Social cohesion in practice.
Aalto student team contains seven students from different fields and most definitely diverse and complimentary approaches. They have been learning and successfully achieving work with each other as the project has been rolling since November 2018. The willingness to contribute to the Nepali Project has been the energy that nobody has wasted. Nepali Team 2019.
Although just upon the arrival in Kathmandu, the team has become one better, stronger and larger group by the full integration of the five students from the AITM, Asian Institute of Technology and Management whose have been contributing as the half necessary for making such a project. See the profiles of a real, cohesioned and unique multidisciplinary team of twelve students.
André majors in Collaborative and Industrial Design, Anumaria, Lassi, Luis Alfonso and Roosa in Creative Sustainability, Carles in Telecommunication Engineering and Kristiina in Electrical Power and Energy Engineering.
Lassi Tähtinen [Finland]
Honesty, love, commitment & compassion is what Lassi values in life.
A lover of life and arts, born and raised in Finland, but a citizen of the world. Music, nature and movie enthusiast always a second away of getting too deep in thought. Curious and persistent, even stubborn at times, but always trustworthy and ready for working together to get things done.
He did his bachelor’s studies in Business and Administration, got some valuable insights but did not really ever affiliate with the competitive business mindset. With couple years of working experience in urban innovation and co-creation research and development projects, Lassi has built a passion for seeking an understanding of structures – both social and administrative. Interactions, systems and causalities are something he is really intrigued by. Studying in the Master’s programme of Creative Sustainability in Real Estate and Water Management at the moment is a jackpot for Lassi to deepen his understanding of the aforementioned.
Kristiina Kolu [Finland]
Kristiina describes herself as a nature lover, who enjoys spending her free time by walking in a forest, going to sauna and dipping to icy lake and dancing with Latin rhythms. She is inspired from people with different backgrounds, great team spirit and magical nature experiences. The most important values for her are empathy, freedom and equality and she sees that curiosity is a path towards learning, growing and creativity. In terms of studies, Kristiina majors in Electrical Power and Energy Engineering, focusing in new energy technologies and renewable energy resources. She is interested in questions related to climate change and sustainability, and what kind of challenges developing countries are facing with these issues.
”We should never lose the inner child in us, because curiosity is the best way to keep learning and growing”
André Santos [Portugal]
André is a Portuguese soul wandering in the snow fields of Helsinki, Finland. Currently, he is studying Collaborative and Industrial Design master programme with a minor in Creative Sustainability. He is particularly interested in holistic and multidisciplinary approaches with a focus on analytic and systemic thinking. He strongly believes that working on sustainable development projects is where he can best utilise his potential. As the philosopher Ervin Laszlo said, we need to “live in a world better designed” and that is the “biggest challenge”, and André wants to be part of it.
Roosa Verkasalo [Finland]
Roosa describes herself to be a goofy adventurer at heart, who aspires to experience the world. Truth be told, she is a hard-working, devoted design geek, who loves to spend time also at home. This sincere and resourceful Finn has learned to find home wherever she is, in the people around her, thus making it possible to combine many of her dreams.
Prior to Aalto, Roosa has a bachelor’s degree in interior architecture. She has worked in this field on both domestic and international design projects. Studying in the Creative Sustainability Master’s Programme, she is looking to learn methods to bring more depth, new perspectives and systemic approaches to her work.
Carles Martínez [Spain]
Carles is an enthusiast of outdoor activities. Born on the sunny coast of the Mediterranean Sea, his love for nature has determined his character, his hobbies and his present over the years. Mountain climber and photographer, Carles is qualified in Telecommunications Engineering and he studies in Aalto University the master’s program Communication Engineering on Data Science and Artificial Intelligence with the purpose of contributing to the improvement of technologies and services related to Health & Wellness.
Despite being passionate about new technologies and outdoor sports, his favorite activity is to go to the woods and patiently get to interact with wildlife.
Anumaria Salminen [Finland]
Anumaria is a happy Finn, with a never-ending love towards good food and sunshine. As in Finland the amount of sunrays is somewhat limited, she sometimes feels the need to travel the world – both in search of a warmer environment but also of new experiences.
