Day 1
My week began on Tuesday the 7th of April and it started out with myself and a girl named Robyn- who was a mutual friend at the time, but then we became really good friends!- meeting at the bus stop and making our way into Google! When we departed the bus, we began a roughly ten minute walk towards the Google offices. The closer we got the more swallowed up we became in a sea full of highly intellectual, happy and bubbly Googlers, all chatting about how their Easter and bank holidays went. This was the first inkling that the Googlers were extremely happy to be working at Google because I've never seen people so excited to be returning to work after a bank holiday! Fast forward a couple of hours later and I could understand why!
Walking in the front door was overwhelming to say the least. Considering I'd never been in an environment like this before, I wasn't entirely sure just what to expect. There were bright colours everywhere, security in blue polo shirts, people walking along, chatting blissfully, clutching their Apple and Google gadgets and a fridge stacked with free refreshments! I had officially died and gone to heaven! (insert love heart eyes here)
We made our way upstairs and found 40 other Transition Year students all standing around exchanging names. Half nine came around and our Google buddies introduced themselves. We were all given passes with our names on them that would allow us to enter past the turnstiles and a card that displayed we were oneweek@googlers! This was were our exploration really began! Lifts at Google were far from normal, just like everything else there! Pressing floor eleven on the keypad and entering our designated lifts we were on our way.
Stepping out of the lift, my eyes lay on glass, beautiful, clean, sparkling glass. Looking down, I realised we were up high (if being on floor 11 wasn't enough of a clue, I don't know what exactly I was waiting for!) It was a magnificent view, to say the least. There were buildings stretching back as far as my eyes could see and a canoe race happening on the river. Total and utter bliss. To my right was a pool table and a fridge full of more refreshments such as ice tea, water, sparkling drinks and minerals. Around the corner from that, was a fooseball table. Working in Google must be so boring! Taking a left and walking straight, there were a couple of tables with chairs scattered around them. Again, surrounding this room was glass and if I thought I had seen a magnificent view, I had thought wrong!
People rushing to get to work looked like little blobs, the Aviva Stadium was within touching distance, or so it seemed, cars, buses and bikes filled the streets and houses and buildings looked like little mazes. 'I could get used to this' I thought. I later found out that every floor in Google had a theme and this floors theme just so happened to be 'Oceans Eleven'. I can see what they did there;)
A couple of introductions, agenda explaining and 40 students in utter disbelief and awe later, it was lunch time. Ever heard the expression 'happy as a fat kid in a candy shop'? Well if that same fat kid had of been at Google that day, he would have been bloody ecstatic! Five different restaurants, ranging from burgers and all different kinds of meats and salads to pizza and pastas. Not to mention the deserts. Freezing cold ice cream parallel with luxurious, warm chocolate brownies. Are you still with me?!?!? Take a look at this picture, which does the brownies absolutely no justice what so ever!
(p.s. I forgot to take a picture of the ice-cream, so this is only half of heaven!haha)
After we had put on the Google Stone- something all employees are supposed to put on within the first month of working there because of all the free food!haha- we returned to our base (floor eleven) and walked out onto the balcony (where I took the picture from above) to chat for a while. The weather was gorgeous and the view was so relaxing!
In the afternoon we were given a tour of the second office, which was just as mind boggling as the first! There were swings, music rooms and mini kitchens. Every floor had a different theme, for example, there was a Craggy Island themed floor (Father Ted) and an Alice in Wonderland themed floor too, where all of the items on that floor were upside down! Anything really was possible at Google. To finish the tour we all picked out an ice-cream from one of the freezers in the mini kitchens and headed back to our base.
Back on floor eleven, 40 Google bags filled with SWAG (something Googlers called little merchandise i.e. key rings and things like that) were handed out to each of us and that marked the end of our extremely memorable first day at Google! I was already looking forward to what day two had in store for us!
So that's my first instalment of the four-part series 'MyOneWeek@Google'. Hope you enjoyed and I'll post part two within the next few days!
Thanks for reading,
Michelle x
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