Closing Time

I think it took until last night, singing old 90′s boy band songs to a crowd of 250 Chinese kids, that I finally had a realization: I hardly feel like I’m in China at all. Well, except for the fact that when I try to speak to people, they mostly either respond in broken English or cannot respond at all. Even if the language is different, the noise is the same. The actions are the same. The personalities, the energy, the raw emotional ether is so absolutely, undoubtedly the same. 

Last night was the closing ceremony of our second camp session. Each session is eight days long and has a big ceremony at both the opening and closing to mark the event, with tons of performances by kids and teachers alike. And the atmosphere, despite the location, is so amazingly familiar. Kids scream for their friends when they go up to perform, quietly compare and rate the singers and dancers, playfully throw candy and paper at each other, and get bored if a bad performance goes on for a longtime. 

Even if I cannot always communicate my exact feelings to the people here, I still feel a connection, a strong connection, something more emotional than spoken. A smile is always returned with a smile, a tongue stuck out gets a laugh, and a confusing explanation of a game returns a puzzled look until that light bulb goes off, and when it goes off, the smirk that follows tells you everything. 

But just as much as I feel that connection, it is so fleeting. It sucks being at a camp that only lasts eight days. The time is just long enough to get close to some of the kids and get a short glimpse of the potential of their personalities and the intricate layers building inside of them. Just as you realize how cool these students are, how much you like to hangout with them both inside and outside of class, just as it seems like great friendships are falling into place, it all ends. 

Quickly, simply. 

The parents come rushing in at 4pm, just as I end my last class, and whisk their kids away into their cars. Bags fly into trunks, students into back seats, with barely enough time for a few hugs and a couple of pictures. And suddenly, the school is empty. You walk by classrooms that are eerily empty, silent for the first time in days. And when I go to sleep tonight, the knocks on the door at midnight from kids asking for help with the air conditioner or the shower, or 2 am. noises calling names through the wall. Everything will be quiet tonight, serene and peaceful. A needed rest, definitely, and some time to just think about the last week. But it’s hard to concentrate on the ones who have left and reminisce for too long. The next group of kids is already on their way, boarding trains and planes in their hometowns,packing their cars for the long drive ahead, a mass of youthful energy descending on a single point in southeastern Xi’an.

I am now more than halfway done with this trip, this job, this learning experience,this….whatever it is. And the reason why I haven’t written as many blog posts as I did before is because I’m just trying to sort out these feelings. Teaching is an intimate job and it takes a lot out of you.  You are solely responsible for the education of about 50 kids every session, trying to enlighten them with knowledge, leave them with something new to add to that cranial repository of all things life and living. It is hard to fathom how teachers can bear to leave students after a year, when I already miss the kids after spending only a week with them.

But so it goes, and so it will continue to go. Two camp sessions down, and another to go. But first, a trip to see the Terracotta Warriors tomorrow! And then another eight days of teaching, a quick jaunt to Beijing, and then back to the Big Apple. 

Does anyone know why it’s called the Big Apple? I had a student ask me that question, and I had no idea. Maybe because New York state grows a lot of apples? 

Anyway, more stories to tell soon enough.

Zai jian!

Matt

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Matt went on his AIESEC internship in Xian, China before starting his freshman year at Yale. You can read more about his experience on his blog. 

Amy's Czech Republic Adventures!

I can’t believe I have already been in the Czech Republic for a month! My internship has flown by so fast. When I first arrived in Ostrava, I had no idea what to expect. Luckily I was greeted at the bus stop by an AIESECer, who helped me navigate the confusing public transportation system. The people I met throughout the day were no exception to that first friendly face, and I finally began to feel at ease in this new place after all my traveling. Following all the welcoming, I prepared a presentation about the United States, which was actually much harder to do than I anticipated. How do you explain American culture to someone who has never been there? When I finished, about ten of us walked to the location where I would present and it turned out to be a lot more legit than I thought! My presentation was part of a series of different cultures, and there were pamphlets on the chairs with my name on them and everything. So crazy! Afterward, we all went to a pub and had an interesting talk about our different cultures.

