As I am interested in the world of culture, I wanted to get to know the reality of this world better by doing a two-month internship at a German cultural association called Kultur Aktiv.
So it happened that on 2 May I set off from Marseille in the direction of Dresden. The journey was not easy and the legendary punctuality of German trains let me down so badly that I almost missed my connecting train!
The day after I arrived, I had an appointment with my internship supervisor. I had to take public transport in Germany for the first time. It took me over an hour to understand how the tram works, but after asking some passers-by for help, I was finally able to get to my internship place. So in these two months I was able to get to know many facets of how a cultural association works.
The Kultur Aktiv association organises a gallery on its premises called “Galerie nEuropa”, where photographs about life in Central and Eastern Europe are exhibited.
As part of this project, I was able to take a look behind the scenes of a photo exhibition. It made me realise how precisely everything is organised, e.g. the distance between the individual pictures.
Kultur Aktiv also organises meetings called ”Café Kulturschock”. These offer anyone interested the opportunity to meet new people and learn or improve their German at the same time. During these two months, I had the task of organising one of these meetings. This was a real challenge for me, because I was far from mastering the German language myself. So I looked for ideas on how to conduct this German lesson in a playful way. I led the session with the help of my tutor when I was at a loss for words. Although it was stressful, it was a very good experience that made me overcome my fear of expressing myself in a language I didn’t know perfectly.
During these two months, I was also able to find out how a website works and even participate in the creation of some articles. I also had the chance to create new designs for social media.
The internship also gave me an insight into the financial functioning of a cultural association and showed me how difficult it can sometimes be to be dependent on external funding.
In summary, I can say that this internship has helped me to broaden my view of culture and to no longer limit it to certain styles, but rather to see it as a channel that allows one to renew one’s own idea of society.
A stay abroad is always a very rich experience that you grow from, and yet the beginning is not so easy. I remember well how when I arrived I felt lost in a world I couldn’t understand, all the signs were in German and I was afraid of upsetting people if I asked them for help. During this time I felt a deep loneliness. As the days went by, however, I was amazed at how quickly I got used to the city and its routines.
I began to gradually discover the city with its many beautiful buildings, churches and museums. I enjoyed walking through the streets of Dresden and seeing a new style of architecture that was often different from what I was used to. As I am very interested in history, I was fascinated by the history of Dresden, although I sometimes had difficulty understanding the connections. The city of Dresden was part of East Germany at the time and I was particularly struck by how much this period of Germany’s division, which is still very much alive in the minds of Germans, is almost unknown to us, apart from drastic events like the fall of the Berlin Wall.
I tried to understand what living conditions were like in East Germany. During a commemoration week for young people from several European countries, partly organised by KulturAktiv, I was able to visit, among other things, a former prison for political prisoners.
Besides Dresden, I also had the opportunity to discover other German cities. Among other things, I travelled to Berlin for three days. It was the first time I travelled alone to a country other than France. There I discovered a completely different city that impressed me with its cultural richness and diversity. In those few days, I was able to discover many famous sights that I had heard about regularly.
I also spent a few days in Bavaria, Munich to be precise, where I was once again able to get to know a new side of Germany. These trips helped me to build my confidence and learn to stand on my own two feet.
In general, I would say that the German lifestyle is not that dissimilar to the French one, except perhaps the relationship to food. I was quite surprised that there is no real break at lunchtime. Everyone eats while they work, and that surprised me a lot at first!
In summary, it was a very good experience that allowed me to gain new knowledge and at the same time discover a new culture that impressed me with its diversity!