Portugal-Universidade do Porto, Portugal

After years of building up my friendships in Würzburg, the semester abroad was a pretty big step out of my social comfort zone. Being on your own in a foreign environment and not even speaking the local language can be pretty scary, and the fear of becoming socially isolated was not a minor one at first. However, I was very well surprised by how easy it is to meet new people within an Erasmus semester.

As soon as I arrived in my shared flat with 12 flat mates, my initial worries vanished, because we are group of international people that are extremely sociable and energetic. We live in a row house near the city centre and share a living room, a small garden and the kitchen. Especially in the kitchen, it often gets wild in the evenings, with at least five people dancing around each other trying to prepare their meals at the same time. It's a bit chaotic, but my flat mates are lovely people, and we are having nice conversations what makes you quickly forget about it. Interestingly, the eating habits are alike among all internationalities. Pasta is on everyone's menu almost every day, only the sauces vary from ketchup (but you're only allowed to do it when the Italians aren't looking), pesto and parmesan to sauces you create yourself. Since it's common in Italy and Spain to still live at home while studying, some of my flat mates here are on their own for the very first time. Every little success in cooking is celebrated and the joy of experimenting slowly grows. My flat mates from Colombia and Tunisia also make me realize for the first time what a privilege it is to be European and to be able to travel and work easily across national borders.

Another possibility to make new contacts is, of course, at the university. Whether during orientation events for new students at the faculty or by seeing the same people in different lectures. You quickly break the ice by asking the Portuguese people for help with translations because many Erasmus students struggle with the language and the Portuguese bureaucracy in the International Office. Even though they know the language, it's not always clear to them what the lecture is about. After class, you can buy "Super Bock" in the cafeteria, so you can talk about your studies and life in an informal setting. Not only the lifestyles but also the study contents vary greatly from country to country. The Finns study programme in architecture is focused a lot on technical tools, meaning they do digital drawings from the first semester on and have never had to build a real model in their lives. In Portugal, on the other hand, a lot of emphasis is put on artistic creation. Looking at the complex models, I'm very glad that I haven't chosen a focus on construction design here. Instead, I'm doing studies with a focus on urban design in a group with two Portuguese people and a Brazilian, which gives me the opportunity to get to know different working methods and design approaches. Every couple of weeks, there are barbecues and music events at the faculty, which strengthens the relationships further (thanks to the omnipresent "Super Bock").

Besides university, you can get to know people from all over the world through events organized by the European Student Network or similar associations. These organized events range from pub crawls to trips to Morocco and always attract a large number of internationals. During my first weeks in Porto, I met a wide variety of people at a beach sports event in the afternoon in Matosinhos or a picnic in the Parque da Cidade. Now that the weather is getting chilly, the events are increasingly moving indoors like film nights or paintball games. The variety of activities includes something for everyone, and the challenge is not to meet new people, but to keep and maintain the new contacts. Fortunately, you always meet half of the people again in the Bar “Adega” or at the next Erasmus event.

In addition to meeting in person, there are many ways to connect virtually these days. There are WhatsApp or Facebook groups for seemingly every interest, where people arrange to meet for bar nights or trips together, look for flats or talk about their favorite music. I was lucky enough to meet Magda, who is from Poland, through one of these groups. She wants to stay away from Krakow for as long as possible through exchange programmes. After having spent a semester abroad in Australia and several one-week Erasmus programmes, she has a lot to tell, can imitate dialects from all over the world and is fantastic at planning trips. Conveniently, she lives with a Portuguese who owns a car. He not only has many local stories to tell, but also shows us places on road trips that would be inaccessible by public transport. But I'll tell you about those another time.