July 13 2009
The week here started rainy. Well, at least I thought it was going to be rainy. We were supposed to have our city tour on Monday but it was raining so much that we changed it to Tuesday and had a lecture on human rights instead. I still went to buy an umbrella though after breakfast because I didn’t want to be totally soaked. But of course, the moment I came out of the store with my newly purchased umbrella, the sun decided to start peeping through the clouds and 5 minutes later voilá, no rain.
So we went to our lecture, which was quite interesting. In a way, I think I actually learned more about Europe’s many different courts and legal systems instead of human rights issues. It seems that, as with any organization, there’s a lot of politics and bureaucracy involved in such things. It’s a wonder that people ever want to take their case to court when it takes so much effort.
After the lecture we had a company tour of Ruuki products. They make various steel products, mainly construction oriented things. It was kind of neat to walk around on the floor during their work day. It surprised me how few people really need to work to make that place run. Apparently, during an average shift, there are about 40 people working on the factory floor, running the machines and what not. But so much of it is automated now, it seems that most of the workers are there just to supervise and make sure everything is working properly. I can definitely see how a lot of lower paying jobs will no longer exist in the future thanks to these developments. I think there will always be some human supervision in such places though. As efficient as machines can be, they still aren’t without error.
Other than those things, I didn’t do much on Monday. Well, I suppose I did go shopping and bought a few things. My heart really isn’t in it anymore though. I just can’t think of anything else I need to buy. Maybe just one more pair of shoes?
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