Portugal-Universidade do Porto, Portugal

Bom dia! I have been in Porto for four weeks now and I have already been able to gather some first impressions of the country and its people. The city has a very special atmosphere and a great vibe. In the city centre, when the weather is good, there are talented street musicians on every corner. In seemingly every other building there is a gastronomic establishment and people are sitting along the street, laughing, enjoying themselves and the whole city soaks up this vibe and gets entranced by it. What you pick up directly experiencing the city life: Only tourists stop at red lights. Thanks to (more or less) sophisticated one-way street systems, driving a car must be the purest nightmare and basically no one is riding bicycles here due to the numerous hills and lack of bike lanes. The bus drivers race just as fast across the city as one knows it from Würzburg, however, here they also have to deal with narrower roads and cars parking anywhere but where they should. When arriving on the 9^th of September I had to drag my rather heavy suitcase from the metro to my apartment up the hilly landscape and overcome streets without lowered curbs. Quickly, it was apparent to me that walking by foot here can also be quite a challenge.

Contrary to my (and all the other Erasmus students') expectations, the university did not start at all on 12^th of September, but two weeks later. This meant that I had a surprising amount of time to explore the city and especially the beach nearby Matosinhos, where I immediately signed up for a surfing course. If you think of surfing as of running into the ocean with a sleek board under your arm, throwing the board into the waves and yourself onto the board to paddle into the sunset and elegantly taking the next wave, I will have to disappoint you. First, you have to, rather inelegantly, squeeze into the skin-tight wetsuit, warm up on the beach and do a few dry runs by standing up on the board on land. There's not much technique to learn, so we were quick to go into the water. The first hurdle is to get on the board and not to fall off instantly.  The exhausting paddling and getting up at the right moment are a completely different matter. So, especially at the beginning, surfing means to swallow a lot of salt water and frustration. But even for me as a beginner, there are small joys: in mermaid style (lying on the surfboard because the legs just didn't want to get up, with the arms pushed up into the yoga cobra position) being washed onto the beach by a wave at breakneck speed.

A post-surf highlight is to raid the baked goods section of Lidl (a good place to go if you're feeling a little homesick) before taking the double-decker bus with panoramic windows back to the city to round off the evening. Porto features many fantastic parks where you can take in spectacular sunsets. You meet up bringing a bottle of wine, for example, in the Jardim do Morro and watch the sunset accompanied by the sounds of the street musicians. As soon as the last rays of sunshine disappear behind the hills, people applaud, and then gradually move on to the city centre. Here, there is a lively hustle and bustle during the evening hours, as many people stand outside on the street instead of sitting in a bar, talking and consuming lots of beer. If you order a beer here, you automatically get a Super Bock, which even I, as a wine lover, enjoy plus it`s affordable. The majority of the approximately 8,000 Erasmus students gather almost daily at the bar Adega Leonor, where you get the Bock for 2€ and a joyful atmosphere for free.

Since I actually came to Porto to study, I should probably also report a little about it. When it finally started on the 26^th of September, the next shock was waiting for me right around the corner. I almost exclusively chose mandatory elective courses for my learning agreement, which turned out to completely overlap in time, consequently, I had to change my course selection again. And again and again. In the beginning, I mostly felt overwhelmed and after I finally was set with the right courses, the next challenge was to find the course rooms on campus. Even though the buildings designed by the ‘Pritzker’ prize-winner Álvaro Siza are quite aesthetic, finding your way around them is not necessarily easy. Thanks to the helpful Portuguese people, I now manage to find my way around quite well. The lectures also let me face some challenges, since the course description "suitable for English-speaking people" probably only means that the professor could speak English, but doesn`t have to... luckily, I am able to get through that with the help of my Portuguese fellow students. My favourite place to spend my free time is the library, which has a very special atmosphere due to its great skylight, bright wooden interior and the numerous books. Apart from that, it is very nice to sit in the shade of huge plane trees on the terrace of the cafeteria with a meia de leite.

By now I've been in Porto for four weeks, and despite the chaos and confusion at the beginning, I've felt incredibly at home from the very first moment on. Inspired by the liveliness of the city, I feel full of energy and much more relaxed than in my everyday life back in Würzburg. I have already experienced a lot, made great trips and met inspiring people and look forward to reporting about it soon.