Hi "insert name". Why would you come to see this part of the website? You know me already? You might have your reasons to come here I guess. How you doing? I hope you like reading because you are going to get me to know on a few paragraphs that I hope dont make you feel bored :)
(that's my dog btw)
My name is Menelik. I was born on march 7th 2006 in Venezuela, but now I live in Portugal with my mom and my brother :)
Im basically a man, I just turned 18y/o so I dont have to lie on websites about my birth date when I sign up 😎
You might already know the course I'm in, but maybe you don't, lemme tell you about it.
(If you click "school" you can check a few stuff I did/fix/clean in classes 2 years ago)
I'm not in a programming/coding course like my other mates who come with me to Vilnius. I know a bit of C++ but that's not what I wanted to tell you. Hardware is my thing. I love building Pc's ( I built mine, It's on the photo), and I feel comfortable while I do stuff related to my area and course. It doesn't matter if I have to open a device to find out what's wrong or just open a console to clean the dust and change the thermal paste. I always enjoy it :)
Last Summer I started to work in a Pizzaria as a Pizza Finisher. My work was basically cutting the pizza in 8 slices and finishing it with the remain ingredients that were left after it was taken out the furnace. I'm not a pizza fan, my girlfriend and friends can tell you that. But I love the pizza that my boss makes.
I kept in contact with my boss and the work team and they asked to come back this summer aswell because of my swiftness they said. After they proposed me that, I started to work with them again (for now such a waiter, 3-5 days a week), also helping them sometimes in the kitchen if needed. All of this in order to buy a new phone with a good camera to take photos during this month in Lithuania and prepare myself for the FCT.
As I told you I love fixing stuff. If you look above, you will see me above this text with a playstation controller of a friend of mine. I was trying to fix the drift on one of it's joysticks. After checking that just cleaning the potenciometters wouldn't fix the issue, i decided to unweld the joystick of the controller i got for pieces and weld it again in the one that had drift. Everything worked. Lately, besides the PAP and working in the pizzaria, i've got requests of friends and friends of friends in order to check and fix stuff. I dont earn lots of money with it. But at least I enjoy it and meet more people :)
Maybe I'm talking too much about my course and what I do and wanna do for living... Lets talk about more personal stuff 😉
I love playing videogames like league of legends, valorant and minecraft with my friends, but I also enjoyed playing single-player openworld games such subnautica or infamous second son (games i've earned the platinum trophy)
I'm a Mortal Kombat enjoyer, and I'm thinking about buying a graphics card to play mortal kombat 1. I firstly started playing mortal kombat 10 on my ps4 with a mate, just a few weeks. Then i decided to buy mortal kombat 11, since it was the last one which was released at the moment. After months of playing it I didnt feel bored of playing it, so I bought mortal kombat 1 when it was released, but it barely runs on my PC. Because my plan was to add a dedicated graphics card later, and conform with the integrated graphics of the amd 5600g ryzen's apu.
After going to Lisboa-Games-Week in a shool's trip, and winning around 50 games of mortal kombat 10 and loosing 2, I started to take the game more serious, because who knows... Maybe i can do it 🤠
It's my last year on school and I'm grateful with this opportunity, and all other opportunities I wouldn't probably have on a country like where I was born. The truth is, things are hard... and programmes like Erasmus, allow us to grow as people and make us feel grateful for what we have and maybe other doesn't and wish with. This is not my first FCT, but still I feel scared about all of this. Also this is not the first time I was selected for erasmus but I feel like it's gonna be a new different experience which can bring me skills and help me become more indepent. Not everyone has the opportunity we are having. Be grateful, be kind, get to know culture, become better and grow as a person.
If you ever wanted to be part of this, don't give up. This place isn't given, it's earned.
Well, It's enough information about me. Now you maybe know me better than some people I have on my instagram close friends 😂
There's still lot of stuff I could tell you about myself. Like that I watch anime such one piece and others. But i dont wanna take the risk of making you feel bored.
I still dont believe you did read it all. Thanks you for your patience .
I hope you do what you love and reach all your wishes.
