Olsztyn: a different place to do your erasmus

Olsztyn is a very different place to do your Erasmus. It's a city whose way of life is very quiet and relaxed, and the nature and landscapes are incredible. University of Warmia and Mazury is very nice. The Kortowo's campus is very big, plenty of students and services, supermarkets, restaurants, dormitories, sports areas... And the best of all, a WONDERFUL lake and forests where you can enjoy a lot at every time of the day (having a beer with friends, making Barbecues, resting in the grass when it's sunny, driving a boat, taking incredible pictures of the wild nature, etc). For me, the best of the city is the campus. Absolutely! Also the old town of Olsztyn is very nice. It's very small, like a little village, but the architecture is clean and is originally conserved, and there are lots of restaurants.

The Erasmus atmosphere is great, and you will be able to know everybody, because the Erasmus LLP programme it's still beginning to be implemented, and there are just 100-130 erasmus per year (even though the UWM is increasing its number of students, more and more every year). Last course 10/11 we were basically 2 big nationalities: Italians and Spanish, and also some others like lithuanians and turkish (the biggest group were the spanish). The good thing is that you can know all the erasmus students and you feel like in a small erasmus world. Also, there are a lot of international students from international degree of Medicine (they are not erasmus, but they are also incoming students), so the number of foreign students in the city is fortunately a bit higher than it can seem.

Also, one of the best things of this country is that is REALLY cheap. Bus tickets from 1’30 zlotych, rent a room for 600 zlotych, a beer in a bar for 5-6 zlotych… you won’t have problems of money anymore! I'm used to spending a lot of money in Italy because is more expensive than Poland, and here I can do whatever I want without care so much about that!

However, I also have to say that It's such a different area of Europe that getting used to living there can be hard, even more if you like very big cities or capitals. Because Olsztyn is not so big (180,000 inhabitants), it's located in the middle of nowhere, and the bigger city is 3 hours far away. Therefore, the entertainment is quite limited, and at 7-8 o'clock in the evening the city is dead, with nobody in the streets (except in the summer). Of course, there are a lot of bars and pubs to go if you want to go on party, but normally they close early (max. at 3-4 am) and are not very big. So after a few months, if you don't change and don't go to different places, you can feel tired of going to the same small pubs and to see the same people.

The weather there is very, very cold! To my mind, Olsztyn has only 2 seasons: Winter and summer. And of course, the first one is longer! Anyway, It's VERY nice to see the snow in such a wonderful landscape. And being at -10/-25ºC during 3-4 weeks can be very interesting and a different experience in your life! If you don't mind being at these freezing temperatures, you won't have any problem to get used to the weather there! It's not as bad as it's said! For me, the problem is not the cold. The only problem is the lack of hours of sun in the autumn and winter (when at 15-16 pm it's already dark).

About the culture and customs of polish people... It's quite hard to explain, because I've found very different kinds of persons here. But I could divide the poles in 2 big groups: 1st, the open-minded, young-thoughts, cultured and charming people who will help you with everything you need and will be very interested in everything about yourself and your country (I've to include here the nice university staff, the helpful mentors and the responsibles of the Erasmus Student Network - ESN -). And the 2nd group of people, the closed, a bit racist, cold and serious people. Obviously, the best way is to meet people of the first one (Fortunately most of the students are like this).

I really enjoyed the erasmus there, but if you wanna choose Olsztyn, you have to know that if you prefer cosmopolitan, urbanized, busy and big cities, getting used to being here can be a little bit hard (even more in the winter). So if you don't like small cities or limited atmospheres, and you need big and international erasmus groups and variety of cultural, entertainment and leisure activities which only exist in bigger and more cosmopolitan cities, probably Olsztyn won't be enough for you. So that depends of the way you are and of that you expect of your erasmus!

Enjoy OLSZTYN!