I absolutely love the BEST challenges: Breathtaking Barcelona
Hola, què tal?
I decided to have a challenging summer. It has been non-stopping.
From 15th July to 5th August I was in European Innovation Academy. In the meantime, from 3rd July to 31st July, I was attending a MOOC course from Técnico Lisboa about Digital Transformation. In the last week of August, I worked at my home town’s city hall, as a computer technician. From middle August (to the present) I’ve started a project, using the MEAN stack.
But it was on 6th that I enrolled in one of the most exciting, utterly challenging experiences: BEST Barcelona Autumn Course 2017.
Some months ago, I became curious about Board of European Students for Technology and its courses. After asking for feedback, my friend from BEST told me: “Just go, you won’t regret it”.
I decided to give it a try.
After considering which course would be the best to choose, I chose Dream it, Design it, Do it, organized by BEST Barcelona.
The academics
I’m currently doing my masters in Computer Science and Engineering. As a computer scientist and aspiring entrepreneur, 3D printing caught my attention.
As stated by BEST Barcelona:
The past few decades have been a revolution in technological terms all over the world and across all fields; the idea of creating a three-dimensional object by putting together several layers of material (following a computer model) seemed surreal in the eighties, it’s been pointed out as one of the possible industrial revolutions of the present.
Possibly one important piece of Industry 4.0, 3D Printing is a new style of manufacturing. The possibility of fast, cheap and easy prototyping is capturing the attention of not only startups, but also big companies.
There are some restrictions, nowadays. Today’s 3D printers require humans to setup and maintain the 3D printer. Moreover, the refill has to be done manually. Imagine the possibilities when these will be no longer be limitations.
It wasn’t difficult to acknowledge that I could benefit from learning about 3D printing. The academic part was an easy choice for me.
The culture
Barcelona is the capital city of the autonomous community of Catalonia. With around one and a half million people inhabit this city, it is surrounded by the Mediterranean Sea (South-East), the Collserola Mountains (NorthWest) and two rivers (Llobregat in the South-West, and Besòs in the North-East).
It is an industrialized city. In 1992 it hosted the Summer Olympic Games. The artistic and architectural patrimony is present in the most popular sites.
The travel
I live in a small, cozy city called Elvas. Elvas is near Badajoz, Spain. As a Portuguese, my localization has helped me — a lot — to increase and practice my Spanish skills. Those were, certainly, useful in Barcelona.
The travel distance was about 240km by car plus 1000km by plane. It took around 3 hours by car plus 2 hours by plane.
Day 0
6:45h: Departed from Badajoz.
Later, on Sevilla, I had the opportunity to go to the Centro Andaluz de Arte Contemporáneo.
15:35h: Departed from Sevilla towards Barcelona.
17:10h: Landed in Barcelona.
19h: Arrived at the hostel.
Meeting my fellow participants.
I took a big breath and looked at the schedule again. It looked like a small version of this:
Although I was pretty scared with the scarcity of the yellow color — the God blessed “zzz” — I was determined to participate in every single activity. “I love challenges, I won’t fall asleep”, I was trying to convince myself.
Day 1
We went to the official opening of the event. The main organizer, as well as some other organizers were present. There was also a representant from UPC — Universidade Politécnica da Catalunha.
Next, we visited Ateneu de Fabricació — where we ended developing our modelling project, facilitated by the access to a sheer amount of resources. A practical introduction has been given to us. After that, we formed teams and had a brainstorming session, trying to figure out solutions to problems in the social area.
In the afternoon we had a workshop about 3D modeling with Solidworks. The class was very smooth, slow-paced and useful. We ended up knowing how to extrude a sketch. That’s cool.
Next stop: Olot, a volcanic area, surrounded by mountains, 50km away from France. The weekend trip was about to begin.
The travel took more than we expected. The traffic jams from Barcelona are worse than I thought. Fortunately, the delay was not that significant.
When we arrived, we went unpacking.
21 participants, 18 guests and around 70 organizers were staying in the building.
Social activities and the welcoming were next. The organizers even provided us with live-music (some of them are really talented).
Day 2:
Rain. All the hype suddenly disappeared, when heavy rain bombarded the house. The organizers came with a brilliant idea: a Dance challenge. It ended up being a success.
Day 3:
Gymcana. That’s the name of the social activities that took place on an awesome sunny day. The activities remind me of a Portuguese student tradition: Praxe. Praxe intends to include new students into the academic and social environment. Some of Gymcana’s games were pretty similar to the ones I’ve played three years ago.
As I was speaking to some organizers, I discovered that there are three types of BEST members: Observers, Baby members, and Full members. Basically, observers are possible candidates to BEST, while baby and full members are effective members. There were some observers helping members. I had the chance to ask their experience in BEST, so far.
The possibility of taking somewhat frequent naps helped us to counter the lack of sleep. At the end, we were all very energetic and motivated.
We also went to the pool party. Later, some of us gathered to play soccer — on a soccer field.
Finally, to close the day, we had the International Evening. In this dinner, participants are supposed to bring traditional dishes and beverages from their home countries.
Day 4:
Excursion. We visited an old volcano, which was inactive.
We came back to Barcelona.
At night, we went to Plaza de España.
Day 5:
Had more classes about Solidworks. We visited labs from the university.
After that, city rally — passing in some of the main points of Barcelona. I met with one friend from European Innovation Academy. He even joined my team.
Day 6:
We visited Tinkerers Lab and ICFO.
We had a walk around the city, covering some points that weren’t in the city rally.
Day 7:
This was the day of project developing. Cloud Sole- Our idea consisted in making a 3D printed ergonomic and cheap foot sole. Our prototype would be in plastic, but the working version would be made of some polymeric material with viscoelastic properties. Using OpenSCAD — a programming language, we managed to generate the model base. Using our knowledge about 3D printing and OnShape, we refined the shape.
Day 8:
We made the final adjustments to the project and printed it. Besides that, we also worked on the presentation. In spite of us having a problem printing our piece, the little object gave the idea of a shoe sole. At the end, generally, people liked the concept.
In the official closing, there was a speech from BEST Barcelona president. The main organizer also had her own speech prepared.
After that, we had a coffee break, in which we were presented the Friends book. Some sort of dedicatory book, in which you could leave a message to other participants.
Last but not least: the farewell party. The party was at Pacha.
From Pacha to the hostel. From there, straight to the airport. I couldn’t sleep on the last day. I caught my flight at 8:50a.m, to Sevilla.
From Sevilla to Badajoz.
From Badajoz to Elvas.
Some notes:
- Being proactive and caring about people will help you build relationships. It was very easy, and relatively fast to connect with many people.
- It might be difficult to some people not get angry with someone in the course time. Nonetheless, remember: everyone is there to learn and to have fun. Be cool!
- If you are thinking about attending a BEST course, keep in mind that it is important to choose an academic theme that you feel interested in. I wouldn’t recommend you to go if you don’t like the academics. Yet, if you don’t love the theme, I wouldn’t discourage you to go either.
- The academics are important. As we dig a little deeper, however, the social and cultural aspects are the most important. Actually, you are not going to this kind of course to be an expert on the field. You are going to receive an introduction, tools, and techniques that allow you to further research on the topic and achieve a deeper comprehension.
- Take advantage of the huge multicultural environment. Think, you can know in first hand, what it’s like to live in another country. If you have any doubts, it is the right occasion to clarify them!
Un somriure, y adéu!
Thanks for reading! ❤
Feel free to reach out and talk!