I headed back to Brno for a few days before my internship officially started, glad to have the opportunity to see even more of the Czech Republic. There, I had the chance to hang out with some more AIESECers, and some were from more familiar places like Madison and Colorado, while others were Brno locals or from China. We watched the Euro Cup in pubs and explored the sights of Brno. The next weekend, I even had the opportunity to go to Berlin, which was absolutely incredible. I’m glad I took advantage of the opportunity to travel while in Eastern Europe.

Eventually, it was time to head to our first summer camp, where we would be for the next 3 weeks. After a long, hot day of traveling and many mishaps along the way, we finally made it to our camp and settled in! I quickly became friends with the other AIESEC intern, Ellie, who is originally from Canada and currently living in Bulgaria. It was definitely nice to be living with someone else who spoke English as a first language, since polished English was rare to find at camp. The first few days were a little difficult, as I felt very much outside my comfort zone. It seemed that almost no one spoke any English, and the kids were extremely shy to even try. At that point I had no idea what to expect of the next 3 weeks, but I was definitely nervous.

Luckily, those circumstances quickly changed as both the children and other staff members quickly warmed up to us. Within a couple days, we would come back from dinner to find 10 eager children on our cabin porch, waiting to try and talk to us. The kids were shy but curious, and the language barrier became less of an issue as we played games, danced, and learned to speak Czech. Once we realized that English was not going to be very prominent at camp, Ellie and I set out to learn Czech ourselves, asking the kids as many questions as possible. The girls would pop into our cabin just to point to different objects and quiz us on their names! I’m proud to say within the first 10 days, we had learned all the body parts, numbers, animals, colors, clothing, objects in our room, greetings, and phrases like “what time is it?” “how old are you?” and “do you like..?” Our basic Czech always broke the ice with the kids, who were either impressed or collapsed into fits of giggles at our accents.

The camp itself has been a ton of fun, and we have been involved in all sorts of activities. Some of these games and adventures have involved painting our faces like zombies, sprinting through neck-deep water of an obstacle course, riding horses in the meadow, playing human bowling, and taking day trips to a nearby swimming pool. It’s been a blast! We even showed them a little American dancing by expertly shuffling to Party Rock, and I even surprised the boys by proving that girls can play soccer, too. Dancing and soccer have definitely been two of the best activities to bond with the kids, as it doesn’t really matter what language you speak for either of them! Overall, this camp has been great for learning about the Czech culture, language, and food as well. Today is our last day at this camp, and then we will be moving to another one very soon for one more week. I am eager to see what the next chapter has in store.

The beautiful view of our camp that I get to wake up to every morning

Some of my favorite 10 year old girls at camp! (and now 4 new facebook friends)

The main square in Ostrava
-Amy D.

Budapest, Take One

I wasn’t really sure what to expect from my internship in Budapest. When I landed, I was worried that the guy who would be picking me up, Gery, would be late, or maybe I wouldn’t be able to find him. But I did find him. His dad, who was driving, didn’t speak a word of English though. I had no directional sense, and I could only trust that this random stranger would get me safely to the dorms (the name and appearance of which I wasn’t even sure of). And he did.

Once at the dorms, Gery helped me get the key to my room and settle in a bit. No one else was in the dorms; because it was a weekday, the other trainees were still working at the camp. I stood in the middle of the rather large dorm room, at a loss for what I was supposed to do next. Gery didn’t really know either, so he tried to call the other trainees and see what they were doing. After a short conversation with a guy named Mark, he told me that Nick and Ani (more strangers) would be back in the dorms shortly, and that I should wait for them.

Nick turned out to be a shredded trainee from Singapore with a heavy accent, and Ani was a tall Indian with a mustache and a heavy accent. I mostly tagged around with Ani for the afternoon. He took me to the mall to pick up water and an Ethernet cable (there is no wifi in the dorms), and then out to dinner at Burger King. (Yes, I did have my first Big Mac in a foreign country.) We also attempted to get a phone for me, but it turned out to be too much of a hassle. I ended up just using my cell phone to call home every week or so to check in, emailing updates when I could and using an app to call using wifi when wifi was available.

