7 week report :-P

i just had my mid-internship review with my manager. his feedback was generally positive, so i am happy. he asked a pretty interesting question during the review meeting: "so do you feel that your time here has been going by quickly?".

i honestly did not know what to answer..."both" i said, and he kinda took it as a bad sign. "well, it is really not a bad sign", i tried to explain...

if i think of the stuff i've learned at work, then time has flown by pretty slowly. i know a lot more about Search; i know a lot more stuff about how things work at Microsoft; i've changed my mind about the industry (initially i thought it was not a great thing); all these put together make me feel like i've been here for quite a while.

if i think of the fun-stuff i've been doing (meeting people, going places) then, yes, time has flown by pretty quickly so far, and i feel like i still need to do a lot more stuff before my internship ends. i've met sooo many interesting interns, that it will be hard to leave this place and go back to MD. let's see, here are short descriptions of some of them:
- the "fab four" explorers who work in the same "hallway office" as me. Ronny, Judith, Nik, and Nikki. they are waaay to loud sometimes. they make fun of ronny all the time (well, he's just really funny to begin with). they are nice to have around; whenever i am too tired or need to relax, i just take my headphones off and listen to their stories. judith always talks about her funny family, nik always picks on judith, nikki can sneeze for 10 times in a row, and ronny...well...ronny is just ronny and that's enough.
- phil and lucky: the amazing SDE interns from Commerce Search. their projects are hard as hell, but they've been doing great work so far (their managers have nothing but good things to say about them). phil is my doubles partner for ping pong, but i havent played any matches with him in a looong while (yeah, i need to work less). lucky is the mellow overachiever; good for really deep/serious conversations; bad for ping pong cause he always kicks my ass (my expansive ego cant take that).
- the "champions": i met these kids because of Tom. Tom is this perfect example of a "social butterfly". he brings people together, and he can organize some of the best parties. you can't get bored when he is around. the "champions" themselves are a pretty interesting group. geeky as hell, but REALLY fun. so far, i need to admit tho that, out of all the champions, my favorite is Mehmet. he is this larger-than-life guy with tons of energy. he is the life of the party, and he says he will help me make dolmas ("sarmale", for romanians).
- the "russians": well, in this group most of the people are russian, or at least from the former Soviet block. hmm...let's see, my favorite in the group is this guy called eugene (idk how to spell the russian version of his name). he's the type of chill dude with a really naughty smirk on the face. my next favorites are Janette (i am sure i spelled that wrong) and Barjan. they are an interesting couple: Barjan is this ADD-guy who starts talking to random people on the street with a fake Borat-accent (Barjan is actually from Kazahstan). Janette seems to be the opposite: she is a typical good-girl, with really good taste in clothes.

well, so...this is how i would summarize my 7 weeks in seattle so far. i did not want to talk about work, cause i get enough of it all day long. i also did not want to talk about the places i've seen, cause...they are just places. the folks around me, tho , they are pretty awesome and this would be an entirely different experience without them :)