Meet Elona Zejnati

A language translation app for a phone can go a long way, says Elona Zejnati, especially when you are 4,100 miles from home and trying to navigate your way through the food aisles at a grocery store. Zejnati, 28, uprooted her life in New York and moved to Helsinki, Finland, for three months trading magazines for books. At Bonnier Corp. in New York, Zejnati is a consumer marketing manager for digital and says she has already learned a lot in her new role at Tammi in Helsinki as a social media expert. "The products I'm working with here at Tammi are quite different from Bonnier Corp.," says Zejnati. "It's been interesting for me to be on the editorial side where product ideas are generated and brought to life as opposed to the consumer marketing side where the product is presented to us in its finished state."

Zejnati's duties at Bonnier Corp. typically include executing online and e-mail subscription marketing for the Science and Technology and Outdoor groups and supervising and analyzing online marketing campaigns. The move to Tammi for three months is allowing her to delve into a world where the target market is educators instead of gadget lovers. "I'm responsible for developing a social media strategy for the Finnish educational market and utilizing social media to communicate with current and prospective customers, as well as developing new 'social learning' tools for the classroom," she says.

Although New York and Helsinki both have extreme winter conditions, Zejnati discovered she could survive much lower temperatures than she originally thought. "Coming from New York City where snow is mainly an annoyance and ugly background to everyday life, I've surprised myself by realizing that a snow-covered city can be quite a beautiful and peaceful thing," she says.

The Finnish people have been her favorite thing about the GROW exchange so far. "Everyone has been so welcoming and it has been great meeting so many new people from a different culture and with different customs," she says.

With her time in Finland halfway over, Zejnati can confidently recommend the experience to anyone interested in GROW. "If you've always thought of applying for it but pushed it off, don't wait, apply this year," she says. "It is truly a great experience."