Customer Interviews No. 1

I decided to ask people what they thought about a bakery opening in Gainesville. I don't know of any bakeries close to campus that sell homemade bakery goods, let alone any that pertain to those with certain dietary needs, such as gluten allergies or diabetes. 

I followed the steps that Professor Pryor discussed with us in class and asked people what they thought of Gigi's Cupcakes, a cupcake shop on Archer Rd., and if they thought there was anything they could improve on. Whether the thought of anything to improve on on their own, I asked them if they'd like to see them expand their bakery goods and recipes and if that would affect them, of if they wouldn't really care and just like it the way it is now. Here is what they had to say:

*Some people preferred to be interviewed without their faces being recorded, so I have cropped out their face for their liking.

What I learned from this experience was that even though I originally thought this would be very beneficial and a great idea, and though many people I interviewed didn't disagree with the idea, no on seemed very enthusiastic and I think that if Gigi's Cupcakes or anyone else spent money and time in opening a homemade bakery that was available to people with dietary restrictions, I think it would likely fail as a business. There's nothing super new about the idea and I discovered Gigi's does in fact serve gluten-free cupcakes, however they don't serve anything besides cupcakes. I think the few amount of people that would love a gluten-free or sugar-free bakery shop would not be enough to keep the shop open and in business. From the five people I interviewed alone, only one followed a gluten-free diet. Only two other people said they knew people affected from diabetes, and those friends may not even live in Gainesville. So this idea only has 1 out of 5 customers, which means it most likely wouldn't be successful.

Something I learned from interviewing people is that it's hard to get honest feedback because it's hard for people to imagine your vision with them. You can say "so what if this were to happen and be available" all you want, but the issue is that the can't really ever fully visualize this idea without seeing something. I think this could be better avoided if you bring pictures or a business plan to show customers to get better feedback because they would have a better vision of what they're saying yes or no, dislike or like, to.

Week 4 Reading Reflection

I thought it was interesting how the author discussed how people can act certain ways just because of their belief that they're supposed to act in that way in accordance to different stereotypes they "fit into." I also find this theory interesting as it then explains what the author was trying to say earlier in the chapter that people believe you have to be born creative, and that they can't become creative. This fits into what this theory says, that people believe they weren't born creative, so they think they never will be and live life according to that fact. They won't join art clubs or go to museums because they say they can't make art or wouldn't enjoy it because they believe they aren't creative.
One thing that confused me is how the author talked about that people think innovation is all planned, when he says the truth is that innovation is unpredictable. But how can it be unpredictable if the people who think of it don't work for that company? How does the company find out about it and believe in it to implement it?
I would ask him those the questions I asked about; how does a company find out about ideas from people who don't work for them? And how, as that random person that doesn't work for that brand, can you work towards getting it heard and made possible?
Something I disagree with the author about is his statement about how a creative person actually can thrive off of ambiguity. I don't think that this is true, and I also think that this is stereotyping. I consider myself a rather creative person, and I have taken a couple of advanced-level art classes, and I also hate not knowing what things are going to be. I have clear images in my head of what I what my end result to be, however that might not always be exactly what it turns into, I do know exactly what I see as an endpoint when I start a piece.

Top 5 World Problems

Top 5 Problems:

1. Oil Drilling
• Oil drilling is the most important issue because of any awful effects it has on the environment, as well as unwanted foreign friendships it makes by putting countries, such as the U.S., in a position of dependency on other nations that might not otherwise be allies with.
2. Fracking
• Fracking is very important because it hits home. It is much more in Americans view. It is a dangerous and possibly hazardous act that can only go on for so long before we all may be regretful a little too late.
3. Education
• Without fixing the educational system as it currently is, we are not just handicapping large portions of future generations, but also the United States as a whole. Education has always been held to a high standard because without it we know there can be no future is one of the top most power nations in the world. I believe we have somewhat lost this sight though in the years since Apollo 11 and the race to try to learn the most about space first, and I think it's time that the U.S. brings the goal back into full sight or we may actually have a potential in majorly falling behind.
  
