AIESEC Madrid

Hey everyone! I’m currently studying in Toledo, Spain for the semester. Unfortunately there is not a local LC, but Madrid is only a 50-minute bus ride away. I will not be an official CEED, but I’m going to try to be involved as much as I can. The VP OGX happens to be a girl from Washington D.C., Maria, so she has been my main point of contact. Maria’s mother is Spanish and after Maria moved to Spain a year and a half ago, so did her parents.

The LC of Madrid has been having a lot of issues recently, so a meeting was called with the MC last Thursday. I was invited to go along, so I spent the afternoon with a Maria and a girl from Belgium before heading over to the AIESEC office.

Before expanding on the meeting, I need to lay down what has been happening in Madrid. Originally there were three LC’s in Madrid belonging to three different universities. The three decided to combine and form a city wide LC. From there issues ensued. They only have one GM a month, and even then people always make excuses for not showing. A lot of people want to be involved, but no one actually wants to do any work. The EB has been following apart and just a few weeks ago, the LCP up and left after some drama. Maria is now the only EB member left and things need to change!

Here comes the meeting I attended. Two of the MC members ran the meeting to discuss what needs to be done to keep the Madrid LC alive. Elections will occur in two weeks to form the new EB, goals were set, and the MC informed us that in order to stay active Madrid needs one EP, one TN plus one more of either by next December. Maria is planning on running for LCP and as long as people get motivated I think there will not be any more issues. On a more exciting note, LC Madrid just matched its first two EPs, one girl going to Nigeria for a year and another going to Hong Kong!!!

The meeting itself was very interesting because it kept switching between Spanish and English because of the two MC members one was from Mexico and the other Costa Rica. Also, all of the current members speak Spanish minus one guy from Turkey, who is currently studying at a Spanish university even though he speaks no Spanish. How that works, I have no idea. The rest of the MC seemed really cool and I got to hang out with some of the Madrid members that night. Hopefully I’ll be able to make it to more meetings and help get Madrid back up and running!