Amazing AIESEC internship in Tehran, Iran

From April until July 2009 I had the wonderful possibility to do my internship abroad with AIESEC Kaiserslautern and AIESEC Iran. After a time of searching I found a great management internship in Tehran, Iran with the company Henkel-Pakvash. Henkel-Pakvash is a joint-venture of the German company Henkel and the Iranian detergent company Pakvash. Everything worked well in preparing my internship: the Iranian AIESECers organized for me my visa, answered all my questions, gave me a lot of useful information about Iran, life in Iran,… and I even met my boss in Frankfurt at the airport.

As I arrived in Tehran, 2 Iranian AIESECers, Hossein (Local Committee President of AIESEC Tehran) and Negin (my buddy who helped me a lot) picked me up at 4:30 a.m. from the airport in Tehran which is still 45min away from the centre. Although it is really difficult for them to leave their home during night they did it and welcomed me. In my first days they organized my flat in a dormitory for me, showed me the city, helped me to have a bank account and had always a program for me that it was never boring. On my first weekend which is Thursday and Friday in Iran, we hiked in the mountains in North of Tehran and had a wonderful view of Tehran. I still had some days after my arrival to get familiar with my new life.

On my first working day they accompanied me to the Henkel-Pakvash headquarter which should be my office for the next 3 months. Everybody was so friendly and showed/explained everything to me. Above all I must thank for their great hospitality. Finally I worked in the HR department of Henkel-Pakvash in a team with 6 “Henkelaner” mainly for change management. I learnt a lot and I had always enough to do. I got responsible tasks and enough support in it. All in all I just can recommend to everyone this internship and I am more than glad that I did it.

During the weekends and in the evenings I was always busy. Although I didn’t have plans all the time some AIESECers or friends of them did something with me and the 2 other interns from Germany and the Netherlands. I lived together with them in the dormitory and we had a great time together. We went in parks, eating Ice cream or the popular and good Ice Pack (which comes from Germany according to the Iranians although we don’t know it at all!), to the cinema, in a fun park for bowling, billiard and scooter, to the swimming pool (they had different opening hours for men and women) and of course we visited some sight seeing places and did PARTY! I wasn’t limited in my freedom of movement at all. Of course it’s different when suddenly every woman wears a scarf in public and long clothes. Most of them don’t wear a chador (the black scarf for the whole body) and they have a lot of make-up. The scarf is more and more at the end of the hairs and they look just great. I had only to accept that I must wear long trousers and that you greet woman maximum by hand shake.

Sometimes we visited on the weekends other cities like the most beautiful ones Esfahan and Shiraz or Qom, Abyane,…

All in all I had a wonderful time in Iran and got a deep insight in their culture, their daily life and found a lot of new friends who I will miss all the time. Even the election in Iran at the end of my internship couldn’t sadden my experience. I even got a better view on Iran through the election because it showed to me once more that the people are not like we see it in the western media. They want to have democracy and they fight for it! I am a very lucky guy that I could make this experience and discover Iran by my own and not though the “dirty” glasses of the western media. I really like to go there some time again because it’s a wonderful country with a lot of culture, nice landscapes and buildings and above all because of the people. I am so thankful AIESEC Kaiserslautern, AIESEC Iran and all the others who were involved that I could make this experience.

Now it’s your turn!