My desire to intern at Playa Viva arose out of the sheer yearning to immerse myself in an eco-tourism and resort atmosphere. I have the ultimate goal to someday develop my own Eco Sustainable resort and the path I choose to take is one which I experience hands on learning in areas of the world that practice eco sustainable initiatives. My primary focus is to constantly gain new learning experiences through extensive travel and volunteer opportunities around the world. This, I believe, will help me grow both intellectually and worldly enough to achieve my desires and goals in life with respect to establishing an eco-resort.

I sent two separate in depth e-mails to both Playa Viva (Zihuatanejo, Mexico) and Inkaterra (Amazon, Peru) explaining my intentions and description as to why I would relish the opportunity to intern at their resorts. I attached my updated resume as well.

Originally when I sent the e-mail to both resorts, my expectations of receiving an optimistic answer were slim to none. I figured that these resorts are both so established and luxurious, why would they accept a young traveler who isn’t even studying in college at the moment, to intern at their resort? I was reassured when David from Playa Viva sent me an uplifting response to my e-mail.

At this moment I realized that this is the start of a great journey ahead of me.

Many positive thoughts were running through my head as I envisioned the potential possibilities with this internship.  David and I had since been trying to coordinate a time for a Skype interview session. My time was limited, however, as I was volunteering at the Perugia Farmhouse Backpackers Hostel in Perugia, Italy and had guest responsibilities to maintain. The other issue was the fact that my laptop was virtually unusable. I ended up using a French student’s laptop of who was staying at the hostel at the time. She was just about to leave but quickly allowed me use her laptop for a limited time.

In a rush I went on Skype for our scheduled interview session at 17:00. Unfortunately all of my documents as well as resume were on my laptop so I wasn’t very prepared for this. Also, French keyboards are a bit different to use. This muddled with the exhaustion I was facing from the night before with guests and my loud dorming situation made for a difficult and lacking interview on my part.

Regardless, it was nice to talk to David and learn more about Playa Viva, his initiatives and future concepts for the resort. I was enthralled and managed to have many spur of the moment questions running through my head which David answered thoroughly.

By the end of the interview, we had decided I was best suited to be the “community concierge”, helping people experience the best of the resort. In addition, I was also offered to integrate my passions during the course of my internship by incorporating my desires of the study of the environment, photography, fitness and eco tourism, David is giving me a lot of leeway to lead the path I wish to take but is also guiding me in a positive direction towards my career. My role that we decided I would perform will make this internship such a pleasurable and educational experience for both Playa Viva and myself.

David arranged my flight from LAX to Mexico. I was officially on my way to Zihuatanejo, Mexico!  Ideas starting floating around as we discussed more concrete concepts for my internship outline.