The Week

The Department of State

My special pass that I had to wear at the Department of State


First time dressed up in a full suit for my interview
at the Department of State - of course it was 85 degrees out (so HOT)

The Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (I finally took a picture)

I have not updated my blog in awhile because this week has been pretty hectic and I've been too busy to write.

Work was really busy this week, we had lots of events and lots of publications to send out, and also database entry to do (probably the most monotonous and boring task I've had to do so far).

We also had A LOT of homework to do this week.

Since so much happened this week, I'll just go over the highlights.

Tuesday:

We got taken out to lunch by one of our supervisors at Carnegie. We just got a new intern on Tuesday and so she took all three of us out to lunch and Carnegie paid for it. It was a really fun lunch, we had some good intern bonding and we got to know Kendra, one of our supervisors who is not a whole lot older that us, much better too!

Thursday:

I went to my second event at the Carnegie Endowment. It was called "The 2010 NPT Review Conference: What Next?" and the speakers were Deepti Choubey (a Carnegie Scholar) and the US Special Representative of the President for Nuclear Nonproliferation Ambassador Susan Burk - so basically this woman works directly with Obama on Nuclear issues. It was a very interesting event on the NPT conference and what it means for the US. She discussed what the US wanted going in, and also why we shouldn't consider this conference a failure by any means like some people in the media were calling it.

This is probably my favorite part of my job because I get to learn about so many international relations issues from people that are so smart! So that was exciting!

After work on thursday a few of the Washington Internship Institute Interns and I went to a grad school reception for Princeton University's Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs, Tuft's Fletcher School of Intl. Affairs, John Hopkins Nitz School of Advanced International Studies, Georgetown's Walsh School of Foreign Service, and Columbia's School of International and Public Affairs.

It was really interesting, and there was FREE food which was awesome! The only thing that was a little bit frustrating was that we would ask them if they had people that went to their schools right after undergrad and almost every one said that most of their students are in their mid to late twenties and went after working for a few years and a lot of us were planning to go right after undergrad. Also their acceptance rates are a bit daunting, and we all felt like we needed to go save the world before applying or they wouldn't accept us. But it was at least good to find out about them, and what they were all about, and I think right now my favorites are Princeton, Tufts, and Georgetown.

Friday:

Friday was a VERY exciting day because I got to go do my first informational interview, which is a requirement for my internship seminar. I did my info interview with the ambassador/foreign service member who spoke with us last week because he was really interesting and I wanted to ask him some more questions about the foreign service.

I was able to meet with him at the Department of State where he is the second in command of the Population, Refugees and Migration Bureau just under Eric P. Schwartz who is sometimes in the news. It turned out to be probably the worst day for me to choose to meet with Ambassador Robinson because it was World Refugee Day so he was very busy, but he nicely took time to meet with me for 40 minutes.

We talked about a lot and I got all of my questions answered about the foreign service and he also gave me some tips about applying and also other career paths if I decide that I don't want to do the foreign service. So the interview was amazing, and he was great, and it was also fun going into the Department of State. I felt quite important because I had to go through security and then sign in with the front desk and I was escorted everywhere and had a special little pass.

It also made me really excited to see more of the Dept of State on our tour next week with our class because I only saw one section of it.

I also dressed up for the first time in a full suit and I even wore hose because I feel like the Dept of State is pretty fancy with lots of high up people and I didn't want to look underdressed. But of course the one day I have to dress up really fancy it is 85 degrees or maybe even hotter and I have to walk almost a mile from the metro to the department of state. It was kind of miserable, but I guess that is DC for you! And I was still glad I decided to wear a suit because almost everyone at the Dept. of State does wear a suit so I didn't look out of place!

Saturday:

Today I babysat for my friend Hope's old youth leader and her husband who have just moved to DC for about 5.5 hours. They have two little boys, one that is one and a half, and one that is 3. They were very cute and I was basically just entertaining them while the movers moved in boxes and I just kept them out of the way. We went to the park, spent lots of time outside, which they loved, and I did too until I was dying of heat because it is 90 here today plus humidity!

But it was really fun and it was great to make some money as well!

For dinner tonight we are going to Adams Morgan to explore that neighborhood because it is where all the ethnic food is, it's kind of like how cities have little italy, little thailand etc...but with this it is all crammed into one neighborhood. It should be lots of fun!