4. Terrorism
• Terrorism is a huge world-wide dilemma being faced currently and most people are truly terrified for their lives. This being said, this should be one of the upmost important issues facing the world today.
5. Discrimination
• Discrimination is such a big issue that is surprisingly still facing the world today, in 2016. Though this issue is of major importance and is just silly that it still exists, it is not the most life-threatening as the other problems, which is why it still made top five, but is listed last.

Solutions:

1. Discrimination. 
• So many things could easily be implemented to fix this problem. A huge step in the right direction, that would be outrageously easy to put into effect, would be to ban the confederate flag, a flag that stands for a outdated belief in which southerners though African Americans' only purpose to work as slaves and never free. We now live in a world in which we know this not to be true, so why are we still waiving this flag?
2. Fracking.
• Fracking and oil drilling have very similar solutions but because fracking it much more locally chosen and affected, I think it is a slightly more implementable solution than oil drilling because the U.S. would not have to worry about possible foreign tensions being created.
3. Oil Drilling.
• That being said, ending drilling for oil would be the one of the easiest solutions to achieve because of so many known and existing other power sources that could rather easily be implemented.
4. Education
• So much money goes into oil, war, and other affairs that could be better invested in education. So many countries pay most or all of students education expenses. Some countries provide free secondary public education (such as college), and that often includes free textbooks, and other countries will not only provide free public education, but will also invest more money into students by paying them some hundred dollars a month for living expenses to be subsidized. If the federal and state budgets were more evenly distributed, I think college in the U.S. could more easily follow in these other examples, or at least be extremely reduced in costs as opposed to the expenses that currently exist.
5. Terrorism 
• I honestly have no idea as to truly "fix" this major world problem, which is why terrorism is at the bottom of this list, however it is still such an important issue facing the world today.

Week 3 Reading Reflection

Something that really stood out to me in this reading was the section about the "dark side of entrepreneurship." I had discussed in a previous post how some of my fears with being an entrepreneur was the seemingly essential action of rejecting the traditional ways of life because of not being able to care for a family, or marry and settle down, to never have financial security. Talking about these risks in the book made them become more real and not so scary, even though there was no solution presented for the problems, documenting that these are problems that come with the job, and that many entrepreneurs experience them, makes it feel like they're not impossible issues to handle because so many people already do.
One thing that was confusing was how the book kind of contradicted a couple of characteristics, for example, on page 31 the book states that entrepreneurs have a low need for status and power, but then later on (page 42) states that entrepreneurs have an overbearing need for control, which to be, "need for control" is the same thing as "power," so that part was a little confusing to me.
If I could ask the author two questions, I would ask him, one, what are some solutions to the "dark side of entrepreneurship"? And two, how can one become and entrepreneur when some of the characteristics are more "born" traits than "earned"?
One thing I disagree with the author about is that entrepreneurs are people with a "low need for status and power," I think without that drive for power and success, what would an entrepreneur be working so hard for in order to become a successful entrepreneur?

Very Short Interview No. 1

The entrepreneur I talked to owns a art business in which she designs and creates different household products into beautiful pieces of art. From kitchen utensils, to candle jars and vases, she takes ordinary glass or stainless steel objects and adds stones, beads and wire to make these ordinary pieces gorgeous works of art and usually sells these at art shows or house parties.

What does it mean to be an entrepreneur?
"It takes something that I'm passionate about, an idea, and are able to make money from it."
What do you think I should learn in this entrepreneur course?
"How to stay focused on a goal... Learn how to work with other people towards a similar goal or end point. You need to learn how to read people, to communicate, to be aggressive when you need to be, and lay back when you need to."
What do you wish you had been taught in school before setting out on your own path as an entrepreneur?
"How to come up with a formula for an end price that includes my time in addition to the wholesale price of the product. I wish I had learned web design."

