Internship in Izmir city, Turkey

Dovilė Žemaitaitytė

After graduating with Asian studies (Turkology) in Vilnius University, I felt like I would love to adopt more new skills, which from previous experiences I knew I would get by coming back to Turkey, the country my bachelor degree is based on. That is why I decided to use the Erasmus+ post-graduate internship opportunity. First, I asked my friends that I made there by doing Erasmus+ about internship possibilities and in few month I selected work place for my post-graduate internship.

I did my internship in Izmir city, Turkey as field coordinator‘s assitant in company, which organizes events. I realised that it could be a great start to enter the professional world, because in this type of job I will be able to get in touch with lots of new people from bussiness world. I wanted to gain deeper knowledge of Turkish language and it was a perfect place, because it was my work language and everyday from early morning till evening I had to communicate with clients in Turkish language. Throughout my internship I learned how to deal with missunderstandings, mistakes and I definetely find my self more confident right now. My internship was based on communicating with clients, finding new workers and in general helping to organize all events that my company was responsible for. Sometimes i was asked to work as a translator in international events, like fairs. I also had a trip to capital city as a translator. Other times there were just simple meetings between two companies that we needed to arrange.

Before starting my internship I had no understanding in event organization, but now I feel like I have at least main knowledge. It also helped me to get to know Turkish culture way more better. Occasions that we have here and there are really different. In Turkey they are more pompastic, they put a lot of effort into even lets say simple bussiness meeting. Place, time, table, chairs, people that will meet guests – everything should be considered. In general, my internship was full of new experiences, changing people, always dinamic and full of little stress. I think that it was a great five month of my life, which helped me to achieve new work skills, make new friends and built my personality. I feel thankful and very happy.