AIESEC - Where all the first experiences take off

 By: Unknown    23:52  AIESEC events, Global Citizen, Global Village, LC posts   No comments

Global Village

Date: 03/11/2014

Location: JAMKO Cafe

Last week, I got to be a small part of the organizing team for the Global Village event. Now, i got the chance to be the one reflecting some memories here to our blog.

The organizing team has 4 people: Tu Linh Dong, Lena Rogova, Olga Borisova, Sarah Perrine and Linh is the team leader. All of them have just recently joined AIESEC at the beginning of this autumn. This event was the first time ever for them to work in a group as an AIESECer.

Picture 1. Our lovely organizing team 

So now the event was finally over, what was your first feeling that appeared?

Sarah: relieved (laugh)

Linh: I was relieved (smile)

Lena: I was pretty satisfied. :)

Organizing an event, whether it is small or big, takes investment. With the hope was to make their first event as perfect as possible, there would be no surprise they had put quite an effort and time. Before the event date, most of them were stressful worrying about what could go wrong during the process, which was quite normal for any event organizers. To see the final product delivered to participants, they could let go the deep breath they had hold back. "We finally made it!" - that is the relief wrapping around any person after first times doing something. 

Picture 2. The cultural experiences board. 

Global Village was created in order to promote AIESEC's projects for whom wish to be volunteers abroad. At this event, participants were introduced to four countries: Colombia, the Philippines, Uganda and Poland. First, our lovely host Sarah facilitated people to write down their most memorable cultural clashing experiences. Then those notes would be taped on the board, which were voted later to choose the best story with a winner prize (sweet chocolate bars, we figured who would not love chocolates?). The idea behind this is to show that cultural differences can happen everywhere but only by travelling will you get a full insight into a country's culture and values, which is also the main purpose of Global Citizen project.

Picture 3. Food display

After that, the participants got the chance to taste four different kinds of dishes from above countries.The organizing team did a good job bringing the cultural factor here. They cooked themselves the food (the team leader Linh even made two dishes from Uganda and Philippines herself) even though they did not originally come from the countries. The feedback they got was highly positive. Videos about four countries were introduced at the same time. The purpose was to raise people's knowledge about the countries they might be interested in coming to work. There were also guest speakers: two travelers to Philippines and Poland who gave us briefly their own opinions about those two countries and Linnea - who was a volunteer to Uganda through AIESEC.

"As a leader for this project, I had drawn up a lot of ideas at the beginning. I was full of energy and expectations to make all of the ideas work. It was indeed a pity that some of them were changed at the end due to the limited time and some twisted technical problems we had. However, of course, I had a valuable experience to see how the reality of event became much different than planning on papers. I learnt most about time management but also other project skills as well. If I could choose to do it again, I would have probably made the same decision. Moreover, being mainly responsible for this event was more stressful than I thought. Not in a stressful scary way but I mean I needed to be the one committing fully at the event. It was also my first time working with other new members of AIESEC, so i cannot lie that there was no problem at all. There was some differences in working styles, which I do not think they came from different cultural background but from different personalities. However, they were not that major that we could not get through it. Eventually we did organize the event as successful as a demo version to the participants and we were all happy about it." - Linh (translated and written by blog administration).

"For all of us, it was our first time working together and it was also our first event. I used to work on projects with people in the US and now I got to work with different people from different nationalities, I realized how not alike the way we thought. It is like, planning an event would be the same all over the world but in reality, we were all different. The only thing irritating me was the unexpected problem happening at the beginning, when our venue had some other people using still and we found difficulty settling people down or moving them." - Sarah

"Anyway, it was such a good experience. I thought the event was good in my opinion. This project started only more than 2 weeks before the event actually took place but i thought we did it well. People loved the food and seemed to enjoy the time. I would surely join organizing more events after this." - Lena

Both three members of the organizing team I interviewed agreed that the event could be better but it was perfect to be as a start. The participants were asked to leave feedbacks at the end and here are some of the opinions:

• "Seems interesting. I was already thinking of going to an interview."
• "Everything was very nice but it would be better if the sound system was louder."
• "Thank you for evening, That was very interesting."
• "That was great. But i hope to have more info."

