Life in a Semester

Hello, I am Ketevan 21 years old exchange student from Georgia. In my experience report, I want to tell you my story in RheinAhrCampus and generally want to share my emotions, attitudes regarding the exchange semester.

Honestly, when I was applying for the Erasmus+ Exchange program at RheinAhrCampus, I was checking out previous students’ experience reports and I was imagining myself writing my own story in Remagen and here I am, I did it.

Time is really flying… now the summer semester is almost over and I can’t believe, so many things happened to me. It’s impossible to put everything in one short text, but I will try my best. The first weeks were difficult for me I even didn’t know how to take a train or book tickets, but now I am looking back and feeling proud of myself because I overcome all the obstacles on my way with the help of other exchange students and the incoming exchange student coordinator at RheinAhrCampus. I want to highlight the fact that I am so lucky because of the people I met in Germany. Exchange students from previous semester are/were very helpful and kind to me. They helped me a lot in my daily basis. Now I feel like these people are second family for me.

The main reason why I think my semester in Remagen was successful is that at the same time I had interesting classes and had the possibility to meet people from all around the world and build up new friendships. Studying in a multinational atmosphere made me more aware of different cultures and personalities. I feel, I have become the kind of person, who can easily communicate with people from different countries and cultural backgrounds. I remember the international week at RheinAhrCampus, when we had several guest lecturers (from Australia, Canada, India, Georgia, Lithuania and etc.) who provide all the useful information to students about internships and future opportunities.

I should mention, I was an intern at RAC and that really pushed me from my comfort zone to develop my professional skills and get used to be more punctual and organized.

During the semester I tried things, I have never done before. We, exchange students, and our local friends had some mini excursions around Remagen, I tried camping for the first time in my life. Also, there are several lakes nearby and my friends and I went there for a picnic several times. What is more, I went to the Black Forest region, we visited Titisee and spent an amazing weekend there.

Then I was traveling in Western Europe. I went to The Netherland and explored two beautiful cities- Amsterdam and Rotterdam. I visited the Rembrandt House and Rijksmuseum. After it, we managed a plan a trip to my dream city: Paris. The Palace of Versailles was absolutely shocking for me. Also, visiting the Louvre museum was my dream from childhood, so you can imagine how happy and amazed I was while staring at Mona Lisa.

Generally, I can say it loudly, that my exchange semester was a success. At the same time, it was useful for my professional growth- I was an intern and definitely learned new things while being a course assistant and helping professors to lead the class and I developed my personal skills, because living alone and being responsible for every little detail in your life rises you and makes you more independent, creates stronger personality out of you.

Last but not least, I want to use this platform to say thank all the people I met in Germany. Members of Sprachen/Internationales, students, lecturers, the Erasmus office…you really made my stay in Remagen interesting. The best thing is that I am extending my Erasmus+ exchange semester and will be in Remagen till February 2021 and looking forward to new challenges and adventures for the Winter Semester 2020/2021 at RheinAhrCampus.