to study here. Lester B. Pearson International Scholarship changed my life in many ways. It covers my tuition, my food, my accommodation. I was able to - being part of scholar - I'm able to meet all these other 36 amazing students coming from all around the world. Chris Yip 8:25 Yeah, it's a terrific scholarship, it's a terrific way for us to to bring international - top international students to the University of Toronto. We're very proud, of course, to have you be part of our community. So again, congratulations on that. We are doing this in unfortunately year two of the pandemic in a sense, and you did spend the first year at U of T, but kind of remotely. What was that like? Diana Virgovicova 8:54 That was...(laughing) Chris Yip 8:56 You can say it was not a lot of fun. That's fair enough. Diana Virgovicova 8:59 Okay, so I started studying remotely from Slovakia which is six hours of time difference so that was challenging, especially working on the design projects with people coming from China, ranging from China to Toronto. We had to find time which works out. Sometimes I had my lectures until 2am for example. The meetings were sometimes at 3am as well. Chris Yip 9:24 Right. Diana Virgovicova 9:24 So I had to change my sleeping schedule a little bit but I did not feel like studying at university, I still felt like I was at high school. Chris Yip 9:32 Yeah, yeah. How did you find, I guess, building a community in a sense? I think one of the the interesting aspects is that - like everybody was remote essentially, right? Whether you're in Toronto you were still remote, if you're in China, obviously you're remote and yet you were still part of, as you mentioned, first year design teams and understanding now the challenges of time zones. It's kind of like what corporate teams do now in the corporate world because they've got people around the world as well. Will you still able to feel that what the SKULE - S K U L E - community is actually like? Diana Virgovicova 10:03 Yes, yes, I did a little bit. It's very different now one's in person. We had some meetings, but it was not... Chris Yip 10:13 Not the same. Diana Virgovicova 10:14 Yeah, not the same. Yeah. Chris Yip 10:16 I'm intrigued, in a sense, because I've had lots of chances to meet, obviously, first years this year who are coming in and also second years, like yourself, who weren't on campus first year. First, it's great to be in person, I'm going to continue to say that it's amazing that we were able to make it work so well and full congratulations to everybody in the community for making this fall comeback in person work so well but have you connected with your first-year design team folks in person since you're on campus and now that you're in second year? Diana Virgovicova 10:48 Yes, yes, I did. And I was also very shocked when I like enter the lecture room. And there were so many people around me. I was like, surprised that those people were actual human beings. Previously, they were like, characters in the movie on the screen. Chris Yip 11:02 Right. Diana Virgovicova 11:03 And now I was really shocked, like, very shocked. And also when I met you in person, I was like, shocked at your actual real person. Chris Yip 11:11 Okay (laughing). This is something I think that has been a part of the learning process for people, right? Is that there's been so much community building and interaction and people building collaborations and discussion groups and all sorts of stuff virtually for the first years, and even still a little bit now, but you realize how strong those connections were and the ability to kind of build off of those once everybody comes back in person. Again, it's really sort of showed the resilience and sort of the ways that people can now build virtual communities that really do function well once you get back in person. At least now, you don't have to be up at 2am to work with your design team anymore. Okay so this is another sort of prestigious thing that you were able to secure between first and second year and you leveraged which is a really fascinating program called the Cansbridge Fellowship and you just got an internship with Astra Navigation. Can you tell us a little bit maybe about the program and a little bit about the fellowship as well? Diana Virgovicova 12:07 So Cansbridge Fellowship is open for students from all programs all around Canada. The students - they usually choose 20 students each year - and the students get $10,000. They have opportunity to go to do internship in Asia in any country of their choice, as well as they go to San Francisco for one week to meet some professionals from Tesla, or go in Silicon Valley. Chris Yip 12:32 Right. Diana Virgovicova 12:33 So I apply for this program, because I really liked it. Last year, I got the Cansbridge Fellowship, I have a friend who was the first first-year student they ever had. So that was a very interesting thing, because most of the people who got it are like five years older than me. So what are you doing at Astra? So Astra Navigation is a company based in Texas. They are interested in replacing GPS navigation with magnetic fields of navigation, basically, navigation based on the magnetic fields have Earth. We will be able to navigate in the most remote places on the Earth and they are working with US military as well and US emergency services. So I was a technology analyst, because they're now raising some money so I was doing some research on their competitors. I learned a lot about the actual technology behind AstraNav, behind the magnetic field navigation. I was able to meet people who are working at AstraNav. They're coming from NASA or Caltech. That was very interesting. Chris Yip 13:34 That's actually interesting, because I think using that approach, then you don't need GPS satellites. So your issues with sort of crowding of space now you're just relying on on magnet field lines as a way of understanding where you physically are. Diana Virgovicova 13:47 Yeah, exactly. You have to be like connected to some number of beacons. And when one of them disconnects, then you are not able to navigate in the area. Chris Yip 13:56 Cool. It was in Texas. I presume you were still working remotely. You didn't get a chance to go to Texas though. Diana Virgovicova 14:03 Yes. This was online, yeah. Chris Yip 14:05 Are you still working - are you still interacting with Astra? Are