We got back around 8pm, so I had more than enough time to settle in before my roommate, Ioanna from Greece, came back around 10pm. She brought with her three other trainees: Hesham from Egypt, Jonathan from New York, and Mark—the guy Gery had spoken to on the phone—from Hong Kong. (Later on, Hesham told me that coming back at 10pm was early for them. Usually, we trainees didn’t come back until at least 11pm. That night, however, they knew that I was arriving. “Oh, Amy’s getting here!” they said, according to him. “She’s from Yale! We need to meet her.” So they came back early just to meet me.)

A mere 17 years of age, I was the youngest in a group of 10 trainees, the rest of whom ranged from 20 to 22 years old. They were all shocked that I hadn’t even started my freshman year of college yet—it ended up being the source of many jokes, especially when I had trouble getting into clubs—but accepted that I was more than capable of running the AIESEC Summer for Youth camp with them. Speaking of running the camp, I came in with little to no idea as to what I was supposed to be doing. I trusted that the other trainees would help integrate me into whatever system they were using, and, as nervous as I was about hanging out with people two to five years older than me, I appreciated the effort they made to include me, the latecomer, in their plans. The second day I was at camp—a Wednesday—Hannah, the girl from Australia, approached me and asked if I wanted to go to a beach retreat with them that weekend.

By the time we were at the beach, it seemed ridiculous that I’d only met the other trainees a few days ago. I bonded with them in just that short period of time, to the point where I felt comfortable going out at night with them and staying in an apartment with them.

My relationships with the kids we taught, however, were more varied and complicated. But that’s a blog post for another time.

Love, Amy

Bem-vindo a São Paulo!

Just a few days in Sao Paulo and it has already been so eventful. This is my first experience going abroad for an extended period of time and by myself. I had no idea what to expect. My thought as I was departing the Los Angeles International Airport (LAX) was, “What am I doing??” I was leaving my home and everything that is familiar for a country I have never been to, full of people I don’t know, and where I can’t even speak the language. “Nervous” doesn’t even begin to describe the emotions that were rushing through me.

But finally, I arrived. I safely made it to the Sao Paulo Guarulhos International Airport (GRU) and right as I walked out of the exit, I was kindly greeted by my host Thais, a 22-year-old Brazilian University student, and her welcoming parents. We exchanged kisses on both cheeks and suddenly, everything wasn’t so scary anymore.

Sao Paulo pizza definitely lives up to its reputation of
being one of the most delicious pizzas in the world. Yummm!

After stopping at Thais’s home for a bit to drop of my bags and settle down, we headed to her grandmother’s house for dinner, where I also met Thais’s cousins and Aunt Valeria. At dinner, I had my first experience of what a typical Brazilian household was like, as well as my first taste, literally, of authentic Sao Paulo food. Dead tired from being up so long from traveling, I finished the small cup of coffee Thais’s grandmother poured for me. Brazilian coffee is so good and so strong! I drank the tiniest amount of coffee I had ever had and became wide-awake! The flavor was also just so rich. Most delicious coffee I have ever tried—and I am a Starbucks regular. The food just kept getting better. Sao Paulo pizza is known to be among the best in the world and it certainly lived up to the expectation. So delicious! Trying different foods, whether well-known or previously unheard of, is definitely one of my favorite aspects of traveling.

I survived my first day in a foreign country, and now it was time to rest up for my big day at work.

I woke up at 6am to get ready and eat breakfast. For breakfast, we had some white bread with cheese and a type of Brazilian meat called mortadella (which is quite similar to the American bologna!) and some fresh guava (called goiaba in Portuguese) juice to wash it down. If there is one thing that is certain about Brazil, and probably most of South America, it is that the flavored drinks and juices here are soooo delicious and plentiful, thanks to the wide variety of exotic fruits available. After gulping down one more cup, it was off to work!

I took a bus to the subway station around 7am and found that I had arrived just in time for rush hour! The station was jam-packed! The subway traffic was nothing like I had ever experienced before (here is a picture of a crowded subway station in Tokyo, but it was basically this):

So crowded!!

