Capilano University Students Blogging Abroad

I remember reading these entries last summer before applying to study abroad and now I’ve been here for almost two months and it’s finally sinking in. I love being in the sun and being super tanned, I mean who doesn’t. I do miss home on occasion but try to distract myself, it’s not like I’m completely cut off from everyone. One thing I’ve learnt already is nothing will go as you plan, so you might as well not do it. It can also be quite the emotional roller coaster with making new friends and perhaps losing old ones but I just keep thinking this is what I’ve wanted for years so I refuse to regret anything I do. It’s a complete growing experience, I didn’t know I was so dependent on my friends and family until the other night when the power went out and I didn’t know what to do or who to call. It was sad really haha. I’ve learnt a lot about the culture already in one of my classes and it is even more fascinating then I had expected. I honestly can’t wait for whoever comes next year,...

The first couple of weeks were hard to adjust to, but after being here for a month I have comfortably settled into life in Vlissingen. We quickly realized it was necessary to buy a bike and rely on that as our mode of transportation. I miss my car back home but biking around the city to run errands is a nice change! (although it can be difficult sometimes when you have to do things like laundry). Everything is in Dutch obviously, so finding things when you are grocery shopping and navigating around the city can be a challenge at times. I will say though that you can talk to almost anyone in English in Holland and they will understand you and be able to speak very good English back to you. The city we are living in is quite small and not very exciting during the year. It is located right on the south coast of Holland and attracts a lot of tourists during the summer months that come here to enjoy the beautiful beach and its boulevard. School is very slack and relaxed here so I have fo...

After the first time being London with the school, I went to there with Mike, Andrea (two came from CapU as well), Elizabeth, Tyler and Grayson (three came from U.S.) for the second adventure. We got up early and took the bus to Hatfield train station which took 10 minutes. Then, we bought a round-trip ticket from Hatfield to London that includes transportation ticket the whole day in London for £8.6 which is 3-people group price.   This was my first time to take train in United Kingdom and the terminal station is the famous “Harry Potter Platform 9 ¾” which made me so excited. It took less than half hour to get into London. We took pictures at the platform 9¾ as a souvenir. Then, we crossed the street to take the tube which went to Camden Town market. This market was quite big which includes outdoor and indoor areas. We visit the outdoor parts first. Almost everything was included in this market and you have the chance to bargain the price with sellers. Elizabeth bought a dress ...

The business world is becoming more and more globalized; in fact, not only is the business world but also the world itself has become more globalized. Everyone is connected in one way or another; it could be through purchasing something made from a country across the World, having a relative living across the Ocean, watching a movie filmed in a country you’ve never heard of or talking to a friend you met through the Internet. We are all connected. When I was a little girl, I heard about this Chinese proverb, which says, “Xíng qiānlǐ lù shèng dú wàn juǎn shū,” which means, “walking 1,000 miles beats reading 10,000 scrolls/books.” I knew the meaning and accepted it but I never really truly understood it. Then when I got older, gotten different overseas experience and exposed to diverse cultures in different countries, I started to gain a much better understanding of this proverb. That was when I discovered that it is one thing to read and learn about a culture from a textbook but anothe...

When you first arrive you will get extremely excited and is ready to go to work and meet a lot of people! The guests are nice and you are all happy and preppy and thinking that this is the most magical place and the best experience ever! Every night you go on the party bus, every day before or after work you’ll go out with your friends.  But as time goes by your body will soon be crashing after long ridiculous hours and the latest hours ever and of course, the many nights of going on the party bus.   Half way through your program you would complain that it’s too hard and that you want to go home. Everyday you’ll drag yourself to go to work and put on a fake smile on your face and behind that smile you are complaining to yourself about how stupid it is. You barely see you friends anymore; the only people you see are the cast members that you work with and guests with the most ridiculous and repetitive questions.  Two more months goes by and you will realize how f...

