#ipesummer2018

[umichenginabroad]

Au Revoir, France.

Our final days in France were spent wine and olive oil tasting at one of the oldest, family-run mills in the nation, Chatêau Virant; visiting the oldest family-run soap factory in the nation, Marius Fabre; and spending a day in Marseilles visiting the beaches, the Basilica, and taking a tour of the beautiful cliff sides along the coast. Below you can find some pictures that I took from these last few days.

I am immensely thankful for my study abroad experience. It is bittersweet to be writing this final post from France, but I am grateful for my opportunities. In our final week, our program studies culminated into a final presentation on a satellite mission to measure light pollution. This presentation was given to the directors of the 4 schools in which we attended, one of them being a 2-star general for the French Air Force. I can say that I learned more practical, application-based knowledge than most of my education at home. Not saying that my education was bad, but there was definitely less of an application base to the curriculum, and more of an emphasis on research and theory. This work makes me excited to join the industry and start working on awesome projects like this one.

The GEA Summer Space Program is something that I will remember forever. From dining under the Eiffel Tower, to wine tasting in Salon de Provence, to watching the airmen take off from Ecole de l’Air, to taking boat tours of the beautiful cliff-side beaches in Marseilles – it was a journey of a lifetime. However, traveling for a month, spending 4 weeks in 6 different cities, where you don’t speak the native language, and hauling around a month’s worth of luggage can take a toll on anyone. That being said, I am ready to return. I am ready to bring back my newfound knowledge of a different culture, and see how I can become a better person because of it. Living somewhere else for this long of a time has really put a new perspective on meting new people.

Finally, if you are considering going abroad, anywhere – stop. Stop considering. JUST DO IT. I promise you that you will enjoy it and earn so much from the experience. I will recommend going abroad to everyone, and the GEA Space Summer Program to anyone remotely interested in space systems.

Go Blue, and go abroad!

Scott McCormick B.S.E. Aerospace Engineering ‘18 M. Eng. Space Engineering ‘19

[umichenginabroad]

Readjusting to Home

I’ve been home for a week, and I’ve quickly settled back into my routine. It does, however, feel a little strange to be home. In Spain, I was constantly surrounded by other kids my age, my friends and other students at the University, we had the freedom to do how we pleased: explore the city, eat out, hang out in each other’s rooms at any time of day (when we weren’t in class, of course). Being home I’ve noticed the void left by not always having four or five people to spend time with. I got used to being in a group, doing everything with  other people. Now I wake up and as I eat breakfast I look around, and instead of seeing the thirty other students on my program, I see my dogs eating their own breakfasts in the corner, and occasionally my sister or brother will join me for a bowl of cereal. This is how it has always been at home, and it’s not better or worse than how it was in Spain, in fact it should feel more normal I think, but it has been a bit of an adjustment back from a group mindset to a more independent one since I’ve returned.

One of my first views out the car window upon arriving at home in Colorado.

I have stayed in touch with several people from the trip individually since leaving, and our program group chat has not quieted down one bit. I hope it stays that way for a while, at least. It’s been nice to track everyone’s journeys home and to see how everyone has been settling in and spending their time since they’ve been back. Some people went straight to work, others have eased back to life at home, napping, golfing, going to the pool, cooking, while others have spent some extra time travelling around some to England, and Portugal, France and the Czech Republic, and they will eventually return home later this summer.

I am so incredibly grateful for the opportunity I had to go on this trip, to take an interesting class on Renewable Energy and to learn some Spanish, which I hope I will use again soon. I am also grateful for the many friendships I formed with people in the program over the six weeks we were abroad, and I look forward to maintaining and further developing those relationships when I go back to school in the fall. Only eight weeks left before we’re back on campus in Michigan, and as much as I want summer to last, I also cannot wait to see my friends from the abroad program, as well as my friends from freshman year and be able to share with them the outstanding experiences and adventures I had in Spain earlier this summer.  

Farewell!

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring

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Salon de Provence, France.

Salon de Provence. A relatively small, quaint and quiet place in beautiful southern France. The weather here is amazing, and the landscape reminds me of a mountainous Florida. Since we are not too far from the Mediterranean, palm trees, grapevines, and olive trees are abundant. But yet, when you look off into the horizon, you see large rolling hills and mountains, rather than the flat, marshy lands that you might expect from a tropical climate. Here, we are attending L'ecole de Air, which is the French Air Force Academy. The academy is fairly strict, but our guide is Captain Laurent, and he is quite an amazing guy. We were able to meet the headmaster of the Academy on the first day, who happened to be a two-star general. We took some pictures, but unfortunately I don't have a digital copy to share.

