Professional Potluck was a success!

What’s this Professional Potluck you ask? Well, it’s a mixture of two things that one would never think to put together: culture & business.

This past Monday, the International Business Association put on an event geared towards striving our professionalism along with breaking those cultural barriers that come alone with performing business with international companies or individuals. As part of the IBA myself, I had the honor of also being able to combine my other organization, the Temple Arab Student Society as part of the event! It was a day filled with tons of speakers and tons of food! Who doesn’t love an international and diverse lunch? There was food brought in from all over the world! Everything from samosa’s to falafel, to even chicken over rice. But, okay, minus the food of course, there was tons to be learned. Every speaker came up and spoke about how their culture actually effects the business’s they run. An Egyptian dentist from the Rittenhouse Square Area, gave a lecture about how diverse her practice actually is, and how there are about 7 different languages spoken by all her workers. Pretty impressive!

It’s always events like this that prove to me how diverse the world actually is, and America too of course! It would be impossible to succeed in such a world if emphasis was not put on the importance of breaking cultural barriers. In such a diverse city, and even campus, I meet people from all around the world and learn new things everyday. The fact that I chose International Business as my major satisfies my craving for my love of cultures. The business world is something that is the same throughout every country. Every country may run on different cultures and aspects, but business combines them all in ways never thought possible.

A global and an international mind is a successful mind, right?

Philly: the perfect city.

Why yes, I just attempted at making the title rhyme. It was worth a try!

There’s so many things that I seem to forget to blog about, and one of them recently has been my realization of how much I actually love Philadelphia. I’ve been down to center city at least 20 times in the past couple months, and every time I go I can’t help but love it more and more.

There’s so many things that I could talk about when it comes to downtown Philadelphia: the endless restaurants, shopping stores, parks, and the list goes on and on. Whenever the stress gets to me, or if I just need a moment away, I always find myself going to Penn’s Landing to relax right on the waterfront. Yes, I just gave you my secret spot, so be thankful! There’s so much to do in the city that I never know where even to begin.

I’m pretty sure all my money my freshman year was spent investigating every restaurant I could find. My friends and I found ourselves wandering from street to street trying to find our way around. Now, two years later, I finally can say I know where MOST are, and how to get around. One of the hardest types of adjustments is being able to use public transportation. Coming from a town where I used my car to get around anywhere, I barely every hopped on a subway or train to get anywhere. After the first couple times, I slowly memorized all of the stops and ways to get around. It’s one of those aspects of a city that one seems to just learn over time, and it took much less time than I had thought! After the first couple visits, I barely had to take out my iPhone and navigate around using Siri like most suburban natives do. Now I’m the one spotting all those city newbies out on the streets. It’s funny how things can change in such little time.

Just to give you a little insider’s view of my favorite Philadelphian spots, here’s a quick tour through my instagram pictures!

Spring Fling!

The day that we’ve all been waiting for since the start of spring semester finally took us by surprise yesterday! For once, the weather was nice and the sun was out all over campus. Spring fling is our very own all day carnival where clubs and organizations set up tents and tables all over campus with activities and competitions. What could be better than being out in the sun with all your best friends?

Since I’m involved in so many campus organizations, I got to jump around from table to table and helped out as much as I can! My main tent was the Arab Student Society, where I got to deck our tent out in different Arab flags, show off my ethnic wear, and hold belly dancing lessons. Yes, I actually had people come up, try on my belly dancing skirts, and get taught! We played Arabic music the whole time and made sure to dress people up for pictures in our very own Arabic photo booth!

After helping out, I walked around with all my best friends and checked out all of the other organizations table. They had a huge concert for us in the middle of campus lead by a DJ where everyone danced, ate, and had fun! There was also a rock climbing wall, where I attempted racing my best friend and ended up failing horribly. I guess you’ll never know how good you are at something until you try it, right?

Spring fling is definitely one of the best highlights of the year, and every year it just gets better and better! I love being able to take a day to just remind myself how much life passes by and that not every moment should be stressful in college. There needs to be time to actually enjoy college life, and Spring Fling is definitely Temple’s way of giving us that!

Only 6 weeks left!

6 weeks…5 weekends…42 days…until i’m free!

Well somewhat free…

This has seriously been another crazy fast semester and I can’t believe that a couple weeks from now i’ll be halfway done my college career. It seems like just yesterday that I was in that white cap and gown graduating high school with all my best friends.
Now i’m in a different city, with different friends, and more motivated than ever to keep pushing myself forward. With final exams just around the corner, one thing i’ve tried to do this semester is start planning further ahead. Whether that’s planning for internships, summer classes, or even trips, I tried to make everything centered around being ahead of the game.

Sophomore year is definitley one of those years that flys by, but it’s also one of those years that people tend to forget about and not take advantage of! In a matter of 7 months I was able to become the Public Relations Chair of the Temple Arab Student Society, Brand Ambassador of the Barnes&Noble Bookstore, and successfully hold my position as an Owl Ambassador in the Admissions office. Those hectic few months have made me realize that chances that are given, no matter how stressful they might be, are worth taking! There’s no such thing as being “too busy” because it’s basically up to you to create time to do the things you love and enjoy doing. For me personally, I’d rather look back through time and be happy with everything I successfully did, than regret not taking chances when I had the time.

With the year winding to a close and the weather FINALLY becoming nicer, I’ll make sure to keep you guys updated every step of the way! But for now, get out there and enjoy the nice weather while it lasts!

