Chase Carnes ’16

Why did you decide major in IR and Asian Studies?

In high school, it was always my dream to travel. All I wanted to do – more than anything – was to go abroad. Finally, after working and saving with my younger brother, I was able to study abroad in Taiwan for my whole junior year. I enrolled in a local high school there and took classes all taught in Mandarin. That experience really contributed to my interest in understanding other cultures. But I think more importantly, it gave me an interest in international politics. The relations between China and Taiwan aren’t the best, it’s tense. In the Mainland Chinese government, they say that Taiwan is a part of the mainland, and Taiwan says it’s independent; there are other people that even say the Taiwanese government is the true Chinese government. Needless to say, these disagreements create a very tense environment. While I was in Taiwan, several Chinese fighter jets flew over Taiwan, which scared everyone. I was in class at the time and I remembered our teacher saying, “Everyone, you have to be quiet and get under your desk while the planes fly over.” When we looked out, the streets were just completely empty, which really was a unique sight in Taiwan. I thought, “Wow this is so different from being in the US,” and it really made me want to understand why this was happening. What are the motivations of each country? How can these tense relations be resolved? That’s what sparked my interest. When I came back and I enrolled in college, I started studying for an Associate’s Degree in cross-cultural studies at a smaller university and still wasn’t too sure where I wanted to go to school. I knew I was probably going to stay in Texas because of my financial resources and I thought I’d probably go to a state school. When I eventually transferred to the University of Texas in Austin, every class on international relations or Asian studies I took confirmed that this is what I’m passionate about, what I really want to study.

What’s it like writing two theses?

There were two majors I wanted to do and I wanted to get honors in both of them because I think I was being a little overly ambitious before I really understood the work involved. In order to do that, I had to write one thesis for each major. Without much of a thought, I decided, “Okay, I’ll do that.” I don’t know why I was trying to do so many honors programs. I was doing three different programs my senior year. My junior year, I convinced myself that, “It’s gonna be easy, it’s no problem.” But when I got to senior year, it was so difficult and I came so close to not finishing. I wrote one paper for international relations and another for Asian studies. Even though my theses’ subjects were similar, I couldn’t overlap them. I couldn’t reuse what I wrote. Each thesis came to be about 60-70 pages. My advice is, before you start writing a thesis, figure out your priorities. Do you really want to do this or is there something else in college you would rather do? When I started my theses, they were not my main priority, but they needed to be. Towards the second semester I was getting a little bit behind, and I had to make them my first priority. Other things in my life took a back seat. At this time, I was the vice president of the archery team, so I still had my duties, going to practices and coaching archery, but I couldn’t go to the competitions that I had been training for all year. My advice is that you gotta figure out what you want to do in college. Though I am happy that I wrote those theses and would choose the same path again, there is still a piece of me that is a little sad that I didn’t go to those tournaments.

What do you miss most about Texas and in what ways is it different from Massachusetts?

This area is similar to my hometown because it’s a smaller town with a bunch of little mom and pop stores, it’s rural, and there are a lot of little farms around. I think I probably miss the variety of different foods in Austin and San Antonio the most. I really miss Tex-Mex! I think that’s my most missed food. There are some good restaurants here but it’s different from Tex-Mex, it’s really not the same. The one thing I don’t miss about Texas is the weather. Coming from Texas, I never experienced snow and cold weather and so far I have really enjoyed it here in Massachusetts. I am not missing the 90+ degrees in Texas.

Do you have any insight on dealing with long distance relationships in college?

I actually do! As you know, I met Pa Chia* in China through a study abroad program called the Critical Language Scholarship and we immediately just became really, really good friends. Eventually, I wanted it to be a boyfriend-girlfriend relationship where we’d try to do long distance after the program. But both of us had bad experiences with long distance not working, so we were not sure if we wanted to do it again. After I had come around and decided that I wanted to attempt a long distance relationship, Pa Chia was still against it. During the last two weeks—we were only in China for two months— I pestered her about how we could make long distance work, trying every cheesy argument in the book to no avail. Finally, at the airport before we left, she said, “Okay, let’s do it!” I feel that the success of a long distance relationship really depends on the person you meet. Having Pa Chia in my life has been such a blessing, even when we were two thousand miles apart (yes, I calculated it). Communicating with each other and understanding what’s bothering you is incredibly important because in a long distance relationship, it can be difficult to share that emotional connection.

*Pa Chia is Chase’s girlfriend, fellow Moho and friend of mine.

What have you been doing since graduation and what are you plans?

Since graduation, I enrolled in an online certificate course for teaching English as a second language. I also decided to move to the South Hadley area to be closer to Pa Chia. I’m planning to teach ESL abroad for maybe a year or two and then go to graduate school. Right now I’m looking at the Peace Corps as an option.

What is your favorite thing about Mount Holyoke and do you have a favorite spot on campus?

I think my favorite thing about Mount Holyoke is the community and its wonderful support. People here really look after each other. Academic staff and faculty really seem to take an interest in students and reach out to them. My favorite spot on campus for studying is the octagon room in the library.

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• class of 2016
• international relations