At first, 12-year-old Anna Brugge couldn’t see the fish.
Behind a pair of virtual reality goggles, she moved her head slowly, side to side, as a flat-screen monitor to the front and side showed her point of view, looking around a computer-generated building in three dimensions.
Then, Darryl Massey of Kwantlen Polytechnic University, who was in charge of the VR demonstration, told her to look down.
Brugge did as he suggested, and the image of the flat-screen display shifted, showing the fish.
“There it, is,” she said, sounding pleased.
Brugge, from Langley, was one of thousands who packed the parking lot and filled the inside halls and outside courtyard of the Langley campus of Kwantlen Polytechnic University on Saturday, May 11.
READ MORE: GALLERY: Rendezvous at Langley KPU spotlights science
It was their seventh annual open house, said Elizabeth Worobec, dean of Science and Horticulture at KPU, who described it as a chance for KPU to connect with the community.
There were plenty of hands-on demonstrations, with one of the more popular being a ride in a cherry picker operated by KPU partner BC Plant Health Care.
People waited in line for a chance to put on safety harnesses and ride the bucket high in the air to get a close-up look at the top branches of some big trees just outside the outdoor courtyard.
“You can pretend that you’re an arborist,” Worobec said.
There were also magic shows, wireless robots, and edible plants on display at the event.
Over at the brewery lab, student Clint Haley was handing out small samples of craft beer created as part of the two-year Brewing and Brewery Operations course.
Other hands-on opportunities includes rappelling up and down a tree, making “blood” and glitter slime, a recycle sorting game, urban gardening and seed bookmarks, a button-maker studio, and disease detective and lie detector.
On the same day, KPU hosted the Langley Open House that gives prospective students and the public a chance to see what programs and courses KPU offers, as well as a look inside the campus.
Science Rendezvous is part of Science Odyssey, a national celebration of science, with events taking place on the same day in 25 cities across Canada.
Last year, the event attracted over 3,000 people of all ages.
More photos from the day can be seen online.
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Email: dan.ferguson@langleyadvancetimes.com
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