Universität Ljubljana, Slowenien

Hey, everyone!

You know that feeling, when you’re on vacation and you check the weather forecast to make sure that the weather here is better than at home? So far, I certainly had the more advantageous weather and was able to brag about it whenever I called home. But for the last two weeks my luck has turned. While the weather in Germany apparently was quite decent, the weather here was rather uncomfortable, not to say it was pouring. The bathing season had temporarily to be put on hold and the pool on our terrace was repurposed into a rain storage reservoir. In the whole Balkans there wasn’t a single dry spot. My fellow students and I desperately tried to find a nice and dry destination for our weekend trips, but no chance! The only possibility to flee the bad weather would have been a last-minute flight to Istanbul which we sadly dismissed due to financial aspects.

But the bright side of this cloudy weather was, that after weeks of Erasmus activities we finally had time to prepare for the upcoming exams. Yes, you’ve read correctly: in Slovenia many exams already take place in May even if the official exam period doesn’t start until the middle of June. The academic calendar at Ljubljana University seems more like a rough guideline than like a strict schedule as it is common in Germany. It can easily happen that you get surprised by spontaneous lectures because every professor seems to schedule and reschedule the dates of the lectures as they please. I already passed my first colloquium in ‘Mechatronics’. Now I am preparing for a practical exam in ‘Finite element method’. The lectures for this subject were solely offered in Sloveian – a particular challenge for me.

While the exam period is starting, festival season is ending. Last week, more than 3,000 students came together in the pouring rain to celebrate the end of ‘majske igre 2015’, which is what those festivals are actually called. ‘majske igre’ means “May Games” (a combination of open-air sport and evening events) which are an old tradition in Ljubljana took place this year for the 32^nd time. The atmosphere was breathtaking as usual in spite of the rainy weather and everyone was in a good mood.

Fortunately the weather forecast for the next weeks looks much better so that we can go and explore the Julian Alps. We already planned to go on a climbing and a hiking tour through the canyons. Hopefully I can tell you some pleasant stories about that next time!

Until then! Yours

Lukas