Hi, I’m Sonya. I am 21 years old from Westfield, New Jersey. I am a double major in Spanish and Strategic Communications with a focus in Public Relations minoring in Italian. I have an international internship this summer where I am now; in Madrid, Spain. For those of you wondering what a day in the life of an intern in Madrid looks like, here you go:
Every day during the week I wake up at 7:45am to go to work. I make a cup of coffee and have some yogurt. I put on my business casual dress or a Lilly Pulitzer dress with a blazer. I then put on some makeup to look professional and put together at the office. I always remember to grab my metro card and then I head to the metro station to start my commute. I hop on line 1 (Estrecho) then switch to line 4 (Bilbao). I normally arrive twenty minutes before I am supposed to be at my office, so I walk to my favorite coffee place (Café y Te) right across the street from where I work. I sit down and immediately I am served. After just two days they already knew my order; a very typical black coffee which here in Madrid they call a café americano.
I arrive at my office exactly at 9 or a few minutes before because I am used to the North American culture of getting in trouble if you are late for work. On the other hand, here in Madrid, you will be surprised to find out that no one comes to work on time. In Madrid we are on Spanish time. Nothing is rushed – especially arrival times. Everyone is always late and that is a just a cultural norm that I had to adjust to. One of my colleagues, Nuria Sanchez, comes in with the keys around 9:15 am. I walk in and begin my work immediately.
Every morning I am asked to complete a certain task, updating the articles posted on Google about AOGLP, GLP, and AUTOGAS for my firm. Once I am done with that I make myself a cup of coffee – we all need coffee and take a break together before working on our projects for the day. The CEO arrives after we have our coffee and greets us all. He always says that I have a smile on my face and he is happy to see me every single morning.
Now it is time to crank out all of the press releases. I start off with our two clients, Renotkil and Martinez Loriente. I write press releases based on what our clients want the public to be informed about. I work very diligently to make sure that my Spanish is correct and that my grammar is perfect. There is a lot of pressure for me to write it correctly because it goes out not only in Madrid, but all over Spain. Being that I know how to manage my time well from experience in the US, I never get stressed. I take one task at a time and get the job done in an efficient manner.
Gema Izguerido, my boss, and I work together every day to complete all of the press release components; we tackle the release together because it is that large. After we write the press release we must fill out “la nota de prensa”; a synopsis of all of the articles that we have written today. Then together we create an excel file explaining the details of each source that we have included in the final press release. Once this is done we are finally ready to send it to our clients. Sometimes Gema gives me 16 press releases to complete. I work from 9am-2pm and then I am free to go home as long as my work is complete.
I am so thankful to have such an amazing internship at Consultores y Personales Quantumleap, where not only have I developed professional skills in the Spanish workplace, but also have improved my Spanish. I cannot wait to see what other opportunities this international business experience will bring me in the future.
Photo 1. by Sonya Khedr
Photo 2. by Sonya Khedr