Reflection:
I realized that being an entrepreneur doesn't mean you're power or money hungry, or a business person- an entrepreneur can be anyone, whether it's someone who is a business mastermind or someone who is creative and artistically talented. Being an entrepreneur doesn't mean you're only one type of person, with a certain set of skills and interests, anyone can be an entrepreneur as long as they have a passion and are willing to work for it.

World's BIGGEST Problems

1. War in the Middle East
• The best way I can describe this is that this set of people thinks that this land is inherently theirs "by the words of God" and then this set of people thinks the same land is also inherently theirs "by the words of God." I think the best solution is, and I might be biased (most people are when it comes to world issues), that they need to determine a settlement to split the land, and actually stick to this agreement.
2. Oil drilling
• One of the big problems, in especially the U.S., is that we are supporting nations we don't necessarily want to support just because they "have the goods" (oil) and we "need" that good. We're also supporting harming the environment by trading with these nations and continuing to support oil drilling. A solution for this is to, one, look else where for oil so that we don't have to depend on nations that we don't agree with, and two, start looking for other power sources.
3. Fracking
• The simplest way to explain this is that we are drilling into high-pressure ground and releasing gas from these ancient and compacted rocks to use the gas as a power source. The problems from this are numerous, there have been reports of the gas leaking into water sources and contaminating people's water. This can be viewed via YouTube videos where people turn their faucets on and put a lighter under it and the whole things catches fire. I think a solution to this is to - shockingly- stop fracking! We need to sign petitions,  and keep pushing and voting for it to be made illegal. 
  
4. Styrofoam 
• Styrofoam takes over a million years to decompose... why would we even produce something with such a life? Especially when there are other options that take half the time to decompose. Paper products are the best solution to this problem. Paper is cheap and doesn't take very long to decompose and paper can be recycled to make more paper products; so their life itself is longer and their decomposing time is very little compared to styrofoam.
5. Climate Change
• People, especially where it snows, keep saying that "Global Warming doesn't exist" because it's still snowing and scientists have been talking about it for years now. But what many people don't understand is that things like climate change happen very slowly and very moderately so will be seen overtime and when Global Warming was first brought to attention, it was a prediction, not a statement saying the world overnight changed and we're all going to die. A solution to this is education, learning what exactly climate change is and that only together can we put a stop to it, and that it's not too late to make a change.
6. Underutilizing power sources
• The solution to all these problems listed above (2-5) are primarily just changing where we get our energy from, but not doing this is a problem in itself. Wind, water, solar- there are so many "green" energy sources out there that are more effective (and sometimes cheaper) than these other sources and cleaner on the environment. 
7. Politics
• Where to begin? First of all, a lot of the political world nowadays is corrupted and full of people guided by more of their own self-interest than the interest of the nation. We need to try to go back to the beginning of the nation's history and try to remember what our founders and citizens worked so hard for.
8. Education
• Education is expensive, more of a business than a place of self-betterment, corrupt, and also behind. I don't think the education system is teaching kids important and useful things, and anything taught that is useful, is being taught later than it should be. College is expensive, but we live in an economy in which without a college degree, you have probably under a 1 percent chance of getting hired. A lot of universities are more interested in making money for investors than the interest and pursuit of teaching their students and the advancement of education.
9. Discrimination 
• Racism, sexism, religious intolerance, etc.- there are so many ways to discriminate in today's modern society that you can almost laugh that we're still fighting about the same topics. Religion was a form of science in biblical times before there was much scientific findings on they ways of the universe and was created to explain the world, which is now what we have science for. Race just means you were born here, rather than there. Sex just means I was born with this gene, rather than the other. How are all these things still debatable when they mean we're slightly different in a world that thrives off of diversity?
10. Terrorism
• One of the saddest issues in today's world, terrorism. It's everywhere and life/world threatening. The scariest thing is we don't know how to handle it, unlike most issues in which the source of the problem is almost clear and the solution is somewhat clear. That's why it's one of the top issues in people's mind currently because unpredictable, unknown and unidentifiable.

