Advice for Aspiring Exchange Students HOW I MADE THE MOST OUT OF MY SEMESTER ABROAD
When I discovered that I was accepted to study abroad with the International Student Exchange Program, ISEP, I was ecstatic. I received an email telling me that I would be living in Blagoevgrad, Bulgaria for the upcoming semester. I immediately contacted my friend Jill who had studied at my high school as an exchange student from Germany. Together, we began planning a trip for me to come see her in August before I had to be in Bulgaria on September 1st.
I flew into Dusseldorf, Germany on August 13th. I stayed at Jill's house with her and her mother for the next 2 weeks. It was nice being able to live with locals while in a foreign country. This allowed me to be exposed to a way of life both similar and different than my own. I visited Cologne and Berlin, and attended a few drinking festivals referred to as "Schutzenfest". My first offering of advice: If you're like me, and you have the advantage knowing someone who lives abroad, take initiative to go visit them! Extend your time abroad by arriving before your semester or staying after it to spend some time in a friend's country or city. If you don't know someone from the beginning, make friends during your time abroad! Extend your travels by staying with a new friend in their country before heading home. It is a new and interesting experience to live with locals, and it made the introduction of being on my own in a foreign country a little easier.
During my stay in Germany, Jill brought me on two different trips to the neighboring country of Holland. We visited the cities of Venlo and Amsterdam. Because her city, Neuss, is very close to the border of Holland, it was an easy excursion to make. My advice: Visiting countries which neighbor each other is an easy and convenient way to go about traveling. Make your way across a country until you hit the next one, or, rather than buying an expensive flight to a country farther away, save your money and buy a bus ticket (which is usually cheap) to a closer country, so you'll have more money to do things.
On September 1st, I flew in to Sofia, Bulgaria. I arrived at the American University and one of the first things I received was my orientation schedule. I noticed that the school had already planned trips for us to go on in the upcoming weeks, so I booked them as soon as possible.
When you study abroad, your school will most likely host similar trips. They may not necessarily be to neighboring countries, but they will mostly likely be to well-known cities or historic sites. My advice: Buy a ticket, and go! It is the most convenient way to travel when your school has the transportation and accommodations already planned out for you. Because I took advantage of the opportunities my school offered, I was able to add two more countries to my list: Greece and Turkey. I also had the pleasure of visiting the famous Bulgarian Rila Monastery.
When I was in Istanbul, there was so much to see and do, that it was almost overwhelming. We decided to take a trip to the Grand Bazaar, which was ironically the most chaotic location in the city, but also where I was able to find some peace of mind while strolling from merchant to merchant. My advice: Take in your surroundings. Really take in the little things, the small details that make a specific place special to YOU. For me, it was the lamp shops of Istanbul. All of the tiny, little shops that were bursting with brightly-colored ceramics and glowing lights. I could've spent hours in them, staring at each one, trying to find two that were identical. When I think back to that city, those beautiful lamps will always come to mind. The same goes for the mask shops of Venice, Italy, where it was so easy to get lost in curiosity and wonder at the different identities hanging upon the walls.
There was a night when a few friends and I wanted to go to a park that sits on the top of a hill, overlooking the city of Blagoevgrad. The view is spectacular and we figured it would be even prettier with all of the city lights. Normally we would hike, but because it was already dark outside, we decided to take cabs. The driver spoke absolutely no English, and therefore was not at all understanding where I wanted him to take us. Suddenly, I remembered the word "planina" that my Bulgarian friend Desi taught me, which meant "mountain". I excitedly started repeating "planina, planina, planina!" as I pointed towards the direction of the specific hill. He nodded, smiled, and said, "Oh! Planina!" I was finally able to tell him where we wanted to go! My advice: LEARN AS MUCH OF THE LOCAL LANGUAGE AS POSSIBLE! Even if a word seems somewhat useless or random, you never know when you might need it! Pick up as many words as you can - you'd be surprised at how much they may help in the long-run.
