Justin Santamaria moves his fingers across his iPad and suddenly the creature comes alive. The size of a baby, Zora rises from the floor onto her feet, flexing her white plastic limbs, joint by joint. She stands there, her eyes round and appealing, and the five elderly ladies seated in a semi-circle in front of her are full of anticipation.
“She’s giving me the eye,” laughs a lady in a wheelchair. But that’s impossible because Zora is a robot. Since February 2019, the management of this nursing home in Paris’s 15th arrondissement have been using her to complement the care they offer their elderly residents.
Zora leads her class through a gentle workout. She moves her head up and then down to her chest, then from side to side, all the while accompanied by calming music. Her five students follow her every movement.
The next exercise gets them working their arms. Everything, including Zora’s speech, is preprogrammed by Justin on his tablet But Justin is no mere puppet master He is a specialist fitness instructor for the elderly and disabled, and while Zora shows her students the moves, Justin is free to give them individual attention. He walks over to a lady in a wheelchair and encourages her to stretch her arm fully. “I know you find it difficult,” he says sympathetically. He explains to the group that circling their arms will help with picking things up.
The members of this chair-based gym class at Villa Lecourbe obviously adore Zora. All have poor mobility, some have cognitive problems, too. But they do as Zora tells them and when she—they always refer to the humanoid robot as a “she”— plays La Vie en Rose, they sing along, smiling.
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