Bug List

1. UF's lack of parking
• UF is an unplanned-campus that continues to grow, without much space to grow. More students are being accepted than the school was originally built for, and this will only continue One solution could be where parking lots already exist, parking garages could be built within the same space. By building up where the land already exists, were adding space and spots that currently aren't being utilized.
2. Excessive amount of tickets written in Gainesville (primarily UF)
• Many parking spots I find aren't very well labeled, even when you go searching for a sign for an area you think you're allowed to park, a sign might not exist or not properly illustrate the area it is referring to. A solution for this bug could be writing signs to more clearly to describe the spaces the rule applies for.
3. Living on the second story of a house or building with no elevator creates a difficulty with bringing laundry downstairs to clean, luggage downstairs to pack your car, a large amount of groceries upstairs, and other difficult activities related to these.
• A levy system or shoot or anything alone this idea could be an easy fix.
4. Styrofoam issues
• I try to be as "green" as I can in my day-to-day life. However, the sorority house I live in only buys styrofoam cups, as opposed to paper, which are awful for the environment. And even when I am staying home and just want some tea, the glass mugs that are supplied are so tiny that you can barley fit even just a single cup of water in it. This could be easily fixed by buying larger reusable mugs, or even paper cups.
5. Mattress sheet always being pulled off the mattress
• I love the feeling after cleaning my sheets and making a nice, clean bed. However, I hate that within a days time, my mattress sheet is already being pulled off, especially since I have a bunk bed and it's hard to reach the inside corners, so it's annoying to have to struggle to do this often. I think the primary issue for this problem is a combination of weak elastic around the perimeter of the sheet, as well as too-exact measures for the mattress. If the fabric of the sheet was extended a couple inches in each direction, it could reach further under the mattress to become a sturdier fit.
6. Luggage not arriving at airports
• The airport tells you to ensure the arrival of your luggage, be sure to get to the airport and check your luggage two hours prior to your departure time, but still your luggage is commonly lost. And even when your luggage doesn't arrive, the airport often cannot track where it is or how long it will take to arrive. I believe the root cause of this issue is that the luggage isn't put in the plane immediately after being checked and secured. 
7. Insulated water bottles
• I love insulated water bottles because I hate getting books or my computer wet from the condensation on the outside of my bottle. However, I can't ever find the huge 1 liter bottles that are insulated, but I prefer bigger bottles to make sure I always have enough water to keep me hydrated on busy days. A solution to this could be insulated water bottles with filters in them so I can refill as much as I please, or even just insulating the bigger water bottles.
8. Drinking too much on airplane
• This can be very common on airplanes and very disrupting to all the passengers. An easy solution would be to place a drink cap on the amount of alcoholic drinks each person can purchase.
9. Recliner on airplane seats go too far back
• Too often your "large amount" of leg space quickly disappears due to the flyer in front of you reclining their chair all the way back. The best solution for this would be to only have recliners that go so far back that wouldn't greatly impede on those behind the seat.
10. Menus don't put up prices online
• I hate when I'm trying to decide on a restaurant to go to and research the restaurant to see what food they have and how expensive it is, but the prices are never listed online. As a college student on a budget, this can be extremely frustrating as the price of a restaurant can make or break your plans to eat there. I know there are websites that label how expensive restaurants are, but use symbols such as "$" and "$$$" to illustrate how pricey the meals are, this doesn't give enough information as to what that website considers expensive and not expensive, as these definitions aren't universal because different people think of different prices as "expensive." 
11. Lack of bunk bed night stand
