Internships in Seville, Spain - Adelante Abroad

I had a wonderful time interning with Adelante in Sevilla. Southern Spain is somewhere I’ve always wanted to go, and it did not disappoint. There was plenty to explore and discover while also enjoying an immersive experience and improving my Spanish. A heads up for future applicants, I just wanted to say that I made all of my closest friends from the language school I attended the first two weeks. My workplace was a very small company with not many other people, so we didn’t meet up outside works. So if you’re looking to become close with locals, it might be a bit more difficult. That being said, the Spanish people are super friendly and I had many wonderful conversations with waiters, taxi drivers, and just casual conversations with locals. But if you imagine yourself only wanting to make close friends with Spaniards on arrival, it may be tough.

As my time in Spain is quickly coming to an end, it has made me reflect on my time abroad and appreciate all the memories I have made. For some context, I am doing a computer science internship in Seville, Spain, from January to May. When I first came out, I took 2 weeks of Spanish classes, which were fantastic. These classes quickly helped me make some friends and get used to living in Spain. After these classes, I started my internship at PCPaco, which was a fantastic experience. It was exactly the role I wanted for my career, teaching me tons. They also helped me explore more of the city and learn about all the holidays. I think that my favorite part of Seville is the people. Everyone I have met out at clubs and in general has been extremely friendly and patient. Admittedly, my Spanish was not amazing starting out, but everyone was patient with me and quickly helped me learn. Overall, 10/10 experience, and I definitely would recommend it to anyone wanting the experience of living abroad!

To begin, I really enjoyed my time in Seville and I don't regret this experience. That being said, there were of course positives and negatives that others should be aware of. Starting with the good, Seville is a beautiful city with great nightlife and many sights to see. The people that I worked with from my marketing internship at the partner school, Spanish Institute for Global Education, were friendly and I always felt I could ask them any questions. I created lots of content for the social media, designed various promotional materials, and gained experience of what it's like to work in marketing. I also was able to travel on excursions with the school and had time to explore around Europe on my own. Now for the negative, my first internship I was contracted to pulled out once I was already in Spain. I ended up doing social media marketing for the school, so I did not experience the Spanish immersion that I had hoped for. I lived in an apartment with other English speakers, and my internship only had me come in two to three days of the week. I made friends with the students at the school, but they were all English speakers as well, and I didn't know how to meet Spaniards my age to help me be immersed. I would recommend staying with a host family so you have to speak in Spanish. With the housing, the apartment was generally nice, but my room had no window to the outside, it opened to the laundry room. There was also a smell of mildew from the bathroom that would never go away. It was just bad luck of where I was placed. I still appreciate the knowledge I gained here and the experience of living among a different culture.