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Monthly Archives: April 2012

Freedom Day in South Africa

27 Friday Apr 2012

Posted by EngineerChic in Diversity, South Africa, women in engineering

≈ 1 Comment

Today marks the 18th anniversary of democracy in South Africa. On this day in 1994, people of colour were allowed to vote for the first time, ending Apartheid and white minority-rule in South Africa, with Nelson Mandela being elected into presidency.

Since then, our country has come quite a way! We now have our third democratically-elected president, equal rights for women and all races live in peace and harmony. Ok, maybe thats a bit too optimistic, but in the short time that we have been free, a lot has been done to further equality in my country.  It’s hard to imagine the very different world my mother and father grew up in.

For starters, it was close to impossible for non-whites to study engineering during Apartheid.  In fact, most of the private-sector was closed off to non-whites due to the harsh racist laws imposed.  Most promising young people went into fields such as medicine and law fields that allowed them to practise their professions within their communities. This is why doctors and lawyers are still highly revered in the Indian community of South Africa. (My dentist told me that he would have been an engineer if he had had the opportunity.)

On the other hand, globally, womens’ rights in the education system and the workplace have greatly improved over the last few decade. Part of South Africa’s Constitution, written shortly after Nelson Mandela became leader of our country, creates a platform for women to have equal rights to men in all regards. Over the last decade in particular, the country have implemented key policies to see this dream manifest. As a result, companies in South Africa’s largest industry – one that hires the most amount of engineers in the country – has started realising the value that women add in the workplace.

Mining in South Africa is by far the most important sector of our economy – a large piece of the pie which until recently had been completely closed off to non-whites and women.  Due to legislation, women have been encouraged and aided into careers in the mining industry – from both a developmental/ technical standpoint, as well as a business and leadership one. Despite the support women get, most still bear the brunt of discrimination in its many forms in the workplace. As elsewhere in the world, this is changing, however slowly.

Working in this space, I have been fortunate to encounter amazing women who have managed to make their mark in the toughest of industries despite real challenges.  So much has changed in the last 18years that its impossible to imagine how my life would have been in those days. I am really grateful to the men and women who sacrificed their freedom, reputation, careers and even lives to bring freedom to me and every other South African.

HAPPY FREEDOM DAY SOUTH AFRICA

 

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ConstructingChic

25 Wednesday Apr 2012

Posted by EngineerChic in Career, Engineer Chic!

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So have I started a blog-trend? Or could there really be another me out there?

I recently discovered another awesome Sassy Southern Sister with a super-chic blog about being a feminine female in the rough-and-tumble world of engineering!

(and by South I mean Southern Hemisphere, of course 😉

Check her out at ConstructingChic.com

 

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The Law of Engineering

25 Wednesday Apr 2012

Posted by EngineerChic in Career

≈ 3 Comments

Something that I’ve heard again and again from people in careers is that they had no idea they would end up in the job they were in today. So many people start out in one career and often dramatically change career-paths at some or other point. Thats one of the resons I’m not too stressed about where I want to end up – as long I am learing a lot where I am and having a great time, its okay. And boy, am I learning a lot!

I never knew thatone of the biggest challenges on the project so far was ensuring the equipment was on site at the right time. This process is called procurement and is basically the process of selecting, purchasing, fabricating and ensuring the stuff is delivered to site at the right time. This is most of what I am doing right now. You may be thinking – why in the world is a mechanical engineer busy buying goods? Well, actually, there is so much that has to go into this process that requires a broad technical knowledge base.

Firstly, I am interfacing with the design engineers to ensure they put together the technical specifications of all the equipment packages – the crushers, the tanks, the structural steel – to meet the needs of the plant we’re building. Next, I need to ensure that the suppliers out in the market get the packages, and that they are reliable and are able to give us a good price and deliver in time. This means interfacing with the scheduling team and the accountants.  Putting all of these bits of information together and coordinating the various consultants, suppliers and project team members to do something as simple as placing an order for a ball mill requires time and serious organizational skills!

The other big eye-opener was the legal contract issues that come up. You would think that the agreement between us (the client) and the suppliers would be mainly about getting the work done at the right price in the right time. But no. Its more about ensuring that each party agrees on performance guarantees, equipment warantees, contractual obligations and exclusions, and that each party’s lawyers are 100% happy that the other isn’t going to find the smallest loophole to default on commitments!

Well ok, I am overdoing it just a little. This may seem very negative and unneccesary, but believe me, this is the type of thing that you, as an engineer, will encounter in  the real world. Contract management and the law behind it is something I’m finding actually quite interesting…who knows…maybe my career will take an unexpected turn in that direction one of these days…

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Home Improvements

06 Friday Apr 2012

Posted by EngineerChic in Engineer Chic!

≈ 1 Comment

I know its been forever since I’ve blogged, but I think you’ll forgive me – I have been busy moving into and setting up my new place. My mum’s also moved up with much of her furniture (I didn’t have much) and we’ve been planning on how to integrate our furniture with the style of the new house.  Since its an open-plan living roon, dining room and kitchen, and the kitchen is done in gorgeous greys and silvers.  The problem is, most of our furniture is hardwood with richly-coloured upholstery!  We have beautiful vintage frames and mirrors, in gold not silver – these will have to be repainted.

So as you can imagine, we’ve been busy planning on how to give our things a complete make over and have come up with some exciting ideas!

  • Painting a feature wall in a rich, suede silver-grey with loads of texture;
  • Re-upholster chez-lounge from red and gold, to a rich velvety silver;
  • Redo the mirrors, frames and some small pieces of furniture in silver leaf using rub and buff;
  • Sanding down the oak dining room table and giving the legs a dark grey stain and the top a darker one to lift the grain;
  • Staining the bar stools by giving them a stoney grey wash with a slightly weathered finish;
  • Re-upholstering all of the armchairs and getting some matching curtains to go;

I’ve decided that as we will be doing much of the work ourselves, it would make for a great series of blogs! I’ll do before-and-after pictures and step-by-step guides on how we went about revolutionising our existing furniture to make our new house look highly chic and livable!

And not to forget the garden! Its a nightmarish mess of ill thought-out arrangements of plants and flowers that will also need a complete make-over.

This is so exciting! I cant wait!

I actually bought a drill last week – a really good Black and Decker one. I discovered that the cordless ones are much nicer, but a whole lot more expensive (more than double the price). I went to work hanging picture frames and mirrors today – drilling is a lot easier than I thought it was. I can’t believe I never thought I could drill a hole before.  Even with my newly done manicure (a beautiful set of bright red nails with just a splash of nail-art) I managed just fine.  Now I feel silly about all those times I waited around for my male friends/ colleagues to drill things for me when all this time I could have just as well done it myself!

Ooh, I feel so empowered! I also bought a set of screwdrivers and a hammer and some other stufff. I found all these at my local hardware store. I got one of the sales-guys to show me where everything was and what I needed for the things I needed to do. He was just so helpful. I will definitely go back because that hardware warehouse was a dream. Loads of useful things!

 I can’t wait until I get my sander and start sanding stuff! 

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