South America

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5AM Snorkels, Boat Life, and Doing It for the Plot

Penn Global Seminar: Darwin’s Laboratory: History, Philosophy, Evolution and Social Ecology in the Galápagos Archipelago Allison, one of the Fall 2025 Penn Global Seminar Correspondents, shares her experience abroad during the Winter Break. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. When I applied to the Galápagos PGS,…

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Hiking, Healthcare, and a Suitcase that Won’t Zip

Penn Global Seminar: Health and the Healthcare System in Chile Anya, one of the Fall 2025 Penn Global Seminar Correspondents, shares her experience abroad during the Winter Break. Follow along with the group of correspondents on our blog and look out for their images on the @pennabroad Instagram feed. In just a few hours, I’ll be on a plane to Chile…

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Kelechi Onyia

Contact Ask Me About… I am not a native Spanish-speaker, nor have I taken classes of the language here at Penn. However, I learned Spanish for 3 years in high school and really enjoyed practicing my fluency. I am also from New York City, which is a very diverse city, and I had so many…

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Allison Li

Allison is a senior from Buffalo studying neuroscience with minors in healthcare management and creative writing. This semester, she’ll travel to the Galápagos Islands with the PGS, Darwin’s Laboratory: exploring the islands through the lens of evolutionary theory, its development, and climate policy. On campus, she is involved in the Student Harm Reduction Coalition, Shelter Health…

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Anya Mittal

Anya is a junior from Boston, MA studying Bioengineering and Robotics. This winter, she’ll travel to Santiago, Chile with her Penn Global Seminar to learn about the Chilean healthcare system. On campus, Anya is on the board for the Society of Women Engineers and is working on building a surgical robot at the GRASP Lab. She’s passionate about…

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Mate, Soccer, and Steak: Finding Community in Uruguay

GRIP: Entrepreneurship in Montevideo, Uruguay When people asked me where I was going to spend the summer and I answered “Uruguay,” I was often met with confused expressions or comments like “Where is that?” or “Isn’t that near Argentina?” Few people seemed to know much about the country, let alone its culture or community. But…

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From the City to the Falls: Embracing Argentina Abroad

GRIP: Social Impact in Buenos Aires, Argentina Living in Buenos Aires this summer has been just as transformative as my internship itself. Every day has been a balance of adjusting to a new culture while also enjoying the excitement of exploring a city that feels alive in every corner. From the moment I stepped off…

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Cartagena: A Journey Beyond the City Walls

GRIP: FinTech in Medellín, Colombia When I first decided to plan a trip to Cartagena with my cohort, I thought it would just be a quick getaway; a chance to see the coast, do some sightseeing, and then come back to Medellín refreshed. What I didn’t expect was how much it would change the way…

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From Spreadsheets to Construction Sites: My Summer in Medellín

GRIP: FinTech in Medellín, Colombia When I landed in Medellín for my GRIP internship, I wasn’t entirely sure what to expect. I knew I’d be working with a large construction and real estate company, but the day-to-day reality ended up being much more dynamic and hands-on than I imagined. Within my first week, I found…

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Diversity within Colombia: The Amazon Rainforest

GRIP: FinTech in Medellin One of the most interesting parts of Colombian culture shock this summer was my experience being in the Amazon’s rainforest and meeting its people. For four nights, I toured the river-region of the Colombian Amazonas department. There, I stayed in its capital city of ~35,000 and then briefly lived on an…