He Li

He Li

The main difference between my sketch and reality is that my sketch is a lot more grid-like, while the actual layout of Harvard Square has far more curved roads and diagonally-aligned buildings. For example, the engineering and law school portions of campus are at a diagonal to the Yard, whereas in my sketch they were aligned with the left and right sides of the yard. I also misjudged the area around the Eliot house cul-de-sac, and drew it along the grid rather than at a diagonal, following the line of the river, as in reality. This made it so that the area around Lowell house is distorted. There is too much empty space to the north of Lowell house in my sketch, because there is less space in reality because of the curve of the river. I also misjudged the spacing of many of the non-Harvard buildings and businesses, because I am not too familiar with many parts of campus. The part that I drew is where I spend 90% of my time while at Harvard, and most likely reflects my mental map of how to navigate it rather than any conscious memory of a map of Harvard. When I'm walking around, I think more in terms of whether I take lefts or rights, not whether a certain path is curved.