Pre-departure post…kind of

Posted by on January 29th, 2010

Hi this is my pre-departure post because I didn’t have access earlier.

My name is Jan Beecher and I am from Nanaimo, British Columbia. I landed in Hanoi, Vietnam on January 9th. I have always wanted to work in a developing country. It has always seemed that it was something I had to do to complete myself as a person. And I have had the opportunity, or come close to doing something like this before, but it never worked out. Now, at 47 years old, I am here, doing what I need to do. I am a recent graduate of Creative Writing and Journalism from Vancouver Island University. I have two boys, 20 and 18 years old. The hardest part about going on this assignment has been leaving them, but I know that they will be fine.

Pre-departure training left me feeling prepared in so many ways, and now that I am here, I must say I am super glad we went through so much. I know about Uniterra and WUSC and that gave me pride in what I am doing, I knew to expect certain feelings from myself as I adjusted, and I learned to expect and respect reactions from this new culture as I interacted with them. People laugh at me sometimes here. I miss my family sometimes here. I get asked what I am doing in Hanoi all the time here. Thanks to pre-departure training I can at least dig inside my brain cell and sort some of this onslaught of experience into the “oh yeah, I knew that was gonna happen” file. Believe me, that has been a good thing.

Everything happened very fast, from finding out I was going to getting here. I think that was a great thing. It took work on my part but it took ten times as much work on the WUSC people’s part – THANK YOU!!

That’s it for now. More to come …

Posted in SWB, Vietnam

Comments

1. November 19th, 2010 by Laurent Tran

Hello! Jan,

My name is Laurent Tran and I am a Global Studies student at VIU, looking to apply for a WUSC internship in Vietnam. I read some of your articles in the Navigator student newspaper about your internship last semester! I had some questions for you about your experiences in Vietnam, if you have time to answer:

1) How long did it take to get answer as to whether or not you were accepted into the internship, from the time application?
2) Were you required to organize a lot on your own? For example, did you have to find your own accommodation in Vietnam?
3) Did the internship give you any advantages or vital skills for your professional life?

Thanks, and look forward to hearing you.

Cheers!
Laurent

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