As we all can see, there were both positive and negative feedbacks. Reading them, I thought, what could be better result for the first time organizing an event? There were things they needed to colled for further development but that was the whole point for "first times". Being a part of AIESEC means being brave. They are not more experienced than the rest of us but AIESEC showed them not to worry about such thing. AIESEC becomes the place where they were given the chances to practice their "first times", because it is also the place where fear does not stand as an obstacle.

Global Village will be soon happened again in January with more improvements. This time, you got to know what the countries are like and what it is like to live abroad. Some brochures about volunteer projects were also passed around during the event. Next time, participants will be given more answers to their queries deeper to volunteer projects. Until then, you all can check out more information and even apply here http://www.aiesec.fi/ if you are interested. Curious about how life of a volunteer is? You can read the stories' posts on AIESEC JKL facebook or blog.

Let's be brave and face the challenges like how AIESEC members have done.

- Nghi Dang -

AIESEC Blog Administration

Read More

EuroCo 2014 in Greece: the Connecting Point of AIESEC leaders globally and what it left me

 By: Unknown    00:50  AIESEC events, AIESECers Experience, LC posts, LCP   No comments

AIESEC is a miracle place for inspiration and witnessing the grow in people’s potentials. One of the happening that gave me that deep feeling was EuroCo - AIESEC International Conference 2014.

This year, EuroCo took  place in Athens – the beautiful capital of Greece . This International Conference  is intended for Local Committee Presidents all over Western European & North America and Central & Eastern Europe to keep updated with the strategy of AIESEC International.

In EuroCo, we got the chance to meet people who share our same goals: Together we bridge the gap of cultural differences, erase the line of stereotypes through exchanges. With strategic directions, we ensure the standard and satisfaction that we have promised to bring to our interns.

Yet, how much can AIESEC be relevant? We are among several other organizations in the world who also do volunteer,develop leadership or striving for peace. How can we be different in our own values?

I brought up to AIESEC local presidents I met the same question: What can AIESEC brings to your own people?

“In Colombia, people pay a lot of tax. The problem is, the government doesn’t keep its promise to spend our money in the way it is supposed to be. In other words, people lose trust in leaders and leadership. How AIESEC can improve the situation? We demonstrate social responsibilities and sustainable leadership, so that we can gradually impact Colombians’ mindset.” - Juan Manual Duran ( AIESEC Colombia).

Prieler (AIESEC Austria) told me that : “The problem in Austria is that youths are really passive. They think that just going to universities, earning a job and marrying is enough. Therefore, through our exchange programs, we can show them that youth can do much more and have more responsibilities for the country.”  

“And what keep you motivated in AIESEC?” I asked Minchev from Bulgaria. “You know, it’s development and impact. You don’t have to be in AIESEC to do volunteering; but when I’m in AIESEC, I’m not only developing myself, but also developing the leadership in others”.

They, as all other Presidents in the Conference, are young as we are in our 20s. However, we feel the boiling urge to demonstrate social responsibilities by care for people and society. It’s simply wonderful to talk and understand about other countries’ challenges and how AIESEC is striving to tackle them step by step with our core program.

The truth is that, no place on this planet is perfect and it will never be perfect. Thus the world is calling for young leaders, who show genuine concern about what happens around them and are ready to take brave actions to chance and change the situation.

AIESEC Conference was full of  both serious and fun moments. One amazing aspect contributing to the uniqueness of AIESEC is Roll Call. “I love roll call, it’s like our unique communicative language” – said my friend Matt from AIESEC USA. Roll calls are not only about dancing. They may look simple, but carry the meaning of connecting people. Could you imagine hundreds of people from over 40 nations who have barely met before all dance the same moves? We share moments through wordless happiness in the air.

Video: AIESEC in Switzeland roll call: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_IvKTOHd7Cs&list=PLN_kQT2Sg7_FqbfKrLm0_-pmIgZQ9l7VI&index=6

“All good things come to an end, but it’s the beginning of something new, something big and something brave”. We got home with our sugar cubes – the sweet memories from international friends, and swung into actions to keep up the flame of achievement.

Picture: Sugar Cubes - sweet memorabilia from AIESEC friends

Thanks all people I met in EuroCo. Each of you has given me so much vibrancy of stories and AIESEC lives in different places. That’s what make me love AIESEC, cuz AIESEC is always full of people’s inspiration.

