I leave Paris with countless memories I will cherish forever. I also leave Paris with a box of macarons of course!
Macarons from a Laduree Macaron shop
Our final week together was packed with prototyping and enjoying the more chill vibes of the city. Team Cheese continued to create our cheese cutting board for a client with low hand mobility. We ended the week with a successful prototype that was able to cut through different cheeses for our group charcuterie board. It was very fun being able to work together and create a final board. A lasting memory from the trip will be our final design review as we gathered around our devices and created a masterpiece.
Cheese Cutting Board and Charcuterie Board
One aspect of the process I appreciated a lot was the space we prototyped in. The Learning Planet Institute was a fun place to work and also had some cool people that worked there. Vlad helped us a lot with generating ideas for the prototype especially when creating our ergonomic handle. He helped guide us by providing a thermoplastic that we then modeled in the shape of the handle we wanted so our client with lower mobility could easily grasp the device. It was a fun trick to use plastic beads to create our handle that could easily be modeled with boiling water and hardened with cold water.
Handle Molding Process
Beyond class, one of my favorite overall days actually came from exploring the city by myself. After a fun class and a very yummy lunch at L’as du Fallafel, I decided to go on an adventure to a nearby garden called Jardin du Luxembourg. It ended up being a very exciting walk as I passed Notre Dame and the Pantheon. The garden was beautiful and I was able to sit and take in the scenes as I read a book. It was very nice being able to relax a bit in such a special setting. I also enjoyed the feeling of being in a new place and the walk there. To end the day I met up with the group and we went to a yummy ramen place for dinner.
I am a huge food person as I have already mentioned and you may have guessed by now. Out of everything I ate in Paris, I became obsessed with truffle pasta. I had truffle ravioli on one of the first days which was creamy, rich, flavorful, and light. It was filling but also not too filling and it brought me an immense amount of joy. After that, I ordered truffle pasta again when I saw my aunt and uncle and then a third time for my last dinner in Paris. Although I also loved the escargot(especially the pesto sauce), the truffle pasta definitely won the award for my favorite meal. You can get truffle pasta in the United States, but something about the fresh pasta and the sauce hit differently.
Truffle Pasta!!!
I am so grateful for the experiences that ISEED gave me. Both in Amsterdam and Paris, I pushed myself outside of my comfort zone to try new things. Europe is a great setting for art, history, food, exploration, and so much more. For anyone considering the Europe program, I would highly encourage you to come. Expect to learn how to develop connections with people across the globe and gain other perspectives on engineering design. I leave Paris feeling inspired to get back out into the world to create change.