This week in our CSR Class, we discussed more about the free market system and capitalism. One thing that stood out to me was that even though as Americans, we pride ourselves on being free, we spend more on government regulations than many European countries’ entire GDP.  We also watched part one of “The Corporation” documentary.  Before watching the movie, I was extremely pro-business and corporation, however, it has opened my eyes a bit to some of the downsides and unethical aspects of corporations.  I had obviously known about the large corporations unethical acts such as Enron and more, but I now have a different perspective, seeing how many large corporations that are still around today have acted in the past.

This week in our internship seminar class, we talked more about the different and interesting aspects of each others’ internship placements.  I had figured most others would have similar experiences to myself,  but there has been quite a wide variety of jobs and experiences, opening my eyes up to the corporate world of Italy.  We also went through different characteristics of different businesses.  My personal favorite was the discussion about companies being task or goal oriented.  I enjoyoed this discussion because it made me really think about my job placement, as I felt I started out much more task oriented, with strict instructions, but then moved to more goal oriented tasks, with just the final goal in mind, but an entrepreneurial mindset throughout.  

In my internship this week, we mainly focused on continuing our database creation, which is going along very well as we have made great progress.  We also helped TempoCasa create a few new listings and  descriptions in English to make them sound more appealing to a traveller, rather than the broken English that Google Translate spits out.  Charlie, Su, and I also had the chance to tour an apartment to see the process of talking to the owner, taking pictures and discussing prices.  Even though they only spoke in Italian, so it was a little hard to understand, it was super interesting and a great experience to see all of that happen in real time. I have been continuing to build great relationships with everyone at the office and we are already making plans for a night out towards the end of our program!

Lastly, I have been continuing to try my best to assimilate to Italian culture.  I can really feel myself starting to immerse as my parents came to visit for the first time this week for a week and a half.  Even walking around with them, it was funny to see how fast I had already learned the tiny aspects of Italian culture that makes Americans stick out.  We have a family trip to Lake Como planned this weekend, so I am very excited as I have heard stories about how beautiful it is.  Last week, I attended my first ever wine tasting, which was a super cool experience.  I have never been a huge wine drinker, but the wines we tasted there, combined with the descriptions of them, made me really enjoy the experience.  Who knows, maybe I will become a big wine guy before leaving Milan!