>> Production support for "Journey Indiana" is provided by WTIU members.

Thank you!

>> ASHLEY: Coming up.

>> BRANDON: Discover the next generation in computing.

>> ASHLEY: Learn how a master woodcarver found his calling.

>> BRANDON: And explore a Tibetan Buddhist retreat.

>> ASHLEY: That's all on this episode of -- >> TOGETHER: "Journey Indiana."

♪ >> BRANDON: Welcome to "Journey Indiana."

I'm Brandon Wentz.

>> ASHLEY: And I'm Ashley Chilla, and we're coming to you from Shades State Park in Montgomery County.

Located on 2800 acres in central Indiana, Shades State Park boasts a variety of attractions for visitors.

Sandstone cliffs overlook Sugar Creek, rugged trails pass through shady ravines, and ample waterways make for spectacular canoeing.

And we'll learn more about this beautiful park in just a bit.

>> BRANDON: But first, we're headed to Monroe County, where producer John Timm explores the latest in computing technology at Indiana University's Quantum Science and Engineering Center.

♪ >> Quantum mechanics is the science of things that are very small.

So the behavior of atoms and molecules.

So all of chemistry is basically governed by the quantum mechanical laws that tell you how one atom binds to another and how the electrons float around in an atom.

That single particle quantum mechanics is really at the heart of most of the technical revolutions of the second half of the 20th century.

So some people call that the first quantum revolution.

♪ >> We have been using quantum mechanics already in our technologies for a few decades.

We have used quantum mechanics in solar panels.

There are particles of light called photons.

They hit some solar panel that is made out of, for example, some semiconductor material, and that rips off electrons.

Those electrons, if you can capture, then you can generate electricity with those electrons.

So the phenomena that is that is called the photoelectric effect.

And it was precisely Albert Einstein, okay, that explained that phenomenon.

So that is quantum mechanics.

This way of using quantum mechanics that we've been using for decades is not exploiting entanglement.

That's the reason why that old way of using quantum mechanics is called the first quantum revolution, and this new way of using quantum mechanics, that is exploiting that property entanglement, is called the second quantum revolution.

♪ >> That entanglement property leads to a lot of interesting phenomenon that we don't completely understand.

And so we're hoping to shed new light into that.

That's one of the things we are exploring, and through that and some of the other activities that were going on here at IU Bloomington, we decided to found the Quantum Science and Engineering Center.

♪ >> The Quantum Science and Engineering Center is supposed to coordinate the whole effort in the quantum science and engineering here at Indiana University at IUPUI.

Essentially, it is some sort of center for ideas and technology that includes people from a whole variety of departments.

>> The story here begins almost 100 years ago.

This is the realization that very small objects and very cold objects -- think atoms, electrons, nuclei -- they obey a set of laws that we call quantum mechanics, which looks nothing at all like the laws that we can easily observe in our everyday world.

♪ Whenever there are new laws of nature that we discover, we can harness them to build some new technology, if we understand what those new rules are.

And so making use of those fundamentally different properties that atoms and small objects are governed by, allows us to compute and to solve very challenging mathematical, scientific problems in a new way that is unavailable to us using classical computers.

♪ What is going on in this lab is we are looking to take individual atoms that we trap and control, and harness them to compute in a much faster way than we can using ordinary computers.

♪ So our motivation for this is in order to harness these new rules that allow us to compute in a faster way, we have to have objects that fundamentally obey these laws of quantum mechanics.

And so if we had objects that, yes, they are small, but they are interacting with background gases, with other materials and with other objects that are destroying these quantum states, then they no longer obey our rules of quantum mechanics and we cannot get any computational advantage from them.

♪ >> So there's a large number of new technologies and phenomena out there for us to explore.

♪ >> Just from a large framework perspective, I would say that any -- any place which is computationally intensive, that would have big quantum applications.

So the first one is AI.

And any time you want to do simulations to help improve your artificial intelligence, that is obviously one big application.

♪ The other thing that is also happening from businesses' perspective is there's so many -- more and more processes are becoming autonomous.

With the sensor-based society, we have so many sensors in our cars and our homes.

So all of those sensors, the data that you are collecting, how you process the data, that becomes a really high intensive environment.

♪ So from my perspective, what really excites are the vast possibilities of things that you could not do without the support of quantum -- like, with the support of quantum that there are huge opportunities in these different industries.

♪ >> What types of problems are open to having computational advantage when we use quantum algorithms as opposed to very good classical supercomputers.

I would say a motivating factor of QSEC here, is to say, what material science and what chemistry-type problems can be solved using quantum algorithms, and let's work on the theory side to figure out exactly what those algorithms look like and let's use that to inform what kind of quantum hardware we should build to solve these problems.

>> Who knows.

I mean, there are so many open doors at the moment.

There is room for interesting and exciting ideas.

♪ >> ASHLEY: You know, Brandon, we get stories on this show that I understand completely, and I can absolutely give my opinion on and talk about.

This is one of those stories where I had to watch it a few times, and I still don't know if I quite figured out what they were talking about.

