Our trip back started at 5:30 am on Friday, and after about 18 hours of traveling, I made it home. After thinking about the trip for a little, I’m going to make my reflection post.
The first week of the trip consisted of the company visits as well as getting to know the people in our group better. Within the first few days I already had a good feel for Augsburg and how the city worked. I think that Augsburg is the perfect size for the Plus3 program because it’s not overwhelmingly big, but there is still a ton to do and explore. One of the first things we did was go to Oberammergau, which was beautiful. The company visits were amazing and exceeded my expectations. I wasn’t 100% sure what to expect on these, but I was very impressed with how much they welcomed us and how much effort was put into our tours and presentations. Seeing the factories was amazing, my personal favorites being GROB and Audi, and the presentations were also amazing because it allowed us to have a look at all aspects of the business. I definitely learned a ton about these companies, the auto industry, and business as a whole. It was great to hear inside the minds of employees as well as people like Stefan Nicola. Overall, the educational part of the trip was amazing and much more fascinating than I expected. I definitely have a much better understanding of how business works in real life and how much research and planning goes into staying on top of the market.
The weekend and second week consisted mainly of more touristy stuff as well as our final presentation. I enjoyed every city we went to and thought each one was unique in its own way. I loved seeing Walhalla in Regensburg as well as all of Munich. Going to Neuschwanstein was amazing, even though the weather wasn’t and our free day in Salzburg could not have gone any better.
It was also a great opportunity to get to hang out with the German students some, and I definitely will never forget tons of these experiences. I had been planning on doing this program before I even committed to Pitt and even scheduled two semesters of German in my first year to be able to speak some in Germany. Overall, I don’t think that the program could have gone any better (despite maybe less rain) and I definitely learned a ton about not only business, but also the German culture.
