Ally Mulvs in Dublin

My second week in Dublin was a lot of fun, but also stressful. I’m still trying to get myself into a good routine, and I’m hoping I can work more on that in the coming week, but for now, it felt good to get more settled! I don’t really have to use maps on my phone to get to my internship anymore, and I’m finally starting to feel comfortable in my room – it almost felt like I was sleeping in a hotel for the first few days! But I’m glad that even when things get stressful, I have a great group of people here to help me relax and have fun at the same time. 

Internship

This week I started to get into the swing of things at my internship. Since there are a handful of other interns (one from the US and three or four from Ireland), when my supervisor asks me to do something I haven’t learned yet, they have been so helpful in getting me on track with what they are doing. I do find myself feeling overwhelmed pretty often, simply because they are already in such a good routine with what they do in the office, and sometimes I don’t know how to do things that they can do easily in five minutes. For example, I don’t know how to order a courier to come to the office to pick up PR packages (I didn’t even know what a courier was until last week!), and I don’t know little things like how to make the printer work the right way. But again, the other girls I work with have been so patient in helping me with any questions I have, or even with making sure I’m feeling comfortable and offering to help me out when needed. 

With that being said, I’m also proud of myself for doing my best to assimilate into a work environment in a field I’ve never worked in before in a new country. The things I worked on this week made me excited at the possibility of working in marketing & PR in the future. I helped my supervisor do a full cleanout of her office, which has a lot of the boxes, bags, and products we use to ship out PR packages to different influencers from their clients. It took all week, but it’s already so much easier to find what we need for different projects, and we also put together boxes upon boxes of products to give away to charity. I packaged PR packages for brands like Neutrogena and Aveeno, which are things I use in my own everyday life, which felt so cool to do. On top of all of that, I got to know my coworkers a lot better, too. Two other interns, Michelle and Olga, are from Ireland, and we had a lot of fun trying on funny wigs and costumes from one of Burrell’s clients they received products from (pictured here!). I’ve noticed that the leadership style in the workplace is based on a foundation of trust and friendship, and they do a really good job of balancing being friendly and having fun with each other and knowing when to buckle down to get things done. What’s cool is that this carries over to my supervisor as well, who is always asking us about our personal lives and cracking jokes with us while we work. I think this environment is so effective, and it’s a huge contrast to the more formal, strict workplace environment I think is more common in the US.

Outside of work, this week I hung out a lot with friends, whether that was going out to dinner after our internships or just sitting in the common room until late at night. On Saturday, a few of us went to The Forty Foot, which is a famous cliff-jumping spot in Dublin. We walked around the bay and explored the surrounding town, and Reggie, Ed, and Kate ended up going swimming! The water was a little cold for me so I didn’t go in, but it was so nice to sit and take in the scenery with everyone. We also went to a seafood restaurant and it took an hour and a half to get our food and Kate and I were very hangry. 

The highlight of my week was probably the day trip to Giant’s Causeway and Belfast. Although the bus was a little cramped, the views from the bridge at Carrick-a-Rede were probaby one of the most beautiful things I’ve ever seen. It was also really cool to hike Giant’s Causeway – every time I see something like that I have to keep reminding myself that it’s real because of how insane it looks. The political taxi in Belfast was also such an interesting experience. It was eye-opening to see all of the political differences visibly between Northern Ireland and where we’re staying in Dublin. It was shocking that two places so close to each other and only separated by a wall can have such starkly different views. I also thought our tour guide was really great at describing the political conflicts in Ireland in a digestible way, even though it took a little while to get used to his accent since it’s a little different from what I’m used to hearing at work and around Dublin. I love that we’re able to explore the country and that we have these trips planned for us because I don’t know if I would know where to go or what to do otherwise. I also love that when we’re on these trips, we all get to spend time together as a group, because I feel like it’s made us all so close in such a short amount of time.

While this week was a little stressful on the work side, it was also a lot of fun! I’m looking forward to nailing down my routine and having more fun in the coming week, and maybe starting to plan a trip somewhere else in Europe on our free weekend.