P/S: Dearest thanks the host organizing team from Greece as well. The food and all your support was really amazing, rich in variety and especially olives. :D

- Le Phuong Anh-

Local Committee President at AIESEC Jyväskylä

Email: lephuong.anh@aiesec.net

Tel: +358 044 563 5382

Read More

LAS - Local AIESEC Seminar: Flashback of new AIESECers

 By: Unknown    23:42  AIESEC events, LC posts   No comments

Two weeks have passed since the LAS event but the excitement and memory is still around. Brand new shining members have already started to pull off their energy for working and being a part of AIESEC JKL. So where does the energy come from? I guess we have to go back a little to the LAS event, when it all began.

LAS 2014 

• Date: 04/10/2014 - 05/10/2014 
• Location: Nano Sauna University of Jyväskylä

"Honestly, I know that it was not perfect in every ways which of course, was quite difficult for any kind of events. But those small mistakes were blurred out in the end, because our final experience about LAS was good. It was really good."
That is what Pia Korhonen and Titty Varghese (two new members of Outgoing Exchange Professional Interns) concluded about LAS. When received the invitation to the event, they expected they would get to learn deeper about AIESEC, what AIESECers are really doing and have a chance to make new international friends. Those expectations were indeed met.

The event lasted intensively for two days, especially on Saturday when we started at 10am and only left at 9pm. Almost the whole weekend we stayed inside a small room with nearly 20 people but it was worth every minute. Coming to the event, we brought with us the curiosity of how it would be to become a part of this AIESEC family. We honourably had Natalya Shuvalova as the "chair" of the event (the person who provided us informations and guidance about working with AIESEC). She is working with the National Board at AIESEC in Finland currently but she has been with AIESEC much longer with different positions before. Due to such thick experiences, she gave us all what we needed to know. She told us how things were done and how people worked in AIESEC, based on her own stories which was the best thing. "She spoke about her own fear when she was elected in new positions and she had no idea to do things. However, she managed to do it eventually. It showed to me that even if everything would start with a fear, we could all get through it", said Pia.

Pouring water tradition

As new members, we were excited but also confused. This is the reason why LAS was needed. We got the general information about history of AIESEC and all the projects going on at the moment. At AIESEC JKL, there are four teams: Incoming Volunteers, Incoming Professional Interns, Outgoing Volunteers & Professional Interns. On Saturday evening, we had one event in which we got to do basic tasks of each team. It was really effective. If we were still lost in what and how people work in AIESEC JKL earlier that day, we were then able to let go the confusion. It also directed us to the suitable team so that we would be able to contribute by doing what we found most interesting. The final decision was informed on Sunday with the cutest ceremony ever: pouring water on the chosen teammates - indeed a fresh waking up method in the morning!

Pizza for dinner on Saturday

On the other hand, probably we cannot ignore the free foods and coffee offered in the event. The Faci Team did their job well done and all the participants gave them high credits for that. Responsibility to take care of nearly 20 adults probably was not easy, not to mention that they needed to maintain our satisfaction throughout the event as well. At the end of that long Saturday, we did have an after party and Marianne Peltola (Vice President of Incoming Volunteers team) has said :"You guys are still here with us so at least we know, we did something right". And yes, you all did.
On Sunday, each of us left LAS with the best souvenir one could get - the "sugar cubes". AIESEC has this tradition about "sugar cubes",which means people get to write their thoughts about a particular person on little pieces of papers and put them in the envelope anonymously. What could feel more better to read about the sweet things people wrote to you and then find yourself giggling?

"Sugar cubes"

SO WHY AIESEC IN THE FIRST PLACE? 

"When I got the chance to come studying in Finland, I was aware that it was an opened society. People openly talk to each other, smile, explore, go out and find a way to develop yourself. So then I thought maybe I could join AIESEC JKL", Titty explained her first reason to come to AIESEC. Pia also believed she would gain more chances practicing her leadership skill while working with AIESEC JKL. For other people, reasons might be that they wanted to do something different or got to meet all kinds of people but we all got one same question in our head :"Why not?". After LAS, we never felt better that we had asked ourselves that questions. We were inspired to contribute something to this world and society. LAS showed us how short life could be; maybe before you realise it, time has passed and all of us know how scary time is, once we lose it, we lose it forever. LAS proved to us then we should take actions in order to make our lives more meaningful, full of memories.