As a result, it took about 40 MINUTES to get onto the first car. Personal space means absolutely nothing during this time. In total, it took about 1 hour to get to the school, though, during normal subway hours, it should only take about 15 min.

After surviving the most hectic subway ride I had ever been on, I finally arrived at the school. To my surprise, I was welcomed by a faculty and student body made up of about 75% people of Japanese-decent! I did not expect to see such a large concentration of Asian students at the school. Though, I later learned that the neighborhood the school is located in is actually one of the communities most concentrated with Japanese families and is in close proximity to Liberdade, also known at the “Asian District” and where the largest population of Japanese outside of Japan is located.

At the school, I met the two English teachers I will be working with, Professora Sueli and Professora Christiane. They introduced me to their students, 2^nd through 9^th grade, who were all so welcoming and enthusiastic! They were excited to learn about American culture from a native and were eager to enhance their English.

The enthusiastic 6th graders!

Just as the students were thrilled to learn about a culture and its language, so was I. Let the journey begin….

Celebrity

I signed my first autograph today. There’s something about being the only white person in a roughly two mile radius that makes you stand out. Not really sure why.

I have new respect for celebrities and pro sports players. While I’m teaching, luckily for me, the kids turn off their immediate impulse to start giggling and screeching and pointing cameras at me. But as soon as I start to walk out of a classroom, a switch goes off –click– and girls start pulling my arm back and lining up to take pictures with me. Somehow these girls have Bieber Fever for me. Of course, I smile for their pictures and oblige their requests to sign my name, but the whole time I can do nothing but giggle and make a smirk over to my teaching assistant, trying to get some recognition of the ridiculousness of the situation. But the teaching assistants also ask me to take pictures sometimes, so I guess that recognition is short-lived.

But just as I stick out like the ugly duckling, I am trying to blend in with Chinese culture. My Chinese is getting better everyday (I’m good with numbers from 1-99 and a few phrases) and I’m trying to use it in daily situations like buying a drink or talking to a student. But I guess that I have to accept that I will never fully blend in. I’ll always be the guy with green eyes and a decent tan (every Chinese person I have seen has brown eyes and is really pale, even though it’s the summer).

One of my classes of 15 and 16 year olds.

As my Chinese gets better, my English is getting worse. In order to make sure beginning English students understand what I am saying, I have to speak very slowly and simply. “Can someone raise their hand and give me an answer to this question?” has become “I…need…an…answer….Raise…your…hand.” I even sometimes find myself accidentally about to use common mistakes like “one months” or mispronouncing words. Hopefully I’ll still be coherent when I get home. Writing “One times, I went go China” on my first Yale paper wouldn’t be so impressive.

I took a chance to explore the historic downtown part of Xi’an on Saturday, so I’ll make sure to get some pictures up and all of the details.

Zai jian.

Matt

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Matt went on his AIESEC internship in Xian, China before starting his freshman year at Yale. You can read more about his experience on his blog. 

Second Week in Hungary

Just finished my second week in the camp!  My experience here so far has been awesome.  I look forward to the first day of class every week when I get to meet my new students.  The first half of the day is spent with them in the classroom.  After lunch all the interns meet up and we usually participate in different camp activities.  So far my favorite has been the trip to the local pool and waterpark, which was paid for by the camp.  After dinner we all meet up in an empty classroom where we start lesson planning.  Since the first Wednesday here was the fourth of July, I've made every Wednesday an American themed lesson that the kids really enjoy.  I've had them read articles about America's history and the difference between America and Great Britain.  After a break I teach them a little geography, then have them try and guess the lyrics to a famous American song.  Finally I teach them American slang words, which they always seem to enjoy.

After lesson planning there's usually a late night activity that the interns usually participate in.  It's ranged from a fire dancing show to a rap concert by Hungary's most famous rappers. 

I can't wait for my next two weeks here at the camp, and for the two weeks after in Budapest.  Tomorrow I'll get a new group of students, and I can't wait to learn where they're from/what they're interested in learning.

