Hello again everyone!

Long time no blog – my apologies once again.  So I’m going to start by taking you all back to a week ago on Friday…

After the discovery that the Tate Modern is within walking distance from the office, the girls and I decided to make a late night trip after work.  Then all of a sudden pops up Mike Smith (Managing Director for Ink aka The Friendly Giant – 7ft tall!), who asks our plans.  We reply that we’re off to the Tate!  His response: ‘No you’re not, you’re coming to the pub.  Get your coats.’.  And get our coats we did.  He took us to a bar round the corner, where we met some of the people who work at Ink.  It was really lovely, because the office is split in two and so we hadn’t had the chance to get to know any of them yet.  We narrowly missed out on taking a private car to the next pub (sob), but still managed to have lots of fun!  Definitely a night to remember.

For me, the highlight of the weekend was definitely seeing Romeo & Juliet the ballet at the O2.  It was an absolutely stunning evening – the costumes were beautiful, the dancing was amazing and as I am pretty much in love with the music it was possibly the best bit!  No, I lie.  The best bit was seeing it all put together.  I would definitely recommend a night at the ballet if you’re ever in London – just something a bit different to do!

The best part of last week was taken up by a visit to Leeds for training in a programme called Acturis.  This programme is used by lots of people in insurance, so it’s good for us to have a basic understanding of what it is and how it works.  I’m not even sure if I could explain in a blog how it works, as it’s all quite technical!  Basically it stores contacts/clients/business and can do things like calculate premiums, add fees and excesses.  We were lucky enough to be taken out on Thursday night by a couple of the guys from the office which was really lovely – they made us feel at home straight away!  For me, this experience was more noteworthy as it marked us surviving our first business trip.  We booked trains, braved the 7am underground and had a hotel breakfast next to all the men in fancy suits.  Was quite a surreal experience really, but without a doubt the best breakfast I’ve had since the internship started…

We headed back to London on Friday afternoon and ended up going straight to bed!  Apparently this work malarkey fair takes it out of me :s.  On Saturday my flatmate from uni came to visit.  Once she’d dumped her stuff we headed off to explore Spitalfields – a very trendy area of London which has loads of markets to explore.  Unfortunately we got there so late that many of the markets were gone so instead we decided to grab a late lunch/early dinner.  En-route to the underground home we were lured into B@1 cocktail bar by their happy hour (a rare treat for us Scots!), and I would highly recommend it.  The staff were keen to chat, and even got us mixing some of our own drinks – much to Susan’s horror, I might add.  After a couple we were pointed in the direction of Brick Lane.  Brick Lane, you say? But that’s where you get curries!  Our thoughts exactly.  Nonetheless off we went in search of some nightlife.  With a little dose of hindsight I feel I can say that rather predictably, we found ourselves seated around a table in the restaurant we’d been to the week before eating a full meal!  Well, to be fair it was two curries between the four of us, but it was still definitely not what we had intended.  Perhaps a highlight of the weekend.

On Tuesday I had one of the biggest/scariest/most exciting days of the internship so far!  I was visiting Zurich the insurers in their Birmingham office…  So once again it was an early train for me, but this time without Sarah and Susan.  After a 6am started, one underground, a train and a taxi ride I arrived at the Birmingham office to be greeted by Olly White from the Actuarial pricing Team.   We embarked on an intense day of training, with a little bit of data analysis thrown in.  Once again I was thrown in at the deep end a little, but Olly was excellent at answering my many questions and repeating things where necessary!  I learnt (and hopefully understood) a few different methods the actuaries use to calculate results, and predict future ones.  This was an invaluable insight for me – both for my work on this project, and for when I am considering my future career. 

And finally…

WE LEAVE FOR CAYMAN IN 1 DAY, 12 HOURS AND 42 MINUTES*…  Not that I’m counting or anything.

Jenny xxx

*Correct at time of blogging.