So many new things!

May 20^th 2015: Arrival at Penn State!

Driving this far west into PA was a new experience for me; the first of many to come! I arrived just prior to going to our welcome dinner at an awesome place called Happy Valley Brewery. This was a lovely experience as the food was delicious (see the picture below of my portabello mushroom sandwich!) and I really enjoyed getting to know everyone. We then went back to campus where I unloaded everything to make myself at home in a dorm room-not to worry this was a single room with an ensuite bathroom-which was great!. Living on a college campus again was quite the change from my fast paced NYC apartment life!

On the following day the four of us interns met up with Maria, our intern supervisor and assistant manager at the South Food District on Campus, Mr. Hopey, Interim Director of Food Services, and three other assistant managers, Scott Shroyer, Jamie Robinson and Eneri Knarr. Everyone was so friendly and welcoming. It was great to listen to everyone's experience prior to working at Penn State and stating our career goals and those for our time at Penn State.

The next day which was Friday and we worked on our awesome selfie scavenger hunt which took us all over the campus!! This is the largest campus I have ever been on, which even includes visits to Cornell and Syracuse Universities!

For Saturday, Sunday and Monday we worked at Findlay cafeteria serving over 3,000 campers. This was by far one of the hardest things I have ever done. We had to wear the standard uniform of a Penn State Food Service Employee (see pic below) which was definitely a change for me as I'm used to wearing business casual every day! We got up at 4am for these three days and did essentially whatever the managers needed us to do. I got to make what seems like a million pancakes, help cook what also seems like a million pieces of chicken, actually serve the food to the campers, work in the awesome dishroom sorting silverware and unloading the clean dishes as well as cut about 100 cantaloupes. This does not even begin to scratch the surface of the amount of tasks that go into making a campus dining hall run smoothly. I have always had respect for the behind scenes aspects of food service, having been a waitress for a short time, but this just opened my eyes even wider to it all and helped me realize just how hard it is!  

I am really looking forward to our time here at Penn State and all we are going to learn!