Mohandas Karamchand Gandhi was an Indian activist who was the leader of the Indian independence movement against British rule. Employing nonviolent civil disobedience, Gandhi led India to independence and inspired movements for civil rights and freedom across the world. The world community had recognized his birth anniversary ‘October 2nd’ as ‘the International Day of Non-Violence’ in 2007. His legacy is well honoured.

According to reports, 70 countries have installed a statue of Mahatma Gandhi world wide. Some locations in which his statue can be seen are Pietermaritzburg – South Africa, Johannesburg – South Africa, Amsterdam – Netherlands, Washington – USA, The Hague – The Netherlands, Almaty – Kazakhstan, Paramaribo – Suriname, Georgetown – Guyana & Rio de Janeiro – Brazil.

We’ve managed to develop two 3D Virtual Reality applications on the EON Reality platform. The one was an educational walk-through of conventional water treatment in Singapore and the second one a learning module for the maintenance of a rooftop water tank. It was rewarding to see our work being displayed on international Stage during Singapore International Water Week a few weeks ago. The second application is also a great break-through for students to gain experience through Virtual Leaning. Rooftop water tanks are NOT accessible for public and therefore difficult or nearly impossible to bring 100 students on top of a 40 story building. It was different for a me coming from a web-development background to work with EON’s software, but we adapted easily.

The iCube, used to project 3D simulations you can literally walk in

Working at ITE was a great experience! Just to see how much is invested in educating young people and preparing them to become skillful professionals. Though the courses are less academical, we must not forget that we need skillful people who are willing to take those drawings and calculations and turn them into masterpieces! This is also one of the reasons that ITE has many collaborations with leading companies in the world. Students get to learn about the latest technology while opportunity awaits them.

Seriously? You have a fighter jet at school?

My admiration also goes the WorldSkills Foundation who got me here in the first place. They literally go across the world to promote skills by initiating projects that include young professionals to develop and implement innovative solutions for real challenges. Bringing together people across the world, collaborating, tackling global challenges, broadening perspectives, celebrating accomplishments and sharing knowledge are just some of the words that come to my mind at the moment to describe it.

Team USA and Australia for the Water Innovation Challenge

So what have I gained after this? So much… I literally have to sit down with you and tell you all about it.

• Working with 3D Virtual Reality
• Participating in projects in a different working environment and culture
• Managing my company (Bit Dynamics) from halfway across the world and putting trust in my team back home
• An eye opening experience about large markets compared to Suriname
• Singapore is not really a “fine” country, people do occasionally take a sip of their drink in the train
• The pro’s and con’s of a structurally “perfect” system
• A sharpened life goal and connected some dots that will help me achieve it
• Fuel to go back to Suriname and working towards getting us connected with WorldSkills
• At least 100 Singaporeans who know where Suriname is
• Friendships and connections
• A possibility to be crowed KayaKing :D

Do take the time to learn more about

• WorldSkills Foundation https://www.facebook.com/worldskiller
• Institute of Technical Education https://www.ite.edu.sg/
• EON Reality http://www.eonreality.com/

We’re actually in the last stage of the project and working to finish it off the next week. We haven’t posted a lot of updates about the project due to some confidential matter. We’ve been talking about this with the involved parties and my colleague Michael was able to do a write up of the beginning phase of the project.

As most creative projects, it all starts with rough drafting, sketching, doodling, brainstorming and story-boarding. I’ve embedded Michael’s write-up below. Be sure to check it out!

So from my experience in camping in Suriname, whenever you arrive at a camping spot the first thing you do is setup your accommodation (tent, hammock, etc.) and then prepare or look for food. So after settling at in my hotel the first night I decided to wandered around in the neighborhood and yes, I found the Hawker Center! That definitely beats taking the metro every night to the mall to get some food. The variety of food available at the Hawker Centers is great. From noodles, to fried rice, dumplings, seafood, fish and also the simple chicken rice with vegetables.

To be honest, I haven’t tried the most interesting yet, but I’m planning to go for some seafood some time soon. I also discovered 4 more Hawker Centers in the neighborhood, so they’re almost everywhere.

