Wriiten by our St Lucia intern, Laure
Four months ago, all the students of my year-group were offered by our Business School the opportunity of leaving France for a six-months internship in a foreign country. Discovering the world of work and experiencing cultural differences were the two main goals of this adventure promoted by our teachers.
Some of us really understood the concept and moved into a flat share with 4 French-speaking people in London to do photocopying in a big company;
I decided to take a bigger risk to make the most of this amazing opportunity. I wanted this internship to be an eye-opener not only for my study choices but also for my life choices.
I won’t lie to you: South Africa was not my first plan. I had been studying Asian culture and language for five years and was first looking forward to putting what I had learnt into practice.
However, the internship offered by THAF was too attractive for me not to try my luck and apply to take part of this incredible South-African adventure.
This is how I ended up on a flight to Durban, swotting up on all the books on South-African culture and history I had found in the library.
Judging by the face of a fellow passenger, my attempts of Zulu “clicks” were not convincing at all. Lesson number one of my trip: You can’t learn Zulu from a book.
It didn’t take me long to find out the second and most important lesson of my adventure here in St-Lucia: You learn lots more than just about the culture of the country you are in while doing an internship with The Happy Africa Foundation.
Obviously, traditions, values and ways of work of South Africa are the ones I have learned the most about. As an intern for THAF, I have worked hand-in-hand with the African Impact team in St Lucia, which includes 6 wonderful Zulu ladies. The international management courses I had attended have finally taken on their full meaning here. Dealing with the traditions but also the desires and expectations of the local staff members, the communities and the Indunas (chiefs of the villages) is far from being an easy task, but it is part and parcel of the work African Impact and THAF are doing.
Thanks to this internship, not only have I had the chance to meet and converse with South-African people, but also with people from all around the world! It’s hard to explain to your friends that yes the NGO you are working for is registered in England, but the African Impact Business Manager you are working with everyday is from Australia, and the project manager comes from Scotland. One of your roomies is from Texas but the other one is Canadian. You’ve just had a professional meeting with Afrikaans people living in St-Lucia but you’re next appointment is on Skype with your English internship-supervisor.
Being part of THAF organization is like being part of the rainbow nation Desmond Tutu has always dreamt about. Everybody is different and everybody is the same. The cultural diversity I have been dealing with is definitely the greatest strength of The Happy Africa Foundation, and the most amazing part in the end is to see what we are able to achieve all together.