´I love it, I love it, I love it!´ says Lucas Steinle, who came to CuriousU all the way from Brazil. ´I enjoyed the cultural exchange, sharing our experience of how we see the world. Especially during the Smart Cities track, which I followed. It was great to hear a lot of different ideas on how to solve problems in this area, adding a human touch - as you say here - to the engineering side, which I normally focus on.´
Strange lunches and no time for sports
´It´s my first time in Europe,´ says Chong Pohan from China. ´I want to study in the Netherlands in the future and thanks to this visit I know that the country is even better than I expected. I really liked the summer school. There were many activities and people are friendly. Although, you could have some more delicious food here next year. Like Chinese food.´
He wasn´t the only one to mention the local food. ´I enjoyed the experience overall, but it was interesting to see that Dutch people eat the same type of food for breakfast and for lunch. I´m not used to that,´ adds Steinle. ´I also love the Sports centre here at the campus, but unfortunately I don´t have time to use it very much.´
The lunch menu and the lack of free time for relaxation or sports seem to be the most common complaints among the otherwise very enthusiastic participants. ´We were just talking about going to play tennis, but there isn´t any time. It can be intense, but overall I really liked it here,´ says Carlijn Vis.
Busy schedule
´I personally didn´t mind the busy schedule, but it might seem like a bit of an overkill to some of the students. Courses are mandatory and there isn´t a lot of free time,´ thinks Dan Ionita, who comes from Romania, but is now a PhD candidate at the UT. And as it is almost traditional among UT students, he also plans to start his own business: ´I decided to join because of the EntrepreneurialU track. Most people here want to start their own company, but they have no idea how. This was a great way to learn. However, I found out about CuriousU by accident and I know a lot of PhD´s, who would like it but didn´t know about it at all, so it might be a good idea to inform them better next year. In any case, I enjoyed the whole festival theme. The organizers really made it work.´
A fellow UT student, Arturo Perez Rivera from Honduras, agrees: ´I think this summer school was very interesting, entertaining, but also exhausting.´