• With a bunk bed, it's hard to have a night stand, especially in the set-up of dorm rooms as the ends of the bed can be used as ladders for the top bunk. Without the options of the front, sides, or back of the bed to set a table, it can be annoying to find places to sit your drink or phone, or even an alarm clock. There are hanging tables that can hang from your bed, but they're made for framed beds to slide on top of the framing of the bed. A hanging table that was magnetic could stick to the metal of the springs of the bed under the mattress.
12. UF wifi is very unpredictable and weak
• Students that live on campus depend on this wifi as their primary source of internet to do school work. With such unpredictable wifi, to can be frustrating to try to finish homework and loose the wifi or have very slow wifi. As college students, we work at a fast pace because we have so much to complete, and this irregular wifi can really slow us down and affect our grades. The root of the problem is that there aren't enough wifi routers, because the farther you get from the router, the worse the wifi, so if there were more around the schools, the wifi would be stronger. 
13. ProctorU
• With ProctorU gaining popularity among teachers, many students are running into the problem that college living usually requires a roommate. It's very inconvenient and stressful for students to have to plan with their roommate an appropriate time to kick them out to complete their exam. A quick-fix for this problem could be that the proctors should be proctoring the student isn't talking to their roommate. If the roommate is just sitting in the background, minding their own business, the proctor should be able to ensure they are not helping the student cheat.
14. Headphones being plugged in
• I always get nervous when I plug-in headphones to watch a video and I'm not sure if the headphones are plugged in, the last thing I want is for my phone to blast a sound in a very quiet room because I thought my headphones were plugged in all the way. An easy solution to this could be to have a quick image pop-up on the screen to indicate the headphones are plugged in, similar to the image that appears to show you turning the volume up or down on a Mac.
15. Not knowing when my toothbrush is old and needs to be thrown out
• A quick solution for this could be color-changing bristles that as the color slowly changes to a different color, you would know it was getting closer to the time to throw your toothbrush out.
16. Key pad house keys
• Many houses are turning over there metal keys for electric key pads that you simply enter a code in the key pad and the door unlocks. An issue with this system is when the electricity turns off unexpectedly. An easy fix for this would be to set these key pads to battery or solar operated to ensure you're never locked out of your house.
17. When people don't know what they want by the time they get to the cash register
• It can be very annoying for customers, and even cashiers, when a customer has waited in line, gets to the register to order, and still doesn't know what to order. This really slows the line down. A good solution to this could be to have a menu written outside the door so the customer can decide what they want before they come in, or maybe have a wait queue at the end of the line, right before you reach the register, in which people who haven't decided can wait and still decide what they want without loosing their place. This way, as soon as they have decided, they've already waited in line and are next to order, while still letting the people that are ready to order go through.
18. Long lines and people that complain about the wait
• The main issue here is that we live in a society of impatient people that don't always realize how long something can take. While you can't change people, by adding an electric sign outside the door that would state how long the wait is to order and get your meal/drink/etc. many impatient customers that don't have the time can decide for themselves if it's worth the wait.
19. Website confusion
• There are so many different websites for UF students to keep up with. A solution for this problem would be compacting all of these different sites to one informative website, as opposed to five.
20. Waiting for shower to warm up
• Many people in waiting for their shower water to warm up, loose track of time and let water go to waste that was warm. A solution to this could a timer on the outside of the shower to indicate when it's warmed up.

