(because it was way too long to re-type)
its midterm season already. can you believe it?! luckily i dont have any, but i do have a bunch of projects and presentations coming up. grad school is pretty different from undergrad in terms of the type and quality of work you do, but i dont mind because we can pick all of our topics. right now im working on a presentation about social work interventions to survivors of FGM, a presentation explaining a project in Scotland targeting Johns to deter prostitution and human trafficking, and a reserach proposal for a comparative social policy analysis surrounding the laws of prostitution. fun stuff!
i started my internship yesterday! i chose the one at IBCR (the one I really wanted from the time I heard about it in ny). im nervous about it though, mostly because of the schedule. my uni suggests an internship during the year for 2 days a week or one full time for the summer only. they require you do it full time for 4 months, starting yesterday. so i have NO idea how ill work full time and manage full time courses, but the internship is PERFECT for what I want to do so the risk is worth it. it will end at the end of february, which i realized yesterday means ill be swamped for the whole ski season =[
...and a little about my first day. boring, of course. a lot of listening and reading to learn about what ill be getting involved in. its a small office, about 5 staff and 5 interns. the interns were all really nice and i ate with them and we went for a walk. they all speak french and you could tell they didnt really want to speak english, but they did for me. its more motivation to learn faster, i guess! my projects are county profiles on the MENA region (North Africa and Middle East), basically helping each county to produce reports about themselves and how they've implemented the UN's convention on the rights of the child. I think I'll do a lot of editing (they think if they put a report in google translate its acceptable english. i returned one to egypt yesterday and said its not even editable - have an english speaker there work on it first.) ill also do fact checking and when the reports are done at the end of January Ill spend the next month analyzing them and trying to establish best practices for the other surrounding countries to adopt. pretty awesome stuff. my other project is about child soldiers. im not really sure what work ill do for that project yet, but i was told to memorize all related international/humanitarian law about it this weekend! fun!
also im getting a vibe that the office, or at least the boss, is really weird. its set up in an old high school gym (i cant escape!) so the sound echoes a lot, so NO ONE SPEAKS! all day. all. day. if you have a question you have to walk over to the person and whisper to them. its SO weird. and at lunch everyone has great personalities! i wish i could make a little conversation to keep the day moving. also, apparently the boss FLIPS if youre even 5 mins late, which i always am. so im really nervous about staying punctual every day for 4 months. and i had to ask YESTERDAY for approval for one day off for thanksgiving, and i may not get it. he wasnt there yesterday but he sounds wacko.
i dont hang out with people as much as id like to. i called my few friends a few times and they were always busy, so i dropped it figuring they just dont want to hang out. so i was getting bored and lonley but im really hopeful about the other interns at work. theyre young, social, and they already invited me to two different things yesterday. yayyy!
um.. im having a halloween party (with all 2 of my friends, lol) next weekend. im wearing what i wore to rococco last year, lar.
next week is mine and daves 6 year anniversary. whooooooooooooooooooooooah! i went home for his birthday last weekend and i cried when i had to come back. it was so nice to be comfortable and around people im familiar with. i am determined to get more out of montreal, though. theyre having an occupy montreal thing today i was considering going to, actually. have you guys participated in any of the protests?
(side note: i didn't go, but i followed the live feed from nyc for hours yesterday. crazy stuff is happening. crazy.)
sorry that was really long. i miss you bungholes. stuff reminds me of you guys all the time. i talk about you a lot. anyho, love and smd.
<3
