spotlight on honors: study abroad

honors students abroad

lindsey - greece

JUNIOR, Business major

AUGUST 2010

I am going to be studying in Thessaloniki, Greece at the American College of Thessaloniki (ACT) in the fall of 2010.  ACT was actually kind of chosen for me.  I have always wanted to study abroad, and the best year to go is during your sophomore year when you still have Gen Eds. left.  Well, I got the RA job my sophomore year and thought that it was a great opportunity so I decided to do that.  I now needed business courses since I would be studying abroad as a junior and ACT was suggested by Janis Halpern since it is one of the best business schools in Europe... that is English speaking. I knew that I would have fun where ever I went so I was all for it. Thessaloniki here I come!  I recently got my class schedule and I have all Tues. Thurs. classes! so I will be traveling a lot during all of my 4-day weekends!  I have always wanted to study abroad since even before I came to ISU.  My parents both did and I have looked at all of their picture albums (they went together) and have always been excited about traveling

OCTOBER 2010 

Hello from Thessaloniki! It has already been a whole month since I arrived in Europe!  I haven’t traveled to far away from Thessaloniki yet and I have mostly been getting settled so far.  I am having a great time here!  I was pretty homesick at first, but it is getting a lot better. 

Life:

Town/ where I live:  I live in Thessaloniki which is a port city in Greece.  It is on the coast, but there aren’t any beaches in town, but there are a lot within an hour or two by bus.  I live in a pretty big town.  It is the second largest city in Greece.

The hardest thing to get used to is the way of life here.  And you can tell that it affects the other US students, too.  Greece is VERY laid back.  Everyone is at least half an hour late to everything and no one worries about anything.  In class it is a major change from back in The States.  The teachers are very slow to tell us when stuff is due and what they want from us, but on the bright side of things, you tell a teacher that you are really busy during the weekend they will move your homework back or even cancel it.  They actually told us at orientation that we are tourists first and students second.  I LOVE IT!  I am trying to embrace this as fully as possible.

Weather:  It got cold really quick this year, according to the locals.  I would rather be cold than hot, though.  All the walking I have been doing really warms you up.  And when you walk you get to look at everything as you go.  Walking has become my main form of transportation.  I can also say that, after 4 weeks, I have finally mastered the bus system!  A bus system may seem easy, but when everything is in Greek, and the bus driver doesn’t speak English so you can ask his where he is headed, it is hard!

Classes and School:  The real reason I am here is to go to school and learn.  I am in 4 classes: Greek 101 (Greek Language), International Business, e-Marketing, and Advertising.  They are all going pretty well so far.  Most of them are easy.  Greek is by far my hardest class, but it is the one I actually need to learn the best while I am here.  It has already come in handy a number of times.

The campus ACT has all the way from preschool to an MBA program.  The American College of Thessaloniki (ACT, where I go) is actually just one building, the “New Building” (ACT is a small division of Anatolia College).  The library and the ACT “New Building” are located in the back of campus and these will be the only two buildings that I will have to use.  This is a lot different than having each class in a different building like I sometimes did at ISU.

Food:  My two favorite foods here are gyros and crepes. I always get dessert crepes with white chocolate, strawberries, and banana in it.  I love watching the crepe makers spin their little sticks and make the crepe and then add the ingredients and warm it up.  My most recent crepe was bursting and he used a whole banana!  I had to get a spoon to eat it because it was oozing with so much amazingness.  I could live on those things.  You can also get them sandwich style with meats and cheese, but I only see them as a dessert food.  Gyros are for meals. I always get my gyros with lamb meat (the usual) and French fries and tzatziki (τζατζίκι) sauce.  Absolute perfection.

And, I am addicted to the grapes here, especially the green ones, they are so sweet – like candy!  I don’t know what it is about grapes from Greece but the grapes I get here off the side of the street from outside bins are way better than the expensive ones I get from the US in the supermarket.  I love the street market right across the street from us.  The owner always gives me free stuff since I go there every day.  He is adorable!  I am getting to eat more and more fruits, since I don’t like to cook much.