As also a new member of AIESEC JKL personally, I still feel that inspiration wrapping around me. I could not agree more with Pia and Titty for all of their opinions about LAS. I felt thankful for what LAS has raised inside me. I remembered when I left LAS on Sunday, I had the urge of being heroic and felt like I could be a superwoman at that moment. I bet that would be something we never experience everyday. Speaking on behalf of all the new members of AIESEC JKL, I hope what we shared here would direct you closer to us.

Read More

LC Posts: Starting out Active YOUth

 By: Unknown    08:36  GCDP, LC posts   No comments

AIESEC Jyväskylä's iGCDP team has spent spring 2014 working on Active YOUth, a project geared towards activating marginalized youth to give them positive experiences regarding work skills and education. Right now we are at the stage of putting out our TN forms and starting to do interviews for possible interns! As the project is starting to become reality it's a good time to write a few words about the process.

The planning of Active YOUth began in our Local AIESEC Seminar, autumn 2013. The newly formed iGCDP team wanted to influence the high youth unemployment rates in Jyväskylä and the planning started with a project where a diverse, international team of interns would work at local youth centers, helping young people with plans for their future and careers. 

First things to take into account while planning a project were costs, a timeline for planning and implementation of the project, possible partners and possible funding. The team sent out applications to different funding partners, and during February the project was granted financial support. Together with Jyväskylän Kaupungin Nuorisopalvelut (youth services) the team started to plan the concrete implementation of the project project and deepen our co-operation. Nuorisopalvelut's side is to provide the project with the locations and help advertise and recruit youth, the rest falls on AIESEC Jyväskylä.

iGCDP team at Toukofest 2014

Up next was the planning of promotional materials and visual outlook for the project. The name Active YOUth was decided on, and after some logo designing the project got it's own website and a Facebook page. Promotional work was started off at Toukofest 2014, an event for 12-16 year old school children.

At the moment the project resources go to recruiting youth, starting to accept applications from possible interns and finding host families for the interns to get to know Finnish culture while working for the project. During the next months the team will start contacting possible sponsors for the project.

If you're from the Jyväskylä area and would be willing to help out - either as a team member or a host family, contact our iGCDP Executive Marianne at marianne.peltola@aiesec.net! If you're from outside Finland and you'd want to work as an intern in this project stay tuned for the TN form at myaiesec.net! Jyväskylä is waiting!

Read More

AIESEC events: SUCCESS 2014

 By: Unknown    09:15  AIESEC events, AIESECers Experience, LC posts   No comments

Our superhero, LC member Kim Alberts worked as OCP (Ogranizing committee president) for SUCCESS 2014, a national conference held 14.-16.3.2014 in Jyväskylä. She shared some of her thoughts about her AIESEC career, how she ended up working as an OCP in a national conference, what it was like and if SUCCESS 2014 was a success or not.

SUCCESS 2014

It’s good

To be

It’s good to be an OCP

"During the autumn of last year [2013] I searched for a student association to join, partly because I wanted to get involved in the organization of activities in Jyväskylä, and partly because I wanted to meet and hang out with awesome internationally oriented people. Via Facebook I found out about AIESEC, and before I knew it I was a member of this global but local student organization. I was happy to meet so many active, talented, happy and professional people and I quickly got sucked into the AIESEC culture.

Kim during SUCCESS 2014

A few weeks after I joined AIESEC, I attended a national conference where I learned about the history, values and goals of this enormous network. It was then that I saw what great variety of opportunities was offered within the organization, and what we could offer students from all over the world. On the way back home from this conference, my new friend Jose suggested that I should organize such a conference one day. ‘Yeah right’, is what I thought, realizing that I was only just introduced to this whole new world of opportunities. ‘Well’, I said more joking than anything else, ‘I even might consider it, if you come back to Finland to help me.’ Of course he said he would, but honestly who would take this seriously… Barely two months later, I was honored to be asked to apply for Organizing Committee President for the upcoming conference in Jyväskylä: SUCCESS 2014. After considering this opportunity (because of course I would like to lead a team to achieve such a challenge, but I was just a newbie without any AIESEC experience) and after the not too subtle suggesting and pushing of our EB, I decided to give it a shot and apply. And thank god (in this case Anna, Talvikki and Piia) that I did!

