Maud during her internship in Vancouver

Hi everyone!

Time is going so fast when you’re having a good time. It’s really like the saying: “Time flies when you’re having fun.” I’ve been doing my internship in Vancouver for a while now and it’s amazing! I will take you back to the beginning and make you all jealous!

The end of my university career approached and I had to start looking for a challenging internship for my thesis project. All my friends decided to stay in Amsterdam but I really wanted to go on an adventure to Canada! I don’t know why Canada but I felt really attracted to Vancouver so I just simply HAD to do my internship there. That didn’t run as smoothly as I thought it would. My university couldn’t help me because they didn’t have contacts there and when I sent out emails to companies, I never heard back from them. Eventually I decided to contact Abroad Internships because otherwise I would end up in Amsterdam too and that was not my plan!

And so it happened! Applying for my visa was the most unsure thing in the end as Canada uses a pool system. You inform the Canadian government that you’d like to apply for a visa after which they invite you to apply for that visa whenever they want you to.  That’s why I didn’t know when I was able to go there. Luckily it went all very well and I could go! And how much I looked forward to it!

After a flight of ten hours long I finally arrived in Vancouver! Saying good bye to family and friends was hard but less hard when I left for my internship in Madrid three years ago. And I have to admit, the city was helping a lot with this! Everyone knows the good prejudices of the Canadians I guess but some are really true! They’re amazingly friendly, very helpful and although not everyone’s playing ice hockey, they do show interest and are big supporters!

I cannot describe the city in words – it’s so great. Vancouver is the third most liveable city in the world and that’s for a good reason! You literally have everything here; the water (great for paddle boarding and kayaking), the mountains (you can go skiing here - less than an hour drive) and a big city (although the public transport could use some improvement there!).

I do my internship with a bakery and catering company with six different locations in the city. I was welcomed with open arms. My boss and the owner of the company told me it’s not only about work but also about doing fun things and that I could ask them anything and that they would help me with everything. That was nice! It’s really comforting when you have such people around you, to start your adventure like this. Especially when you don’t know anyone and are far away from home.

I am the first intern here and in the beginning I had to get used to that. But now that we know each other better and know what we like, it all goes better. I create my own projects for my thesis but of course I always make sure they approve it. I wanted to do sales and marketing at first but now I’m working on all different aspects because it’s not such a big company. This is really nice because now I know what I do and don’t want to work on in a company when I’m graduated!

I really fell in love, and sorry dad and mom, but I don’t want to come back home anymore!