>> BRANDON: Yeah, you've got to get up to date on your quantum engineering.

>> ASHLEY: Yeah, I gotta work on that.

>> BRANDON: Want to learn more?

Just head to the link on your screen.

>> ASHLEY: Earlier, we spoke with Chris Newcomb, the property manager here at Shades State Park, to learn all about this one-of-a-kind place.

♪ >> Shades State Park is the 13th state park property.

It came in the system about 1947.

There's 105 campsites, 12 miles of hiking trails.

There's a canoe and backpack camp as well.

So there's just all sorts of hiking activities.

There's playgrounds.

A little bit for all the family members.

The views here at Shades State Park are absolutely gorgeous.

It's some of the best in Indiana.

♪ A lot of times the ravines are very rugged.

It was developed from when the glaciers receded millions of years ago.

This is the oldest park in Indiana.

Notice I didn't say oldest state park.

It's steeped in history.

It's had everything from the Garland Dell Springs Association, which came here and established 150 acres and a resort in the late 1800s and early 1900s.

Joseph Frisz ended up buying all the stock options and opened up a resort that operated here for several years until the state took over operations.

There's rumors to have been Native Americans or Indigenous people that lived here as well.

♪ The trails here are very rugged, very deep canyons, deep ravines.

Reportedly there's all sorts of different springs.

Some very rough hiking.

Geologically, you can see some honeycomb features in the rock when you are down around the creeks, and there's also ladders on trail four, which is very popular for everybody.

The Pine Hills Nature Preserve is part of Shades State Park.

Pine Hills Nature Preserve was Indiana's first dedicated nature preserve back in 1969.

If you walk that feature, you walk near Indian Creek, which flows into Sugar Creek.

When those two combine, it does some beautiful rock outcroppings.

There's also an area where an old mill used to be as well.

♪ If you need a place to come and relax, a good selling feature that I always tell everybody, cell phone coverage is intermittent.

So if you come here and you want to unwind, this is a place you want to come.

You can absolutely see some of the prettiest terrain and land in Indiana here.

♪ >> BRANDON: You know, over the years, we visited a lot of state parks.

What are some your favorite things to discover as we go through them?

>> ASHLEY: I mean, two things come to mind.

Obviously, fall foliage in central Indiana is gorgeous, but also just exploring different kinds of terrain.

You know, I think people think Indiana is flat, and it's more than just flat land.

>> BRANDON: Want to learn more?

Just head to the link on your screen.

Up next, producer Saddam Abbas takes us to Bartholomew County to meet master woodcarver Bob Taylor.

♪ >> When I was growing up, it was during the Second World War.

So there was not a whole lot of toys out there.

Everything was being used for wartime.

So I was always making something with my hands, with cheese boxes, or whatever -- whatever you could find, little pieces of wood to work with.

When I started Boy Scouts then, my grandfather had given me a knife when I was 8, and I have a duplicate of that knife that we found years ago.

Then when I was a senior in high school, they gave us an aptitude test of some sort.

The test results came back and they said, well, with your aptitude in mathematics, with your interest in hands and drawing, it looks like to us that you would make a really good pattern maker.

And I said, well, what's a pattern maker?

I had no idea.

So I went home and I asked my dad.

I said, here's what came back with the test, and I said, I don't have any clue what a pattern maker is.

And he said, well, I know what a pattern maker is.

My dad was a foreman at Cummins.

I finally decided that woodcarving was my -- the chosen element because wood is warm.

If you are doing sculpture in stone, stone is very cold.

It's really hard on your hands; whereas, working with wood is more comforting and more -- and it's easier on your hands.

When I first started out, I was doing three-dimensional carvings, which is what you see on the wall and the narrative slides.

And then I did a lot of three-dimensional carvings for other people.

♪ In 1946, after the war, we had a -- what we called the ball diamond, which was next to the foundry here in Columbus.

And that field was opened most of the time, except when the circus came to town.

And that was our sandlot ball diamond.

All the kids -- neighbor kids would go over there and play ball.

But when it was circus time, the circus would come to town on the train, and then unload within a block there, which was two blocks from my house.

And we would always go over there then, and we would want to water the elephants or whatever, see if we could get a free ticket.

Of course, they would always run us off because they were afraid if an elephant steps on you, it's probably not too good.

But anyhow, that was part of that.

So that was one of my carvings now that I have -- it said in the paper, I have a clipping that talks about the train coming in and unloading, and it said the train was almost a mile long.

And it was the second largest circus in the United States at that time, which was Cole Brothers Circus.

So all of those memories ended up within my memories also now, and so that's the fun part, that you touch other people's memory.

Well, I hadn't thought about that in years, you know, but, yeah, I saw it happen.

♪ Mooney came to Columbus with his carvings in his truck, and that's what I'm carving right now.

I was about 8 years old at that time.

We went to the county fair.

His truck was just inside the grounds of the county fair.

So Mooney would come out on a platform that was connected to his truck, with a little piece of wood, and a knife, and he would make a few cuts in the wood, here and here and here, and make a pair of pliers.

And I said, wow!

