When the exam was finished there was a huge relief all round! After a major power nap, we partied into the early hours. The party came to an abrupt end when one of the Irish guys broke his ankle while jumping around while drunk (as you do....!). This was CSI for the students from the USA on campus as the fire brigade, ambulance and NASA cops arrived within five minutes! Whereas, in Dublin he would have been given another pint and told to walk it off! A hectic week lay ahead for our life science department which started with a visit into the research centre to see how urine is recycled for drinking applications in space. The Korean astronaut from our class gave a fascinating presentation on her experience of becoming the first Korean woman to become an astronaut. We also had a workshop on designing spacesuits and got to hold real space suits which provided us with some focus for designing one for our team project. As part of this workshop we spoke to two NASA scientists who are working on Devon Island who are designing robots and rovers for Mars projects.

Next stop was Stanford University. We got the opportunity to use some of the most hi –tech robots employed for robotic surgery. From the picture above the robot can be seen working on a dummy patient. From behind where the photo was taken was a TV screen and human controls for the robot in which each student practiced their surgeon skills (Luckily it was only a dummy patient!). 

Later that night was time for the Irish culture night presentation. We had a strong group of five and we spoke about our four seasons of rain, culture, food/alcohol, music and I covered the sport trying to explain the concept behind Gaelic football and hurling. Our presentation finished with ten volunteers from the audience dancing along to the River Dance. Hilarious it was! Each of the presenting countries had to provide some traditional delicacies. The French had lots of interesting food and wine. The Greeks had really nice salads and desserts and we had Guinness, hot whiskeys and no food-I explained in the Irish culture that eating was cheating! The next morning with a few sore heads we stayed on the robotic surgery theme. This time we acted like the robots and dissected pig’s hearts and stitched the flesh of a pigs leg (not a good idea after the night before). However, it was interesting and to be honest, it was the first and the last time for me as it took me a while to eat meat for my dinner for a day or two!