Events:

I am in LOVE with film festivals.  There was an International Film Festival in town and I wasn’t too excited about going, but everyone else was so I tagged along.  I ended up staying with Jess, Jackie, and Taylor till the last movie at 1:30 a.m.  There were so many awesome short films!  I think that these movies were the best of the best and they always come to Thessaloniki at this time of the year, and man, they are excellent!  From now on I am going to every film festival within 50 miles of me!

My sailing trip:  My sailing trip was amazing!  I think that it is hilarious that the only part about this whole sailing trip that I hated was the actual sailing part!  It was so bumpy and I felt really sick the whole time! In the afternoon on the last day of my sailing trip when I was sitting on deck in the back of the boat the girls up front start screaming.  I looked up and saw three huge, beautiful dolphins speeding toward us.  I sprinted up to the front and laughing and our captain ran over because he thought someone fell off.  I got a video of the dolphins!  It was the fourth time we had seen dolphins on the trip, but this time they actually swam right over to us and under the boat in the front.  We think that we actually scared them off because we were so excited and jumping everywhere.

Fall break (2 weeks away): So far Jackie, jess, Andy, Taylor, and I have bought tickets together. We are going to Rome and Amsterdam - each for three days. We were going to go more places but decided that we did not want to be stuck in airports the whole weekend. Also, flights are extra expensive that week because it is when all European schools have off. We will have plenty of time in each city to see everything we want to and won't be rushed. I think it is a perfect idea.

Other Trips to Come:  In addition to Rome and Amsterdam for fall break I am going to go all over England with my parents for a week over Thanksgiving.  I think that we are taking a trip to Venice during that time, too.  I am going on a school trip to Athens, and I will be going to Paris over Christmas with Christian when he comes and visits at the end of my stay here.  I am also going to go to Milan with my friend Katharine; she is a fashion major and we want to shop!  There are these hot baths that the school is going to go on as a trip, too - I am excited because it will be cold and we will get a chance to get our bathing suits out one last time.

Oh, and I got to ride in a Greek police car. Don’t worry though, I didn’t break the law.

One night during the first week I got here we were walking on the coast and we randomly saw these three boats.  There was a Reggae one and a Pirate one and another one.  We talked to one of the guys standing outside the boats and he explained that the boats took little 30-minute trips around the bay.  Admission was free and drinks were 3 Euros!  Well, when we got on the Pirate boat we found out that only coffees were 3 Euro and just about everything else was about 9. I got a soda for 5 Euro and later came back for an iced-coffee.  Gina, Eve, Katharine, and I had a good time.  The sun was just setting and it was so pretty!

Here is a random, tiny car thing that Katharine and I found when we were out shoe shopping.  I see them everywhere transporting stuff like wood and windows.  I love them and want one so bad!!  Once I saw one that had 3 grown men in the front seat and one guy was like sitting outside the window because he couldn’t fit.

We visited Platamonos during my sailing trip.  Eylse and I went directly to Platamon Castle.  The castle was absolutely stunning.  And the view… beautiful!  We could see the coast from the top of the hill so we snapped pictures and enjoyed the warm weather while the sun was still up.  As an added bonus we also got to go in for free because we were students. I originally thought that the castle was going to be lame, but now I can’t wait to go to England and see all of the castles that my parents saw when they studied abroad.

Here I am on the front of the boat during my sailing trip! In the background is Thessaloniki. This was taken on the last day and we were about 2 hours away from the port. I was super nervous taking this picture - it was bumpy and I didn't want to fly off!

NOVEMBER 2010

I cannot believe that my stay here in Europe is half over!

