Born without an arm, he made one out of LEGO
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David Aguilar was five years old when he discovered Lego toys, which became a haven against the ridicule of his disability, and the creative child, at the age of nine, built his first prosthetic limb from small parts... Today, as a young man, he has fulfilled his dream of making a child Another benefit from what it does.
David, who is currently 22, suffers from Poland's syndrome and was born without a right forearm.
But this rare congenital deformity did not hinder his life. On the contrary, it was a stimulus to his ambition, and a source of livelihood.
This Andorran student, who has been fascinated by robots since he was a child, has little spare time, as he is about to complete his bioengineering training, gives lectures on motivation, has published a book, and participated in the “Lego Masters” program on the M6 channel. He was among the speakers at a conference on innovation organized by the US space agency "NASA".
His facial features contract as he remembers the years when Lego was also a refuge for him.
At his university residence near Barcelona, in northeastern Spain, David recounts, "When I was a teenager, I kept playing with Lego because it was a way to forget about harassment, and it helped me a lot in ignoring the sarcasm."
During these difficult years, when he was 17, David designed a more precise prosthesis that, for the first time, allowed him to perform push-ups with both arms.
David arrived today in the fifth version of his prosthesis called the "MK5", which is a "Lego" arm with a robotic appearance, with blue rods at the end that act as fingers that David activates with the movement of his torso, thanks to a system of robotic pulleys.
Although David used to live without his right forearm and therefore doesn't use it every day, he knows that many people desperately need a newer-generation prosthesis that could cost thousands of dollars.
"Since I made my first prosthesis, I realized that I had the power to help others, and when I saw myself in the mirror with two arms (thanks to the prosthesis), I felt that others really needed it," he says.
David then created his YouTube channel and called himself "Hand Solo", in a word game based on the word "Hand" (meaning "hand" in English), and inspired by the character "Han Solo" in the "Star Wars" series.
Soon, the story of the young man spread and became cross-border.
A few months ago, he received a letter from Zauri Bektimisova who wrote to him because her eight-year-old son Biknor, born without arms, could not get a conventional prosthesis.
"The prosthetics are mostly big and heavy, which is not good for her spine," explains the Kazakh, who has lived in Strasbourg for two years, where her husband is a diplomat at the Consulate General of Kazakhstan.
David promised her to try and build a prosthetic for Becknor.
At the end of August, the young boy and his mother went to Andorra to try out this lightweight, clip-on prosthesis that Picknor controls thanks to a rope attached to his left foot.
"Now I can pick up things I couldn't do before," adds Becknor, who is now able to throw the ball at his brother or hold a small computer.
In fact, they are just a few small pieces that changed David's life.
Zauri notes that "his self-confidence is greater."
In David's mind, projects are crowded.
He asks himself, 'If I did it for Becknor, why shouldn't I repeat it to a boy or girl without a leg?'
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