Witamy W Poznan!!
Valentine’s Day is a time that should be spent with loved ones. However, in an ironic twist, it was the day that I had to leave the people I love and start out on my new adventure in Poland.
We arrived in Poznan at 9pm and were met by our mentor and president of Erasmus in our university, Natalia. Natalia is very bubbly and talkative to say the least. She made us feel extremely welcome and relaxed within minutes of our arrival. We were taken to our dormitory which we were told is one of the better ones in Poznan and given our room keys.
Before we arrived, I was told that I would have a single room, so you can imagine my surprise/shock when I walked into my room to find a 6 foot polish guy named Piotr enjoying what can only be described as a romantic Valentines embrace with his girlfriend. I never had time to let this shock sink in as Natalia insisted that I, Anna and DarÓma attend an Erasmus party. We only stayed at the party for a short while as we were tired; however we still met several people from different countries who all managed to make us feel welcome.
Before bed, I received great news in the form that there was a mistake and I actually do have my own room, so after 30 minutes of trying to put a sheet on my bed, I finally fell asleep in my own bed.
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| Statue of Adam Mickiewicz |
The next morning, we met with Natalia who brought us to our university (Adam Mickiewicz University). We received our welcome pack and when we asked for our timetable, we were met with a blank expression. Apparently we have to go through every module, decide which one we want to do and email each individual tutor to seek permission to attend their class. We currently have only been accepted to one class, which is slightly concerning, but I’m sure it will be sorted shortly. We also received our student cards and travel card which allows us to travel around all the trams and buses (both are quite frequent and efficient) for one month.
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| Erasmus friends |
That night, we attended the famous ‘Erasmus Tram party’, which was really fun as it gave us an opportunity to meet more Erasmus students such as the Turkish, German, Italian, Spanish and Dutch students who we have become good friends with.
On Friday, we went shopping with Aina, a Catalonia student staying in our dormitory (Do not call her Spanish or there will be trouble!). We picked up some essential items and slowly but surely, our rooms are beginning to feel more like home. We then decided it was time to cook our own dinner, however, we were restricted by the lack of an oven, grill and microwave. After some discussion, we made an extremely exciting meal of…….. Pasta! (I hope that my sarcasm is easy enough to understand while reading this)
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| Ice Skating.... Badly! |
On Saturday, DarÓma, Anna and I took a tour of the city and visited the ‘Old town.’ This showed us how beautiful the city is, with its old multi-coloured buildings, restaurants and monuments. Our tour was cut short as we had agreed to meet other Erasmus students and dabble in a bit of ice-skating. After spending 20 minutes on the ice, I can say that I have a new found respect for figure skaters! I’m proud that I managed not to fall, however, I think it would be impossible to fall while tightly gripping the wall and skating at 2 miles per hour. I managed to get home safely and fitted in some Skype time with my girlfriend back home.
So, that was my first week in Poznan and to sum up in 3 words, it’s been Snowy, strange and exciting!
Till next week, Do widzenia!
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