No Fog in Sight: My First Week as an Intern in SF

There is an art to moving to a new city. Whether it’s for a season or for the foreseeable future for a full-time job, the amount of time it takes to settle in can vary greatly depending on the way you approach the move. In your first week, focus not on the events themselves, but how you face these events. Having a bright and optimistic attitude will go far in getting you connected with some really fascinating people – and trust me, there are a lot here!

Last Tuesday, I landed in SFO to start a new internship with not only two mammoth suitcases, but an air of pure exhilaration – an air much more pleasant than the blazing, sticky summers I’m used to in North Carolina. All I could think of were my firsts: my first time away from home for an entire summer, my first time in San Francisco, and most importantly, my very first internship – a giant step towards creating my future career. I quickly realized it was essential to take any anxiety or hesitancy and tweak it into a positive outlook on all that this summer has to offer. A sense of “emotional entrepreneurship” if you will – transforming nervous jitters into adrenaline and excitement for growth.

After all, what can I complain about? I’m in San Francisco! A city that thrives off innovation, fresh thinking, and talks of brand development over happy hour – all thumbs up in my book. Each morning, as I take the BART to downtown San Francisco and walk 0.5 miles to the office (thanks GoogleMaps!), I observe the crowd of people that surround me. I love the feeling of having so many beautiful things to look at on my walk to work that my eyes can’t scan them fast enough or that my mouth can’t form the right words to describe them quickly enough.

One thing I certainly see everywhere – interns! Just like me! But who are they? More than a venti chai latte to snap me out of my morning fog, I crave conversation with these students – I crave friendship.

“Where are you from?” “So…how’d you end up here?” “What do you want to check out in the city this summer?”

Call them as cheesy as your mom’s mac and cheese casserole, but these easy kind of questions can spark some truly worthwhile connections. In just one week I’ve met an amazing amount of people with really interesting stories. Walking down 2nd Street I met Marvin, a young entrepreneur making the exciting move into a new office space for his new startup Out of Milk – a grocery list Android app. Then there’s Samantha, a graphic designer who right off the bat was able to share my affinity for deep-fried southern concoctions after having studied at Savannah College of Art and Design.

One night over a plate of spiced lamb ragu, I listened to the lovely Gokce tell me of her journey across the globe from Turkey to San Francisco where she is now a marketing intern at Udemy. When I asked her for what should be on my must-do list this summer, she said, “There is so much in this city. Find your passion and then do and see everything that’s related to it,” – my favorite piece of advice so far. Last but not least there’s Kiwi, Udemy’s adorable pup who jingles around our shared office space with big fluffy ears looking, well, as sweet as a kiwi!

I owe a h-u-g-e thanks to all of the wonderful folks I’ve connected with this week. The internship scene in San Francisco is already shaping up to be an exquisite setting, full of the country’s coolest interns who are super willing to help out in whichever way they can, whether it’s directing you to the right BART station, offering advice on which neighborhood to find summer housing in, or inviting you to a game of FIFA during your office lunch break.

After all, it’s not always about where you are but who you’re with that makes any experience worthwhile. As interns, we work hard to demonstrate our most awesome skills in the office and in turn, we don’t want our free time to fall flat in a playground of a city like San Francisco. So next time you recognize the intern “look” on someone (big bag, cool shoes, headphones, cup of coffee, workings of a rockstar), stir up a conversation and ask them what their story is. You’ll both walk away with smiles, contact info and new weekend plans to check out that cool taco truck you’ve read about online!