Reflection

I did find this brainstorming rather difficult as many of the "bugs" I thought of already had solutions to them, they just aren't widely known or used. I also realized that I think of bugs all day long throughout my week, but when it comes time to thinking of them and writing them down, I was drawing a blank.

Week 2 Reading Reflection

In a world in which the amount of self-employers is growing at an extraordinary and fast rate, I think that this fact casts today's society as being full of entrepreneurs. In order to be your own boss, you want to be thinking of new and innovative ways to make your business a success. Some things that stood out for me the most in this chapter was how the entrepreneur is the leader of the economic world today. With gazelles becoming increasingly more popular since the 1990s, entrepreneurs must be all around us and in everyone. I think most people, especially college students, are always thinking about what they want to do after they graduate, or in other words, what job they want to do that already exists. Few people say I want to be a (blank), "blank" being a career title that has never been invented. But without an economy led by people who do think in those terms of creating your own job, there wouldn't be a lot of jobs that exist today, as well as an overwhelming amount of unemployment. As new things are invented, such as cell phones, old careers have become obsolete, such as telephone operators. Such inventions can lead to unemployment, however, there are also plenty of jobs that didn't exist before that now do, such as director of social media. As entrepreneurs, such as Mark Zuckerberg, have set out to create things, such as Facebook, new jobs have resulted in these business creations, possibly jobs that weren't even intended by these creations.
Something else that surprised me was how the book mentioned small business owners weren't innovative or looking to make a large profit. I think that small business owners could be innovative in they're thinking and wanting and willing to improve on different aspects that are no good in big-businesses. However, I'm not sure if I just misunderstood this part of the chapter, as the author was possibly saying that "small business owners" who are innovative in their business practices and ideas are mislabeled as "small business owners," as they are actually "entrepreneurs."
I was surprised as to how much research has gone into the career of "entrepreneur." Especially with the different schools of thought that exist. After reading the different stands, I really enjoyed the Micro view of entrepreneurship, as I liked how this school looked from within out. I am constantly finding myself dissecting myself or other's characteristics and analyzing how they can use these skills to their advantage, such as in their careers. I really liked the table on page 11, table 1.2, as it showed some examples of characteristics and phrases we commonly hear and what those phrases measure so we can be aware of these skills we posses to utilize them to their fullest potential.
One thing that is confusing to me, that maybe the next chapter will better answer, is how an entrepreneur can be made. Being how organized and prepared the textbook illustrates entrepreneurs, so much so that they can be surprised by the unexpected and are so well rehearsed that they can still conquer the venture, I don't understand how anyone can encompass these traits. Plenty of people are not as quick or smooth as the book made this skill sound. Especially with the short attention spans many Americans now have with today's fast moving society, many people don't have the focus to think so quickly on their feet. I myself get so set on one idea of thinking or solution, that when this idea falls through I am too surprised to immediately think of the next best idea.
Some questions that I would have for the author would be how do entrepreneurs exhibit a normal life with real-life bills and desires without certainty as to where their next paycheck is to come from. I understand that entrepreneurs are risk-takers, but with a family and monthly bills, how can you be a "smart" risk-taker that lives a "normal" life. Also, what classes do entrepreneur majors take with such an open-ended major, do you make a resume or not because you're your own boss? I guess my question(s) really are, how does this infinite career of very broad description play out in the real world. I know in the book it is mentioned that no "gazelle" survives, so is this career not a forever career?
Bedsides the disagreement, or misunderstanding of the author's definitions of "small business" owner versus "entrepreneur," I had little disagreement with what the author said. In fact, I learned a lot. I enjoyed learning how much potential there is in this career, especially being that I always thought of entrepreneurs as inventors, and that they had to be creating something new, not just being innovative in business ideas and organization. Though, it does worry me a little as to how risky this career still seems to me.

My Entrepreneurship Story

This past summer I took part in the University of Florida's Innovation Academy's event, Catalyst. This is a competition in which members of the Innovation Academy program form teams of at least three or four members, some were even bigger, and brainstorm and create a new and innovative product and then research a way to make this product work, as well as develop a business plan to pitch and promote your product to potential "investors" (the judges).
My team created a product that would look and work similarly to a Fitbit, but our target audience would be diabetes patients. The bracelet would monitor your blood-glucose levels, as opposed to the current solution in which patients must prick their finger upwards of 20 times per day. We, as a team, thought this was much too invasive of a process, as well as intrusive on the patients' day-to-day lives. We wanted to develop a less-invasive and less time-consuming way for diabetics to be able to monitor their levels to maintain a healthy life-style, while also still enjoying life to the fullest.
We researched and discovered that there were recent studies that found that you can find these same blood-glucose levels in sweat, rather than blood. We decided to utilize this technology into a bracelet that would have a strip on the inside of the bracelet (the side that touches your skin) to gather sweat and analyze the these samples, which from there the results would be sent to your smartphone's app that would not just display your glucose levels, but also keep track of a number of other things for you to have full control over your disease. The app would include sections such as prescription(s) history, a tab that would be connected to your pharmacy, a tab that would keep track of your eating and exercising, as well as have a support-room/chat section in which you could either connect to other diabetics with similar issues that you're dealing with, or ask a doctor that would be in the chat room any questions you may have.
We however found one problem when we were going over the idea and realized that what if people don't sweat a lot, or at least on their wrist. So we went back to researching to find a solution. We finally found a technology that the military uses that sends a tiny shock into the device that generates just enough sweat to analyze different chemical levels, such as glucose. This electric shock would be virtually painless and thus not undesirable for people to use.
We then practiced different pitches and ways to grab audiences' attention, and outlined the key points that we should highlight, and printed these onto a poster-board and flyers for our audience to read and follow along with as we performed our sales pitch.
This experience was so meaningful and something I'll never forget. Not only did I get to meet and become friends with all my team members, but it also made me realize all the potential I had to be creative, innovative, and an entrepreneur.

