SC Connecticut News

Barkotel Zemenu, an international student from Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, believes in the transformative power of relationships. According to him, relationships form the very foundation of the universe and human existence. His perspective is informed by his dual immersion in the study of physics and languages at Yale University.

Zemenu's prowess in physics led him to work for over three years in the lab of David Moore, an associate professor of physics at Yale. His primary focus was on research and development for a detector that might one day validate the existence of a theorized nuclear process known as neutrinoless double beta decay.

He has presented his physics research at various scientific conferences both nationally and internationally. His academic pursuits took him to Israel for astrophysics research and Germany for studying quantum gravity. These experiences earned him numerous scholarships, honors, and leadership awards, including being selected as a Knight-Hennessy Scholar at Stanford University and receiving an invitation to meet with more than 30 Nobel laureates in physics as a Lindau Young Scientist.

However, Zemenu's passion extends beyond academics. He stated, “I did not expect college to be the place where academics stopped being my life’s top priority,” adding that he found greater joy in deepening his relationships with others.

The COVID-19 pandemic played a role in this shift. Having taken his first year of classes via Zoom from Ethiopia, Zemenu did not take his interactions with his new community at Yale for granted upon arriving on campus.

His love for languages emerged almost accidentally when he chose Hebrew to fulfill his foreign language requirement. Despite initially hoping it would be similar to Amharic, his mother tongue, he quickly fell in love with learning a new language from scratch. This newfound passion led him to publish a 250-word Hebrew poem in Yale’s Accent Multilingual Magazine by the end of his first semester.

Zemenu expanded his linguistic horizons by taking classes in Mandarin, ancient Greek, and Arabic. He shared, “I just enjoyed immersing myself in communities of native speakers, religiously attending language tables and cultural events and native-level conversation groups throughout the week.” This immersion taught him colloquialisms and cultural nuances that textbooks could not.

Now, Zemenu sees opportunities for new connections and relationships everywhere he looks. Even a restaurant take-out menu becomes an occasion for him to identify Mandarin characters. He likened this process to the construction of atoms or even protons and neutrons, demonstrating his unique perspective on the interconnectedness of languages, relationships, and the universe.