Nice to meet you :)
Once upon a time, there was... Just kidding. Lets get started :)
Time to leave Portugal! May 4th was the day in which we started this amazing mobility in order to do our internships. The meeting point was a flix bus stop. Paulo, Ricardo and me were the first to arrive.
After more or less 5 hours we made it to the airport. Besides one person couldn't come with us, the rest of the group could board the fly.
Finally, after all of this, we were in Lithuania. We were all feeling tired due to the travel, but we still had to wait around 6 hours to have access to our rooms and be able to take a nap. We found a place in which we could wait at least till 12h00 before we went back to the horel and could leave our baggage in there.
While we were waiting for our rooms to be ready (14h00), we decided to walk around Vilnius, and get to know some place. We all were really tired, but it was good anyways. We took lots of pictures and also got to know someplaces we must visit during this month.
At 14h of clock we went back to the hotel and could finally access to our rooms. My roommates are Paulo and Ricardo. All of us had the time to take a shower or take a nap till 19h of clock. Time at which we'd have planned to take the dinner.
Finally, at the end of the day we all went to "7 fridays" and had a dinner together. Most of us ate hamburguers but also some others ate pizza. Still... We all agreed that the place was really comfy, and the food was also delicious.
On monday we started the day by taking a bus for the first time in this country. After taking the bus we got to know our new working space and also more about the company we are working for.
Today was our first encounter with LINEŠA, an innovative company specializing in non-formal education. We were warmly greeted by the team and given a tour of the facilities, showcasing the creativity of the spaces and the variety of educational programs offered. I am eager to commence my internship and contribute to it's inspiring environment.
Right next to Linesa's building, there's a small restaurant. Egle, our teacher in Lithuania, told us to try eating there. The food was really good and cheap and, as planned, we will lunch everyday there :)
We were free to go back to the hotel at the early afternoon before the metting and lunch. So Gabriel and me decided to get into a gym, in which we trained for 2 hours. After leaving the gym we bought some stuff at the "maxima market".
Finally, at the end of the day we had dinner in a different restaurant that is located near to the hotel we stay at. The food was really good and the walls had funny messages next to the doors.
Today was kinda special. After a long travel we had the opportunity of participating in a meeting with Heidemarie Stefanyshyn-Piper, a retired astronaut from NASA. She was on a steam center in order to encourage new generations telling them about her story. Also after she ended her presentation we could speak with her, take photos and ask some questions.
It was such an amazing experience out of this world. All members of our group, including the teachers Paulo and Duarte, were grateful for this opportunity we had. Not everyone meet an astronaut. But we did it, and we really appreciate this opportunity that Linesa gave us, since the moment they were not obligated to invite us, but anyways they asked us to join them. This really shows the way this company is, and the very lucky we are for working with them :)
After the astronaut left we were guied around the steam center installations. We saw some crazy robots and projects that were made by children during their not formal education classes.
The entire group loved this day and it was fun to see all the stuff they were able to teach children. Just by looking at the projects you can imagine their teaching results. Also the creativity of the children has no limits, increasing the originality and quality of the projects
After a long day , we had a good dinner. I ate a sort of brusccetta, that weren't that bad, but could've been better. Our teacher Eglé was there with us and It was a good way to end the day.
In our first day of work Eglé, gave Paulo Paulino the keys for the new room that would be our workspace. Situated in th 3rd floor, we spent about an our organizing and moving the desks that were in the room, so we could make it more comfortable and efficcient for working.
After cleaning our room, our teachers, Valentina and Darius, told us a bit more about the projects they do and how do they teach children.
In our lunch break we ate at the restaurant next to our work. This time we ate a different food, but it was really good
We got some task to do, and I had to check a printer that was not working. Although, the printer started to work properly when I was gonna see it. So I stayed the rest of the day with Diogo and helped him with a website we must do.
At the end of the day we went to a new place close to the hotel and for a very cheap price we ate really well.
Today it was kinda boring/calm. This time I didn't have any activitie related to hardware, but anyways I got something to keep moving. I was again helping Diogo with the website for EMO STEAM. But now I would have the task of making a logo by my own (A.I made sources forbidden). So today I was putten on the skin of a designer.
