My Mechanical Engineering Internship in Belville, South Africa

After the 12-hour flight to Cape Town, I had two weeks to settle in and look for a suitable car. Luckily I had already found an apartment with Jana. After a few days I felt really comfortable in the mother city, as Cape Town is often called. You can do a lot of things here, from wine tasting in Stellenbosch to climbing the Table Mountain; you won't get bored that fast. Those who miss the German food can go to the Delheim Winery, which offers white sausages and other German delicacies.

My first day of my internship was just around the corner and I was warmly welcomed by my future colleagues. Right from the start I was allowed to take on a lot of responsibility with my project. Especially as a German engineering student, I had the feeling that I had gained a great advantage in terms of trust. My internship was all about speeding up the one production process that was currently a kind of bottleneck, but also about increasing safety in production. My company produces large industrial boilers. These boilers have to be turned several times during production. This was done with the help of welded brackets and the crane. This is slow and dangerous because the brackets have to be welded on and off each time. In the first phase of the project it should therefore be investigated to what extent these rotations are necessary. But since it turned out that the rotations are necessary, I was to construct a device that would rotate the boilers, which weigh over 70 tons, with the help of hydraulic cylinders. I was and am very satisfied with my internship and have learned a lot.

After finishing my internship I wanted to go on a road trip through South Africa together with my girlfriend, who also did an internship in Cape Town at the same time. From Cape Town we followed the Garden Route along the coast to the border of Mozambique and then via Lesotho, a small state completely surrounded by South Africa, back to Cape Town. Special are the safaris that you can do in different parks. We went to Imfolozi and Tembe Park and both were really impressive. It is unbelievable how different South Africa is; not only in terms of climate zones and vegetation (from semi-desert to savannah to tropical climate everything is there) but also in terms of different cultures and languages. It was a great experience to experience all this, to see the incredible beauty of nature and to meet so many interesting, great people. It's really true: Cape Town (and South Africa in general) has its very own magic. So I can only recommend: go there and make your own experiences and memories! It is wonderful!