My Summer Internship at ELLE Magazine

By: Saengrawee Chaturapornprasit
          A month after my summer holiday had started, I began working in the Editorial Department of ELLE Magazine in Thailand. I actually hadn't wanted to work at all, but Dr.Piman had skillfully got me into the idea of working by placing me at ELLE, so I'd agreed earlier on that I would work for only a month.
 
          My first day at ELLE was actually a little unexpected because I was so sure that I would be spending the whole internship photocopying and making coffee. Surprisingly, my first assignment was to translate an article taken from ELLE America into Thai, which scared me a little at first because I didn't think I would do a good job. However, I was later on assured by my supervisor that it was a very good piece of translation and that she really liked it, and so after that I was given a whole bunch of articles to translate. With ELLE being a fashion magazine, the articles were mostly fashion and beauty related which did not require much specialization on my part. Fortunately, I didn't know any other languages because otherwise I would have been given articles in French, Spanish, Japanese, Korean and other languages to translate as ELLE exists in all countries. My other supervisor also found a good way to lighten her own workload by asking me to write the four or five columns that she was responsible for, which included information on travelling, shopping, new products, exhibitions and ELLE around the world. Occasionally, I had to photocopy articles and type up the articles that had been submitted in hand writing.
 
          I could not have been more wrong when I imagined the office of such a fashionable magazine as ELLE to be totally modern and luxurious. Not only did this one floor of the Bangkok Post Building house ELLE editorial and marketing departments, it was also the working space for two other magazines, and it amazed me that there could be so many people working in such a little space. The computers that they used were only ten years younger than me and I was surprised to see that they were actually functioning somewhat. However, amid all these old computers and documents, they managed to squeeze me in front of an unoccupied 8-year-old computer in a little tiny space in the corner that I could proudly call my very own private desk for the coming month.
 
          One of the most important things that was required was definitely stamina as I had to spend many hours translating articles and writing articles in front of the computer without doing anything else. Some technical skills, needless to say, obviously came in handy sometimes since the photocopier broke down so often and the MAC computers were so old they didn't look like they worked anymore. One would need to also have good writing skills to be able to perform the jobs given without being told off later. I found out that having respect and courtesy for the supervisors was also very important, especially when they were the ones filling in your evaluation forms after the internship.
 
          Although I didn't get any monetary reward for working there (I wish I did!), I was happy with the feeling of accomplishment that I had after completing each assignment and being complimented. The articles that I wrote were printed and I was credited for my work. My supervisors sometimes joked that I did the whole August issue of ELLE because it seemed like every page you turned, I had helped in completing it some way or another, and that made me really proud.
 
          I admit that it was quite difficult battling with my supervisors in the beginning because some of them were quite mean and awful but after a while I got used to them and learned to ignore some of their harsh words. There were times that one of my supervisor claimed that I was constantly taking time off but I had only missed a day then because I was really sick. She also did not like to have me speaking English around her, even if I was talking to a friend, which I found really strange in the beginning but I eventually realized that she didn't speak English too well. However, after about two weeks of total misery on my part she decided to be occasionally nice to me and on my last day she even took me out to lunch along with other people working there.
 
          There were so many things that I learned from this internship that if I were to state all of them, I would surely need another page, so I will only mention a few. Firstly and most importantly, I got some knowledge of magazine editing, which was exactly what I had hoped to be able to learn. This internship also provided me with the opportunity to improve my writing and translating skills. On top of this, I learned how to work with other people, especially those that I did not like very much and to take orders from those who were in command. Finally, I had a chance to find out what working was like during my internship and it really inspired me to choose to do what I like because I have learned how miserable it was when I had to do something I despised.