This is for the tech lovers! Obviously, while abroad, you mostly use your phone for photos. If you're like me and waited until the last minute to get an international phone plan, it was definitely no use for it. While exploring your city/country, you notice how little or more technology contributes to everyday life.
Something that caught my attention in Madrid, specifically, was navigating the city. At home, we're used to hopping in our vehicles, even for short distances. Here, the locals take advantage of a wide variety of transportation methods, including electric scooters, the metro bus, the metro train, bikes, motorcycles, and the good ole reliable: their own two feet. One technology I could imagine they use is real-time information systems. This system provides real-time information such as train schedules, notifications of train or bus disruptions, and planning/displaying different routes during disruptions. As we were everyday users, we only could see estimated arrival times, you know, things like that. But I can imagine the complexity of the system required to ensure an accurate and efficient bus and train system.
In Barcelona, some of the girls and I decided to ride a gondola. Aside from the amazing view, I was really interested in how the cable car worked. Of course, there's suspension, automation, pulleys, and brakes involved. Though some things seemed automated like the speed and opening/closing of the doors, there had to be some type of real time system involved. After doing some digging, come to find out there is! There's a system that uses real-time to monitor the gondolas' performance and track them to detect issues before they become a huge problem. It includes testing for wear and tear, the cables, and how they perform in various weather conditions.
Aside from the group conversations about businesses and outsourcing to interesting topics at company visits such as the complexities of cyber security, these are examples of technology in everyday that I found interesting.
