My First Days As An Intern Of Tunas Hijau In Malang

Rianne Brink – Netherlands

Finally I’m in Malang, the place I’ve chosen for my second internship in Asia! I’m Rianne Brink from Holland. I live in Amsterdam, the capital city. I’m 21 years old and study European Studies at the University of Amsterdam. Last summer, I’ve finished my Bachelor degree and next year I’m going to do a Master. This year I wanted to broaden my knowledge of a foreign culture and I decided to apply for an internship in Tunas Hijau – kids & young people do actions for a better earth – through student-run organization AIESEC.

In a short period of time I found an internship in Johor Bahru, Malaysia. For seven weeks I was working on a project about HIV and AIDS. I gave workshops in senior high school and I also visited Shelter Home several times. This is a place where HIV infected people live together and where they get the treatment they need. After seven weeks of internship in Malaysia I was still not satisfied with Asia. I decided to apply for an internship in Indonesia. One week later I had an internship in Malang, with Tunas Hijau. Together with AIESEC they’re working on the environmental project ‘Go Green’.

I’ve chosen Malang and Tunas Hijau because I’m interested in the Indonesian culture and I would like to learn more about the environment in a country which is so different when you compare it to Holland. Because Holland is a small country, the problems aren’t as big as in Indonesia yet. Still there are problems with recycling, traffic jams and the waste of electricity. For a couple of years we’ve been trying to reduce the number of cars and we started a recycling program. There is even a Green Party trying to get a place in the Dutch government. The schools pay attention to the environmental issue by offering environmental lessons to the children. The environment becomes more and more an important subject in the Dutch society.

During high school and at the university I’ve learned a lot about the environment in Asia and what the problems are. Nevertheless, I’ve never visited Asia before to see the environment in real life. The next six weeks I hope to discover Asia’s environmental problems but also the benefits. Indonesia has to most beautiful nature I’ve seen in my life and we don’t want to lose that! My first days with my host family, AIESEC and Tunas Hijau were wonderful. A nice promise for the rest of my stay in Indonesia!