4 years ago I have managed to leave on a scholarship student exchange (Socrates / Erasmus). It was Ireland. I was very excited, but I knew it would be my biggest adventure. And it was:)
Ok it was just a little intro, and I would like to divide my presentation into several parts.
1. Studying abroad
2. Dublin & Maynooth (East Ireland)
3. Belfast (North Ireland)
4. Galway (West Ireland)
In the first part I'll tell you how the life looks there, a little bit of study and generally about Ireland. In other parts I'll focus on why it is worthwhile to go there and I'll show what I have seen and photographed personally. So here is no images from the Internet, but either my or my friends:)
Ireland by my eyes - Studying abroad
As you know, on the green island people drive on the left, but compared to this, the rest of the differences is equally large. People has completely different mentality, everyone is friendly and smiles walking the street. People do not live in a rush. Everyone can help. You don't have to afraid go out on evening or night on the street.
Standard of studying it is quite different in the curriculum and the organisation. Educational standards are shockingly low compared to ours. In the fact that they begin to study 2 years earlier. Me and 2 other friends from PJWSTK, we didn't spent a lot of time for learning, despite the fact we were best in group, we brought back almost only "5" marks :)
Quality of life of students is on the contrary, much higher than us. There was a huge campus, residential villas / small block buildings divided into apartments for 5 people. Everyone has its own room, 2 common bathrooms per apartment and common room with kitchen. In newer buildings, each room has its own bathroom, just like in hotel:)
International Society is very active, was organized various events, trips that I'll present in the subsequent parts of my presentation, parties, sport activities and entertainments.
In that moment, there were about 250 international students, so it is quite large amount. There was many abilities to integrate with each other.
I could say, that I could live there, there is different and better life. But I were there only for one semester, I missed my family and friend. I said to myself, that I have to back there in the future, maybe for the rest of my life :)
Any questions?
"Ireland is reportedly so green, like mermaids hair at dawn." ;P I always wanted to go to Ireland, but somehow never enough time;) but I am afraid that this is a very orderly country for me. I like a bit of creative chaos. Clipped lawns equally frighten me. Wild part of Ireland shall be beautiful. But I do not know how large is the percentage of the country.
ReplyDeleteFrom one side to opposite side of the island, you can get in several hours, but each coast is different from any other. There is a lot of wild... :) a lot of space outside the cities. When you travel from one city to skyscrapersother, betweenm them are fields with the sheeps, it is really amazing. Traditional old building like something like palaces, it is gorgeous.
ReplyDeleteIn cities, in example in Dublin(capital) you won't see skyscrapers, tallest buildings are about 5 floors, people live in harmony with nature.
Unfortunately I've never had the chance to visit Ireland, but I'm sure hoping on visiting it one day. From what I've read in this article it sure does seem like a very interesting place :) It seems like a calm country where everything is in order. The only problem might be the complete ban on smoking in public places which discourages certain people (since I'm not a smoker, I don't mind).
ReplyDeleteI have never been to Ireland but I would like to go there especially on St. Patrick day. I adore Guinness and I can't imagine better day than this for massed consumption (I mean participants not only the beer):)
ReplyDeleteI don't like the climate there particularly off-season, but there are cheap Ryanair flights dated from November to April so maybe I will take advantage of it.
I never visited Ireland but I was also participating in student exchange program which made me land in England.
ReplyDeleteI had very similar views, people seem to be so much nicer, not mentioning all the places you can go to. Air seems to be much fresher, grass seems to be more green hehe, literally.
Also funnily enough you are totally right about their education level. For some reason it seems to be rather low and....casual? I dont know. Perhaps only those few Universities like Oxford etc have actually an acceptable level. Hard to say.
Fact remains thats regardless of that their facilities are much superior to ours. I had luck to study at Leeds Metropolitan University and I was really amazed by quality of equipment.
Also I could go to University and work even at 3 AM if I wanted to, and sometimes I was actually doing that.
BUT, even though it seems to be like a dream I must tell you that not everywhere it will be the same, both in Ireland and England.
Bigger cities have much less friendly atmosphere most of the time and wandering around during the night also might not be as safe as you think it is.
Still I think both of those places are definitely worth visiting.
Personally I plan more than that, I actually want to move to England where my girlfriend (who is english) lives.
Oh and by the way, those people are definitely good at partying...
ReplyDeleteGo to Leeds, this city is one big club during the night.
I have never been to Ireland but I visited my friend who studies in Scotland. I have met some nice people there and they were very friendly.
ReplyDeleteSome people adore Ireland but frankly I don't know why. It doesn't speak to me. If I had an opportunity I would spend my holidays somewhere warmer. One thing for sure, they speak funny and sometimes it really is hard to understand them.
Yes, their pronunciation is very strange... Irish is let say acceptable, but at the begining on lectures, I understood 50% of my lecturer.
ReplyDeleteBut in Northen Ireland, in Belfast, I couldn't understand at all, maybe one word per 10 words, it was very odd, very difficult accent.
In Ireland they have weird pronunciation, especialy "-sh" suffix
e.g.
good night -> the say "gud najsz"
eight -> they say "eisz"
uhhh there was much more interesting examples, but I don't remember :(