Internship Report I have done my internship as a part of a programme called Intercultural Project which all Anglistik students are obliged to do. It is not obligatory though to do an internship, the idea is just to go to an English speaking country and thus improve your language knowledge. I, however, wanted to do an internship as well, since I thought it might be useful in the future. My search for an internship was not an easy one because I also had to settle my visa since I do not come from an EU country and for that reason I had a couple of denials. In another case I got an internship in London but I did not manage to go there precisely because of visa requirements. So one day I came across an ad on the web site of Student und Arbeitsmarkt of the LMU. It was about the agency called Paragon Europe in Malta which helps students find an internship. Since it was my last chance to find something for the Intercultural Project I decided to contact the agency and see what exactly they can do and how does this process go. I told them I am interested in administrative internships and they told me they have a lot of such internships that they can offer so it would not be a problem to find me one. The agency also found me an accommodation so I did not have to worry about that either, so I can say I was very lucky because a lot of students usually go through a lot of trouble to find a suitable accommodation. I was living with a couple of other students doing their internships in Malta too. The flat in which we lived was nicely furnished and most importantly we did not lack in anything. When it comes to the expectations I had before my internship, I have to say that since I had to go to an English-speaking country because of my studies, my first goal was to improve my English. Second, I expected to learn something more about the business sphere since I was to do an internship in a well-developed company. I was also excited to go to Malta because I did not know a lot about the country and I was very curious to find out what it is like. My first day in Malta was not a very lucky one because a mistake was made at the airport
due to which I lost my luggage. Luckily, I was able to get it back the other day. One of the first things I believe everyone who comes to Malta notices is the Maltese English. Their English is not what most of people are used to. On the other side, there is the Maltese language which is a mixture of Arabic, Italian and Spanish and all the names of places and streets are written in that language. What is weird is that the address of the company where I was working was written in English in the documents I had, but the address written there at the place was in Maltese and it was different. If I was not given a map with exact instructions I would have probably had difficulties in finding it. My first impression of Malta on the first day I arrived there was different from what I expected. Everything is more or less desert-like. All houses are beige-coloured and look practically the same and there is really not so much greenery there which is due to the number of sunny days and the heat there, but it was simply something I was not used to. Before my departure I attended the Intercultural Project class and I also did some research on the internet about Malta. I was curious to see where that town where I am going to work is situated. I also read a bit about the history because I really did not know anything about Malta except that it used to be a British colony. Then I talked to a friend who did her internship there couple of months before and she told me what places to visit and a bit about the culture. She also mentioned that Maltese English is weird, but at the time I did not realise how much it is different from the Standard English. What I also did not realise is that Maltese would in fact be more used than English in everyday communication. One of the things the company where I worked does is importing goods to Malta and then sells them in their shops. They work with brands like Swarovski and many other popular brands and the department where I worked basically had to take care of the shops and cooperate with the partners they have. My daily tasks included making transfers from shop to shop, making sure everything is in order with the stock. I was also making orders and invoices, extracting daily or
monthly sales and doing KPIs thus helping in the analysis of the overall business. I did stock orders for the upcoming season, which basically means that I had to make a sort of a list of all the products with the bar codes, sizes, colours, style names and numbers and so on. The good thing was that my mentor and her two assistants would always make sure I have something to do and would have patience in cases they had to show me how to do something. I learnt a lot during my internship. I got a chance to see how companies work. On some occasions I got to see my mentor talking to her business partners or some other parties and see how business communication works. I learnt how to work with certain programmes that they used in order to do the job successfully. Also, I think my knowledge of Microsoft Excel also improved since I had to use it a lot in order to do some statistical analyses. Apart from that I got to adapt to Maltese English. At the beginning I really had to concentrate when talking to a Maltese person in order to understand them, but later on my understanding of their accent got better. All in all, I enjoyed my time at work and in Malta as well. Most importantly everybody at work were happy with me. I did not have any problems during my internship and they even said I did not make any mistakes while doing the tasks I was given and they would always be satisfied with how I fulfilled my duties and the fact that sometimes it did not take me a lot of time to finish everything. Maybe the only thing one has to count on when in Malta (but this applies to almost every aspect of life there) is the buses which are never on time, so in order not be late for work one has to take this into account. I did not live so far from my work and a lot of buses were going in that direction since it was not far from the capital but still there were couple of occasions when it just was not possible to avoid coming late to work. However, if everybody knows your only means of transport are the buses they will be very understandable and they will not mind if you arrive couple of minutes late. During my stay in Malta I did not spend much time with the Maltese people I was mostly
hanging out with other students who were also doing their internships in Malta and during summer there a lot of them so I met a lot of people from different parts of world. Summer is probably the best time of the year if one wants to do an internship there. My colleague at work also told me that in winter there are not that many interns who come to Malta. The reason why is because one can do so many things during summer since there are so many nice places to visit and there are also a lot of bars and restaurants where everybody can relax after a day at work or during weekend. There are also a lot of festivals during summer. Isle of MTV and Creamfields are some of them. For those interested in a bit different things, there a lot of opportunities for diving for as I heard Malta is a good place for diving. Of course, a lot of water sports are available as well. Since I only had weekends off I tried to use the time I had to explore the country and visit some of the places I heard of. Therefore, for all the students who choose Malta as their internship destination I would definitely recommend visiting Blue Lagoon, Rabat, Mdina and island Gozo, the capital Valletta is also a must since it has a lot of beautiful sites, gardens and historical buildings. However, take into consideration that during summer there are a lot of tourists there and the buses are a disaster anyway, so sometimes it may take a whole day just to visit one place even though Malta is a very small country. When it comes to some tips I would give to future interns, I would definitely tell them to prepare for the buses because for students it is the only means of transport there, the taxis are too expensive, though if you have good negotiation skills it might help lower the price a little. The thing is that one has to get used to a bit disorganised bus system and the buses drivers who are not helpful or kind at all times. The Maltese also use the left hand side for driving just like in Britain and it might be weird in the beginning as well. As for the SIM-card I did not use a Maltese one since Malta is in the EU zone texting and phone calls were not expensive at all. However, if one wants to have internet on their phone they can get one from a local network at an affordable price. I would also recommend preparing for the language. One important thing to mention is that
Maltese people use English only when they speak to foreigners and their accent is very much different from the Standard variant. I would not recommend Malta if one wants to go there to improve their English skills since English is a second language there. As for the local people I can say on couple of occasions they were very nice, as for example if they noticed we needed some help with directions or on what bus to get to in order to go to a certain place they would be very happy to help. As for the Malta in general I can say it is a country with a very long and interesting history and one can notice that Maltese people are very proud of their history. There a lot of historical buildings, monuments, churches, fortresses and of course beaches, caves and bays which are worth visiting. There is also a traditional feast in Malta and every town celebrates on a specific day, it is usually a saint's day who is also the patron of the town. They celebrate big and with a lot of decorations everywhere and a lot of fireworks. It is worth visiting an event like this because I think it is common only in Malta or only in the southern countries. As for the company where I did my internship I would recommend it because it is a good opportunity to gain insight into administrative area of the business and also to improve your knowledge and skills. They also had foreign interns before me and they will continue to have them in the future too. During my stay there there was one more intern from Malta which can only prove that the company is really open when it comes to offering internships. To conclude I would only say that if you choose Malta for your internship you will probably face with a bit of difficulties in the beginning but you will also enjoy it, especially if you go there in summer. So, I would just wish a lot of luck and lot of fun to all of those whose choose to go to Malta.