OC team introduced at the conference

The first task was to form a team around me with whom I would organize the conference. Since I had been team member of several organizations for activities and events, I had some idea of what I thought was important in a team in preparation for an end result. Different people with different knowledge skills are needed, because obviously I could not do this by myself. However, the most important assets that any team member should have (and keep!) are motivation and fun. So I decided to invite anyone within our local committee and also some friends outside of AIESEC who I thought might be interested. I figured that the people who would apply, would already have the motivation to help. The only thing I demanded from them was to tell me what they wanted to do, and keep me updated on how they felt things were going (the most important item on the agenda of each meeting was ‘happiness of the OC’). Luckily I was proven to be right, and with a total of 19 members our team was the hardest working and happiest team I have ever had the pleasure working with. And obviously I had not forgotten what Jose promised a couple of months earlier, so I invited him and he was the 20^th awesome member of our OC.

Obviously the organization of an event cannot go without challenges (future OCs: double check that you are organizing the conference for the correct date!), but everything that our team got to face, we faced with a smile and a determination to make it work. It is amazing to see how many big and small things should be taken care of to organize a weekend for 100 awesome AIESECers, and I felt privileged to be the one to supervise all the hard work that was needed to make it happen. I mostly enjoyed watching all team members cooperate, challenging themselves and each other, learning new skills, and while doing all this enjoying themselves as well.

OC team's morning meetup

Then, after 5 short weeks of preparation, SUCCESS 2014 was finally there. At Thursday the Faci team arrived in Jyväskylä, and after a brief bonding activity with OC and Faci, and a short night sleep, we were ready to get to work. We had booked a great venue, and all the ad hoc preparations ran smoothly. Ok, I have to be honest and the stress level was a little higher than normal at some points, but with the great spirit of the team we could receive the delegates with open arms and a smile. Now, I know that I should probably tell you how the organization of the weekend itself went, but to be honest it is all one big blur in my memory. I remember my hurting feet from walking back and forward to help here and there, but mostly I remember my hurting cheeks from smiling the whole weekend. I think I can speak for the whole team that it was the great spirit from everyone in the venue that kept us going, big thanks to the delegates, the Faci and chair for that. But most importantly, I could not have been more proud of all the members of my team, who were so independent yet coherent, so exhausted yet active so busy yet positive. Thank you Anna, Daniela, Amy, Piia, Marianne, Thao, Jose, Emmi, Flora, Amy, Johannes, Fiona, Hien, Anna, Iida, Tin, Lotta, Joanna, Otso, Linnea, Mika, Talvikki and Tsuri.

I think it is very difficult to describe the memories that I got from this experience, but I think the following will describe my feeling best: EVERYTHING WAS AWESOME!"

Read More

AIESECer's experience: CEED Johannes Gutnik

 By: Unknown    12:28  AIESECers Experience, LC posts   No comments

Johannes worked a CEEDership (Cultural Envoy for Exchange Development) in AIESEC Jyväskylä during spring 2014. Read another CEED experience here.

Johannes at Lake Jyväsjärvi

"My name is Johannes Gutnik and I am from Germany, Heidelberg. Currently I am studying Mathematics and Physics. Besides studying I am running a small online business and I am a member of AIESEC Heidelberg.

I was an OGX CEEDer at AIESEC Jyväskylä in Finland. As a member of AIESEC it is possible to do an internship at another Local Committee and that's exactly what I did. I picked the project because it took place during my semester break. I had 6 weeks off and the timing was just perfect. I must say that I couldn't have picked a better project. I learned a lot, worked together with great members of AIESEC Jyväskylä and met a lot of amazing people in Finland. 