In our leisure times, we have found ourselves exploring the city center of Salon. Unsurprisingly, it is filled with beautiful architecture and historic monuments that are older than our country. We stumbled upon a castle, went inside, and then were promptly kicked out by museum staff (oops). It turns out, this was the place that Nostradamus was buried, and remains there today (in case you forgot, Nostradamus was the guy who predicted the world to end in 2012).

On Tuesday, we went on a field trip to Cannes, home of some famous film festival (not too hip on pop culture, so I wasn't familiar). We visited Thales-Alenia space, which was compared to the Boeing/Lockheed of the EU. We went inside, and sure enough -- it exceeded every expectation that I had. They build their satellites from T0 to delivery, and oversee every part of the integration, assembly, and testing; all in-house in the facility on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea. Their turnaround time for a typical satellite design cycle was 24-30 months, which was absolutely mind-boggling to me, that you could design, manufacture, test and deliver a cutting-edge, $200-300M piece of space technology that quickly. Not only was the facility amazing, but the city was awesome too. What a place to work.

That's all I've got for now! Up next: wine and olive oil tasting in Aix en Provence at the oldest winery and oil mill in France, and then soap-making at the oldest soap factory in France.

Go Blue!

[umichenginabroad]

Tough Goodbyes

Our last night in Pamplona, Thursday evening, we headed to downtown Pamplona to have our last Juevinxto dinner (pitxto + beverage = 2 euros). It was nice to spend time all together one last time, laughing and socializing while eating in the main plaza of Pamplona.

This morning we gathered outside our residence hall at 2am and said our goodbyes to the Summer sessions students, and other students who were staying, before boarding the bus headed to the Bilbao Airport. Most people’s flights weren’t until late morning, but a couple students had 6:45 am flights, so that determined when the bus had to leave! 

We arrived at the airport at 4 am, after a sleepy ride, and found that the airport was closed until 5 am. Luckily the weather was nice so waiting outside wasn’t unbearable. We finally, however, had to start saying goodbyes once the building did open. People left to go to their gates a few at a time, and each time they’d go around the group and give hugs and say thank you. Only a few people cried, or at least admitted to crying, but everyone seemed sad to leave. I think we all have created such incredible bonds with each other over the course of the past six weeks, and it’s hard to imagine having to go the rest of the summer without Spain and without each other!

The last group of students to leave the airport in Bilbao.

The view of the clouds and the mountains I passed on my flight from Bilbao to Munich, before heading home to Denver.

I, personally, am trying to handle my sadness by reminding myself that all of the connections I’ve made are with people I go to school with, people who I will see in my classes, so even though this experience is over, leaving Spain doesn’t mean leaving each other’s lives.

This experience has been one for the books, that’s for sure, and it’s one I don’t think I could forget even if I tried. Thank you to everyone who had made it what it was!

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring

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Final Days

Our final week in Pamplona has been a whirlwind to say the least! With final exams and projects in our Spanish classes as well as more sightseeing and spending as much time together as possible, we’ve stayed busy. On Tuesday, we visited a palace in the city of Olite, a forty-five minute drive from Pamplona. It was used primarily by King of Navarra, Charles III the Noble, in 1380-1384 as Olite is in the center of the Navarra region and the king found living there more convenient and accessible. We were also able to explore the town for a while after the tour, which was fun, since Olite is much smaller than all the cities we have been to and, therefore, has a slightly different charm.

The royal palace in Olite, viewed from the central plaza of the town.

Flowers across the street from the palace in Olite, with one of the towers in the background.

Additionally, all of the Spanish classes had their final exams and projects. Each class’ final project was the same: to make a video about our individual experiences in Pamplona. We all made a video and then all watched each other’s videos and voted on whose was the best. Alec Goldberg, from our Spring session, won with his video, which talked about living in the moment and not letting opportunities slip you by, which I do think perfectly embodies the motto of this trip. It was fun to see everyone’s individual perspectives of our time in Pamplona, especially in the form of a video!

My Spanish class, Level 1, on the last day of class with our two incredible professors!

On Friday, everyone goes their separate ways out of Pamplona. It’s sad to think that this incredible experience is so close to being over, but we will make sure to cherish every last second with each other until we all board our flights home.

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring

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Weekend in Madrid

This weekend we travelled to Madrid. Our days were busy as we tried to fit as much as we could into the day and a half we were there. We toured the Palacio Real, which was gigantic and beautiful both inside and out, and it offered incredible views of part of the city. Some students rented boats at the lake in el Parque Retiro, a big park by the Prado Museum, while others wandered through the Botanic Gardens for a few hours and spent some time in the close-by Plaza Mayor, a large square filled with shops and outdoor restaurant-cafés.