-Zach

Kelly in Kecskemet

Hungary just isn’t what I expected. I don’t know what I imagined, but all I really knew about the country before I arrived were snippets from history class: the Austro-Hungarian Empire and the later influence by the USSR. I had a friend I met at a camp a few years ago named Miklos who was Hungarian, I knew that goulash was the “must-eat” dish here, and I knew that Budapest was supposed to pronounced “pescht,” lest Hungarians roll their eyes at you.

Hungary, or Kecskemet, the city that the camp is located in, isn’t all that different. In fact, aside from the fact that I can’t understand what’s going on around me (although some people would argue that that is a key and integral difference, I’m pretty oblivious to my surroundings even when I understand the language so it really isn’t that much of a hindrance), I mostly just feel like I’m at camp.

The city of Kecskemet

Which has been great. I really didn’t know what my attitude toward teaching would be, as although I am an outwardly patient person, I easily get frustrated. But as we’re halfway through the second week of teaching, I think I’ve experienced enough to realize that I do in fact love it. My first class of students were so fantastic, and as cheesy as this sounds, I really don’t feel like I could have asked for more of them.

The first day of teaching was a stressful, hectic yet mind-numbingly long day. I was rather exhausted from trekking around Western Europe for the past two weeks, had been training all weekend to learn how to teach, and was still feeling a bit overwhelmed upon realizing that I had free license to structure my curriculum for the week as I wished. Of course, now I really appreciate that fact that the structure of the classes that I teach is entirely of my own creation, but on the first day, I wanted rigidity. I wanted answers; I wanted someone to tell me what to do. What I got was “Okay, your kids are intermediate level, aged 12 to 15, figure it out.” (Obviously paraphrasing to some degree as the mentors of the program were entirely willing to help out, but it certainly felt as if we were just being tossed out into the deep end, discarded floaties bobbing forlornly at the other end of the pool.)

My class from the first week! 

But we got through it. We all did. And as teaching got easier, the students grew to talk more and more. I doubt that they were so great because of anything that I had done, but they truly were fantastic. Each wanted to participate, each loved to laugh, and each (at least it seemed) cared about learning. They grew animated when they talked about subjects that they were familiar with and wanted to share with me (we spent almost an entire hour just talking about Budapest and their lives there) and individually and as a class really proved to be special.

The AIESEC teachers

Aside from teaching, life here is nice. It’s slow, it’s easy, it’s simple. I don’t think I’ve had a chance to relax like this for quite some time. At Yale, it’s always go go go. Go to a meeting. Hole up in the library and study. Power nap but get right back to it. Even while I was at home in Miami, I was working all the time. I had friends to see, I had workouts to do, I had actual work at a bioinformatics lab downtown. But here, it’s calm. When I’m not teaching or lesson planning, I just am lounging. I’ve been playing tennis and badminton pretty frequently, but as we can’t really leave campgrounds, the AIESEC teachers have just been able to chill and enjoy each other’s company. Which is a change that I really needed.

I suppose now that I’m thinking of it, there are moments where I realize “Oh, that’s right, I’m halfway across the world.” One: the camp itself is located on a former Russian military camp. Two: the exchange rate! I know this sounds silly, but the teachers snuck out of the camp into town for dinner one night, and the bill was about 25000 forinths. Which is actually great for dinner for 12, and came to about 10 dollars a person, but it was a slightly unnerving moment.

And now it’s time for the camp’s weekly water fight. One of my students this week hasn’t exactly been an angel, and I’ve already decided that at least a few water balloons have his name written all over them.

Szia! 

Kelly 

AIESEC Yale meets China MC!

Hey everyone! This is Ling, and I am currently sitting at my desk at my internship in the Haidian District of Beijing, China writing this blog post. Beijing is playing host to a large number of Yalies this summer, and naturally there are also some AIESECers in the mix. Last Wednesday the Yale AIESECers (me, along with Korn of OGX and Helen of ICX) met up with the China MC for their weekly team dinner!

