Buenos días a todos!
It’s now mid-July, and I’ve got approximately twelve days left in Madrid and nine days left of my internship at CIAL. It’s the big elephant in the room- whether I see the 25th looming on my calendar, or my host dad mentions it, I can’t seem to ignore the approaching end of the program (terrible). However, that’s only motivated me to make the most awesome of end-of-trip bucket lists:
- To explore the neighborhoods of La Latina, Malasaña, and around my house more
- Return to El Rastro, Palacio Real, Retiro Park as well as some favorite restaurants and tapas bars I’ve written down
- Get churros!! Somehow I still haven’t, which is crazy.
- Do a proper, touristy pub crawl
… and the list goes on! I won’t put all of it on here, but I’m excited to complete all of my targets and activities.
Over the weekend I got to cross some items off from my list. On Saturday, I got to go thrifting and exploring through the vintage stores of Malasaña with a friend, a neighborhood I’ve been wanting to wander in for a while. Then, I took my first real tour of the Palacio Real, which was even more beautiful and grand on the inside! My favorite part of the palace was all of the ceiling frescos and murals- they were so intricate and suffused with natural light in the afternoon when we visited. Afterwards, we took the Renfe train a ways from the city center to spend our night at the Mad Cool music festival. It was the first festival I’ve been to, and it was lots of fun! We saw Girl in Red, Finneas, and Olivia Rodrigo, and the latter had the most insane crowd- we were in the thick of it for only 3 songs before we had to escape to the fringes of the mob. On the edge, it was much more fun because you could actually move and dance and even breathe! Overall it was a jam-packed but exciting day.
On Sunday, I had a more relaxing time which began at the La Latina train station, where I exited for the El Rastro market. I was on a mission to finally get souvenirs and gifts for friends and family back home, and I was successful for (almost) everyone! I also got to poke around souvenir shops near the museum area and Banco de España for some gag gifts. Then it was back home for a chill lunch before an afternoon spent by the pool with a friend, where we planned post-work excursions for the week (and compared bucket lists!).
Throughout the previous week, not much happened- I got sick AGAIN with strep throat and had to schedule myself a doctor’s appointment to get diagnosed and to grab prescription medication. Thankfully I was able to take a few days of work off to fully recover and now in the new week I can confidently say I am finally done with all of these health issues!!
As for reflecting on communication differences and experiences at my CIAL internship, I can definitely recall some. For example, here in Spain I’ve found that my bosses prefer to communicate with me using a middleman – my mentors. Typically, information is passed to me by my mentor graduate students, and I rarely meet solo with my bosses. I believe this style stems from them wanting me to develop good working relationships with my mentors who I spend most of my time with, and I’ve found it to be a perfectly fine system. It’s also an environment which is much more dependent on myself as the intern prompting communication, rather than the American style of receiving lots of instruction, deadlines, and feedback from your higher-ups. I get the opportunity to speak up and communicate a lot more than I feel I would in an average USA job experience, and it feels more like a two-way street than a one-way which is a great balance.
Luckily I don’t feel that I’ve had to overcome any miscommunication situations- instead, it’s usually a hesitation to communicate on my end that I have to overcome. I’ve gotten much better at being confident and direct with my questions, check-ins, and follow up emails. This is something I’m glad to have worked on because it’s truly so helpful to have practice with professional communication, and it’s a skill I can bring with me anywhere in life. My internship experience at CIAL has been a great place to develop and workshop my professional skills, and my communication is a prime example.
Ciao, Katherine