I enrolled in ENT3003 because it is actually a required class for the program I'm in, the Innovation Academy. I hope to get out of this class, as well as all the courses I am required to take for the innovation minor, a better sense of how to think as an innovator and better understanding of the abilities I already posses and how to utilize them. 

Introduction

My name is Maxine Grossman and I am from Fort Myers, FL. I come from a family of five, first there's me, then my brother, and lastly, my sister. We're all pretty close in different ways, and we're very different people. My parents say opposite attracts, and it's certainly true with them. So we all joke that my brother is the mini version of my mom, me, my dad, and my sister is a pretty even mix. Our differences can lead to tension, but I love how we can all come together and celebrate our differences.

I am majoring in public relations and minoring in innovation. I'm obsessed with all things beauty and fashion and hope to work somewhere in this field one day. Some career dreams of mine include working for a fashion magazine, working for any sort of beauty brand (so far I've looked into Kate Spade and L'Oreal, to name a few), or possibly being my own boss by running my own beauty blog and/or YouTube channel. I am currently involved in the University of Florida's Greek life, as well as working as a fashion blogger for Her Campus UFL. I look forward to also completing at least one internship and studying abroad at some point in the next two years I have left here at UF.
I have traveled to two countries thus far in my life, and hope that this number is minuscule compared to how many places I travel before I die. I visited Spain in the summer of 2012, and most recently, I visited Israel in the summer of 2014. I can't even try to pick which one I enjoyed more.
Spain was amazing because I got to be immersed into the culture. Two summers prior to my visit, my family hosted a Spanish exchange student to stay with us. We all became very friendly, and my dad even became close to her parents. They always insisted we visit them in Spain, and so the summer of 2012 we finally did. My dad, sister and I all stayed in the families apartment in Madrid. Our trip lasted all of two weeks and over that time we visited so many tourist, as well as local, hot spots. We also stayed in the families country home in a little city that translates literally in English to "The Village," so I never learned the name of this town because they only told me it in English. We also visited Segovia and, my personal favorite, Toledo. The cities were absolutely magnificent, with such rich history and breath-taking art.

Israel was also very memorable. Together, my entire family (mom, dad, brother, and sister), two family friends, as well as our Rabbi and his wife, all traveled to Israel for my sister to become a Bat Mitzvah. This was such an incredible and moving ceremony, as I stood there with all the people I loved, in front of the Western Wall, where my ancestors had fought so hard for what we believe in, and watched my younger sister grow up, I felt so moved and infinite.
Israel wasn't just a soul-filling trip, it also was a beautiful vacation hot spot. In Tel Aviv, we stayed at a hotel where when you walked out the back door you walked onto sand from the beach. The Mediterranean Sea's color is indescribable, the weather was perfect, and the people were so nice. Tel Aviv is on the coast of Israel's coast, but is also a major city, with many industries maintaining headquarters here. So on one side you had the most magnificent beach, and on the other was a fun, lively city.

I love traveling, and could go on and on, which is why I hope to have a laundry list of places I've been one day. Traveling is my passion, and the main thing I talk about, if it's not something fashion related. I guess you could say beauty is what I live for.

Entrepreneur's Mantra

Post 1

I'm so excited to learn about blogging in ENT3003!