I didn't know much about Finland prior to arrival. Just that people there are a little bit more reserved and quiet. Well that was true but if you get to know the people better it quickly changes and you can get really close. My expectations for the project were easily surpassed, I had way more fun and actual learning points than expected. I was trusted with important tasks for the LC and was included into the team very quickly. Project description matched the expectations very well. I was trusted with the OGX recruitment and promotion process. I worked together with the EB and other members and organized info stands, created online campaigns, helped updating the new webpage, organized a movie night and several other tasks. Also I was a member of the OC (organizing committee) for SUCCES 2014 - a national conference of AIESEC in Finland organized in Jyväskylä, which was a lot of work but at the same time a lot of fun as well! It was awesome 

There were a bunch of memorable moments. As already mentioned, the first conference outside of Germany will never be forgotten. The surprise leaving dinner that I never expected. And most important all the great moments I had with the people from AIESEC Jyväskylä. I learned to sleep less than 3 hours on a weekend. Learning to make Pulla and cinnamon rolls was also a special experience for me. In general I have to say that my expectations have been surpassed and I would've never thought that my time in Finland would be so great. So a lot of thank yous go to the people that made that possible. I definitely recommend the project to anyone who is curious about new cultures, who is open-minded and ready to adapt to a new LC but also who has own ideas and want to realize them. Go to Jyväskylä - your ideas and thoughts are very welcome here."

Read More

AIESECer's experience: Ajla Šoše

 By: Unknown    06:27  AIESECers Experience, LC posts   No comments

Ajla came to work for AIESEC Jyväskylä during February 2014 as a CEEDer, where she got to help our local committee with talent management. Here's what she had to say about AIESEC Jyväskylä as and LC and what she got to experience during her month as an AIESEC "intern".

MY EXPERIENCE IN AIESEC Jyväskylä

"My name is Ajla Šoše and I come from Sarajevo, the capital of Bosnia and Herzegovina. I study Genetics and Bioengineering, and I have been an AIESECer for more than three years. In AIESEC, I realized how much I can do to change my society, how much we as young people can influence the world, how I can develop myself and people around me, and more importantly – in AIESEC I found my true friends, all around the world, who became my second family.

Throughout these three years, I have worked in many teams – as a member of a team dealing with human resources of AIESEC Sarajevo, a member of a team organizing a local conference, as Vice President for Talent Management, and then as National Education Manager, which is still my current role in AIESEC Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, I always wanted to experience CEEDership (Cultural Envoy for Exchange Development), which I considered as crown of my AIESEC career and experience. I saw this opportunity offered by AIESEC Jyväskylä, and I decided to apply, even though I thought I had no chance. After I received an email from Anna, Local Committee President, saying that I was elected as CEEDer, I was thrilled, ecstatic, excited; it was all surreal to me and I could not believe it. One month in Jyväskylä, in Finland, was like a dream coming true.

Finland has always been so interesting to me; beautiful, yet so mysterious. But what did I know about it? Well, pretty much nothing. I knew that it was a cold, cold country, where people speak a funny language, a country with numerous lakes, a country where Santa was born, and where they like heavy metal music. And that was it. As much as I googled it, I knew that I could really get to know the country and people once I got there. So I was just waiting for that February 1st in my calendar.

Once I landed, my first impression was “well it's not that cold!“ (throughout my stay in Finland, -2 was the lowest temperature), so I started regretting bringing so many warm clothes (I was picturing myself going through the snowstorm, with reindeer all around, with my eyebrows and eyelashes completely frozen). Soon, I will realize that Finland is not such cold country as I thought it would be – in any way. The common prejudice of whole Scandinavian region is that people are very cold, reserved, who do not like to talk and share anything and they like to be by themselves. As soon as I saw Anna on the bus station, I knew that I was all wrong.

Jyväskylä is an international student city, as well as the city of AIESEC Jyväskylä, so I had the opportunity to spend time and work with people from all around the world – The Netherlands, Turkey, China, Ukraine, Kenya, Greece, France. Apart from my general job description, which was to assist in recruitment and other events held by AIESEC Jyväskylä, we had a lot of free-time activities (sauna was number one, of course!), and I also had the opportunity to meet students who were studying in Jyväskylä by ERASMUS, thanks to my great roommate, Monika. This global network is one thing that I value the most; now I have people from all around the Europe, even the world, who I can stay with.