The Spring Break Tease…

Yup, I said it. And I’m pretty sure every single college student is reciting that line over and over again, every minute of the day. As a somewhat adult, you slowly start to realize that any break you have, no matter how small, is a tease to the much awaited summer time. You sit there laying in bed until noon, soaking up every minute of sleep you can take, because a week from today you’ll once again be waking up for that dreaded 8 am class. Why in the world do I torture myself with such early classes? I have no idea.

It’s surreal to think that summers will never even be the same anymore. Those relax, care-free, three month vacations in high school change dramatically when you get to college. Whether its summer courses or internships, there’s always something that you SHOULD be doing. Notice I say should, because that should differs from person to person, and from dream to dream.

Are you that student that hates free time, and always want to be doing something?
Or are you that student that would rather just relax and take things as they come?
Or are you a middle person? Not height wise, I promise, but half relaxed and half busy?

There are characteristics that describe every student in numerous ways. Each one of us may have different dreams and goals, but we still tend to look at achieving them the same way. And the first step to achieving them is making use of any free time that we may have. Other than sleeping, I’ve been researching internship after internship, dream after dream. You’ll be amazed by the things you discover when you find the time to just browse around. I always start off with a general search term and find my way into searching things in google that push my hope farther. To have a hard work ethic, I like to surround myself with ideas that COULD happen. Seeing everything as impossible is never the correct state of mind that one should be in.

SO GO OUT THERE AND DO YOUR RESEARCH!… while I sit here and sip on my coffee and count the days I have left to just wondrously google; my favorite pastime.

Here comes the real world!

And no I don’t mean the MTV reality show, but the ACTUAL real world that us college student’s have been dreading ever since our first day of kindergarten.

I still have two whole years of school left, and in college years, two years seems like two days! Time flies by, and even though I’ve said that a million times on this very blog, I will never stop repeating it. And the worst part is, the more I repeat it, the scarier it gets!

On the bright side, yesterday was my first ever career fair at Temple!

One major perk of being a business student at FOX is that we get our very own career center called CSPD (Center for Professional Development). They pretty much do most of the dirty work for us students that way we get the chance to actually meet employers and market ourselves for jobs and internships as much as we can! In order to partake in such events, the CSPD office requires each business student to get CSPD’d. Which is a series of meetings and classes that help you get ready for that scary real world. Instead of taking the classes seperately during my own time, I decided to take the easy way through it and actually register for the Professional Development class last semester. This class is mandatory, so I made sure to finish it earlier. This was definitely by far the most useful class i’ve taken! From resume critics, to what I should wear during interviews, I’ve pretty much learned all there is to know so I’m not so scared anymore!

The Spring Connection yesterday hosted by CSPD was a chance for me to put those skills and resume in action! Beforehand, I made sure to research all the companies that would be present, as well as take notes on what positions they have available. My goal going in wasn’t even to land the perfect internship, but rather to get a feel for things that will help in the following two years, so why not get myself a step ahead?

I practiced my 30 second elevator pitch over and over again, filled my padfollio with resumes, put on my business suit and took action! I made my way to about 7 of my top listed companies, started with my least important ones first to get a feel for things, and then made my way around to being more confident that way. Of course I was scared going in, and not just butterflies scared–more like about-to-throw-up scared. Even after a year of touring, giving public speeches and introducing myself to so many people, I was still nervous of course! The things I do help me get ready for this very step: getting me a job!
Just always remember, the little steps are what matter the most! Let time take it’s time. Take college one day at a time and keep your goals in mind every time you adventure into a new opportunity.

City Dreams

After almost two weeks of classes and being back in the swing of things again, I’m pretty sure it’s safe to say i’m back into school mode. Sleeping early, waking up early, and most importantly, being tired 24/7. I’ve been surviving off of one cup of coffee a day, and I actually wouldn’t want to have it any other way.

One thing that I’ve noticed over the past two weeks is the amount of motivation not only inside of me, but inside of all of my friends. One thing I always seem to forget is that time is constantly ticking. Even though it seems like just yesterday that I graduated high school, I’m now almost halfway done my college career. Everyone around me is slowly becoming more and more dedicated to what they’re doing now, and what they want to in the future. Of course there’s a couple people you meet here and there that are just taking life one day at a time, but in college, those types of students slowly start to disappear. When one is forced to pay so much for school, they’re forced to try their hardest as well and push to better themelseves.

A dream of mine that I’ve always had was to officially label myself as a “city girl”. I’m already proud to have done the first step by going to Temple, which is the best city school I could have ever chosen. However,my next step scares me. I’m constantly worried that my dream of living in that downtown apartment with the most perfect job won’t come true, but I mean, who isn’t? I know that there’s so many people out their with that same exact dream, but isn’t their people out their for every single dream? No matter what goal I push myself to achieve, there’s always going to be someone out their that’s striving for the same thing. As a college student, I’ve already learned to push myself to achieving such a goal, no matter how unrealistic it may seem. One thing I constantly have in the back of my head, is that everyone who is living the perfect city life, probably at one point thought it was so unrealistic too. It’s overcoming that unrealistic fear that pushes you to do what actually can be made real.

Why yes, this was another attempt at my motivational type blogging, but time has seriously been flying by so fast. As much as i’m nervous, as much as i’m actually excited for what’s to come. I strive forward everyday with a positive attitude; an attitude that will fit perfectly with that oh so silly city dream of mine.