As a U3 student in Political Science interested in geopolitics and impact-driven advocacy, I had an absolutely interesting experience as an officer in an NGO in consultative status with the UN, where I had the chance to meet with UN actors, Permanent Missions and other NGO representatives. It was an amazing experience that made me want to learn more about the work of national delegations, having noticed my tendency to orient decisions in accordance with the interests of my country, Morocco.Â
From that on, I hoped to intern with the Permanent Mission of Morocco to the UN, but they seemed to be quite unavailable, and I didn’t like my time in New York, which was a really expensive city to live in. A few weeks after my experience at the UN, I heard about an opportunity to intern with the Permanent Mission of Morocco to UNESCO in Paris. It seemed to be the perfect fit, as I had just spent my exchange year in France and was perfectly fluent in French.
My goal was to concretely observe and contribute to the Permanent Mission’s work, which is to represent Morocco at the UNESCO, to be an intermediary between our Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the organization, and to promote our culture and country through partnerships, events, and other initiatives.
I am happy to say that I was indeed able to fulfill that goal, thanks to the Permanent Mission’s diplomats and administrative staff, who were incredibly considerate and who always took the time to guide me and assign tasks that were going to assist them in their work, if not replace them on some rare occasions. The main responsibility as an intern is first to attend meetings and write reports that would allow the diplomats to either focus on the meeting without taking notes, or to know what was touched on if they couldn’t attend. However, towards the end of July, the meetings were rarer, leaving me to focus on the other tasks that interns usually accomplish. Among other things, I was asked to do research on certain themes that were going to be discussed at forums, to prepare diplomatic letters and other types of official communications, or to translate documents in Arabic or Spanish.
The highlights for me were definitely the events. Although I was afraid to find an empty UNESCO during summer, the headquarters hosted some receptions, and the Olympic Games brought a sports dimension. Those events were an amazing opportunity to network with diplomats and officials from all over the world in the field of culture that I personally value a lot. The most important event was a ministerial forum on the importance of sports. I got the opportunity to meet with famous journalists, football players, and politicians. I was proud to see that NGO representatives went to talk with our Mission to organize projects in Morocco, and that Moroccans were involved at the event, whether as UNESCO Secretariat staff or as NGO leaders. During the forum, I got the chance to talk to Muhammad Yunus, 2006 Nobel Peace Laureate, and told him about my McGill classes where I studied his concept of microfinance. He was appointed the leader of the interim government of Bangladesh a few days later.
Thanks to the guidance of the Arts Internship Office and to the diplomatic team’s consideration, I didn’t face any major challenges, except maybe a lack of balance in the way I was doing tasks, as I would sometimes overload myself and not manage my time accordingly.
Finally, I would like to sincerely thank my donors for making this internship possible. The Vanasse Wilbert International Experience Internship Award allowed me to afford an internship in Paris during the Olympic Games. Coming from a middle-income Moroccan family, this award gave me an opportunity that my peers unfortunately could hardly afford, as those internships are usually unpaid. Thank you Martine Vanasse and Randall Wilbert.
