The midterm yesterday went well. I do not know the results yet, but I think I performed well, and I'm glad it's over. Now I just need to prepare for the final this Friday! hahaha. A bunch of us went out last night to a club to celebrate. We went to St. James Power Station, and it was fabulous and definitely the most fun I've had yet out in Singapore! Oh and even better, it was ladies night, so I spent absolutely no money all night except for the taxi ride home.
We also went on a tour of IBM in Singapore yesterday as a class field trip. It was boring to be honest, but I did learn a few things:
1. IBM wants us to work for them, hahaha. They were trying to recruit us during our entire visit.
2. There is very obvious system of hierarchy at IBM in Singapore. When a worker/team leader/manager introduced himself, he would say "Hi, I'm (name), and my boss is (name). His job is to..." and then he would sit down without having said anything about himself, just his boss! Also, one of the lower managers gave us a presentation, and the first thing he said to us was "well I was picked to give this presentation because I am the youngest" and then the older managers laughed. This guy definitely resented that he was the youngest. They also have a tree diagram of the hierarchy posted on the factory floor and in the offices.
3. Asians have a different sense of humor. It's very dry. They seem to get a laugh out of jet lag. Singaporeans are still joking with us that it seems we have jet lag... but we've been here for over a month. I don't understand.
4. We took a tour of the plant floor, and workers were assembling IBM's digital video recording and storage boxes that are used by news crews, ESPN, and any other station that does live broadcasting. There is a difference in the way Singapore assembles the product and the way that the same product is assembled in the US. In the US, the workers personally handle the heavy boxes, flipping them over to put in screws, carrying them from station to station, and packaging them by hand. However, in Singapore, the majority of the factory workers are small women. For this reason, IBM in Singapore has designed their own devices to carry the heavy boxes. They have a conveyer belt that runs through the factory that transports the boxes to each station. At one station, the box is slid onto a cart and strapped in. The cart has a crank that flips the box over onto all sides so that screws can be placed. For packaging, there is a suction machine hanging from the ceiling. It suctions onto the final product, slides along a track, and then lowers the product into the packaging boxes for shipping. It truly is a very intuitive system that IBM has designed to fit the people in Singapore.
5. To test their final product, IBM places the boxes in a sealed chamber. This chamber changes in temperature and pressure to guarantee that the product can withstand extreme conditions. This is particularly important if these boxes are to be used on or transported by airplanes. I thought this was very interesting and smart.
As for today, we got released from class an hour and a half early! What a perfect start to the weekend! Caroline and I went to afternoon swim practice, and it was our first practice since we swam in Singapore Nationals. Arriving at the pool, it was like a light had been switched on with the team. They were so excited to see me and Caroline, and they were talking up a storm! It seems that they are finally comfortable with us, and I had such a wonderful time talking and laughing with all of them. I'm glad that we're finally past the simple "hello" and "have a nice day", but it's sad because we finally are becoming really good friends with the team and we have to leave Singapore! We only have about one week left! Insane!
We had the most amazing practice. We ran 10 stadiums, did over 100 lunges, and over 100 squats, including 5 x 1 minute of holding a stationary squat. ummm my legs are in pain, but it was awesome! I've never sweated so much in my life! I'm being dead serious. The amount of sweating today far surpassed any sweating I've ever done in the weight room, running stadiums at the football field, or doing agilities on SAC Field. My skin was raining. The Singapore heat and humidity is outrageous. But of course, swimming afterward felt heavenly, and even though I'd been a week since I'd been in the pool, I still felt awesome. So wonderful :)
When we were working out, our friend Joel was complaining that he wasn't going to be able to go out clubbing tomorrow night because his legs were going to hurt so bad. We told him about our awesome night at the Power Station, and Joel invited us to go out with him and some other guys on the team next week! So excited! Joel is going to take us to his favorite place called Zouk on our last night in Singapore. So excited!
Tomorrow morning, Caroline and I are leaving for Malaysia to visit Way Joe!!! I am so pumped to see him and meet his famliy! Way Joe swims with us at Georgia Tech, and he is originally from Malaysia and only came to the US for school. He's picking us up from the airport, we're staying at his house, his grandmother is making us lunch, it's all just so wonderful. Way Joe says that we're playing water polo with some of his Malaysian friends on Friday before going out. On Saturday, he and his mom are taking us around to see some sights, like temples and whatnot. It's going to be a great weekend!
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