Hospitals are often described as a dull and boring place to be. To be there, even when you aren’t sick, can be very emotionally tiring. So as a form of leisure, we always rely on our smartphones or simply chat with the nurses. Who would ever thought we could have a chatty robot in a hospital?

In a hospital in Munich, Germany, there is a cleaning robot that has been attracting the attention of the patients as well as the visitors. The robot has no problem of asking people to move in the case they are blocking her way of cleaning. In the case of the visitor resisting to do so, she shall let her digital tears flow from her eyes.

The robot, called Franzi, roams around the clinic’s entrance 3 times a day as her feet automatically mop the floors. There are patients who stop by to take photos with her as well as to chat with the robot which has the height of a metre.

Franz is not natively German but instead was a Singaporean. She was named Ella and spoke English before coming to Germany earlier this year. She can also sing classic German pop songs and even rap on certain occasions.

Rettler, a company in-charge for Franzi is determined that the robot isn’t taking the jobs from real humans but instead supporting her ‘colleagues’ who struggled a lot throughout the pandemic.

However, as how robots are supposed to be, it has its own limits like the inability to get into tight corners and if it hits an obstacle, it would burst into tears and be stuck until being rescued. She sounds like a Libra!

Due to its popularity, Rettler’s company decided to keep her there for good rather than deploy her somewhere else again. 

This is one of the good examples on how AI can be very beneficial for the general public. Being happy releases endorphins inside you and it is surely good for your (mental) health. Maybe we can expect to see more robots like this in the future , especially in the healthcare section.