Vocation

Nate Long

While studying abroad I will be completing many vocational goals.  First and foremost, my most important goal is becoming bilingual.  This is something that has become very important to me since in high school when I first started taking Spanish classes and it is something I plan on using in my day to day career once I graduate, in whatever form it may be.  For this reason, I feel this is the most important thing for me while abroad.  I feel this will be most easily accomplished by spending as much time as possible with actual Spaniards, which is easier said than done.  In order to get involved with them one of my main goals is to try and get involved in extracurricular events with them, particularly soccer.  I feel that through this I will gain friends and from there clearly be able to spend time with people who are fluent in Spanish.  Another thing I intend to do is try to observe as much as possible and attempt to compare it to business here.  I feel that in store this could be easily observed but one other place I want to observe is particularly around soccer, which will be important because I plan to center my senior thesis around this.  Also, this should be both interesting and fun for me because I feel it simply means looking at soccer and the business around it.  The local soccer team in Pamplona, CA Osasuna, is located right across the street from my school so I feel that this will make learning about them easier.  Lastly, one skill I think study abroad will give me is a better sense of appreciating everyone for who they are and their culture, particularly when it is not the same as mine.