A fun blog post written for Pulse Creative highlighting my first week at my internship and my first impression of New York City.
Pulse Creative is a full-service marketing agency based in New York City since 2004. I interned here in the summer of 2012 when the agency was still a small, yet fierce, boutique agency.
Since then, the agency has grown and consistently wins national and international awards for their work with clients such as Music Unites, Time Warner Cable, LG, Hostess, Southpole, David Lerner NY, and the Philippines Board of Tourism, among others. My original blog post on the agency's website can be found by clicking HERE. The tone of the post matches their quirky sense of humor.
I’ve lived half of my life in California and the latter half in Florida, but like millions of other people, I longed to travel to the cultural capital of the world: New York City.
After almost giving up on finding an awesome (emphasis on awesome) summer advertising/marketing internship, one finally landed in my lap. Before I knew it, my dream of traveling to the Big Apple became reality, and unlike most tourists I would get to experience everything the city had to offer for 5.5 weeks, while also interning at a nifty explosion of creativity, randomness, and excitement known as Pulse Creative.
Most of my “knowledge” of New York City comes from shows like “Gossip Girl” and movies like “The Day After Tomorrow” –because we all know that if something bad is about to happen to humanity, it’s going down in NYC. I also have a very active imagination and tend to idealize any place or event that I am going to before I get there, while also thinking of every bad scenario that could happen.
So in my mind, in New York I needed to dress like I stepped off the runway, I was going to get mugged, the people are rude, the buildings sparkle, I was going to get lost, I would go bankrupt, everything tastes like heaven, I would be “discovered” and become an international supermodel and actress, and I would never want to leave.
Starting work at a new place, and venturing alone to a city you’ve never been to is nerve-raking to say the least, but after being here for a week now, I am already starting to feel like a New Yorker.
So here are some of my first impressions and experiences of the city and working at Pulse Creative:
Pulse celebrated my first day by breaking out bottles of Grey Goose and eating cupcakes. Really it was because one of their employees was leaving, but I like to pretend it was all for me.
I’m really bad at scaring people. On my second day, Dhare gave me the task of scaring John (aka: “Juice”) because it was now a tradition among interns. A sort of initiation ritual if you will. Let’s just say there are now two videos of me failing miserably.
For some reason the apples in New York are 100x better than the oranges. Probably even better than Washington State apples, and that’s saying a lot. I tried to eat an orange and had to spit it out because it tasted like dish soap. It’s probably because I’m spoiled with Florida oranges.
I am noticing a strange trend in Greenwich Village (where I "live") of restaurants with the word “dog” or “papaya” in them.
The weather is bipolar. One day it will be time to break out the shorts, and the very next day cold enough for pants and sweaters. If there’s one thing I can count on in Florida is that it’s going to be hot and sticky every day.
I don’t eat while at the office because I eat very large breakfasts so I’m pretty sure everyone thinks I have an eating disorder. I don’t. I assure you I am obsessed with food.
Everyone in the city, or mostly everyone, is super friendly.
The office uses Macs. I’m a PC, but I’ve already started subconsciously trying to use Mac shortcuts on my HP laptop.
A lot of people say that New York City is really dirty, but what city isn’t? Most of the time you can overlook the trash in the streets and gum on your shoe because you’re distracted by breathtaking views and the hustle and bustle of people bumping into you and tourists taking pictures of everything they see…”Ooh take a picture of me ordering a hot dog, honey!”
Street vendor hot dogs are nothing to write home about.
NY has the best pizza in the nation. And the peppercorn flakes are actually spicy.
No matter where you are in Manhattan, it is noisy 24/7.
Everyone in the office sneezes a lot.
The city is very easy to navigate because of the grid system, but I still manage to get lost.
Being a “gopher” (go get this, go get that) is actually fun in New York, especially if you walk instead of taking a taxi.
I can see why people recommend NOT spending New Year’s Eve in Times Square.
We like to “get classy” at the office sometimes and go on dinner cruises on the East River with clients.
Working at Pulse is like working with a bunch of your college friends. Everyone at some point has an inappropriate side comment, and there’s always someone who has that “brilliant” idea that you know is going to get you into trouble...yet you still do it anyway. As other interns have mentioned before me, Pulse is a family. A hard-working, never-stopping, fun-loving bunch of crazy masterminds. I wouldn’t be surprised if Pulse took over the world one day.
All in all, you certainly will never be bored in NYC or while working at Pulse Creative.
This is going to be an unforgettable summer.