Preface
In the following I tell you about my semester abroad in New Zealand, precisely in Lincoln. Overall, it was really an asset in every way. Besides really good courses at Lincoln University featured by answerresume, where I also have good grades achieved, the adventure aspect was not too short! In addition to a quiet everyday life, New Zealand really offers everything you can imagine. From climbing, hiking and swimming to various extreme sports, there is really everything here!
Preparation
The preparation for my study abroad spending a total fortunately very limited. With the application at MicroEDU everything was pretty much already done. Only the visa had to be taken care of. When the positive feedback came from Lincoln, you had to choose the courses and find accommodation. The search for accommodation was also very easy. You could simply enter your preferences here via Lincoln’s online portal, which you can access. After there was also positive feedback from this, the only thing left was: tuition fees and transfer money for the accommodation (pro rata). That’s it. It was that easy.
Leisure
The free time I spent here can be divided into two main sections, the time during my studies and the time I spent here in New Zealand before the start of the semester.
During the semester, the university has many offers here. In addition to various clubs that an international student can join for a semester, such as hiking club, wine club, caligraphy club, music and much more, there is also the Recreation Center here directly on campus. There is a fitness area here with plenty of equipment for both endurance and weight training. At the same time, there are also different courses that you can take part in every day. The best thing is that this is completely FREE for students since this semester. That’s great and I spent a lot of time here accordingly. For football fanatics, there is of course also a football club, which even organizes friendly matches with other localities – everyone gets their money’s worth.
The second part was of course much more spectacular, so I hardly know where to start. As I already described in my interview, in summary about glaciers, beaches, geysers, volcanoes, jungles, waterfalls and hobbiton, where I had a hobbit beer in the Green Dragon, I really took everything with me that I had in the four weeks could take with me before studying. I think there is no question how amazing that experience was for me. But I could easily have hung on for four weeks after that and still would have only seen new things. New Zealand really has so much to offer for such leisure activities that you can and should really draw on unlimited resources. My plan, which I followed, was to arrive in Auckland and then zig-zag with long-distance buses and mainly rental cars across the North Island and then finally arrive in Christchurch in a larger arc on the South Island. This plan worked great and I recommend everyone to lace up their backpack and get started!
Culture
A few words about the culture here in New Zealand. I’ll try to sum it all up a bit. All in all, the locals here are really incredibly nice and relaxed people. There are hardly any signs of stress, so that it even goes so far that you take the time to thank the bus driver personally when you get out – to name just one example. The next big point and at the same time difference to Germany is to say that in this country people are at least as much into sports as we are, but not football. They are totally crazy about rugby here. So if you want to see something different, the Christchurch stadium is in good hands for just a few dollars. I loved it!In addition to rugby, the Kiwis are also extremely fond of all kinds of “lollipops”- that is the general term for sweets in this country. From fruit gums to marshmallows, cookies and biscuits of all kinds, there is of course also New Zealand chocolate. In general, it goes without saying that most of the food comes directly from New Zealand. So you grow almost everything yourself! The last thing to be said is that I personally read before my stay abroad that people walk barefoot a lot here. I can more than confirm that. It is winter here, around + 5 ° and the locals are still walking around barefoot in the city, in their short sports pants and T-shirt as if it were completely normal. In addition to the barefoot trend, rubber boots are also very popular, so there are actually extra storage boxes for them in front of the library and other facilities. So there is a lot to see!
Graduation
Overall, I would say that this semester will definitely be remembered for a lifetime. It certainly had everything you would expect. The study and courses were more than good. The lecturers were really extremely committed by German standards. You noticed that here you really stand up for each student individually and take care of the problems. I have the Advanced Geographic Information Systems A, Human-Computer Interaction, and Interaction Design courses. If you are looking for a master’s course and are studying computer science, I really recommend these three courses to you! All in all, it was certainly not the cheapest semester abroad, that is clear, but certainly one of the best! At this point, it is certainly advisable to apply for scholarships, such as the MicroEDU scholarship, which has made a lot possible for me! You can definitely do both here, study in peace and let off steam in the incredible landscape that New Zealand has to offer. All in all, the semester was really successful! Many thanks also to the nice and helpful MicroEDU team!