Anumaria has a bachelor’s degree in International business and she is currently studying her master’s degree in Creative Sustainability. She is eager to continuously learn more, and is especially interested in issues related to environmental sustainability and in finding systemic solutions for climate change mitigation.
Luis Alfonso Monje [Chile]
Easily inspired by everything, his personal, professional and academic self doesn’t do the ideas generation and evaluation by selection, but by discard. Finds joy in education by the belief that we are all students and teachers. Freelances as creative director, does work as a photographer and amongst other stuff, aspires to become a better version of his present, whatever that is.
As a so called eternal student, has done some years in universities in Chile, with two uncompleted years of Psychology, graduating finally in Social Communications by studying Public Relations; in Italy, doing the Master in Creative Advertising in NABA and; most recently in Finland, nowadays doing the Master of Arts in Creative Sustainability in the design field in Aalto University.
He used to introduce himself as a creative in beta version. Slow traveler, he was based in Kathmandu in the year 2017 / 2073. He does not wear glasses.
From the very first day, until the very last one.
Although just upon the arrival in Kathmandu, the team has become one better, stronger and larger group by the full integration of the five students from the AITM, Asian Institute of Technology and Management whose have been contributing as the half necessary for making such a project. See the profiles of a real, cohesioned and unique multidisciplinary team of twelve students.
Yug Maharjan [Nepal]
Describing himself as a Nepali boy, full of enthusiasm, energetic and nature lover person. Helpful and trustworthy in every situation needed.
Yug is currently a student of AITM studying Bachelor in Civil Engineering affiliated to Purbanchal University, one basically interested on the designs and analysis of structure. Apart from the study, likes to play outdoor games such as football and volleyball, as well as enjoying good music. Traveling to new places and always passionated, Yug aims to learn new things and to get more and more knowledge. Also, he loves going to trekking and hiking and getting lost in natural beauty.
Gyalbu Sherpa [Nepal]
Currently, a 7th semester Hotel Management student of the Asian Institute of Technology and Management, he likes to mainly focus on providing better service to people. Thus, a natural enthusiast, Gyalbu likes to explore new places and to meet new people. As a hobby, playing ping pong is the highlight but he also finds time for playing the flute.
After the completion of the undergraduate journey, Gyalbu is planning to study and work abroad. He is traveling to China on the upcoming month of May. Besides improving his Chinese language skills and learning about the culture, he is focused on doing his internship of one year.
Richa Khatiwada [Nepal]
At the final semester of Biotechnology student at AITM. Interested in nutrition and wellbeing, healing people seems to be the main focus as a biotechnologist. Today, Richa is currently working on computer aided drug design against multi-drug resistant pathogen with Prithivi.
Getting to know new cultures, the way people live in various parts of the world, and the food they eat interests her. She loves to travel, cook and to learn new things. After her undergraduate, pretty soon, she will be traveling abroad for study, explore and work. She wishes to visit as many places as she can.
Sumit Shah [Nepal]
As the first idea, Sumit shares that he is originally from the beautiful town of Ilam, which is also known as the queen of hills of eastern Nepal. He is a nature loving creative guy, who loves to do creative pursuits like painting, singing and writing. Nowadays he is most enthusiastic about poems. Final year student of Civil Engineering on his last year an wants to do his specialization in structural engineering so that he can help in building disaster resilient structures, buildings and bridges. Highly interested in working in the field of environment and climate change. He also very into spend his weekends and free time working for social and community work helping people in need and animals. In particular, Sumit is interested in street dogs.
He daily dreams about how to make a world a better place to live, spreading happiness, positivity and love.
Prithivi Jung Thapa [Nepal]
He currently studies Biotechnology, finally in the 4th year of the bachelor taught in the AITM, Nepal.
His particular interests in biotechnology relay on its cutting edge quality as a study field as well as its interdisciplinary nature. Most important, he loves science in general. These days we find Prithivi working on computer aided design. A nature lover who lives in a simple village with impressive natural beauty, where he tries to merge other interests such as literature and music, both listening some favorite artists and as a guitar, violin and madal player. Book enthusiast.