The project aims to develop a methodology for enhancing emotional intelligence through STEAM activities, supplementedby interactive materials, a board/online game, an assessment tool, and stakeholder recommendations, accessible to allschools.
Today we had a free day. In the morning we decided to go to a laundry near to the hotel to get our clothes clean. We spent around 2 hours in there because we also had to use the dryer, due to the weather.
The first shopping we visited was Outlet Park. It has a good variety of stores and different brands, but we found it quite small for an outlet.
We probably stayed there for half an hour or maybe 45mins. We had time to see everything and also ask in the stores for some gloves. Because Diogo wanted to get some due to weather.
After leaving the first shopping we went to ozas. This shopping was that big that has 3 floors and even more stuff in the floor -1, not only having a parking, but also a pool. We had our lunch at kfc. Personally, this is the shopping I liked the most.
I though Akropolis was going to be the one I'd like the most, but besides the fact it's a HUGE shopping, it's just like Ozas, but more claustrophobic. I dont dislike the way the shopping was though, but after walking for a half an our in that shopping I was starting to feel clautrophobic. Which I think it's kinda ironic, since the shopping is huge.
Today is our first saturday in Vilnius. So we decided to look around and visit some cultural places. The first one we visited was the Gediminas Castle Tower. It was located in the top of a little mountain. We had the freedom to choose if we wanted to use the elevator to get to the top or get there by walking in a route. For using the elevator we'd have had to pay 2€ per person, so we decided to walk, it wasn't that hard and we took some pictures in the way up. We had to pay a ticket for 4€ per person to enter to the tower. There were some interesting things and in the 3nd floor they had a projector with what I suppose was a film about the history of the tower.
After we left the tower, we went to the Vilnius Cathedral. We took lots of pictures and inside of it there were lots of rooms we also saw. It looks such a very very huge cathedral but at the moment you enter in, you found out that it's actually smaller than it looks outside. We didn't have to pay anything to get in and it was an interesting place.
After our lunch we went to the Vilnius Museum Of Illusions. We paid 9€ each. When I first saw the museum I though it was an overpriced price, but now I think it's a fair price for what they offer. The girls that work in there were really friendly and they interacted a lot with used while we were looking everything. It was really funny and I think it's a place that everyone who comes to Vilnius must visit. Also it's interesting the way they explain hor those illusions work.
This sunday we went to trakai. I though we'd only see the castle and get bored, but actually we enjoyed it a lot. The walk we took from the train station to the castle allowed us to also see more of trakai, and not only the castle. We had to pay 5€ to enter to the castle, that isn't that expensive for the things you gonna see there. The castle is huge and really fun to see. It even had a machine for making your own souvenirs. We all took lot of photos all around the castle. It felt like the castle was seperated in 2 big areas. The first one not that big, with some tools they used to use at the time, and the second one located deeper, not at the beggining but basically at the end of the walls. It was bigger in height and I think the stuff that was there was more interesting than the thingss we had saw in the beginning.
There was a machine inside trakai castle almost at the end of the "tour". The machine was very simple, you had to put 2 coins, 1€ + 5cents. It would keep the 1€ coin and by turning the wheel of it, you would be able to remake the 5cents coin into a new souvenir all made by yourself. I still wonder the legal voids of this, since the moment we are "destroying" money.
In our way to trakai castle we got hugry, so we stopped in a restaurant to get our tanks filled. The hamburguers were really good and tasty, and they even give us gloves so we could take our meal without gettings our hands dirty.
After ending the visit to trakai castle. We still had time till the next train. Nobody wanted to come with me on a boat trip, but after insisting a lot, they came with me to ask the man how much it was gonna be. The man told us it was 10€ per hour, only then, after hearing the price, everyone wanted to get into the boat 😅
It was really fun and we did crazy stuff like going under the bridges that connected with the castle. We had to lay in the boat so we could make it to go through.
Today I got to to continue my work with the logo, this time I completely changed my main idea and started again from the beginning, trying to create a logo based in STEAM. Which would have that word written by draws of pictures related to the project.
