15 weeks! Au Revoir Cyrille

15 weeks ago Cyrille joined us here at TTPL for his Work Placement. He announced his arrival with this blog - Hello World Well here we are 3 months later and its time for him to return to Belgium.
Good bye Cyrille, good luck and please stay in touch!


Hello world this is Cyrille again! My 15 weeks of internship here in TTPL are coming to an end and to be honest, I will miss a lot of things here in Torquay.

During all this time, the best thing was to meet a lot of European students and that way, to make a lot of friends! Chatting and having a laugh around a pint of beer with them during the weekend or after a day of work is the best way to unwind and relax. If I can give an advice to new students; don't be shy! Nobody bites, go speak to other students and get to know each other. This will make you happier, you will improve your English skills and in the weekends, you will go visit surrounding cities in UK (Plymouth, Exeter, Totnes or even London) and have fun on Friday and Saturday nights.

My work placement in The Training Partnership Ltd was really fruitful for me. Now I know what office work consists of and I learned to be more independent and open-minded. The staff members are very competent and always available when you need them. What is the most amazing with them is that they are like a family, they all get along with each other and everyone is ready to lighten the atmosphere at any time, which makes them a fantastic team!

The host family that welcomed me was the nicest one I could have wanted. They were always happy to have a talk with me and I quite like the food my host mother was cooking, which is not the case for all of the students coming here.

What more could I say? Working abroad for some months is an experience every student should live. I would have stayed longer if I didn't have exams to pass… anyway, every day here was enjoyable and Torbay is a wonderful place to live in even if few people might be very weird sometimes.

I am already looking forward to come back here in the future!

Thanks a lot TTPL for all you have done for me, you guys are the best!

Secret Squirrel

Sarah - a German students view of the Torbay experience

Hey, my name is Sarah. I’m 18 years old and I live in Germany.

At my school, every student has to do a work placement in twelfth Grade to get some insights in economic processes. As our school offered to do this work placement in the UK and English is my favorite language, I decided to take the plunge and have the courage.

On my first day here at The Training Partnership I knew I wouldn't regret it!

I love working here, the atmosphere is relaxed, but also very productive and someone’s always quick with a quip – mostly Ian or Sam. ;-)

Sam is also the one I’m mostly working with or better said for. I support him with searching for different activities around Torbay, so that the Students get some ideas of what they could do while they’re here in the UK. Besides the fun tasks there was of course a lot of paperwork – probably like in every other office.

After work there’s still enough time to explore Torquay. Whether you want to go shopping or enjoy the sunset at the beautiful harbour. There are also a lot of pretty places around Torquay, like Brixham with all its beautiful Coves or Dartmouth with its many Castles.

My host family is very nice and helpful. On my first day of work, I didn't catch my bus, because unfortunately it doesn't stop at my stop…

It was pouring and as I got back home, my host mother already called a taxi for me.

The best way to improve your English is to just talk! 

If you’re in the same accommodation as one of your friends, don’t just talk in mother tongue, but instead talk with your host family. You could definitely learn some interesting things about the UK, you may not knew before.

Also you should definitely go out, have fun and make new friends. There are some nice pubs in Torquay, like Appleby’s or the Green Ginger. 

Another good way to meet new people is the weekly student meeting from TTPL – which, by the way, I helped to organise J  – where you can talk to all of the other students from many different countries.

Unfortunately I’m just staying for two weeks and that is definitely too short to explore the whole beauty of Torbay. But nevertheless I made some of the best experiences, I will never forget.

Thank you TTPL! J

My Life in Torquay - Yasmin, a Swiss Student in Torbay

Before I went to England I was quite excited because I really didn’t know what to expect. Now as I have been here for quite a long time I know that British people really are as friendly and polite as they are said to be. The word 'cheers' is quite a universal one and is not only used as in Swiss German we say 'proscht' whilst clinking wine glasses together as I have learned back home but also covering any meaning ranging from 'thank you' to 'goodbye'. And yes, the English really do drink a lot of tea. But now enough talk about the stereotypes (and I haven’t even started to talk about the weather ;-)) but more insight into my everyday life here in Torquay: I have been doing an internship since the beginning of January at the Riviera International Conference Centre in the Marketing and Sales Department. Here I do various creative tasks such as creating flyers, posters and vouchers and also helping to keep the website up to date, writing press releases or doing paperwork. I especially like that the work is very rich in variety. This week, for example, I will represent the Centre at a Tourism Exhibition.

I stay in a very nice and friendly host family and I think that it is the best way to experience another culture. I am convinced that my language skills have also improved because of the interesting conversations at the dinner table. I think it’s especially useful to learn another language as it is actually spoken – that’s what you can’t really learn at home.

I always look forward to the weekly students meetings; it’s a good way to get to know people from different countries – always a lot of fun! On the weekends we often go out together in Torquay’s various pubs and every now and then we end up in the night clubs as well. In the daytime we explore the towns nearby or go shopping. Sometimes we meet for a cup of tea. Yes. It’s nice to adapt to another culture...