I want to learn how to do that.

I told my folks, I want to see him do that again.

They said, well, we're going to go over to the exhibit and look at the 4-H exhibits, and then we'll pick you up on the way back because we were going to go ride a few rides, and then we were going to go to the harness races that they had every year, have some Cracker Jack and go home.

That was our yearly event to go to the fair.

So I'm standing there waiting for Mooney to come.

What he would do then, people would come out and go through his truck, and I think they paid a nickel or a dime, whatever it was, to see his carvings.

And so then he came back out on the platform, and the people that had gone through were gone, and I'm standing there.

And he said, can I help you, son?

And I said, well, I want to see you do that again.

And he said, would you like to see what's in the truck?

And I said, well, I don't have any money.

He said, don't worry about it.

So he came down off the platform, and took me by the hand and led me through the truck.

And what he had in the truck exhibiting was called the History of Steam.

And it was from the little bitty steam engines, up to the bigger engines, up to the train engines, and even had the Lincoln funeral train carved out of ebony and ivory.

Most fabulous stuff that you'd ever seen.

Well, that -- all of those carvings are now in a museum in Dover, Ohio.

♪ I've always accredited God for giving me the gifts of using my hands, and I believe that God does give us gifts, and he expects us to use them.

So that's kind of what I've done.

>> ASHLEY: I was thinking about the way that we capture memories throughout time.

And you know, now everybody takes their phone out and takes a picture or takes a video, and it's very in the moment, right now, and then it's gone.

You don't think about it.

And what I love about what he does is that it takes a lot of time and effort to really create that memory in that piece of wood.

>> BRANDON: Yeah.

And you probably live in that memory for a very long time as you work on that piece.

Want to learn more about Bob's work and other traditional artists?

Visit traditionalarts.Indiana.edu.

>> ASHLEY: Up next, we're back in Monroe County, where producer Nick Deel explores the Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center.

♪ >> In 2003, the Dalai Lama, spiritual leader of Tibetan Buddhism and boxing legend Muhammad Ali, a Muslim, met in Bloomington, Indiana, to break ground at the Tibetan Cultural Center.

It was a striking display of the cross-religious, peace and harmony.

The center was the vision of Thubten Jigme Norbu, the brother of the Dalai Lama and professor of Tibetan culture at Indiana University.

The center has since been renamed the Tibetan Mongolian Buddhist Cultural Center, but its mission remains the same.

Advance the cause of Buddhists in exile, and promote peace and harmony between cultures and religions worldwide.

>> So our goal is, first of all, to preserve our culture and religions.

And meanwhile, we open up this wonderful space for public so everyone is welcome here.

And not only that, when they come here, they can learn from us.

>> The center sits on 160 acres south of Bloomington.

Several monks work to maintain the grounds, along with the temple, shrines, library, and even a visitors center.

As they stroll the grounds, visitors are encouraged to look inward.

>> When people visit here, of course, at the very first, they can enjoy the magnificent landscaping that we have here.

So they can enjoy every seasons like winter.

Right now in autumn, very beautiful.

On the landscaping, we have beautiful monuments we call Stupa, or Tibetan we say Chorten.

So these are the symbolized Buddha mind, and also remembering the activities of the Buddha.

And we have -- we also have a prayer wall on the ground.

So when people, when they come, they can spin the prayer wall in clockwise.

But the idea is that when they walk clockwise, they have to observe their mind and be here and now as they walk, kind of meditations.

As they spin, they can think of sentient beings, may they be free from suffering and lost in joy and so forth.

We also have a temple, and people can come in here, and they can learn and enjoy and experiencing the style of the Tibetan Mongolians temple.

And also we have a gift shop, and where not only just people can buy, but they can also get something from the center made by Tibetan refugees and some are refugee from Nepal.

And we have a library as well, where they can go and read a book and, yeah.

We have cottages people can rent, and they can stay here, do some self-retreat and practice.

>> Visitors are also welcomed to attend events such as traditional Buddhist prayer sessions.

[ Praying ] [ Speaking Tibetan ] >> It's an interconnectedness that's easy to forget in a chaotic world.

[ Speaking Tibetan ] ♪ >> BRANDON: One of my favorite memories of taking a group of students to China was sitting inside of a Buddhist temple and just the quiet and the energy there.

If you get an opportunity to visit this place, I highly recommend it.

>> ASHLEY: You can learn more and plan a visit of your own at tmbcc.org.

>> BRANDON: And as always, we would like to encourage you to stay connected with us.

>> ASHLEY: Just head over to JourneyIndiana.org.

There you can see full episodes, connect with us on Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram, and suggest stories from your neck of the woods.

>> BRANDON: We also have a map feature that allows you to see where we've been and to plan your own Indiana adventures.

Well, now it is time for us to head back out into the forest and experience what I know is one of Ashley's favorite times of year, crunchy leaf season.

>> ASHLEY: Absolutely.

>> BRANDON: We'll see you next time on -- >> TOGETHER: "Journey Indiana."

♪ >> Production support for "Journey Indiana" is provided by WTIU members.

Thank you!