START International Days

People who know me well know that it’s always a struggle for me in the beginning to get in contact with people I never met before. But as I’m growing older and learnt from past experiences I’m getting better in it every time. I met awesome people during the START International Days from August, 31st to September, 2nd which were organized by the international student department and organizations of UoG.

It’s been more than 200 international students from all over the world. Half of them full-degree students, the other half exchange students like me for one or two semesters.

The START International Days are 3 days of events exclusively for international students to help them to have a smooth start before the other students arrive on campus. This year they took place from August, 31st to September, 2nd. Here is an extract of events which were organized for us:

• Introduction talks from the university’s vice presidents Malcolm Campbell and Charlotte Yates, the office of intercultural affairs, the City of Guelph, …

• Shopping trips (guided tours to the closest grocery stores)

• Information sessions about health insurance, course registration, library etc.

• breakfast, lunch & dinner together (and most of the time for free)

• household item pick-up (It started at 10 o’ clock, I was there 5 past 10 and everything was already gone! All I wanted to have was one single pot to be able to cook at home. “Like vultures”, as a friend of mine uses to say.)

• Board games, movies, bowling night & social time

• City tour in old school busses

• Campus chase (My team won! :)

For me it has emerged a group of about 10 people from Sweden, The Netherlands, Austria, Italy, France, Canada and Germany. It’s interesting to observe that all of us tend to stay in similar cultures, not on purpose, but it’s so much easier to get and stay in contact with people from cultures which are similar to your own. For example it’s very complicated to get in touch with students from Japan or China as they are extremely cautious and overpolite from a European’s point of view, so that it’s hard to find out if they like you talking to them or not or what they would like to do.

Most of the international students live in the residences on-campus; the undergraduates mainly in the East Village Townhouses and the graduates (it’s only a few of us) in the West Residences. In my opinion, the East Village Townhouses and the West Residences are definitely the two nicest residences on-campus as you live in small townhouses (2 to 3 levels). The other residences are high buildings and often with shared bedrooms (therefore they are less expensive).

Little excursus: I have to pay C$ 3408 (= 2309 €) for the semester (3 ½ months)!! In addition there are fees of around C$ 700 (475 €) for the University Health Insurance Plan (UHIP) and the Dental Plan, the bus pass, and a meal plan card.

I am very happy that the UoG organizes the START International Days helping the international students to get in touch with each other. It’s been fun and the feeling of loneliness from the weeks before is definitely gone!

#startinternational