study abroad

I spent 11 months in Germany and now I’m back home in Finland. It was an amazing experience and I recommend it to anyone who has the possibility of doing an exchange year somewhere. :-)

The first half of my exchange year in Germany is now over. I wrote my last exam on Monday and now I have about five weeks holiday before the start of the summer term. I had four courses, one of which was my German language course, and I passed them all with good grades. The scale goes from 5.0 to 1.0, where everything greater than 4.0 is failure and 1.0 is the best. My GPA for those three was 1.825, which is quite good and I’m really satisfied with it. :-)

In the winter term all my courses were in English but because my language skills have improved a lot, I’m going to take some courses in German in the summer term. I also gained a lot of confidence because I did so well with these exams and I’m ready to take on some more challenging stuff.

But now for the time being I’m going to concentrate on relaxing and spending some quality time with my girlfriend. I’ll write more about studying later.

My exchange year in Germany began a week ago and so far everything has been great. There is some much to do all the time that I haven’t had time to write here, but after things calm down a bit, I shall write more about my experiences here.

I’m flying to Germany next Thursday and I’m getting a little bit excited about it. My year-long study period abroad is finally about to begin.

Yesterday I said goodbye to one of my dearest friends and that made me realize that I won’t be seeing any of my friends in a while. Many things are about to change during a short period of time, but I’m sure I can cope with the changes. Actually I’m feeling somewhat eager about all this.

Leaving feels good, because there’s nothing holding me here and I have no regrets on my mind. The upcoming year holds great many opportunities and possibilities; I just need to take hold of the chances. I also think I need to learn to go with the flow. I’m expecting to learn something new about myself during the year and I also hope that I could gain more self-confidence.

I have big expectations for the upcoming year but I cannot think of any reasons that might prevent those expectations from being fulfilled.

Today I read about the possibilities of doing sports in Aachen. I’m sure doing sports is a good way to spend time there, because it offers opportunities of meeting new people and helps me keep fit during my exchange year. There are instruction groups for many dozens of different sports and it’s very inexpensive. I already made up my mind about going to escrima class, because I’ve always wanted to learn some form of self-defense. I even made a goal out of it, it’s #2 on my list. :)

Yesterday I got an e-mail telling me that there will be a room for me in a student house in Aachen. I applied for it earlier this spring but I wasn’t having very high hopes of getting a room because I didn’t hear anything from them in a couple of months. But now they really are offering me a room!

This is so great! Now there’s nothing more left to worry about and I can totally concentrate on enjoying the summer and my last two months in Finland. :)

I found a girl who’s willing to rent my apartment during my exchange year. She just visited my place and decided to take it. That’s good, because it’s the only way how I can avoid the trouble of seeking a new apartment after I come back from Germany.

Almost everything has been taken care of. Now I only need to apply for a student grant, buy a laptop and get a travel insurance and then I’m ready to go! :)

The flight tickets have been reserved, which means that I can now start counting days until my departure to Germany. I’m flying there on the 30th of August, so I have now 115 days left here in Finland. :)

Today I received a confirmation e-mail from the target university (RWTH Aachen). They have now officially accepted me as an exchange student. This is just what I expected and everything seems to be in order. My study period shall begin on September 3rd with a language test. :)

...and I was chosen to be sent to Aachen, just like I wanted! :D

I’m so excited! I’ve already started looking for an apartment and making all kinds of arrangements. One important thing is trying to find a job for the summer, because I will need lots of money so that I won’t need to worry about financial stuff when I’m in Germany.