Life with Sina

Allison, Sina and Nicki Sina is an extremely bright, beautiful woman of 25 from Germany. She came to Bader Rutter as a part of the Business Branding Network’s Rising Star program from our sister agency wob. BBN is a network of 25 agencies located all over the world. Sina’s focus is Brand Asset Management, which is the internationally vetted branding process used at  all our sister BBN agencies that allows us to work seamlessly together amongst different cultures providing truly global integrated services. While I know that this multi-cultural business interaction takes place at our agency everyday, it was particularly eye-opening for me to see it first hand through Sina.

Sina came to BR at the end of August and left at the end of October. As with other interns who have come to Bader Rutter in years past through BBN, Sina lived with my family and me. She was in some ways another child, but more so a friend to my daughter Nicki and me.

Doing basic daily things became fun with Sina. Going to the grocery store was particularly fun and interesting. She was like a child in a toy store. Her eyes would get big over the number of cereal and yogurt selections and at the size of bottles available in everything from shampoo to ketchup. When it was time to do the laundry or empty the dishwasher, she’d jump up to help making the chore easier, faster and more fun to do.

Visiting places we take for granted such as malls, the lake, restaurants, etc., provided my daughter and me with a renewed appreciation for the things we have and are able to do. For example, they do not have good beef in Germany and Sina loves hamburgers.  She ate more hamburgers here in nine weeks, than I’ll probably eat in a year!

My daughter and I love the water — being on it or in it. We took Sina boating on Okauchee Lake one afternoon and dined at lakeside restaurants on other lakes. While taking her to Chicago for her trip back home to Germany, I asked her a number of “favorite” questions - foods, places, things we did. Her favorite activity was boating on Okauchee. We do that frequently in the summer but hearing Sina say that gave me greater appreciation for how beautiful our lakes are and how truly lucky we are to be able to enjoy them.

The laughter in our house due to her misunderstanding or mispronunciations of the English language or her delight in eating new foods was plentiful. You could always tell when she enjoyed eating something new. The first bite was followed by an affirming moan, and then we’d all laugh knowing she liked it. We laughed a lot!

I can only imagine how difficult it would be live in a foreign country for a period of time where you speak only the native language. Sina would come home many nights exhausted because of the mental gymnastics she would have to do to translate conversations in her head, all while keeping the pace and flow of the conversation. That was amazing to me. She did it so well and naturally.

Sina will soon begin her new job with the brand group at wob. I know she will do well there.