After working, me and Diogo went to the cup shopping. Because we were told that there were some places in which we could do sports and have fun. We spent like 2 hours playing basket. we lost... but it was fun :)))
At the end of the day we took our dinner in +++ as normally,
Today I got to work in some laptops our teacher brought me. The principal objective was to make them work faster. There were 4 of them but only 3 chargers, so I firstly started with 3 and then continued with the last one. Most of them were normal working, but I anyways did some stuff such deleting temporal files and defragmenting the disks. Just to improve their speed.
Since starting the defragmentation requires administrator rights, I got some difficulties in 2 of the pc's. One of them didn't have an user with admin rights, and the other one had a password.
Anyways It was easy to solve, with the help of hirensboot tool. With the help of this software, I was able to take off the passwords and also create an administrator user for the laptop that required it.
Today the teacher brought me this PC. Basically I'd have to improve it's performance as I did like the laptops. Since it has a password I used HirensBoot to complete the task. But I had lots of problems trying to boot from the hirensboot pendrive, so it took me more than expected
Our teacher Eglé surprised us by bringing us some chocolates and coffe to relax in our last hour of working of the day. We spoke a bit about how have we been during our time here and also planned a visit to a museum in the friday.
At the end of the day, we all went to +++. Some of us went to the gym before, and others after it :)
In this day I didnt do much, but finish the task was given to me last day. Since I had problems trying to use HirensBoot. Last day i couldn't delete the temporal files or start the disk defragmetion. This day I completed it and tried to help my mates around in their tasks while I had nothing to do. Then, our teacher Eglé came to our office and showed me some of the tasks I'd have for the next week. Basically I'll have more or less 13 computers to check. They are not being used, but since the moment they want to see if they can use it for anything. I got the task to make them work if possible :)
I believe Im going to have fun next week :D
This friday was also such a free day, but not at all. We went to the laundry before taking the breakfast to get our clothes washed. After that, we had lunch and went to the museum of energy and technology. There we decided to pay for tesla and electricity exposition, which basically explains some of the inventions of him and also get us to know more about the performance of dynamos and basic eletronic components. We loved it, they had lot of things with which we could interact and have fun at the end of the explanation. Some of them were about charging a battery doing specific tasks and them using this energy to make the exposed things to work.
For today we had planned to visit Kaunas. Anyways, we didn't, because if we had gone there, we would have missed the Vilnius Music Festival. An Event that takes place here in Vilnius, every year. We walked a lot on this day but we were able not only to listen to some local musicians, but also there were famous singers all in different places of the city. When we got back to the hotel at the night everyone was tired, but we all agreed, it was a good experience.
I also went to the skatepark before lunch. I got to meet a guy that was friendly and knew how to speak english, so I asked him I could try his skateboard, since mine is in Portugal. It was fun
Near to the skatepark there is a McDonalds, so I decided to buy my dinner there to take away. Later, on my way back to home and waiting to meet again with the rest of us to keep looking around for more concerts, I found a good spot. Spot in which I ate while being in my phone. Btw... I ordered a McCryspi, but only because CBO seems to be an special menu from Portugal, and they don't sell it here :(
Today we went to Kaunas. We were thinking on taking a free day because we were tired due to the music festival. But at the end, we decided to go. When we got there it was already midday, so decided to firstly buy our lunch and then start looking the city. After finishing eating we stared walking around, we visited some places, incluiding akropolis and the church of st. michael the archangel. During our time there we felt kinda of lonely, since the city looked kinda of empty compared with trakai or vilnius, but we are not sure if it's because it was sunday. Also we had fun but since we were tired from last day we didn't enjoy as much as we could have.
Anyways, it was a good experience and there goes another city we visited in Lithuania :))
Today I was planning to start looking the computers they showed me last week, but Eglé had found another task for me for this day. Basically, there's was a person that got a new computer, in which he would work since now. But he had some data he wanted to transfer from his old computer for his new one. I accepted the task and started to work on it inmedietly. My first though was switching the disks but since the new computer has a warranty, it's better not to open in. I decide to ask my teacher if they could get me an usb to sata adapter, and they did it. So, I firstly opened the old PC, to take off the disks and connect them to the new pc throw the adapter, in order to do a clonation with a clonation tool that comes with hirens boot. I firstly tried connecting the ssd to see in which disk the windows system was installed at. Next, after checking that, I'd see how much data there's saved in the hdd, so i could have an idea of how long it would take.
