11 November 2017 is a big day for SPOCK5, the first study weekend was held! With blood sweat and tears our select group of diligent students toiled away at the cases so that they may one day afford the trip to China. The efforts included the groundwork to create a mobile quiz application in java, while other groups did research for internet of things applications or managed to reprogram an oscilloscope.

The date, November 11th (11/11), called Singles’ Day or Guanggun Jie (光棍节: Guānggùn Jié) is an entertainment festival popular among young Chinese people that celebrates their pride in being single. The date was chosen because the number “1” resembles an individual who is alone. The event is not an officially recognized public holiday in China, although it has become the largest offline and online shopping day in the world. Sales on Alibaba’s sites, Tmall and Taobao, have reached US$5.8 billion in 2013, US$9.3 billion in 2014, US$14.3 billion in 2015, US$17.8 billion in 2016. Although we worked hard on the cases the payment is not comparable with the sales on Alibaba’s sites.

After a long first day we came together for a get-to-know-each-other evening with a few beers and a couple of games of pingpong. Before going back to work on Sunday.