I just returned from my fall break that was last week.  Here in Europe, they do not have a Thanksgiving break so they combine those 3ish days off with our ISU fall break and just take a week off in the middle of the semester.  I went to Rome and Amsterdam.  I went with 4 friends that I met here: Andy, Jess, Jackie and Taylor.  Andy and Jackie go to Monmouth College in Illinois, Taylor goes to U of Iowa, and Jess goes to a university somewhere in Montana. They are in a lot of the pictures below.  We all got along great the entire time, which I was sort of worried about, but, fortunately, it was a great experience all-around.

This was the first major trip I have been on since I have been over here. I wanted to write this soon after I got back from my trip so I would remember everything, but midterms have taken over the school… duh duh duh… It has been a week since I got back, but I remembered all the good stuff.  Enjoy!

Rome

We picked Rome as one of our destinations because Jackie is obsessed with it.  I didn’t really care where I went as long as I got to go somewhere cool.  And Jackie assured me that Rome would be cool.  And it was!  It also helped that she was obsessed with Rome before she even came over here because the running commentary that she kept up while we were there was really helpful to me since I didn’t know much about anything.  Sure, I had heard of the stuff before, but I didn’t know about any of the history behind it.

Monday morning we left Thessaloniki bright and early; we were on the plane by 6am so we got up around 3:30.  We flew Hungarian Airlines all week and so on the way to Rome we had a stop in Budapest (Malev Hungarian Airlines Hub).  I had a whole row on the plane to myself on each flight; Thessaloniki to Budapest, and Budapest to Rome!  I slept through both flights, even the snacks, but I didn’t care.  I love empty planes.

When we got to Rome we went right to our hostel and dropped our stuff off.  We had a hilarious shuttle driver from the airport to the hostel. We explored the rest of the day and hit some landmarks within walking distance.  One of my favorites was the Spanish Steps. There were painters at the top painting beautiful pictures of the view below, and at the bottom there was a cool fountain and a singing group of girls.  When they sang it was really loud because of the steps and surrounding buildings.  It was really cool.

We also went to this building where one side was a huge fountain: The Trevi Fountain. There is some superstition about making wishes and throwing coins into the fountain, but none of us could remember it at the time. So I looked like a maniac throwing coins every which way into the fountain to be sure that my wish comes true. Here is the legend via Wikipedia: it is lucky to throw three coins with one's right hand over one's left shoulder into the Trevi Fountain. I didn’t do exactly that, but I was close.  I hope the Roman gods grant me my wish anyway!  Keep your fingers crossed.  Below is a picture of me in front of the fountain.

	The Trevi Fountain		St. Peter's Basilica

We had 2 full days to explore Rome.  We were going to spend one of the days on a city tour seeing all the sites, and one we were going to go to the Vatican and the Sistine Chapel. We got there and the line was forever long.  It was literally 4,000 people in line.  We got grabbed by one of those people who try to sell you tours and he asked 50 euros per person to get in and skip the line and have a guided tour.  We talked him down to 25 each because we kept walking away and because we were students.  The entrance to the Vatican City was 12 euros anyway so we figured it was worth it to skip the line and have a guide.

Our guide was awesome.  She talked us through all of the Vatican and the Sistine Chapel (absolutely amazing!).  We weren’t allowed to take pictures inside the buildings, but here we are on the outside.

St. Peter’s Basilica – this is where the pope gives his address every Wednesday.  We were bummed that we came here on Tuesday, but if we would have come Wednesday it would have been SUPER crowded… and I doubt the address would have been in English.  Inside the Basilica it is where a lot of popes have been buried.  It is also a church.  It is huge.  There was actually a church service being held when we entered.  There were monuments all along the walls to each pope and some popes were in glass caskets… so you could see them.  I got a little freaked out.

We rode around the whole city on this tour where they pointed out EVERYTHING cool in the city.  The city is beautiful, if you like old buildings.  We got there early so we could be sure that we got front row, top of the bus.  It was so worth it.  The front was all glass and I kind of felt like I was going to fall sometimes!  The bus driver was crazy but he turned really well on some of the skinny streets.  I was SURE we were going to run into a building corner.  Everything is so close to the street.  It is building, small sidewalk, and then a street.  And the buildings are all straight up.  Oh, and we went under a low tree and it hit me in the head.

