This week at work I have been working mainly on a chart of Sirius Real Estate’s sites to give to auditors and use as reference for the office and have had other small tasks on the side. After five weeks of the internship and six weeks of living in Berlin, I have already become so comfortable with my colleagues and getting around the city. The new department I have been working in with he financial controllers suits my academic interests much more than the accounting position I was working in for the first three weeks of the internship, which has lead to me being much more happy at work, too. I am lucky that I get along with everyone at my job and have such patient and kind bosses. That is something that I have realized is extremely important to me for when I am looking for future internships and eventually a career. The longer I work with my colleagues and get to know them more personally, the more I realize how similar they are to people I would expect to meet in the United States, and that the differences in our cultures really do not set us apart very much at all.
On Friday evening I went to a street festival in Kreuzberg, a neighborhood within Berlin, called Bergmannstrassenfest. It was a cultural festival that featured music, food stands, and various handcrafts for sale. We spent a couple of hours going to dinner, walking around, and listening to the music. Friday turned out to be such a warm day after a few days of cold and cloudy weather, so I was happy to be able to spend some time outside.
The next day we took the train to Potsdam, a small town about half an hour from Berlin. Here we went to the Sanssouci Palace, which was owned by the King of Prussia, Frederick the Great. We had another extremely beautiful, sunny day, which was perfect for walking around the palace grounds. I was shocked at how large the outdoor property was. It took hours just to walk around the gardens, which had countless different paths and were filled with hedges. The gardens contained lots of different houses and fountains that we stopped to look at, as well, and we felt like we were wandering through a maze. On our way home we stopped to have dinner on the water at an Italian restaurant in Potsdam.
Tomorrow we are heading to the Tiergarten, a large park in the center of Berlin, to have a picnic and spend the day. I am looking forward to the new tasks I will be working on at my internship this upcoming week, and I am especially looking forward to next weekend when I will be meeting a friend in Barcelona, Spain!