GJU’s Student Shares his Internship Experience in Germany
GJU’s Student Shares his Internship Experience in Germany

GJU Students Tariq Shahrouri and Sarah Hijazeen from the School of Natural Resources Engineering and Management (SNREM) had their internship within the German Year at Lobbe Umwelt-Beratung in Iserlohn Germany. Tariq wrote about his experience and here is what he had to share with us!

Hallo Zusammen!

A while ago, Sarah Hijazeen and I had an interesting conversation with our supervisor at work concerning leaving a certain workplace in general and the impression you leave behind you for your colleagues who will soon become future contacts.

Sarah and I were assigned to the Environmental Consultancy department in our company and were responsible for clients from the UAE among various other tasks.

We were the only Arabs in our building thus leaving a good impression was always in our heads in everything we did. We had the good fortune of extending our time with our company for another semester to write our bachelor's thesis meaning we stayed with our company for a total of 11 months (September 2018 - June 2019).

On our last day, as a way to leave a final good impression, we gave away the jars of Zaatar and the souvenirs you see in the pictures below. Our colleagues were overwhelmed by this simple gesture and had real heartfelt reactions when saying goodbye.

Leaving an impression as an intern may sound foolish at first, but it is an essential part of the whole GJU exchange program. In Germany, you not only represent yourself but also Jordan and the Middle Eastern region as a whole, which already has a very questionable reputation in the eyes of your German colleagues.

Being punctual, polite, a hard worker and overall nice is key to help build the bridge between Germany and Jordan, which is the whole point of GJU in the end.

I share this with you here not to brag, but to remind you of this responsibility in Germany and perhaps remind everyone that small acts can build up to something great in the end.

Of course, you are entitled to do whatever you find suitable, but please remember that impressions last not only on you but also on where you come from when you are in a foreign country :)

Good luck!

(Tariq Shahrouri)