Easter 2011

Easter was special this year because of the people that were able to share in the family gathering.  Holidays are always an interesting time for EMI interns because they are often a long ways from home.  There is always the desire to be around familiar faces during special times of the year but the internship is so short that it makes it hard to justify going home for those few short days.  My solution to these feelings of longing for home for the other interns was to share my family with them.  Since the farm is only six hours from Colorado Springs, it didn't take much to convince five of the other interns to tag along with me.  None of them had experienced a farm in such an unpopulated place like the middle of Kansas.  This added an element of adventure to the trip.
Often times there is a perception that there is nothing to do at the farm.  To me, it just makes for an opportunity to be around loved ones or do something creative.  There were a few things that we did to help pass the time but I'll just mention the highlights of the trip.  The first is that all of the interns got to drive a "big" tractor.  Everyone had a good time with that.

 Also, many of the interns were enthusiastic about coloring Easter eggs so we did that as well.

And I almost forgot about the hiking.  We have done a fair amount of hiking while being in Colorado.  I'll probably write a post about that here soon.  But as we drove to the farm, I thought it would be a fun idea if we "hiked" up to the highest point in Kansas, commonly known as Mt. Sunflower.  There are a few important things to note.  First is that the next hill to the west which is in Colorado is higher than Mt. Sunflower.  The other thing to note is that it's common to leave behind items that would show the next visitors the diversity of people who have been to Mt. Sunflower.  Here is a picture of Sydney and Clare showing their respective flags before putting them in the box.

Put all of this together and it's a Easter that I won't be soon forgetting.

Traditions

Interns are always a curious group of individuals.  They come to an office, meet each other for the first time, and try to figure out how to work with one another in a fun and effective way.  This group is no different.  There are five female interns and 4 male interns.  We each bring our own unique perspective and personalities to the group.  

We try to do lots of things as a collective group.  One of those things is running.  Each Tuesday after work, a local restaurant "sponsors" a 5k run through the streets of downtown Colorado Springs.  By "sponsor" I really mean that someone organized an event long ago and people showed up and it has been going ever since. It's good to see the community come together and participate in an event like this.  So far there have been sever of us interns that are regulars at this event.  The draw of running ten 5k runs and receiving a t-shirt is enough motivation apparently.

Tuesday ends up being a busy day.  At the beginning of the semester, we instituted "Tie Tuesday" which meant that everyone should wear ties at work.  It took a while for it to catch on but it eventually did.  Some of the staff members even participated.  Here's a picture of those wearing a tie one Tuesday.

But that's not all that we did on Tuesdays.  Seeing that it was "Tie Tuesday" we thought it would be appropriate to go an eat supper at a Thai restaurant.  I know, it's clever.

Then came Friday.  I don't know who came up with the theme but Friday is now deemed "Flannel Friday."  We try to get everyone to wear flannel.  Flannel really means a plaid pattern of some sort.  It's starting to get warm outside so I don't know how long this will keep going.