Yasmin

Germans in the UK

Hi, we are Emma (16) and Lou (17) from Hamburg, Germany. A couple of months ago our teacher Birte Oggesen started talking to us about a work placement in the UK. We would go to Torquay for 2 weeks, work in different companies and stay with host families. We were very excited after we filled out the not too short application. We left on Sunday, February 23^rd and flew from Hamburg to London. After a couple hours of us hanging out at the airport, grabbing some food we got on the coach that would bring us to Torquay. After the long ride on a smelly bus we finally reached the Torquay coach station where our host families picked us up. On Monday morning we went to the Torbay Innovation Centre for the Welcome Meeting, where the TTPL staff gave us some information about our stay. On Tuesday we stated our work placement. Lou got placed at the Training Partnership in Torquay and Emma started working at Churston Farm Shop. From the first minute at TTPL Lou loved working there. The colleagues were all very nice and made her feel welcome the second she entered the office. But Emma wasn’t too sure if the cashier job was the right thing for her even though she really liked the staff there. She got replaced after one week at the Churston Farm Shop and joined Lou for the second week at the Training Partnership. We had many different jobs to do which were all very interesting. After one week Lou was even asked to answer phone calls which she really enjoyed. Emma was very happy with her placement and really liked the work. It was just like she expected – working in an office with friendly staff and interesting work to do. 

Lou

Emma

Living Coast - Greta and the Penguins...

I am Greta, I am 18 years old and a student from Germany. I did my 2 weeks work experience at Living Coasts. It was a wonderful and awesome time! All the staff was very friendly and attentive, that was one of the first things I noticed at my first working day.

In the first week I worked at the the 'Education Department'. In the summer that means that there is a lot to do with groups of children but in the winter there isn't much to do so I did some research for a new area about sea turtles and the new 'Pole to Pole Campaign' what was very interesting because I learned pretty much. In the second week I worked at the 'Animal Department'. That was a week with hard work but also around the different animals. For example the penguins: Every morning I had to rake the sand of the huge penguin beach to clean it from leaves. That was quite exhausting but all the time the penguins were directly around me and some of them also wanted to play with the rake or my feet. Afterwards I was allowed to feed the penguins what was really amazing! Besides I fed the seals what was great because they catch every fish I threw to them. Of course there was also some kind of work that was not interesting. I worked in the kitchen what means cutting fish and squids, weighing fish for different animals or doing the washing up. To be honest

more than half of the time was like that but I forgot that while feeding the animals. Later I often worked with the different animals inside. I cleaned the aquariums, checked temperatures and salinities and fed again some animals. There were many several aquariums with seahorses, crabs, a lobster, rays and a lot of other fish. I gave food to all of them what was really interesting because they all eat in their own special way. For example the octopus that gets living crabs or the seahorses that have no stomach and get their food every few hours.

At the weekend I also did a few trips, for example to Exeter, Brixham or Dartmoor. My great hostfamily drove with a friend of mine and me to the Buckfast Abbey and afterwards we drove through the Dartmoor.

That was an amazing experience because it is very different to Germany and we saw some wild ponies. We stopped and my friend and I were able to stroke them. That was unique because in Germany are no wild ponies.

Travelling to England with the Training Partnership was a very good idea! It was a excellent chance to improve my English and getting more confident with the different language. It was a gorgeous time and I hope I will come back in the future!

Hello from Cyrille, TTPL work placement student

My name is Cyrille, I am a 21 year old boy from Belgium. I had to do a 15-week internship in a foreign language company for my last year of school. So I chose to go abroad to improve my English. I contacted WEP Belgium to organize my internship, everything went well and they found me an accommodation and a work placement at the Training Partnership Ltd in Torquay, United Kingdom.

The day of my departure, I was a little stressed but now I know I didn’t have to.

I arrived in Torquay on the 2^nd February; the taxi driver showed me a bit of the town and then brought me to my lovely host family that will have to put up with me.

Now I am working for The Training Partnership Ltd. The first day I saw the office and the staff, I knew I would love working here, and I was right!

This is my first week here and I can tell that people here are very nice and really help me feel comfortable. I already thank them for being that kind with me!

For now, the only defects I found about England are the rain and the cars driving on the ”wrong”  left side of the road haha.

Gianluca...Working at Living Coasts

My name is Gianluca and I am an 18 year old student from Germany. I came to Torquay for a 2 weeks lasting work placement. The Training Partnership chose the Zoo and Aquarium Living Coasts to be the right place to work for me.The first thing I noticed on my first day was, that the whole staff was very friendly and open minded. That helped me feeling confident, although English is not my mother tongue. But getting along with the language emerged to be very easy, taking new instructions and tasks never was a problem.

Working in the animal department was exhausting, but mostly fun.  There were two different sides of work. On the one hand I was allowed to be right next to animals, which is very interesting. Arousing the sand of the penguin beach with a rake was a lot of work, but being in touch with the cute penguins was a great and unique experience as well. Additional to that I was allowed to feed seals, and loads of birds I can not name, rays, seahorses and jellyfish in the aquarium ect…. On the other hand there was also work, which was not so much fun, but it also had to be done.  Loads of food had to be prepared for the animals. That means: Cutting loads of sprats and other fish into small pieces, handle quids and care for meal worms. I don’t know if you can imagine the smell in the kitchen, which you carry home in your clothes as well of course. Again this is a unique opportunity to see what happens behind the walls of a coastal Zoo. Animals can not really help you to improve your English, but talking to a lot of people really does. Most of the employees were very talkative and interested in my personal background, so I got a lot of chances to take part in conversations. My vocabulary didn’t grow a lot during this short time, but I got a lot more used to use the language actively. Finally a chance to realise, that the huge effort at school pays off. You overcome your inhibition level faster than before and feel more self-confident about the language than before.

In conclusion I have to say, that the impressions I got here will last forever, I am glad that I have been here!