A Day In The Life of Amanda Nguyen

Amanda Nguyen is a social entrepreneur, civil rights activist, and the CEO and founder of Rise, a non-governmental civil rights organization. During the rise of COVID-19, Rise Justice Labs launched the Survivor Safe Haven initiative, which partners with local businesses across the United States to provide survivors of domestic or sexual violence with a safe space to call for help. As we work together to beat the pandemic by social distancing, many survivors continue to be stuck in dangerous situations.

Follow along as Amanda shares with Orcé what a typical day looks like for her.

 

9:20 am:

I wake up, put on music and make my morning coffee. Lately it’s been Vietnamese iced coffee with sea salt foam. I’ll then listen to a morning recap of the news while I do my morning skincare routine before heading to my study.  

10:00 am:

Every morning my team sends me a Daily Brief of my day which includes all my meetings, relevant news clips and important documents I should review. If I am on-camera for the day then I’ll put on make-up, like Orcé, and if I am speaking to an Ambassador I’ll change my attire accordingly. 

10:30 am:

I touch base with my team on our daily stand up call. Here, Rise senior staff read out all of our tasks for the day and any upcoming meetings or important events we’re preparing for. Usually we would have this meeting in the couches and ball pit of our office, but sadly we’re all at home now.

12:00 pm:

Depending on the day I have various meetings. Monday’s we check in about our United Nations campaign while on Tuesdays and Sundays we strategize for our domestic work. Our organizers across the country read out the latest developments in each of their states so that we can keep up with the progress of each campaign. We also read out our movement snapshot which tallies the number of states, lives, and laws that we have impacted this year. 

2:00 pm:

After my meetings in the morning I’ll take a quick lunch. I like to tend to my indoor garden at this time. I have eggplants, tomatoes and little calamondins that are almost too cute to eat. 

7:00 pm:

I usually sign off around 7pm, once my meetings have wrapped up. Then I’ll put a jazz record on my gramophone and start making dinner. During quarantine I’ve made a lot of traditional Vietnamese recipes and I try to document and share them on my Instagram.

9:00 pm:

Once I’ve finished cleaning up dinner, I’ll spend some time working on a new hobby, reading, listening to classical music - or some other activity to help me unwind. Lately I’ve been reading Barack Obama’s latest memoir, A Promised Land,  and writing handwritten letters to my friends.

11:00 pm:

Right before I go to sleep, I’ll start my evening skin care routine.  

12:00 am:

I watch a late night comedy show to relax. My favorites are The Daily Show with Trevor Noah and The Late Show with Stephen Colbert. 

1:00 am:

I try to sleep but let’s be real I am scrolling through TikTok. It’s terrible and I am working on trying to not look at my phone before I sleep!

 

New to Rise? Tune into Yu-Chen's Fireside Chat on IGTV with Rise founder, Amanda Nguyen as they both share their stories.