Let's get something straight: I've never had the travel bug.
Ever. As a kid, traveling was stressful. I'm very much a homebody, I love routines, & I like knowing exactly what to expect in an experience. I particularly dislike doing new things alone and have gotten very good at going just to the edge of my comfort zone, then using the buddy system to make a challenge a little less overwhelming. During my freshman year of college, I sat in my dorm room and spent hours making 5 (yes, really) four-year plans. Among others, I briefly entertained the thought of double-majoring and triple-minoring — glad I nixed that one — & debated about going to Chile or Dublin to study abroad. With three minors, two ministries in Ithaca I adore, and a reality check of my Spanish skills (which, while not horrendous, are definitely not good enough to spend a semester in immersion courses for politics, counseling, and journalism), I had come to terms with the thought that I wouldn't spend time abroad. *Enter Sage Corps* I had spent the better part of a week writing & re-writing a cover letter, resumé, and application for a summer internship I wanted desperately. After at least 10 hours of editing and three friends (plus my mom) proof-reading, I hit submit, checked my email, and saw something from (what was at the time) a super random company called Sage Corps. They were running a Winter Start! Program in several different countries, including Dublin, Ireland, which has been on my bucket list for quite a while. Their application involved a few standard questions asking about my name and major, a resumé submission, had me rank my top 3 countries/program location preferences, and a brief (1-3 sentence) short-answer response about why I was interested in partnering with a start-up abroad. I totally expected to never hear anything after I hit submit, which is why I was shocked when I opened my email a few days later and discovered that I was actually accepted to their Amsterdam Winter Start! Program (there wasn't enough interest to run the Dublin one this time around). Saying I was highly skeptical is definitely an understatement: the program costs $2,500 (not including flights) & it seemed like a scam at first. I had 14 days to accept the offer to participate, and I spent a ton of time looking online at various testimonials, talking on the phone and emailing back and forth with Sage Corps representatives (including the CEO), and connecting with previous participants in the program. Eventually, I decided it was worth the risk, submitted the deposit, and crossed my fingers that I'd get something valuable out of the 9 days I would be spending in Amsterdam. Trying to prep for Sage Corps coincided with a super busy semester for me, I had to apply for a new passport and expedite it (because the one I got when I was 12 expired), and I didn't book my flights until Thanksgiving break, so I was a little stressed that something would go wrong or that the experience wouldn't be worth all the hassle. (One recommendation for anyone thinking about doing Sage Corps: definitely prioritize the logistics module and the ones that have you fill out forms! The logistics module goes over the schedule (so when you need to book flights), safety in your host city, and insurance info, so it's important to at least skim through). On the flip side, I can tell you with one hundred percent certainty that the Sage Corps Experience is worth every penny. Money from your deposit pays for your hotels, some forms of transportation (we received a 4-day tram pass to cover our transportation costs to our start-up), some "must-sees" (museum tickets, touristy destinations, etc) in your host city, and the costs for the Welcome & Program Close dinners. I'll go more into detail about the start-up internship experience in my next post — this one is already turning into a novel — but this one outlines what the first few days with Sage Corps looked like! Sage Corps Day 1: Welcome & Group Dinner The program starts and ends on the days that are officially listed on the program description (for us, it was January 2nd—11th) & it's totally fine to fly in then! If possible, I do recommend getting there a day or two early to avoid jet lag & familiarize yourself with the city, but most people (9/12 of those in my cohort) got there on the day our program started, so whatever works best for you is great :) The only thing officially on our itinerary (besides checking in to the hotel) was a welcome dinner at 7 p.m., which was a fun chance to get to know everyone! There were 12 members of my cohort from various colleges across the United States, plus a Sage Corps staff member named Jacob (who is wonderful) and a student named Luke who had previously participated in the 8-week Summer Start! program in Amsterdam over the summer. Our group clicked really well right away, so we all explored Amsterdam for a bit together after dinner and then called it a night. Sage Corps Day 2: Orientation, Meet with Start-ups, Explore! This was definitely a super great day. We met up at 9:30 in the hotel lobby, took public transit (Sage Corps covered day passes for everyone) to Rockstart (a local startup hub), where we introduced ourselves to each other, heard about some tips for safety/having a good time in Amsterdam, and got an overview of what Sage Corps had in store for us. After that, we set some personal & professional goals for the trip (mine are below as an example of what we did): Personal Goals:
Professional Goals (set during orientation meeting):
After orientation, we took a break for lunch/to meet up as project teams, then split up to go to our project hubs to meet with the team we would be working with the next week. That was a great time to go over the deliverables (outlined in the professional goals up above), ask questions as a team, and clarify with the CEO what he was hoping the presentation would deliver. We met back up at the Rijksmuseum around 4:30, but it was closing at 5, so the group decided to use the tickets another day and split up for the rest of the night. My group wandered walked through the Vondelpark (we'll go back in the daylight for sure), grabbed some light food/drinks, and visited the MOCO museum, which was incredible! After that, we walked around aimlessly just wandering/exploring as we meandered back to our hotel and got back right around 9:30, which capped off the day perfectly. Sage Corps Day 3: Excursion Day! We left our hotel at 9:15 & took a tour of at Zaanse Schans just outside the city, where we explored some windmills, a cheese factory, and a clog workshop. We started by walking over a bridge to get to the village, which still has some Dutch folk living in it (but has primarily become a tourist attraction). The first indoor stop on the walking tour was the clog factory, where we got to watch them carve a clog from a block of wood in approximately 5 minutes (even though it used to take 3 to 4 hours to carve one clog by hand). After the clog workshop, we had some time to explore the shops in the area, which was a great time to pick up some souvenirs for some family back home. I also ate the best apple & cinnamon sugar pancake I have ever had in my life (seriously, if you're ever in Amsterdam, get a pancake — the Dutch know what they are doing when it comes to breakfast!) After about 30 minutes, we met back up as a tour group and walked through a cheese factory, where we got to sample over 20 types of cheese! My personal favorite was definitely the smoked gouda – 10/10 would recommend. Post-cheese factory, we walked along the river again and got to go inside (and on top of) a working windmill :) It was super interesting to get to hear a bit more about the history of the area — for example, there used to be over 1,000 windmills along the river, and now there are only 13! We even got to see the windmill in action, where large stones were being powered by the windmill in order to crush rock to mix with oil (produced by the mill next door) to make paint. Once we got back to the city, we went to Foodhallen, which is a super fun food market toward the heart of the city with tons of different stands and varieties of foods. Everyone was pretty beat after that, so we parted ways as a cohort for the night. My roommate and I tried out a fun Italian place with some phenomenal onion soup followed by gelato, then made it an early night and came back to the hotel. Sage Corps Day 4: Free Day Although there was nothing officially on the schedule, we definitely used the day to our advantage. Because I had gotten here early, I had already explored some of the areas on the suggested to-do list, but there was definitely a lot more to see :) In the morning, I explored a bit on my own and found a café where I grabbed a light breakfast, then headed to a bookstore to pick up a copy of the Diary of Anne Frank. After that, I met up with some members of the cohort to go to a breakfast spot called Pannenkoekenhuis Upstairs, which was incredible. Once we had eaten brunch, a group of us made our way to the Rijksmuseum (absolutely a must-see if you're in Amsterdam) and took our time going through it to get a better sense of the art and history of the city. I hit a major wall after the museum, so I walked to the 9 Streets District toward the City Centre and spent two hours reading in a café called Bagels and Beans. Once I got back to the hotel, I took some time to catch up on emails, update my planner, and do a little bit of outlining on the objectives we needed to deliver for our start-up, which I'll go over on my next post! :)
1 Comment
Nancy Bradley
1/11/2020 04:20:15 pm
I am loving following your most excellent adventure, Liz!
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LizWriting, running, reading, and keeping it real along the way. Archives
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