During my stay, we organized the local conference – Local AIESEC Seminar – which was held for potential new members. This opportunity provided me another experience, which challenged me and made me to step out of my comfort zone; I had the honor and great pleasure to chair this conference. During that time, I bonded a lot with people I worked the most with – Anna, Talvikki, Piia, Kim and Marianne. They have shown me once again why I am still in AIESEC, they inspired me with their life experiences and challenges, and with them I lost every single prejudice I had about Finland and the Finns. I am truly grateful for this opportunity, and proud and happy that I can call them my friends.

I fell truly, madly and deeply in love with this country; with everything about it. I have never felt anywhere so safe and secure, and in the end, so accepted. My friends told me that I would not have culture shock in Finland. Well, they were wrong once again, just as I was. My culture shock was that everything is so perfect, that everyone is so calm and polite (and I thought the Brits were the best in this). I ate bread with raspberry jam and whipped cream on top in the sauna, I made my first sushi, I drank the most expensive beer in my life, and at the same time the most disgusting one, I realized that Moomins are from Finland, that people go partying with overalls, I walked on the frozen lake. The only thing I regret is not staying longer. One month was not enough to experience everything I wanted, to explore, to travel, to spend more time with those great people.

That little country, far in the north, with cold wind and lot of snow, has a special place in my heart. When I think about my time spent in Finland, I smile because I know it was unique experience which changed me to some extent, which changed my life perspective, which showed me how people from this country are special. At times, it was a bit difficult to adjust, because I come from different background, mentality, way of thinking and perspective. However, I realized that not everything is what it seems like, that every country and every city has a story to tell. This experience taught me that we should grab any opportunity that comes along, it restored my faith to myself and made me proud of who I am and where I come from.

Most importantly, this experience taught me that nothing is impossible. I believed that one girl from a small country cannot contribute to Finland in any way, but I was wrong. I learned that dreams are never too big and that there are no boundaries when we are passionate about something.

I am grateful for this experience and all people who made every day of it special and memorable. I always say that we will remember people and moments with those people, and I am proud to say that I have a lot of stories to tell, true friends I gained throughout this journey and I will cherish those memories whole my life.

Finland and Jyväskylä, we will meet again, I promise. I know."

Ajla (second from the left) at the mini LAS

Read More

Spring greetings from LC Jyväskylä

 By: Unknown    03:50  LC posts   No comments

The spring term has started off with speed. Here's a brief overview and some info on what to expect this upcoming few months!

Success 2014

SUCCESS 2014, the 4th annual AIESEC in Finland conference will be held this upcoming weekend, 14.-16.3.2014 in Jyväskylä and our LC has been busy preparing for an intense weekend of ideas and innovations. Our awesome and hardworking OC team has done their best to make SUCCESS - well, a success!

Our new team members from our spring team member recruitment have been trained and are starting to get to work in our LC. Their term starts off with a bang organizing a conference right away! In addition to new team members we are currently in the middle of choosing our executive board for 2014-2015. One member has already been voted by the general assembly - hooray!

In OGX LC Jyväskylä is working hard with Global Citizen promotion and recruitment of exchange participants. We have a bunch of events coming up including a movie night and several info stands (with coffee of course!) so stay tuned and up to date with events by liking our Facebook page. You can find out more information and apply to Global Citizen program on the Global Citizen website. Read stories about Global Citizen in Finland or abroad and expect new material on the blog and in Facebook on a weekly basis.

In ICX LC Jyväskylä has gotten to enjoy two CEEDs helping us in arranging team member promotion and talent management as well as the currently ongoing OGX promotion. Our Kindergarten Project EPs have all left Finland and the iGCDP team is currently in the process of restarting the search for new raises for the project. While you wait for fresh content from the EPs read our first participant's story and her kindergarten's story about the project.

That's all the news for now, stay tuned for more content, events and info in the future and have a sunny springtime!

Read More

AIESEC events: National Conference Jan 17th-19th 2014

 By: Unknown    02:48  AIESEC events, LC posts   No comments

AIESEC in Finland kicked 2014 off with National Conference, this time hosted by AIESEC Aalto in Helsinki on Jan 17th-19th. Here are Piia and Talvikki's experiences from NatConf -14.