So I decided to go to a place in a mall nearby called “Express Cuts” where you just walk in, put a 10 dollar into a machine and receive a card to queue up for your turn. I already knew what not to expect, because I could see the difference between the barbershops back home and the results of the customers before me. I got my turn, told the lady I wanted a Crew Cut (apparently that is what my haircut is called) but not too short on top. After 10 minutes she was done… and no pencil line side burn what I’m used to. They don’t do that.

So the service was “okay” but not to be compared to what I’m used to when going to a barbershop back home. When you get a haircut in Suriname, you almost appear BRAND NEW when walking out of the shop, looking sharp as a razor!  Going to the barbershop is also more than going to a barbershop. It’s going to a chill spot where you could actually enjoy waiting your turn, listening to good music, watching a football game or just conversations. Not to degrade the hair salon here, but the point is that barbers in Suriname have very good skills and can definitely match up their skill to the world!

Having said that I’d like to send a shout out to The Basement Barbershop (Paramaribo) and Jased Barbershop (Commenwijne). Just want to let you know you’re doing a great job! Big up!

Together we have to design and develop two 3D Virtual Reality applications for the Institute of Technical Education (ITE). The first is an application that will be displayed at the International Water Week 2014 in Singapore and the second will be used in one of the courses of ITE. In this application the student gets to be in a 3D environment to study a subject which is virtually right in front of him and also gets to complete tasks without the risk of material loss or fatal injuries, which is a good preparation for the real thing.

The application we’re developing is being build on the EON Reality platform which very new to me, so for the 2 weeks I’ve been here I’ve been doing a lot of reading and watching video’s about this software. We’ve also met some of the team members of the EON Reality office based in Singapore and they’ll be available to us to answer some questions when we need it. The better part of it is, that we get to attend a 2 day EON Developers Training next week, which will hopefully accelerate our learning process.

Because this is a 3D Virtual Reality application we’re building, it’s clear that I have to brush up on some 3D skills also. I’ve been walking through 3ds Max tutorials also for the past 2 weeks. Good thing this software is around for so long, so there’s a lot of helpful content online.

You guys are making good progress – Miss Sock Tin Yeo, Director Academic & Pedagogic Innovation at ITE

So if the two above applications are not alienating me enough, I still have to be educated about the contents of the application and the course it will be implemented in. I’m not complaining but it’s just to give you an idea about my experience. We’re very enthusiastic about the project and are making good progress so far. In fact, they moved our deadline for the first part to one week earlier.

This immersive experience is getting very popular in the education system at ITE since our application is not the first. Except for the real life risks this might also be a less costly way of educating the students. Just think about the possibilities of implementation of this thing.

One thing is for sure, I’m not returning to Suriname empty handed… empty headed I mean :).

note: image used in this post is property of EON Reality

Somewhere around last year the WorldSkills Foundation (WSF) send out a call for champions to participate in a very innovative project. The call wouldn’t have reached me if my former trainer, Wouter Niekus, hadn’t posted the message on Facebook. I was immediately interested and decided to sign-up en felt pretty confident. On January 17th I got an email quoting:

I am delighted to inform you that following your interview with Sock Tin and follow-up internal discussions at ITE, you have been selected to join the team for the upcoming Virtual 3D Learning Innovation Lab project in Singapore. Congratulations!

So what is it I really I signed up for?
The project is initiated from a partnership between The Institute of Technical Education (ITE) Singapore and WSF where WorldSkills alumni are selected to develop a Virtual 3D application, a cutting-edge training tool that will be used by over 500 students at the new ITE College Central Icube classroom facility. To break it down: Students get to be in a 3D Virtual Reality environment where they can do some hands-on learning. This time we’re building a application in  Plumbing & Sanitation which will be rolled-out in ITE’s own Facility Management courses.

To get an idea what we’re building you can view this video http://youtu.be/9g-QYVESfw0. The result of last year project completed by Wouter (Netherlands) and Nata (Brasil), both webdesign champions. Joining me this year is Michael Christensen, a CAD designer from Canada. So basically we’ll be using his expertise in 3D CAD design and my expertise in Programming to complete the p