After showing up at the Detroit airport with my rolling suitcase which was generously equipped with freshly pressed presentation suits, I scrambled onto the plane to Arizona with the 10 other Michigan finalists. We arrived at the Holiday Inn in Phoenix, where we had no time to relax after our 3 hour flight.

Since we couldn't ship all of our boards down to Arizona, our fair director, Tim, had some pre-cut ISEF regulation sized boards waiting for us in our rooms. My board from the regional fair was a standard sized board that you would pick up at your local Office Max, which is significantly smaller than the boards that Tim provided us. Before I left Michigan, I ended up blowing up my text and adding a few more captions and data charts to fill the space. I quickly slapped some rubber cement on the backside of my freshly laminated and enlarged display items (courtesy of Kinkos) and stuck them to the board and was done in about 10 minutes.

The Michigan group went down to the Phoenix convention center early so that we could clear any SRC (Scientific Review Committee) violations that might've come up. SRC violations may include simple things such as displaying disabled animals in pictures on your board (which was my mistake), or on a larger scale, a dispute about one of the steps of your procedure that may jeopardize your participation in the fair. Luckily none of us ran into any problems, and went to the host city's welcome event of the night.

The pin trading event is one of the most enjoyable at Intel ISEF, as you get to mingle with people from different cities, states, and countries who all share the same scientific passion as you do. Pin trading also gets to be really intense: imagine 1,500 kids running around trying to find people from other countries so that they can display a Chinese charm or Irish pin on his or her blue and orange ISEF lanyard. By the end of the night, we walked out of the event with our stomachs full and our nametags generously decorated with pins from all over the world.