I personally found Madrid to be more enjoyable than Barcelona, maybe because the weather was so beautiful, maybe because in the last week we finally figured out how to not over-extend ourselves on the side trips. But also, the city felt less commercial, like a place where people live rather than a place people go to visit more than Barcelona did, which can be refreshing as a tourist. Our time here was wonderful, it was nice to spend our last weekend in Spain all together in such a big and exciting city.

El Palacio Real in Madrid.

Our spring group in a park we found on our way to tour the Palacio Real.

The view of beautiful Madrid from a rooftop restaurant some students found while wandering the city on Saturday afternoon. 

Photo by Amalia Siavelis (06/16/2018)

Gigi, Amalia, Abby and Hadley in their boat on the Parque Retiro lake.

Dan Berlfein (06/16/2018)

We arrived back in Pamplona on Sunday evening and on Monday started our final week of class. We are all trying to take advantage of the little time we have left together here and plan to stay busy right up until the airport shuttle picks us up early Friday morning. More on our final week tomorrow!

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring

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Exam Week and City Tours

Our second week in Pamplona was just as busy as the first. All levels of Spanish classes had their first essays due, as well as their first written and oral exams. The feedback was mixed, but in general I’d say everything went fairly well.

In addition to our first examinations, we had several afternoon activities scheduled through the program. We went on a tour of la Plaza de Toros, the bull fighting ring in Pamplona and learned about San Fermín and the running of the bulls that takes place every year during the second week of July in the city. The tour guide told us about how on each day of the festival, six bulls are guided through crowded streets of the city on an eight-minute run that concludes at the fighting ring, where the bulls are then kept until the bull fights in the evening. I found it very interesting to learn about this festival as it’s completely different from anything else in the United States, that I know of at least.

A view from inside La Plaza de Toros, the ring where bull fights take place during the annual festival of San Fermín, July 7 - July 14.

Klara Mateju and I very accurately acting out a bull fight.

We also went on a tour of the main cathedral of Pamplona. We were able to go up to the bell tower and see incredible views of the city as well as the cathedral’s bell, which is 17 tons and is the largest active church bell in all of Spain!

The main part of the cathedral from the bell tower. 

A view of Pamplona from the top of the bell tower at the cathedral.

Our group was also supposed to go kayaking, but the river was too high, so that activity was postponed until next week. It was slightly disappointing, but it gives us another thing to look forward to for this upcoming week!

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring

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A Weekend Away

This past weekend was a free weekend in the program itinerary, so students took the opportunity to either stay in Pamplona to rest or to travel around Europe a little bit. One group of students from the Spring session travelled to Amsterdam for the weekend, another group of Spring and Summer session students travelled to Biarritz, France, and yet another group flew to Paris while many chose to stay in Pamplona to explore the city and catch up on sleep.

Here are some photos from the weekend’s adventures!

A photo of the group of Spring session students who went to Amsterdam this past weekend.

Photo by Amalia Siavelis (06/09/2018)

Buildings along a canal in Amsterdam.

Photo by Amalia Siavelis (06/09/2018)

Jackie, Carin, Noshin and Jenna take a selfie at Notre Dame.

Photo by Jackie Jensen (06/10/2018)

Jackie at the Louvre in Paris!

Photo by Jenna Livingston (06/10/2018)

I was in the group that went to Biarritz, a city on the southern Atlantic coast of France, in the French Basque Country. The beaches there are considered to have some of the best waves in Europe, and so they are a hotspot for surfers. We split up in two different Airbnb’s. The one I stayed in was a four-bedroom house near the beach. It was very cute, with a white exterior, colorful shutters and beautiful hardwood floors inside. The weather was also nice while we were there, so many people spent time outside, surfing, going for walks and shopping along the beach. We also enjoyed the French cuisine; we ate lots of crêpes, pastries, bread and seafood, although we did have pizza one evening, you so have to indulge in something familiar every once in a while! 

It was nice to be in a new place for a few days and get to know some of the students in the Summer session a little bit better. I’m hopeful I’ll be able to go back to Biarritz again in the future and spend a little more time exploring the French side of the Basque Country!

The view of a small bridge and island off of the main beach in Biarritz.

Along a street near the beach in Biarritz. The colorful flowers and blooming trees everywhere were beautiful and a different sight compared to what we’ve had in Spain. 

Celia Osman

Industrial and Operations Engineering/Data Science

Spanish Language, Culture & Industry in San Sebastian, Spain - TecNun Spring