“I wasn’t much fond of sports when I was a kid. Growing up, my mother encouraged me to join karate, as she believed doing sports was quite necessary. I did this until I was 12, but honestly, the day I left karate I was genuinely happy. I never really enjoyed it. What I liked to do instead was music. At 12, I started playing with a small group in a music school. I began with playing a small flute. But then, I heard someone playing the violin for the first time. I fell in love with how it sounded. I took violin up, and unlike karate, I was quite good at it. I could see my progress within a short time, and I was enjoying every bit of it. I know when I was a child, I used to say I would grow up to be a vet, but later in life I knew, if I hadn’t pursued a life in Biomedical Science, I would probably have been the conductor of an orchestra.”
During a tête-à-tête with Diego Calzada Fraile, a cherished alumnus from the Pasteur promotion, we catch glimpses of his life, journey, and aspirations so far. Presenting the first story of Humans of LIVE exclusively for you!
Childhood, Memories, and Laughter
I was born and raised in a city called Fuenlabrada, just outside the Metropolitan city of Madrid. I had my sister when I was six and had my dog who was just like a sibling from when I was three till when I was fifteen. My grandparents had a house in the countryside, where I would spend most of the summers of my childhood. My father had a big family with nine sisters. I had 22 cousins in total, and we share unforgettable memories from our summer holidays. There was this one time that three of us cousins were together. Out of the blue, the two of us started saying some random words and it was so funny to my other cousin that she started laughing. That made us start laughing. The three of us broke down into uncontrollable cackles as if it was a feed-forward-loop. To this day, when we meet, we think about that moment.
Steering Towards Science
I liked animals, I had a habit of catching grasshoppers and butterflies when I visited my village. I enjoyed doing these kinds of stuff. I would say I always liked Biology somehow, and life in general. Nevertheless, I had no idea what I was going to take up for studies. In fact, until months before I joined the university, I had little idea of which subject I wanted to pick up. I knew I did not want to study medicine. I wanted to do something between Chemistry and Pharmacy. Biochemistry was very attractive and at the end I went with it. I chose Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, because of its reputation with experimental science and its well-known research centres. Getting into the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid was quite competitive in the first place, and I remember being quite nervous during the process. Another reason I chose this university was because I was from Madrid myself. Going into a University in a different city would mean additional costs of living, something that my family and I were not considering.
My experience at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid was quite nice. Exam times were quite stressful, but in between them, I used to realize how much I was enjoying the content of my studies. During that time I went to the University of York for a year in an Erasmus program. While I was applying for this opportunity, I had a choice of going to York in the UK or somewhere in either Italy or Germany or Sweden. I liked the subjects in York, so in the end I said to myself, “If you make it to York, you’ll go. Or else you will stay here for the four years.” I ended up going! It was one of the best experiences of my life.
It was my first time studying abroad. The philosophy of the university was very different there. It was fewer hours of lecture compared to Spain and more of self-study. You must be very autonomous, find information for yourself, and learn life in the end!
Venturing into Master LIVE
Going back to my bachelor’s studies, when I was studying biochemistry, I grew an interest in infectious diseases. During my time in Madrid, I spent about a month in two labs. One of them was working on corona viruses and the other was an HIV lab. In York, I took up more subjects on Immunology. When I finished the Erasmus, I spent another month in an Immunology lab where I was getting fascinated by the subject. I was almost forgetting pathogens during that time. That was my third year. At the end of my fourth year, I had to choose a Master.
I started to look for master’s degrees on Immunology. I first came across the Advanced Immunology Masters in Barcelona. In their webpage though I stumbled across the LIVE Master. I always liked vaccines. My mother is a nurse, and it is immunology and infectiology that I personally liked the most. A Master in Vaccines struck the right chord. When I saw the Master, I told myself that this was the Master I wanted to do. The fact that it was a new program made it even more interesting to me. I think it’s beautiful to pave the way. You are more less getting into something that is unknown. This is interesting.
Now, the year I was looking, they were recruiting their first promotion. I was still completing my bachelors at that point, not eligible to apply yet. So I saved it on my calendar for the next intake.
When I applied for Master LIVE, I was under a lot of pressure. I knew it was very difficult to get into. But at the same time, I was telling myself, “If I don’t get this, I don’t know what I am doing with my life.”
The First Moments after Receiving the Letter of Acceptance
When I learned that I was accepted, it was late in the night. I was in my bed, scrolling through my phone when I realized I received an email with the results. I got up, went to the computer to see the results there, saw my name and turned my eyes to the right to see the word “accepted”. I literally couldn’t believe myself. I said to myself, “no! no!! no!!! this can’t be real. I may be wrong; this is the wrong line!”
The second time I checked, I almost cried. I went to my mother’s room and the first thing I told her was, “I am going to live in Barcelona next year.” I couldn’t sleep that night.
Most Precious Takeaway from Master LIVE, apart from the Education Itself
The most important is the people. By this I don’t only mean the colleagues from my promotion, but also the people I know from other promotions.
The second is the languages. Before joining the Masters, I did not like the French language at all. But then, towards the end of this master’s I found myself doing an advanced level of French. This is something I never imagined I would achieve.
Then of course there is the experience of living in different countries and having access to training in enterprises such as GSK and Sanofi. These things were quite astonishing for me.
My Cohort and the Favourite Ones
My cohort has a bunch of great people in it. Choosing favourites is very difficult but I have a predilection for Bea and Melissa, probably because we speak the same language. I also love Lobna, Akshayata, Rafa, and basically everyone.
Being around my colleagues, especially the international ones, made me realize that I had more prejudice in myself than I would have liked to believe. Maybe not voluntarily, but sometimes we may subconsciously be more prejudiced than we like to think we are. My prejudice was overcome by my curiosity. I was able to learn about different cultures and often found myself surprised by our differing views of life. This gradually made me a much more open-minded person.
If I could re-live Master LIVE
I often regret about spending less time with my colleagues during the Antwerp semester. If I could ever go back in time, I would have lived life differently. Also, in retrospect, I would have liked to have my thesis internship in a company and explore the environment there. This is definitely something that this master’s could offer me, as it is offering to current students.
Finding my Purpose through my Journey
My work involves Immunology, something I was already into even before the Masters. However, living through this master’s gave me a background purpose. I apply the vision of vaccines to the research I am doing now.
In the way of being, it has changed me. I could discover myself, what I want to prioritize in life. Working with people from diverse countries with very different mindsets also tends to open your mind wide. I think that happened to me too.
A Second Home, perhaps…
Among the three hosting cities, I am biased towards Barcelona. The weather, the people, the language itself….I learned Catalan language, grew fond of the culture, made friends and found love and lost it, all in Barcelona.
Diego: The Scientist vs the Person
The person Diego likes to sit at the terrace for hours with a can of beverage and chat about life and everything in it. Other times, I engage in political activism. I have grown a bit rusty with the violin. I can hear myself making these small errors with the notes, but I still pick it up. I am still in love with how it sounds.
Thoughts, memories, and realizations: Diego Calzada Fraile
Storytelling: IVAA Website
Diego Calzada Fraile is currently doing his PhD project at Centro Nacional De Investigaciones Cardiovasculares (CNIC, Madrid) in Francisco Sánchez-Madrid’s group, exploring the effects of T cell immune contacts on innate immunty.