Unexpectedtly, after connecting the hdd the same way I did with the ssd. There started to come smoke out of the hdd, so I fastly unplugged it. But after trying, the hdd didn't work anymore. I communicated the situation to my teacher. I was really sad for what happened since I don't really know the reason of it. They we're not mad at me but I still wanna find a way to fix or at least recover that data :/
Today I got the task of verifying some tablets, 28 of them. My job was to delete all photos that children took during lessons. Also they asked me to disable the access to camera aplication if possible. So first thing I did was searching abt how to disbable the camera for that version of android. Since I didn't find anything I'd create a new profile in every tablet, which would have some restrictions. The main profile will stay the same, but now it would require a password to access it. The profile destinated to the children wouldn't have acess to camera and would be named as "tabX" in which "X" is the number of the tablet.
On this day I continued working on the tablets. At the moment there are 20 tablets ready, but for completing the other 8 I'll have to restore all default settings, so I'm waiting for more instructions. They all are fully charged and prepared to be restored, but I won't do it yet since I'm waiting for an answer of them allowing me to do it.
Finally after postponing it for a bit, I got started with my main quest. I brought all the computers that I spoke about last friday to our office/workspace and started my journey. Firstly, I started by organizing everything and separating the olders computers of these that had newer motherboards. Most of them didn't have ram or a disk to boot, so for now I would start testing the power supplies and motherboard to find out what works and what doesn't.
I organized the computers in a way that I could easily get components from the PC's that were older and not worth rebuilding on the left side. I would focus to make the newer computers work.
The first PC I connected to energy worked, but the second one didn't. Since I knew the first power supply I tested was working, I would start using that to know which power supplies were not working and which motherboards were working.
Till my last hour of working, today, I found some more components while looking in the older computers. More specifically, four ram (1gb ddr2 each) and an ssd (512gb). After tes
Today we went to the Molėtai Astronomical Observatory. The trip was long but it was worth it. When we got there Professor Egle surprised us with meat cakes she made by herself and then we went straight to the observatory cafeteria. where we could relax a bit while we waited for our guide. After a while we started the tour to the place where we could see constellations and various ancient artefacts linked to astronomy. We finished seeing the museum, moved to the observatory room and got to see some sun's filaments through a telescope with 2 differents filters.
Today we decided to take a day off. Firstly, we did our laundry in the morning and while we were waiting for our clothes to get dry, we ate in meatbusters. The hamburger was good but nothing special. I bought also something that looked like fried bread, but at the end it was fried carrot and I didn't like it at all. The rest of the day, some of us walked and explored vilnius since I slept and also went to buy a new piercing before the dinner.
Today we went to Museum of Occupations and Freedom Fights, also known as "KGB Museum". It was such a good experience since it wasn't only a museum, but also a prision, in which we could find jail, small rooms and other interesting things. You can get to know a lot about Lithuania and it's history related to when it was part of the sovietic union. There was also a room which was visited for the Papa in person. The building has 3 floors and also a few jails in the outside, but that also is part of the museum.
After visiting the museum we went to CUP shopping and had a lunch in Subway. For some of us it was their first time eating there, not my case, but I'm happy all liked and enjoyed their lunchs
It doesn't bother me to get more work. and since I know the computers are going to be used to create the best 4 I can build with their pieces, I feel really grateful for the surprise :)
Today was the last day we would be with Eglé. She had to go on a business trip, So, due to that, we got our certificate a bit earlier. Also we ate some cake and spend some time with her and Valentina. We feel very grateful for everything Eglé did for us during this internship, and she's such a lovely person :)
Today, since I got more computers last day, I started to check and look for better components and newer motherboards to use. I found 3 ddr4 compatible motherboards which had ram, so I decided to built the computers in them. We only had 2 ddr4 RAM sticks so we were thinking on asking Valentina if he had any other ddr4 RAM that he wouldn't use anymore. We also had to swap the cases because we didnt have all the covers from the original cases that the motherboards we would use were at. We got some computers to work already and they had windows already. But I decided it would be better for us to delete all data doing a reset or new installation next day.