Growing up, I was never a picky eater. When I came abroad and was introduced to various new foods, however, I am not going to lie and say I was more than willing to try them all. When my Bulgarian friend told me about their breakfast pastry, banitza, I was a little concerned. She said it had cheese in it, which is fine, but then she described it as "salty" cheese. I personally hate salty foods, so I was hesitant. But, did I try it? Yes. Was it good? YES! I fell in love with it. My advice: don't be afraid to try new foods while you're traveling. It's part of the experience! If you don't like something, it's not the end of the world. Don't limit yourself from new tastes and flavors just because you're afraid they'll be gross or they sound "weird". The locals like those foods for a reason, right? You may just end up like me, falling in love with something you were initially scared to try!
When planning your travels, it's hard not to get excited about all of the major cities you want to check off your list; Rome, Paris, Budapest, London, etc. - each city is unique in its own way and has so much to be explored. But don't forget about the rural areas of a country; the mountains, forests, deserts, caves, etc.
While I was beyond excited to visit the city of Bucharest, Romania, I found that my favorite part of that country was actually the winding car ride through the small villages, rolling hills, thick forests, and steep mountains in the countryside of Transylvania. My advice: A city is a city. In the rural areas of a country is where its true character seems to lay. Don't forget to set aside time to climb a mountain, explore a cave, hike through a forest, or sleep under the stars.
I joined a group of friends in backpacking through the Rila mountains of Bulgaria, and not only was it the best decision I ever made, but it was by far my favorite memory of my entire study abroad experience. We laid in the grass, way up in the mountains, as the milky way stretched across the sky above us in plain sight.
In mid-September, I planned a road trip across Bulgaria with a few friends. As soon as all of my other friends got word of it, they wanted to join, which was awesome! What started as a group of three renting a single car soon turned into a group of 20 of us in a total of four cars. While I have no regrets because it was so much fun traveling with so many different people, and I made memories that will last a lifetime, we probably could have been more efficient in our traveling if we had less people to coordinate with. We ended up not making it to one of the caves we wanted to visit because one car got lost along the way, and it was also harder to find hotels that could accommodate all of us. My advice: traveling in smaller groups offers for a much smoother experience. Yes, traveling with all of your friends sounds awesome and you don't want to leave anyone out, but consider taking trips with different small groups of friends rather than having everyone go on the same trip all together every time. It is much easier to communicate to a few people rather than a very large group what you personally want to see during your stay, and there are less people to worry about and coordinate with.
When I traveled to Romania, there were only four of us. It was extremely easy to plan out our days and have everyone on the same page. We saw and did everything we had wanted to, and more.
I'm going to be flat out with this one: take every opportunity presented to you. One of the main reasons I had the pleasure of making so many different friends and memories was because I never held back. From saying yes to something as simple as "Hey, wanna go grab a coffee in town?", which ended up leading me to meet my abroad-best-friend, Carly, to something as silly and crazy as jumping into a freezing cold waterfall at the foot of the Balkan mountains, fully clothed and slightly drunk. Seize every moment and don't turn down what might make for a fun or stupid memory (even if the water is really, really cold).
I traveled to a lot of Eastern European countries while I was abroad. A common characteristic of these countries is that most still have their own currency, even if they are members of the EU. Some examples being Romania, Poland, and Bulgaria, which go by the leu, zloty, and lev, respectively. Expenses in these countries were very affordable for a student like me because of this currency difference. My advice: Travel to countries that will allow your money to go further. Eastern European countries do not get the recognition they deserve in the world of studying abroad. They are beautiful and have so much to offer in regards to history and sightseeing. I feel that a lot of students jump to choosing more-developed countries such as Germany, France, and Italy as their destination, simply because they are the most "well-known". While there is absolutely nothing wrong with this, it is an undeniable fact that these countries are far more expensive than others. Explore your choices - I did, and it paid off. When I researched Bulgaria and found that the currency difference would allow my money to go further, I questioned as to why more students didn't choose to study there! The money I saved was what allowed me to financially be able to travel to so many other countries, such as Greece, Turkey, Holland, Germany, Poland, Austria, Romania, Ireland, Italy, England, and not just the one I was studying in.