Blog Archives

  • Blog

The Architecture of Taste: Singapore’s History Preserved in Hawker Centres

GRIP: Business Development in Singapore, Singapore $4 kaya toast with two soft boiled eggs and an iced teh. I had just landed in Singapore the evening before, and this breakfast was my first glimpse into everyday local life. I found myself at K88 Kopitiam, a humble little coffeehouse tucked into a food court off the…

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One Word to Summarize Korea

GRIP: Media in Seoul, South Korea Welcoming. If I could choose one word to describe my summer experience in Korea, it would be welcoming. From getting recommendations on where to visit from my taxi driver to sharing a drink with the group of people next to me during Korean barbecue, many Koreans that I have…

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My Glory Days Are Behind Me

GRIP: Sustainable Development in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam The Pencil Group, based in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam, is more than a traditional branding agency—it integrates strategic planning, creative design, and digital marketing to deliver solutions for our clients. As part of the internal planning team, I am contributing to projects focused on developing…

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There’s an energy here

SA: SIT International Honors Program Alina, one of the Semester Abroad Correspondents, shares her experience abroad during the Spring 2025 semester. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. I came abroad because my gut told me to. I first created my School for International Training login account on…

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Hard Work and Homelet

GRIP: Sustainable Development in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam My fellow interns at Nuoa aren’t just work colleagues. They are my Grab Car commute buddies and the first customers of Homelet! Well, Homelet isn’t technically a restaurant. It’s just me and my coworkers Shaomin and Marcus eating omelets in my apartment in Ho Chi Minh…

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5 Things You Need To Know Before Bustling Through Bangkok

GRIP: PR and Marketing in Bangkok, Thailand Bring Lightweight Clothing Before this program, I had never been anywhere near the Eastern Hemisphere, so you can imagine my surprise when the heat and humidity hit me like a truck. Even though I researched beforehand, the heat still caught me off guard. What saved me was packing…

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Catalysts, Courts, and Chilli: My Singapore Experience

GRIP: Engineering Research in Singapore Spending a summer in Singapore, I imagined long hours in the lab, challenging scientific problems, and maybe a few late-night reactions. I got all of that, and so much more. What I didn’t expect was how much I’d learn outside the lab: from the chaos of hawker centers to the…

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What the Wind Knows: Notes from the Steppe

PGS: Mongolian Civilization: Nomadic and Sedentary Will, one of the Penn Global Seminar Correspondents, shares his experience abroad during the May 2025 travel period. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. Why go to Mongolia? Maybe you love to travel. Maybe you’re interested in nomadism. Maybe you’re interested…

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In the Absence of Certainty

PGS: Rivalry, Competition and International Security in Northeast Asia Lala, one of the Penn Global Seminar Correspondents, shares her experience abroad during the May 2025 travel period. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. Ten days is not a long time. But, being immersed in a new…

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Packing for Wakefulness: Mongolia Beyond The Map

PGS: Mongolian Civilization: Nomadic and Sedentary Will, one of the Penn Global Seminar Correspondents, shares his experience abroad during the May 2025 travel period. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. The movie director David Lynch once said that “If you have a golfball sized consciousness, when you…