We then rode it again and got on and off at different stops.  First stop, the Coliseum! This was my favorite thing taht I saw when I was in Rome. It was amazing. And, as you can see it was really nice on Wednesday, but still really cold.

	The Colosseum		The Colosseum
	The Arch of Constantin		The Roman Forum

The hostel that we stayed at in Rome was pretty nice (extremely nice compared to the one we stayed at in Amsterdam).  It had a lot of room and a huge private bathroom for our room of 6.  We had a new roomie each night.  They were all solo travelers and had great stories.  One dude had been traveling alone for 6 months!  I couldn’t do that.  And all he had was a tiny backpack.

Amsterdam

Traveling – Amsterdam has an amazing airport!  It is so huge and has everything.  I shopped in a supermarket and got a meal while we waited for Taylor’s plane to land because we took different flights.

Amsterdam was amazing.  It is by far one of the coolest cities that I have every visited.  The city is set up with basically no cars allowed.  All of the streets are trams, bikes, and walkers only.  But don’t be fooled, the bikes are as hardcore as regular traffic with cars.  Actually, I almost got hit by like 10 bikers.  They have their little bells and yell in Dutch if you get in their way.  The city was super clean and pretty.  My favorite part was the canals that run everywhere.  They are gorgeous!  I would actually love to return to Amsterdam if I ever get that chance, although I would definitely go in the summer months when it is warmer.

First thing Friday morning we went to the Van Gogh Museum! It was a really well set up museum. This is one of the first huge museums that I have been to, and I thought that I would be bored looking at painting after painting, but it is all done in chronological order. It has stages of Van Gogh's life and each time period is a different room. Bios of him are printed on the wall, in multiple languages, and they tell about his friends, where he lived at the time, and what was going on in his life. One of his most famous paintings, Starry Night, wasn't there, I think it is in New York, but my favorite painting of his was: Blossoming Almond Tree.

After the Van Gogh Museum, we went to the Bol’s School of Bartending.  I have never had more fun, or laughed more, than in this place.

Saturday morning we went to the market and bought some souvenirs.  It was a lot like the Thessaloniki flea market with tons of different little stands all along one road.  I really wish we had these things in the US.  They are so fun!

So it turns out that in Europe the daylight savings time changes a week before it does in the United States.  We had to get up and be out of the hostel by 6am on Sunday in order to catch our flight, but we had no idea that the clocks had changed because there were none in our room and no one had told us.  We get outside and wait for the tram to come get us at the stop.  It was supposed to start running at 6, but we stood there for about 10 minutes then some Halloween partyers who were still up from the night before told us that it was only 5am.  We were a little peeved, but didn’t really care.  Thankfully this doughnut shop was open and we went in there to eat.  We were glad that the time had changed back instead of forward because in that case we would have maybe missed out flight!

We arrived back home in Thessaloniki by 2pm and I went right to bed after a little Skyping.  It was a great week! But, I definitely needed the whole week to recover as I eventually caught up on my sleep.

If I get a chance to go back to Amsterdam I want to go to Madam Trousseau’s house of wax people and to the Anne Frank house.  We didn’t have time to do everything, but we got in a ton of cool stuff.

	The Trevi Fountain		St. Peter's Basilica

Things I miss the most from back home:

Life is so different here, and there are a lot of luxuries that I had in the US that I took for granted.

• Dryers
• Cell- Phones
• Personal Transportation
• Heat
• Microwaves/ Toasters
• Peanut Butter
• Carpet

Things I think that I am going to miss when I leave here:

Although I haven’t been here that long, I am already in love with so many things about this place that I am sure I am going to miss when I head back to The States in December.

• Gyros
• Siesta Time
• Not having a cell-phone
• Adorable stray animals
• The simple, slow, easy way of life.

Gelato!!

