Day Six: May 15th, 2013

And now I'm finally finished! Today was the last day of my internship, and I have to admit that while I feel a bit sad about leaving, I'm also glad that I learned something from the experience. I learned how to operate in an actual working environment despite not getting paid for it. All the while listening to the dynamic between the coworkers of Caribbean Business. Though still, the place was definitely a cold splash to the face concerning the 'real world'.

At first, I was just annoyed at the very prospect of doing an internship. I mean, why make us do this if we're about to graduate? Plus, there was the fact that they only told us about this program mid-way through the year, so that was definitely something that would annoy me. But you know what? I'm glad that my school gave me this opportunity. Now I won't be surprised if my first job is something similar to the computer work I did at my internship. It was a great opportunity to test how I would do in 'real' society, and I truly hope that the school continues on with this program. 

Day 5: May 14th, 2013

Work routine is definitely something to behold. Experiencing it firsthand thanks to school, I could understand that I would get fairly used to my internship schedule. In fact, my entire workday today felt rather routine. Just get in, sit on the computer, do my work, chat for a bit with my supervisor, eat lunch, and then continue working until the day ended. However, now that I'm getting closer and closer to the end, I feel as if I'm going to miss this routine.

Despite moving pictures to their appropriate files being very boring, it has already became my routine. In a way, my internship has become something similar to school. I simply do what needs to be done in my daily schedule. While it will be sad for me to know that tomorrow will be my final day at Caribbean Business, I will always remember the experience and call back on it when I finally get an actual job.

Day 4: May 13th, 2013

And now I'm back to work after a nice relaxing weekend! It was a fairly uneventful day, much like the previous ones. Once again, I was stuck doing desk-work like sorting out files and moving pictures on the computer to a new file. Nothing all that special. It may sound easy, but in reality it is very long and very boring. 

However, so far this entire internship is giving me a new perspective on patience. Before, I thought that I was a fairly patient person. It was hard for me to get truly angry or frustrated at something or someone. But now, after only a few hours of working, I find it hard to actually keep on working. I just want to walk away because it is boring to me. Yet pushing on despite that shows that it's in my capacity to work in this type of environment. I just need to learn how to not get easily annoyed or agitated. 

Day Three: May 10th, 2013

Another day, another opportunity to learn things through actually working. Three days so far, and I can understand that a job in a cubicle is nothing like The Office. Kidding of course, I always knew that it would be nothing like The Office. Doesn't mean I can't be a bit miffed about how bored I can be within a few hours of organizing files on a computer with nothing but my supervisor and a bottle of Coca-Cola to keep me company.

Other than doing common desk work, I was able to sit down with a reporter in Caribbean Business,who's name I've been asked not to give out. He wrote an article stating an analysis of the H.R. 2499 act, and how it could have changed Puerto Rico forever. He said that while the act lacked the sufficient votes to be passed in the Senate, it is something that has been plaguing Puerto Rico for a long time and deserves attention. He even sat down with people like Senator Henry Reid and Representative Llena Ros-Lehtinen for exclusive interviews, explaining that its important for a newspaper to grab exclusive interviews in order to be successful. Hopefully next week, I'll be able to get more sit-downs with some of the employees of Caribbean Business and learn from those who regularly question politician. 

Day Two: May 9th, 2013

Sitting in front of a computer all day is definitely not fun if you have to actually work. Kidding aside, today was mostly spent helping to organize computer files. My job at Caribbean Business, overseen by the employee Blane McLane, was to look for logos in the database and transfer them to a folder for the logos. All the logos were scattered around the database, making the process very long and frustrating. But in the end, I was able to mostly complete my task before I left for home.

Work was not the only thing I performed during today. My supervisor also gave me his two cents on my intended area of study, Political Science. He questioned why I wanted to do it, and asked me things like how I would fix crime without seeming like a dictator if I got a position in government. Before then, I never truly thought about this type of thing that much since I believed I would never become something like a dictator. I read 1984 too many times to actually believe that total control is something good. But my supervisor's questions proved that I DO need to keep these possibilities in mind and have answers, otherwise I'll make a pretty poor future politician.

Day One- May 8th, 2013

Today was most definitely a day for work. Today, I truly learned what it means to be an intern: lots of heavy-lifting an a LOT of patience. I was assigned to do multiple projects to do for the day. I helped an employee redesign the coffee area of the workplace, helped organize returned subscriptions, and moved entire filing cabinets. If I had learned anything from today, it's that filing cabinets are HEAVY.

But no, I also learned that the headquarters of a newspaper is pretty much like any other business: mostly quiet with employees being in their offices and working their respective tasks. I simply helped along as best I could by doing whatever was asked of me. Really, that's all there is to it with being an intern. However, I would like to note that Caribbean business needs new computers or at least new software, but that's simply a minor complaint that only I, a tech-savy teenager, would have. It was simply a minor inconvenience to my job of organizing files.

Day Zero- May 7th, 2013

Unfortunate, today was not a day of work. Due to the unfortunate failure of modern technology, the area I am performing my internship at (Caribbean Business) could not allow us to perform our duties. As it turns out, they had not received our insurance/waver papers due to a bug in their computers, thus they could not legally let us work. If they did and I or one of the other students were injured, they would get into some serious legal trouble. So instead, they gave us the 'grand tour' of the entire building.

The building where Caribbean Business' office is also contains the offices of other publications that are regularly sold in Puerto Rico. They have entire sections of the building dedicated to fashion, graphic design, and just plain news. During the tour, our guide explained to us that computers have simplified a lot of things with newspapers from the old days, like if they wanted a page in color they had to make numerous different sheets of the same newspaper, each one containing what color they wanted on the picture or article, and place them on top of the original negative version. Sometimes, the page would be about four pounds in weight! I myself was amazed at the entire place, and how organized and efficient everyone seemed to be. I wanted to intern at a place where I could observe how my potential career for Political Science could be put into affect. Knowing that I will be interning at Caribbean Business, a weekly newspaper that regularly deals with numerous political events, I can be assured that this place will most definitely help me in my future.