By: Amanda Moore, Nursing ’26 The sunrise outside of the airport. GRIP: Community Development in Uganda As our plane touched down at Entebbe, I opened my window shade only to be pierced by the rising sun. It was the ripe time of 6am. I had only slept for 6 hours out of my 24 hours…
By: Amaan Omer, CAS ’25 Spending time with the local children after eating dinner with their families. GRIP: Power Up Gambia, Bwiam, The Gambia A blast of hot air overwhelmed me as soon as I stepped out of the plane. It was nothing like those sunny Philadelphia days that cured seasonal depression; this was the…
By: Saanvi Agarwal, CAS ’26 A shot of the business and finance hub within Sydney’s Central Business District GRIP: Business in Sydney, Australia I didn’t realize the true value of Google Calendar until I arrived in Sydney. As a Penn student, I was aware of the “Penn Bubble.” Locust Walk’s cobblestone paths resonated with the…
By: Ruqaiyyah Lucas-Caldwell, CAS ’24 Ruqaiyyah Lucas-Caldwell at the UN World Medical Association, Ferney-Voltaire, France I experienced culture shock in my first few days here. But not in a negative way at all. It was a positive one because I was so surprised to see how diverse Geneva was. There are so many different cultures and…
By: Dushaun Thompson, CAS ’24 Dushaun in Lisbon University of Minho Law School, Portugal On the one hand, Braga has provided me the opportunity and resources to pique my academic curiosity and consider my future aspirations in greater depth. This is more or less what I expected from this internship, and it has delivered well…
By: Eesha Balar, CAS ’24 Gambia River lookout. Power Up Gambia, The Gambia It’s been a little more than a week already! Honestly, I can’t tell if it went by quickly or slowly, as I’m still trying to get adjusted to living here. I also still can’t believe I’m across the Atlantic, on a totally…
By: Nikola Datkova, CAS ’25 Bananas on bicycle Gashora Girls Academy of Science and Technology, Rwanda The exam starts at 8 o’clock. The early birds show up at 7.55 am, most students won’t be ready until 8.05 am, the teacher enters the room at 8.10 am—and nobody makes a big deal out of it. Not…
By: Gabriella Gibson, Wharton ’25 Gabriella diving in Australia Business in Sydney, Australia A summer of core memories. That is how I would describe my GRIP experience in Sydney, Australia. I grew up putting together puzzles of the Opera House and watching the fireworks in Sydney as Australians celebrated the new year. I watched countless…
By: Haerin So, Wharton ’25 Haerin and fellow GRIP interns Monika, Lucas, Davis, and Doug at the Pylon Lookout over the Sydney Harbour Bridge Business in Sydney, Australia If I had to describe my GRIP experience in Sydney in one word, it would be: present. Oftentimes at Penn and in college in general, I felt…
By: Anusha Mathur, College ’25 Anusha and a llama in Salta Argentina Social Impact in Buenos Aires, Argentina The immigrant experience is often simplified into cliches, like booking a one-way ticket and never looking back. I always wondered what it might be like to move to a new country and this past summer, I got a…