they looking to bring you back as an intern going forward? Or there was just that one period that you were working with them. Diana Virgovicova 14:15 Yes. They said they would like to keep me so...right now I'm not getting any work to do because I'm very busy. Because, yeah, like part of the semester where I have midterms and finals are coming. I guess next summer, I will again be able to work on something they said they would like to keep me on board. Chris Yip 14:36 Yeah. So hopefully next summer, you'll get a chance to actually go down and actually work within Texas itself. That would be terrific. So now let's see...you're second year. You're into computer engineering side of things. Classes are rolling forward. We just got through fall break week. How's it been? Diana Virgovicova 14:53 I really like it. Like not everything is open in Toronto. Very different experience. Last time when I was here it was lockdown. Meeting the new people, making friends, going on trips with friends, it's a completely different experience. During reading week, we went to Banff. So we flew to Calgary and then we did a trip around the park. We went to, Lake Louise, for example and we did some hikes as well. Chris Yip 15:18 That's actually awesome to take advantage of the break week. Actually that's one of the things we told students to do during break week is to actually not do work. Right? Take it as a true break week. So amazing that you got a chance to go to Banff and tour. Diana Virgovicova 15:31 Yeah and last year during Christmas, during the winter break, I was not able to come back to Slovakia because I would have to go to quarantine again so I decided that I wanted to take the train from Vancouver to Toronto. So we flew to Vancouver and we went by train. Chris Yip 15:48 You really are an adventurous individual. Let me just frame something then. Let's see. You've been in Toronto, you've gone to Vancouver and come back. You've gone to Banff and come back. Have you gone east? Have you gone to Quebec or to the Maritimes? Yes. Oh, you have already? Diana Virgovicova 16:07 Winter reading week last year. I went to Montreal. Chris Yip 16:13 Cool. You still have to you still have to hit Halifax. You definitely have to hit Newfoundland. It'd be cold in the winter, I suggest going in the spring. You're inspiring me, hopefully you're inspires our listeners to to explore Canada as much as you actually explored Canada in less than two years. That's fun. What are you looking forward to doing in the future? Are you are you going to do our PEY program? Are you interested in doing that? Diana Virgovicova 16:37 Yes, yes. I am going to do PEY co-op? Not sure. Probably something with AI. I am very interested in that, I'm also very interested in business. Chris Yip 16:47 Okay, are you thinking about our minors then? Taking part in the business minor? Diana Virgovicova 16:51 I have applied to do engineering business. Chris Yip 16:52 Okay, where do you see sort of career path? You want to stay in the AI business space, entrepreneur space? Diana Virgovicova 16:58 I have two passions. One of them is business, one of them is engineering so I would like to connect them somehow. And I don't see many female founders out there s`o I feel like if I can build something, I can inspire other girls to study STEM subjects and do business. Chris Yip 17:17 That's a terrific opportunity. I think that's a terrific vision. I certainly encourage you to to work or to engage with the hatchery right and get a sense of what's going on in the entrepreneurial sort of startup space. I think there's some terrific programs there and it's a great community to get involved with. So another thing we did talk about, and you inspire me to do this in our first conversation about Slovakia, because I think I asked - I forget how we went on to talk but I think it was a group chat with all the Pearson scholars, all the first-year scholarship winners and I remember we started talking about food, and national dishes, and people were sort of coming from different countries they were talking about what their favorite dish from different countries. And you said that the Slovakian national dish is... Diana Virgovicova 18:02 Bryndzové halušky Chris Yip 18:03 Yeah, which I can't pronounce. And you inspired me to try making it. You know, I think I sent you a picture of my attempt at making this dish. I think you commented it looked good but I had a real challenge, that I know you've also had a challenge, which is in finding the right cheese. Diana Virgovicova 18:18 It's a special kind of cheese. It's called bryndza, a goat cheese. It's traditionally in countries like Poland, Slovakia and Romania. Every Slovak person says that it's ours. It's actually from Romania. Yeah, so I'm unable to find this cheese here. But there are some stores in Toronto, Polish stores, which are outside from the city where I would like to go and look, if I can find it there. Hopefully, I'll be able to and I will bring you the cheese and then you can make. Chris Yip 18:49 Alright, so that's a deal. I'm up for that I am up for the challenge of trying to remake this dish. And then we'll share it and then you can tell me how close I am to to what you're used to do. Let me know if you're able to find the cheese and if any of our listeners actually know where we can also get this cheese, that would be terrific. So with that, I think...would like to thank you so much for spending some time today talking about your experience being part of the U of T community. Thank you so much, Diana. Diana Virgovicova 19:16 Thank you so much for this opportunity. It was very nice talking to you. Chris Yip 19:22 Thanks again for listening to Coffee with Chris Yip. If you want to catch up on past episodes or make sure that you don't miss the next one, please subscribe. We're on SoundCloud, Apple Podcasts, Spotify, and more. Just look for Coffee with Chris Yip. You can also check out @UofTengineering on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn for more stories about how our community is building a better world. And finally, if you'd be inspired to join us, we'd love to welcome you. Whether you're thinking of taking a degree or working with us on a research project, you can find us online at engineering.utoronto.ca or you can visit our beautiful campus in Toronto, Ontario, Canada. I hope I can join you for coffee soon.