A very Erasmus kind of week.

Another week abroad has come to an end, though a very active one, which has certainly given me a picture of how the student life is going to be in Bonn and naturally it involves a lot of fun and beer.

Day 1

This day was crucial as it was the day I got to meet my group, number 14, which consists of a very diverse, both in terms of culture and personality, cheerful and generally lovely bunch of people from Italy,Romania,the Czech republic,Slovenia,France,Spain,Turkey and thankfully I wasn’t the only one who represented two countries, as there is also a Spanish girl who lives and studies in France.Our group leaders an Italian girl and a German guy, who are already studying in Bonn are also very nice and helpful and knew exactly where to take us and what to show us.We met at the Sterntor along with group 15 and proceeded to have a couple of drinks at a tasteful Mexican themed Bar.

Day 2

Day two was a rather long one, as we had a 3 hour long presentation of the program for the Erasmus week and other useful information about Bonn, where we got constantly reminded of how it is Beethoven’s birth place, which let’s be honest is a really big thing to brag about. If you don’t think so I might be slightly distrustful of your music taste and perhaps common sense.Thankfully the presentation was followed by a free meal at the University cafeteria, which was great because a long presentation leaves you twice as hungry.The meal would not so soon be followed by bureaucracy and the enrolment procedure, that was quite fast and efficient, that German stereotype must certainly  have started from somewhere.However, the 2 hour gap that I had to stay in town between the meal and the enrolment, was filled by a pleasant exploration of the city centre alongside a member from my group, who comes from a city in Slovenia that is actually connected to my home city through the legend of ‘ Jason and the Argonauts’ and also lives quite far from the centre.

Day 3

This day started with a quiz, an intercultural one, where we were tested on our knowledge regarding Germany, its culture and people.The quiz went quite well and we watched a rather funny video about a group of students, where each one of them came from a different country and how they all had minor differences but still hung out and had loads of fun in the end, kind of like us.Afterwards, our group had a tour around a city, but it was more of a game than a tour, where we had to find certain information and eventually trade an egg and an apple for any kind of object.The Czech guy in our group was tasked with trading the apple and I had to trade the egg, which got us two lovely lighters from some lovely people who unrelentingly joined our game.The afternoon concluded with our group grabbing something to eat from a really cheap Donner place, the quality of which the Turkish girl slightly disapproves of, while me and the Romanian girl were chatting and mutually agreeing on how awesome falafel is.

Day 4

Day 4 didn’t involve a lot of activities, we merely had to attend one event in the morning, to which I was terribly late due to the Ubahn, but thankfully I met with  an Italian girl who isn’t from my group but lives in my Dorm and we walked there together. I also had a lot of cake, which was really good.

Day 5 

Friday was the party day, which oddly enough started with a trip to Cologne with the ESN. The distance between Bonn and Köln is very small, so it was a rather brief trip.My friend Kim was one of the group leaders so we met at the station and had a chat.When the evening  finally came, we all gathered up at our German group leader’s place for pre-drinks, which seems to be a thing here in Germany as well.The atmosphere was great and the group was at it’s finest, we didn’t realise how quickly the time passed until the point where we had to get back in town and join the party.Although by the time we reached the club, they told us it was full and we had to go to another club and so we did. The one we chose was less crowded, so we had a lot of  space to dance.Speaking of dancing, we do have some really skilled dancers in our group, the girl from the Czech republic being an honorable mention.

Saturday was the flunkyball day!This was not part of the Erasmus program and after parting, I was wondering whether it was a good idea to join a game that involved a ball and even more beer, which was in the end.We were only 3 people from the group, me and the 2 guys from Czech and Slovenia respectively.We met at the Poppelsdorfer schloss, which was full of young people and crates of beer. We were two teams that consisted of 3 people and the  purpose of the game was to hit the bottle that was positioned between the two teams and while the bottle was on the ground, the team that hit it had to drink as fast as possible, while the opponents had to quickly readjust the bottle.I had a blast and even got to meet more people.The evening concluded with a visit at an Irish pub with some pals I met earlier this week some of them being Irish and some German.We ended up singing songs like whiskey in the jar and Galway girl that I’ve heard multiple times whilst studying in Scotland.It was certainly an evening to remember.

Courses start this week,again the excitement is intense and I’m looking forward to see what’s next.

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