"NatConf (National conference), which is one of the four conferences organized in Finland yearly, was this time held in Helsinki. NatConf can be said to be one of the most important conferences for AIESEC Finland as a whole, since it is the one where the new national board will be selected. Thus, the conference is basically organized around the elections and all the activities included to the selection process. Again this year, we got to hear convincing speeches from the candidates some of which were attending the selection process through Skype. As members we also got the chance to “interrogate” the candidates in the Questions & Answers –session and see which of the candidates would be the most suitable ones to lead the organization in the coming term. After the strict selection process the following candidates were selected: Olga as the new member committee president (head of the board) and Silke Hoffmann, Ville Vuorinen and Pranav Pandit as vice presidents. Three of the vice president positions are still open and the second round of applications has already been opened. After the elections it was time to review what had been happening in the different local committees during the past few months and start planning the rest of the term. Soon it is time to start selecting the new executive board in Jyväskylä as well.

Our delegation in the conference was a small but effective one, and despite the little waiting caused by the election, we enjoyed the conference. Especially the gala dinner on Saturday evening was a great addition to the normal conference routine! We got to dress up of course, had a nice dinner with a live music performance by Alexandra from the MC, and met alumni from all over Finland, including Jyväskylä"

Representing LC Jyväskylä
 @AIESEC in Finland National Conference on Facebook
 ©Fanny Haga, Mira Valkjärvi

AIESEC Jyväskylä is currently in the process of organizing the next conference, SUCCESS this March. If you'd like to participate in making SUCCESS 2014 - well, a success (!), check out this video here for info on where to apply.

Read More

Alumnus experience: Tiia Stén

 By: Unknown    12:03  Alumnus experience, LC posts   No comments

Ever wondered what can AIESEC offer its members in the long run? Tiia Stén is an AIESEC alumnus, and this is what she had to say about working in LC Jyväskylä and how it's benefitted her in her studies, work and freetime!

"I joined AIESEC in 2006, the first year I started university. At first, my intention was to join a student organization as "an after school activity" and to meet new people in a new town. I got invited to an AIESEC info evening by the local committee president of that time, Ari Hautala, who convinced me in IRC that there was good food served at the event. However, soon after befriending like-minded AIESECers, AIESEC became like a part-time job and a second family to me, which I enjoyed.

Soon after in 2007 I got selected to the local committee executive board (EB) of AIESEC Jyväskylä 2007-2008 as the Human Resources & Development vice president (VP HR/D). At that time the concept of competences was trendy and rising in AIESEC. During the EB year I gained friends (who still are my best friends) and skills required for "running a small company", like the EB work almost was. During 2006-2010 I attended a countless number of national and international seminars, participated in organizing tens of projects and seminars throughout Finland, and worked as the alumni coordinator of AIESEC Jyväskylä and in the National Support Team of AIESEC in Finland.

The experiences and merits I have gotten in AIESEC have helped me numerous times later in my job and scholarship applications. The whole AIESEC experience I have had during my university years is unique and something I could have never experienced anywhere else. The friends I've gotten in AIESEC remain still after graduation, which is the thing I value the most of what the organization has given me. I don't think anyone can deny the power of connections all over the world - when travelling I always have someone to contact in different countries if I happen to need a place to stay. Reflecting on my own learning outcomes from AIESEC, I’ve noticed that now I am more open-minded, globally oriented and easily approachable than before. I am a kind of a Utopian.

I graduated as a M.Sc. (econ.) with Information Systems Science as my major in February 2013. Currently I am working on my Ph.D. as a doctoral student and project researcher in the Department of Computer Science and Information Systems at the University of Jyväskylä. My dissertation concerns globalization and innovation competence of professionals in the Information Systems field - a topic I began learning already in AIESEC. One of my thesis supervisor professors has also been in AIESEC in Germany during his university years, and I can say there truly are similarities in the mindsets of people who have been in AIESEC."

@SUCCESS seminar in 2008, LC Jyväskylä won the "LC Excellence Award of the year".
Our EB from the left: Toni Pienonen (VP ICX), Sami Vänskä (LCP), Heli Hietanen (VP OGX), and myself (VP HR/D) in the front. Our FC Ulla Leppänen is missing from the picture, but we all still love her!

Read More