Today Paulo and I changed some processors that we found in ddr3 compatible motherboards but that would work aswell in the newer motherboards. The processors we used were all the same, the 6th generation Intel Core i3. It was the best one we could find. While reseting the data from a computer, we would take care of the other 2, install the new processors and also put fresh thermal paste. Paulo knows a lot about hardware. That surprised me since the rest of his classmates were not that comfortable with this kind of manual works. He was really helpful and thanks to him I could do everything faster, since I had someone else to rely on :)
Today, we still had to factory reset one computer we couldn't last day. As I've been doing last days, I worked with Paulo and we were able to get it ready quickly half an hour after we got to work.
Valentina came to say hi and also asked us for some help to recover some data from an hdd he had. This time I didnt use the sata adapter since I dont trust it anymore, so I directly connected the hdd to the motherboard of a computer we made, and with the help of hirensboot tool, he could get back the folders and data he needed :)
At the end of the day, we brought the rest of the computers back to the -1 floor. All the computers I was able to built during this time were finally ready. All of them with an ssd. Also, 3 of them would have the same 6th gen intel core i3 processor since the 1 left would have and amd ryzen.
We had the free day for work but we had to do a lot of things, and prepare everything to go back to Portugal. I had to buy an small bagage which I would use to take with me some computers that Valentina allowed me to keep, since they were going to throw'em away.
Tonight we had our last dinner. We decided to go to Bernelių Užeiga Restaurant It was also the first time our teacher Ricardo ate there. We all had a great time and I would like to comeback someday... maybe to eat a different thing, since by mistake I ended eating someone's else food 😂
The day before we did package everything and prepared for leaving the hotel. Since our flight was only at 20h we decided to ask the hotel If they could keep our stuff so we could lunch more comfortable. They got us a room to put everything and told us to comeback for them at 15h
While others were putting their bagages and stuff in the room, I decided to take a photo on a mirror, this would be my last photo in the Hotel...
At around 13:50 of clock we went to 7'Fridays one last time, so our teacher would try it for the first time and I could eat fried bread. After it we went back to the hotel to get our bagages and waited for a bus to get to the airport :)
Already in the airport, we would wait for the boarding time and be in our last few hours in Vilnius.
We got to the plane and hopefully, we were all of us, the 6 students, sitting right next to each other. So we could speak and spend more time during the flight. I was sleeping most of the time. Also me and Diogo ate some mcdonalds burguers we had bought in the morning before lunch.
After that we safely got to Lisbon. In our hotel I took a bath or half an hour (it was really good and the water was warm), we ordered food and then we fell asleep while watching movies.
I wanted to go to Colombo shopping while I still had the time, so as soon as I woke up, I asked the rest of us who would like the join me. We got to see most of the shopping, but my main idea was to go to PCdiga. Sadly PCdiga wasn't open at sundays, thing that I didn't know.
After visiting Colombo, we took the metro to get to the bus station, and also got to lunch in a subway that was basically next to it. Also spent most of the time sleeping, but I can say this travel was warmer, since the bus was full of people. In Faro, most of us met with their parents, on my case, Paulo's parents took me home since we live near to each other.
This experience we had, was one of the best I'll probably have in my life. I won't forget all we did and the fun it was. I got along with all of you guys and I hope we can later in life keep being friends.
I'm grateful for this opportunity we had and I think this Erasmus+ project made me not only improve my skills but also grow as a person. I can say I stayed in Lithuania for a month, and that it also gave me a different perspective on things.
All I can say is "Thank you" to the teachers Paulo and Duarte for planning all of this mobility and allowing me to be part of this amazing team that shared with me this unforgettable experience. I also want to thank Miss Eglé for all her help, the visits and trips she planned, and also for being such a friendly & responsible teacher for us during this month.
Also even knowing it was just for the last days, I also wanna thank the teacher Ricardo for coming to Vilnius to come back with us to Portugal on the same flight.
All of this experience will always be in my heart, and I hope next year's students that will be in Erasmus projects also get to manage and make all of this project worther than it already is... One month looks like a month, but it was quicker than I thought, even when the teacher had told us that already.