Andrew’s Internship Experience
Andrew studies ‘International Hotel Management’ in his 3rd year at the University of West London. He is enrolled in a four year program in which one of the years must be spend abroad which led him to apply for an internship at the Crowne Plaza Panda Garden in Chengdu.
The 5 star hotel is located 45 minutes outside of the city center and is only 5 minutes away from the Chengdu Research Base of Giant Panda Breeding which is the biggest facility of this kind in the world. It is home to 60 giant pandas, but also has some red pandas and it is one of the biggest reasons foreign guests come to stay in the Crowne Plaza Panda Garden.
Andrew decided to do an internship in China to gain experience in an international company, where he is able to practice the knowledge he learned in several of his classes.
“I really enjoyed studying finance because it will be of great value to me when I obtain my goal and become a general hotel manager in the future.”
The main tasks of Andrew’s internship are making sure that the foreign guests will have an excellent time in Chengdu. As soon as they arrive, he prepares them with a welcome pack, a map of Chengdu as well as the panda base and makes sure they have everything they need.
“I start working at 11am every day, which gives me enough time to work out. Sometimes I even go for a swim in the pool. Afterwards I often eat pancakes and bacon in the hotel restaurant before I get ready for work.”
Andrew gets to experience the dream of living and eating in a 5 star hotel every day.
If you want to know more about Andrew’s experience and see how the hotel looks like, watch our video below:
If you are studying something similar as Andrew and want to gain international experience, apply now!
How is it to live with a family who is Chinese and actually not your family? I tell you, it’s great! Here is my experience:
My Chinese family consisted of my hostma and her husband, their 5 year old daughter and the mother of the hostdad. They were really welcoming from the start and even if I can’t speak a lot of Chinese we always understood each other.
As my host family was quite young they were great fun. We went out for midnight snacks with my other colleagues, they even came to the opening of a club one time, invited me to go to KTV with their friends and so on.
I also got introduced to the whole family, the parents of my hostma and celebrated the moon cake festival with them. They also chose a Chinese name for me, giving me their last name. Really sweet!
And the FOOD! I had so much good food during my homestay and got fed so well that I am still surprised that I didn’t end up 20 kilos heavier.
I still miss to come home after work and smell the food and hear the granny telling me “CHI FAN!” (engl.: eat!).
Besides the cultural experience, it’s great to feel so welcoming and it’s an easy way to learn Mandarin just by teaching each other.
Also want to get that experience? Apply now!
