Internship at the Croix-Rouge Francaise

During my internship at the Croix-Rouge Francaise, I worked closely with immigrant and asylum seeking populations in a way that is very important. Domicilation Postale provides a service that allows homeless people and those with unstable housing to still be able to receive mail and their important documents, similar to a Post Office Box in the United States. Of course, this involved speaking with many people who speak French as a second language, or those who speak primarily one language like Romanian, Arabic, Russian, etc. Occasionally, this also includes translating things from English to French and vice versa, which really challenges your skills not only in French, but in conveying the same ideas in English with a lot of technical jargon.

Through my entire stay, people of all different walks of life showed me kindness, which really helped me fight through the homesickness and the feelings of not speaking well enough. The most important thing that I learned is that when a lot of people come together for the same good cause, anything is possible. Being able to provide a service to one of the most marginalized populations in France allowed me to really see what it was like to improve someone’s life, even if in such a small way.