Opening Ceremonies

Well, all the kids (and chaperones!) arrived back from the afternoon's adventures.

No-one famous was spotted on Hollywood Blvd, but everyone enjoyed the trip.

This afternoon we reviewed presentations with the students. As always, there were some in which I could only smile and nod politely ... I'm confident that they were speaking English .. but it doesn't necessarily mean I understood a word that they said! What never ceases to amaze me with these remarkable students is the passion with which they talk about their subjects.

Many of these projects come about as a result of a curious, yet seemingly innocent, question, and then the quest for an answer takes them in places and directions that they never thought they would go.

We're part way through the afternoon when I get a phone call from one of the parents who is here and over in the exhibit hall that one of our Canadian projects has a safety violation sheet on the desk. Although it is dated last night, it certainly wasn't there when we went this morning, so we drop everything to take the student over to fix it. This messes up our very carefully set up plan for interviews, so we agree to hear a few more tomorrow.

Then it's time to head over to the Opening Ceremonies, one of the highlights of the week. We start with dinner in the Great Hall of the convention centre .. a buffet of chicken, fish, salads, rice and vegetables .. and, the important part, cupcakes of many sizes, colours and flavours!

The students are all in red and white, some have Canadian tattoos, some have flags in their hair, others are carrying flags ... it's quite a sight!!!

The ceremonies start off with a "Stomp"-like presentation. Everyone loved the drums. They then brought out a different set that were rigged up with lights, and the drummers had blacklight costumes. They did a totally different set of music in the dark. Some of the kids got up and started dancing in the few front rows.

So here are this years "fun facts" (one of my personal favourite segments of the fair)

At this years fair, over $4M (yes, million) in prizes, scholarships and trips will be handed out. There are 1543 finalists from 65 Countries (the largest number of countries ever). Over 200 of these finalists have already exhibited in at least one IISEF.

First time countries participating are: France, Tunisia, United Arab Emirates, and Macao SAR of People's Republic of China.

This years finalists are 56% Male and 44% Female. As per usual, this elicits shouts of excitement from both genders! There are over 1,000 judges, volunteers and interpreters here as well.

Fun Facts:

A Mosquito has 47 teeth

Six eight-studded Lego blocks can be combined 102,981,500 ways

Cats can make over 100 vocal sounds, dogs only 10

The saber-toothed cat is the official state fossil of California

Bad joke of the night:

What do you call a test tube with a diploma?

A graduated cylinder!

Quote of the night - from Albert Einstein

"It's not that I'm smart ... I just stay with the problems longer"

Next up as a video with a number of influential people, and former IISEF competitors, wishing the students well.

One of those is BASEF's very own Ben Gulak, who was a two time IISEF attendee, and wound up taking his science fair project, the Uno, on to Dragon's Den. He's now CEO of BPG Works, and is developing a variation of his project for commercial application.

5 Nobel Laureates are also in attendance for the Opening Ceremonies, and they are introduced next.

Our keynote speaker for the evening is Jeffrey Katzenbert, CEO of Dreamworks.

He shared the story with us of the history of the company, and his personal connections to the Lion King and Madagascar movies. Madagascar came out of trips he used to make as a child to the Central Park Zoo in New York City. Over 20% of Dreamworks employees have PHD's, and almost 2/3 of them have advanced degrees ... a huge change from the origins of the company where they hired mainly artists!

The absolute highlight of the night (for me, anyway) was a sneak preview of a 90 second clip of Kung Fu Panda 2.

After the ceremony, we stop to take a few pictures of the whole team, as well as pictures of the team with the Libyan delegation, and the Brazilian delegation. Then it was back to the hotel to hang out for a bit, then bed time.