Aside from the fact that I already started my passion blog, I’m doing my passion blog on bizarre places in nature and my civic issues blog on stress management in college.

Australia is notorious to many for its glorious beaches, magnificent weather, and… pink lakes? That’s right, there is a lake submerged with Pepto-Bismol pink water on Middle Island, just off the southern coast of Western Australia. Lake Hillier went undiscovered until 1802 when Matthew Flinders, a British explorer from the HMS Investigator, first mapped the island. He documented “a small lake of rose colour” in his log as he traveled around the lake. He named the lake in memory of William Hillier, a crewman of the Investigator who died of an intestinal infection while docked on Middle Island. Flinders also discovered that the lake was almost as salty as the Dead Sea, and harvested salt for the ship.

What gives theses lakes their pink tint? Dunaliella salina, a species of halophilic micro-algae, resides in the water and is mostly found in salt fields. Dunaliella salina produces carotenoids, a class of yellow, orange, or red fat-soluble pigments like carotene. Carotene and beta carotene are responsible for the orange color in carrots, the reds in tomatoes, and the varying warm colors of autumn leaves. If the lake water reaches a salinity level greater than that of salt water, the temperature is high enough, and an optimal light source is provide, the algae produces beta carotene in order to give the lake its pink color.

Lake Hillier is not the only pink lake in the world. There are actually eight known pink lakes all over the world in countries like Canada, Spain, and Senegal. Canada’s Dusty Rose Lake of British Columbia gets its pink color from melting glaciers surrounding the body of water. The rock has purple and pink hues, and its runoff causes the lake to have a lavender tint. Las Salinas de Torrevieja is located in southwest Spain where two different salt water lakes sit next to each other as well as the city of Torrevieja. While one of the lakes has a pink tint, the other is colored green. Masazir Lake of Masazirgol, Azerbaijan is the most commercialized of Earth’s pink lakes. The lake produces over a million tons of salt each year, so the residents of Masazirgol built and now run a multitude of factories around the shore of the lake. Without the salt harvests, the water would be excessively saline and unsafe for humans to enter. In Senegal, Lake Retba sits in the Cap Vert peninsula. Lake Retba has a salt concentration of 40%, which appeals to merchants who want to sell salt to others. Salt collectors work in the lake for up to seven hours a day in order to harvest enough sand from the water as well as the beach. In order for the workers to protect their skin from dehydration, they rub shea butter over their skin before entering the water.

If you were to visit Lake Hillier, a bathing suit should be required. The water is safe enough for swimming and it would be a once in a lifetime opportunity to swim in pink water. Much like the Dead Sea, the extreme salt concentration will allow you to simply float on top of the water. Due to the lakes’ unique botanic contents, they are now protected national parks and are poplar spots for certain species of migratory birds.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2344399/The-bizarre-PINK-lakes-world-look-like-milkshakes-freak-nature.html

http://www.cntraveler.com/stories/2015-03-16/maphead-ken-jennings-australia-lake-hillier-pink-lake

For my passion blog, I am interested in either writing about strange places in nature or the history of different sports. I like both of these topics because even though I find both interesting, there is so much about each subject that I know very little about. Sports are an extremely important part of everyday American life, and have brought people together on various civil issues like improving segregation and Title IX. Sports have always been a part of my life and I think it would be interesting to see how they originated as well as evolved in American culture. I also like the idea of writing about strange places on earth. I love being outdoors and enjoying nature, so it would be interesting to learn about places that don’t necessarily follow nature’s norm. Also, learning about these places could help me form a list of places I can travel to in the future.

For my civic issues blog, I’d like to either write about religious tolerance or stress management in college. It would be interesting to discuss religious tolerance because the current issues with groups like ISIS make it very clear that our society is not tolerant of varying religions. It is essential for people to respect everyone’s beliefs. We do not have to believe in the same values, but we do have to respect each others’ values in order to live in a balanced society. This is an idea that some people forget but must be shared. My other idea, stress management in college, is an idea that is slightly more relevant to the college/classroom setting. It’s no secret that universities with high-achieving students, like Harvard and MIT, have some of the highest student suicide rates in the country. Almost all of these suicides are caused by students feeling closed in by stress. This stress could be academic, social, or emotional, but it is clear that students need help finding healthy outlets to relieve their stress. Most schools have some form of psychological services that can help students with these issues, but why does it seem like students feel as though they can’t open themselves up to professionals? This is another issue that hits close to home for me and I know many of my peers, so I think it would be helpful to address where this stress comes from, how it works physiologically, and how to combat it in a healthy way.

My main idea for my “This I Believe” project is surrounded by a quote from Dead Poet’s Society: “And medicine, law, business, engineering, these are noble pursuits and necessary to sustain life. But poetry, beauty, romance, love, these are what we stay alive for.” As an engineering student, its difficult for me to forget about math and science because it’s all I ever think about. But this quote says it all: although life requires science, business, and other noble studies, its the art and beauty that life offers that motivates us to keep living. I also feel that it is important to deliver this message to a class of STEM majors because it is essential to recognize that there are other things to pursue and other beauties in life other than science.

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