I had contacted last year’s MCVP TM (Member Committee Vice President of Talent Management), who I met at WENA (Western Europe and North America AIESEC Conference) over spring break. She put me in contact with this year’s VP TM, Mini, who invited us to dinner. However, Mini ended up with a broken foot a few days before our dinner, so couldn’t make it back to the MC apartment. She told us to go ahead and meet the rest of the MC anyways though.

Finding the MC apartment was actually a bit of a struggle. Mini had sent me very vague directions (which I totally failed at following), which led us down a small dirty road (the wrong one). I ended up calling the MCP (Member Committee President), I was super intimidated, and unknown MC members for directions. I was told I would see old men sitting around playing chess and people cooking 羊肉串 (lamb meat on sticks?). In her email, Mini told me that the MC apartment was located across the street from a place offering "special services" (read: they have prostitutes hanging around their apartment constantly). What I saw instead was a baby poop on his/her mother, so sad. We finally found the MC apartment, located inside this semi-sketchy and very dark apartment building.

Despite the outward appearances of the apartment, the inside was actually huge. We didn't want to take pictures lest we seem creepy, but the MC apartment houses 18 MC members plus the CEEDs that were living there.

Each Wednesday, two members are assigned the task of cooking and feeding everyone else. When we got there, the food preparation process was already well under way. This is Michael, one of the MC members responsible for cooking that week, chopping up veggies. (Yes I am in all of these pictures).

We met most of the MC, and they were all soooo nice! They also had two CEEDs there: one from the US who'd been in China for a gap year and one from the UK. Here is a picture of us with the CEEDs (all of these pictures are credited Korn).

There ended up being SO MUCH FOOD, and it was all very delicious, despite Michael and Alex (the other chef for the night) going on about how they didn't know how to cook. We ended dinner with a really sweet and delicious and chocolatey dessert brought by the Chilean member of the China MC.

Overall, we had a fantastic time meeting the MC and eating a really delicious dinner, I hope we get to meet them again soon! Hope everyone is having amazing times all around the world!

Happy July 4th!
Ling

Victor Working Hard in Tokyo

This blog should've been written 1 week ago.

            Victor Liao from AIESEC Yale is now in Tokyo, Japan. Working hard. However, for everyone to be able to know his awesomeness and how hard he contributes to his internship, he decided to write this blog while working.

           His EP manager gave him a wrong expectation on AIESEC internships. Believing that AIESEC internships are chill and easy, Victor realized that his EP manager sucks after working 13 hours on the first day of work. He probably broke the record for longest working hour EP. It is Japanese business culture for workers to work late until 8 or 9 o’clock to show they are hard working. Although the EP manager told him that the working hour is from 9am to 6pm Monday to Friday, Victor normally goes home at 10 or 11pm three days a week. This is a consulting firm... AIESEC DO HAVE LEGIT BUSINESS INTERNSHIPS.

Besides working on the global recruiting project assigned by the company, Victor was assigned to another difficult task – having lunch and dinner with all the employees in the company for them to practice English conversation skills and know more about different culture. Victor probably tried all the restaurants near the company’s office. Fortunately, the company paid for all his meals.

Done with work, weekends are all about SLEEPING, EATING, and DRINKING. Oh! And some sight-seeing. The AIESECers in Tokyo University are awesome people. Besides making sure every logistic detail is well prepared, they have events for Victor to attend every weekend. Dorm drinking party, izakaya drinking party, BBQ drinking party, and the crazy regional AIESEC drinking party with 80 students all in one restaurant drinking… In these parties, Victor made a lot of friends after impressing people with his drinking ability. He even received some funny drunk texts. Also, Victor got to introduce himself to the LC and share some personal experience in a LCM. Next weekend, Victor will be going on a trip with some AIESECers to a nearby tourist site to see some Japanese temples.

             Tokyo is a really nice place. Good food, fancy department stores, cool culture, and some really nice people. Victor really enjoyed his internship so far and is really thankful to his EP manager for making this exchange possible. He really hopes that in the future more people can do this internship as well. OGX team, work harder next semester!!