Happy end of the school week! I will recap my recent summer internship abroad in India. Through Wellesley’s Lulu Chow Wang ’66 Center for Career Education, I completed a Global Signature Internship at a think tank in Mumbai, India. So, I received this opportunity and $5,000 in funding to go abroad from Wellesley. If you want to learn more about the application process and my experience, read my March blog post or this Wellesley article I was interviewed for.
I arrived in Mumbai in mid-May, a week after finals ended at Wellesley. I have been to India before, but this was my first time in Mumbai. I felt equal parts excited and nervous! I was fortunate to be joined by my dad, who helped me get set up for the first few weeks before he left to go elsewhere in India.
I felt terrified the first week of my internship: the office was located in one of those scary-looking corporate office buildings you see on TV. However, I soon felt at ease.The office was about 15-20 people, and they were close knit. They, especially my supervisor, were incredibly kind and welcoming, and I loved talking to them everyday. Beyond talking about work, I enjoyed hearing about their backgrounds and just how much we all had in common. There were about ten other interns there, and it was fun to be surrounded by people around my age and get to know them. The people I interned with were definitely the best part of my internship, and I miss them.
My work desk
View from my desk. I spent a lot of time staring out this window!
As an intern, I received immense freedom to work on what I want, and I appreciated that. I read and wrote about artificial intelligence and India’s digital public infrastructure, and wrote an article about small businesses in India potentially using digitized moneylending. I also did some administrative intern-y things, like help create guest lists for the think tank’s upcoming conferences.
There was another intern from Wellesley, and we lived together in an apartment in Colaba, South Mumbai. It was so much fun living with her and exploring Mumbai together after work and on weekends! Living abroad independently definitely had its tough days too: there was the language barrier, sweltering heat, and acclimating to a regular routine. This was not necessarily something negative, but I was the only non-Indian person in my office and felt slightly out of place at moments. But overall, I can confidently say that this internship made this one of the best summers of my life.
My favorite place in Mumbai, Marine Drive
Trying falooda
The Taj Mahal Palace Hotel in Colaba
In Bandra West
At the end of my internship in July, my mom joined my dad and I, and we did some traveling in Maharashtra, Odisha, Karnataka, and Delhi. I took so many photos, and it’s been tough to narrow down to a few to include here. Thank you so much for reading!
On an overnight sleeper train
Visiting ancient Buddhist caves
In my mom’s home village in Odisha