In my last update you might remember me mentioning living off of gyros and crepes, well I completely forgot about gelato!  Gelato is the European form of ice-cream and they sell it everywhere.  I have probably tried at least 30 flavors.  YUMMY!  I am seriously considering investing in a gelato maker when I return to The States.

MID-NOVEMBER 2010

Hey everyone!  I went to Athens this past weekend!  It was a school trip.  The university took all the study abroad students, about 60 of us, on a 3 day, 2 night trip to Athens.

Friday

We left really early Friday morning.  The bus picked us up from the apartment building where we all live.  I only have class on Tuesdays and Thursdays so I didn’t have to miss class, but some students were ticked that they had to miss because some still have midterms early next week.  I finished all mine Thursday… they went OK… not fabulous, but oh well.

We had a 6 hour bus ride to Athens, which ended up taking 9 hours, with a stop for lunch in the middle.  I had prepared and brought 2 books for the trek.  I have been reading books like crazy over here!  I have so much free time that I have read 7 novels so far.  They have been all fluff-books, but that’s how I like them.  I finished those all in a month… it took me about a month to find a place where they sold English books.  Haha.  There are so many great places to read!  My apartment gets really boring, but there are hundreds of tiny cafes in town and most of them have an outside part.  If you buy a frappe, a very popular Greek coffee, they will let you sit there as long as you want.  Pretty much everyone has gotten used to those because they are the cheapest things on the menu at most places.  Also, I like to read by the water and the White Tower.  They have good grass there.  Anyway, back to the trip… the bus ride was sooooooo long.  I was excited for our lunch break in Lamia, Greece.

Lunch was good.  Being cramped on the bus was super boring… and hot.  Lunch was outside on a covered patio attached to the restaurant and it was a typical Greek meal: bread, cheese, wine, Greek salad, and a plate of different meats and veggies.  I finished a whole book on the trip there.  Good thing I brought 2, or I would be bored on the way home.

We got to Athens at about 6:30p.m. and then went to the New Acropolis Museum.  The museum was really cool.  It had a lot of pieces of the Parthenon that had fallen off.  The building was brand new and really architecturally cool.  And, it was actually build on top of another ruin that was being excavated.  All of the floors were made out of glass and you could see people working below.  However, I am not quite sure that that was entirely safe, and what happens if they need to expand the excavation site, but the building is on top of it…

We then had a free night.  It was a little rainy, but we decided to go wander anyway.  We walked around town and there were lots of shops with candy in them.  We stopped at a few places.

We went out as a group to a Greek restaurant that night.  There was good food and an open floor for dancing.  We rented out the whole top floor of the restaurant because there were so many of us.  We had a private 2 person band singing for us.  Efi, and our other 2 chaperones, Greek students from school, taught us a whole bunch of dances… and of course I was the first one to join it.  It was a lot of fun!

After that we ran back in the rain and went to bed because it was about 2am.

Saturday

First thing in the morning we had breakfast on top of the hotel!!  We had one of the nicest hotels in the city and the top floor was dedicated to a restaurant.

Here Katharine and I are on the top of our hotel with the Parthenon and Acropolis behind us.

After breakfast we went on an Athens city tour and my favorite thing that I saw was the Panathinaiko Stadium.  I really wish that we could have gone in the Stadium, but our tour was a bus tour.  We saw a lot of other stuff on the tour.

Our tour ended in front of the Acropolis.  Next we went on a tour of the Acropolis and the Parthenon.  “In Greek, Acropolis means ‘the upper fortified part of an ancient Greek city’ and the Parthenon was the temple of the Greek goddess Athena whom the people of Athens considered their protector. Its construction began in 447BC and it was completed in 432BC.”

We had an amazing guide. I really like having guided tours. It adds so much to the experience. We hiked all the way up to the top and it was quite a walk. It was super warm outside! 80 degrees in November! I was in heaven. It was really windy at the top of the Acropolis, so it was nice to sit and rest after the climb and enjoy the view.