Million-dollar experience

A simple answer to the million-dollar question - What is the best thing to do during being a student? - is to participate in Erasmus Exchange Program.

Hi, my name is Luka and I am an exchange student from Georgia at RheinAhrCampus. I hope my blog will trigger you to step forward for your future Erasmus Experience.
As many success stories start with failure and rejection, mine was the same. During my bachelor’s, I was not accepted to participate in the Erasmus Program. However, after that, I grew so much that the application during my master’s went in a very smooth way. I would say that the first lesson from Erasmus is to never give up. So, if you are in the same situation, just follow your passion, and finally, you will reach the goal.
Erasmus is all about feelings. First, you are excited and start creating your future 6 months abroad in your imagination. Then, you are ready to pack and start a new life for a short period of time that drastically can change your mindset, behaviors, and have a great impact on your life. If you did not have time to observe and test yourself before, for this following period you will have a chance to make an experiment – learn and develop yourself. This is a chance that you should not miss in an early age.  

Exchange experience consists of several major beneficial topics. Firstly, it is education that is different from your home University. German educational system is on a high level, it is obvious, but learning subjects in another language, studying with international and host students, listening to the experienced lecturers from successful companies create a unique atmosphere where you develop yourself and build the fundament for your career. Learning a totally new language (German in my case) is a completely funny challenge. So, coming here is a huge possibility to broaden your professional and educational state of mind.

Meeting youngsters with totally different cultures, mindsets and fields is another amazing experience. You meet people who were born and raised in another environment, so spending time with internationals and getting to know each other is fun. You share your culture, represent your country and see differences. One of the memorable and remarkable things that happened during my stay was attending the holiday celebrations from different nationalities. It is really interesting to be part of a celebration that you have never heard about. Meeting new people from foreign countries means, tasting different cuisines, which is a fantastic experience for food lovers like me. Starting with Indian cuisine and not only, now, I can even speak about the methods of cooking of many cities in Germany. During this time, you get closer to new people and make friends, who may take an important place in your life. You never know whom you meet, there are a lot of cases of friendships around me that they even started planning to do business together.

Another miracle for me was the place where I lived. The tiny calm neighborhood in Remagen was very nice. I enjoyed my staying here with my amazing German neighbors, who are my friends now. With them, I visited many places in Germany, made lots of BBQ parties on the balcony and got into German youngsters’ culture. Visiting Nurburgring, which was my childhood dream, just came true, when we went for 24h Racing on the track. I am really amazed by my German friends, and of course, they have already planned their next trip to Georgia, where I will return the same hospitality that I received from them here.

Last but not least, I want to say that the secret sauce of Erasmus experience is traveling. Surprisingly I managed to visit 9 new countries and 20 new cities. With this, the number of my visited countries was more than doubled. This number reflects the same amount of different cultures, arts, people, food, beer, wine, and much more. This is a must-do part of the exchange program, especially traveling with other nationalities makes the trip better. I even can’t fully express the feelings I got from the trips, and especially when travel is the most important part of my life.

With full of emotions and full of memories I guarantee, that your future Erasmus experience will be a bright light throughout your entire life. Good luck and start acting – right here, right now!