Celebrating a birthday away from home for the first time can be a difficult, yet exciting, occasion. I celebrated my birthday two weeks into my semester abroad. I fought with various emotions on that day. It was the first time I was away from home and the idea and actuality of not being surrounded by my family and friends, not taking part in the birthday traditions that I usually do, gave me mixed emotions     Over the weekend of my birthday, 8 girls rented 2 cars and took off to Montpellier and Toulouse for a 4-day road trip of the South of France. I wondered what it would be like, what and how I would feel, not being surrounded by the familiarity of home. Naturally I missed home; however, the girls did an outstanding job making my birthday a special one.  I learned from my new German friends that they celebrate “into” birthdays, so at midnight on Feb.18, I was surprised with a cake and they sang Happy Birthday to me. I was genuinely surprised and very thankful! The fol...

I feel extremely fortunate and grateful to have been given this opportunity to study abroad in England. It has been amazing right from the beginning and is only getting better. My first night here was a bit stressful, but once I talked to some other international students, I realized that they were in the exact same boat as me. This gave me a sense of comfort knowing that I wasn’t the only one, and within a couple days the stress was completely gone. There was a big snowfall at the very beginning of February and a few of us were in London at the time; it was quite different to see how people in London reacted towards the snow. The tubes all shut down, taxis want you to pay ridiculous amounts of money for a ride and cars are slipping and sliding everywhere. It was a bit funny at the time, and instead of taking a taxi back to the train station (our only source of transportation back to the university…) we decided to run through the snow! We ran for 25 minutes through the slush till we w...

The first thing I want to say is it was incredibly exhilarating to be with 15 young people from Capilano University for 11 days, “24 – 7”.    We had a lot of fun together, singing and dancing, wandering around in the dark in Tikal, sailing down the Rio Dulce, and much more! There are also many more sobering memories we bring back with us. Two of our guest speakers, John Bell and Sue Patterson told us that Guatemala is a fragile state.   This was born out over and over again during our short visit. One of our hosts said it best.   Pollo, a leader in the Garifuna community in Livingston showed us the damage done to homes by a hurricane that struck more than 5 years ago. Pollo spoke of meeting the French President, and his appeal that rehabilitation funds NOT be channeled through the Guatemalan government. The poor state of repair of the homes today attests to the endemic corruption in Guatemalan society at the highest levels.   Leonard George and I had the privile...

I am supposed to recap the entire ten days in Guatemala in four hundred words; not going to be an easy task. Throughout the trip we took part in Mayan ceremonies, explored ancient ruins of Quiriqua and Tikal, perused colorful, exciting markets in Antigua and Guatemala City, heard presentations from inspiring and intelligent people, we even had time to relax on the poolside and swim in the ocean. The fact that I witnessed all of this as part of a student body was an entirely new and awakening experience. Within our group we have so many strong and individual personalities and I honestly think that everyone put in their greatest efforts to make sure that the collective group came first above our own individual desires, which is not the norm in our society. I feel that being given the opportunity to travel to Guatemala and learn and engage with the people shaped my understanding of many issues we have been studying prior to travel in a fundamental way. For example, being able to observe...

After what seems like a century, our trip has reached its end. Yes, it felt like a long time, but it is only because the person I was before coming to Guatemala is a different one that is leaving. Before going on this trip, I admit I had a very “black and white” view of Guatemala and its struggles. Yolanda Colom and Sylvia Solorzano Foppa were the last guest speakers to grace us with their presence and have profoundly changed the way I see Guatemala and countries like it. Both of these women were leaders in Guatemala’s guerilla movement. Text books and web sites just don’t give you up-to-date, and first-hand information like they do. In short, they told us about their struggles and defeats, before and after “peace”. Knowing what the definition of guerilla warfare was, I was taken aback by their very beings. They are mothers with kind smiles who once found no other way to defend the integrity of their country than to use violence. When being asked the question of what Canadians can do t...