There has been a lot of University stuff going on. Since we have a bunch of tests and papers due during the semester, it was always busy but now that the semester is coming to an end, we’ve all been finishing up our final works.

But far more important than school work 😉 have been the experiences we’ve made aside from University. We’ve all met new friends, seen new places have done more things and also got new piercings and tattoos, too! 😛

San Francisco, Los Angeles, Santa Monica, Las Vegas, Grand Canyon, Yosemite…we’ve almost seen it all! And yet we feel like we want to stay more. We celebrated Halloween and I saw the biggest Halloween Parade in the world in North Hollywood. Clearly THAT was an experience. Others had fun at the monthly college parties at CI and saw how crazy the Americans can get with alcohol (now I understand why there is an age limit of 21), Twerking inclusive!

Now that we can all see the end (19 days left) of our time abroad, we look at it with one happy and one sad eye. I know that for a lot of us it feels like we want to go home to our families and at the same time we don’t want to leave California. We have all been able to experience so many new and great things. Our english has gotten better, our friendships have gotten tighter and we’ve all kind of got used to this place here and we know we’ll miss it.

A couple of us will take trips around North Amerika after school ends. Others will go back to Germany.

When I was driving to school with some other people the other day, someone said: “This will probably be the most beautiful drive to University I’ll ever have.” We’ve clearly gotten used to the good weather here, although it has gotten kind of cold in the last couple of weeks.

This Thursday there will be another really typical american holiday – Thanksgiving! Another great thing we get to experience. A lot of us will take a trip to San Francisco and the Bay Area to celebrate.

We are all excited for the holidays and we’ll all enjoy the last couple of weeks here in California!

C ya!

Laura

Thinking of Madrid, the first thing that might pop into peoples head might be the long sunny hours and the almost unbearable heat at noon. We ́ve witnessed that the end of spanish summer – which was a nice extension of the rather cold „semi-summer“ in Germany. Until the end of october we had a fantastic temperature in Madrid, always about more than 20 degrees and we enjoyed it. Some of us brought their tennis rackets to play matches on the courts of the campus.

Another group met during their free lessons for playing soccer. Sadly, this has found an end with the onset of winter. Misleadingly we almost bragged there won ́t be a need of warm clothes, let alone a parka in this city. At least since the beginnig of last week we all know better. The temperatures fell down and now we ́re freezing like in Germany. But, what makes the difference, even if it ́s sometimes less than 10 degrees, we have more than five sun hours in the city per day and just a few days of rain.

New people

Furthermore parts of our private life developed. It was our objective from the beginning to get to know new people here, from different countries, with different cultures and languages. We recognized this is a matter of time and it depends on ourselves. After those three months in Spain and after meeting a lot of people at the University every day we all have a circle of friends and people we know better around us here.

We are especially hanging out with some french fellow students, having parties with them, exchange experiences and learn a lot about their culture and their opinion about the Germans as well. Before we were spending time together, the only thing our classmates heard was our tight pronounciation of German words, just like „Kartoffel“. They thought Germans were strict, had no parties, only wanted to be in common with other Germans, never looked friendly and weren’t funny at all. Now we ́re glad, we could adjust these prejudices about our country. We also got in contact with native „madrileños“ some more. On the one hand during the university, while meeting them at the tennis court or at the cafeteria and on the other hand in our leisure time, for example in nightclubs and bars.

These places are our favourite ones for spending our leisure time in Madrid. If there exists a list, of „cities that never sleep“, like for example New York, the capital of Spain should be added. During the day some of the hippest areas, just like Malsaña or Chueca, are almost deserted and get alive by night.

In the evening

The feeling arises that the inhabitants crawl out of their holes in the evening, fill the restaurants at ten o`clock, sit at Sol afterwards with some canned beer or in one of the uncountable bars and dance during the whole night in the clubs of Madrid. So in order to be with natives, Spanish adolescents and other exchange students, you have to go to different bars, for example to a Flamenco-bar, to the Jazz-club „El Junco“ or to the „El Tigre“, where they offer you a plate of food to every drink.

Another typical, extraordinary and very busy place for having some beers coupled with food is the „Museo del Jamón“. You might guess, it is a museum, which it is actually not. It`s a shop, which offers different kinds of ham (Serrano, Ibérico) and it includes a bar where you can buy „Bocadillos“ and drink „Cañas“ (Small beers) for only 70 Cents, and these well-known stores are located in every famous area in Madrid. Afterwards, at about 1am you will meet most young people in the clubs.

The huge Kapital-club is notorious in the city since it compounds 7 dance-areas and plays a wide branch of different kinds of music. Another popular club amongst younger adults is the Joy club where you might snatch a free jigger. Those of us who listen to Hip-Hop love the „Serrano 41“ and the electronic-lovers support the Mondo, where you can see the most famous DJs from all over the world.

A few weeks left

There are just a few weeks left until it is december and there will other places to meet then. The decoration of huge lights and big metalic stars and bowls on taut wires in the streets of the city centre indicate that christmas time is coming. At Sol you can admire a huge metallic christmas tree in the middle of the place, which sparkles colourfully at night.

The Plaza Mayor is prepared for the christmas market which takes place there and we can ́t wait to see it. This market is very famous in Spain and we ́re looking forward to drinking some hot sangria and eating sweets. Right now you already get the typical christmas food you need. At this point it is mentionable that you get real „Butterstollen“ and „Lebkuchen“ from Germany at the „Lidl“ for not getting homesick in the time of advent. Aside from that you can find small stands distributed in the city. They are selling sweet chestnuts and baked pumpkins. So don ́t worry, families and friends at home, with all those sweets, tasty Churros and cookies and cold temperatures it will be no problem to put on our christmas-weight soon.

Charlotte Roever & Janina Götz

In the first post about Bangkok, I told that we have many trips and events organized for the Thai Culture class. A few weeks ago, the other ambassador, Marcel, wrote about the trip to the north of Thailand to see the Loy Krathong festival and discover that part of this magic country.

Since then, we have been to the theater to see an impressive super production about the culture of the different parts of Thailand and how the religion pictures hell, heaven and the in-between. It was a dancing show with hundreds of special effects, dancers, elephants and even a river in front of the stage! It was very magical! Especially because, after what we have learned in class and the trips we have made, we could identify and understand well the elements in the scenery and in the plot.

That was not the only amazing experience we have had though. Yesterday we went to an island called Koh Kham on a one-day trip to plant coral reef. The trip was well organized and we did not have to worry about anything. We were the first group going to this Island and we arrived by 9:30 there. The island belongs to the navy and is quite small but with 2 beaches with crystalline water and no waves.

We were taught about the corals and how to build a coral farm to help save the reefs. We had to act fast putting the corals in some tubes and then we took the boat and the divers of the island put the corals in the bottom of the ocean. We also release the cutest cartoon fish into the water near plants where they can hide.

After that, we had 3 hours to relax on the beach and go snorkeling! We ate Thai food looking at the ocean. I read a book on one of the hammocks that were hanging in the trees by the water and went snorkeling for an hour! It was the best place I went snorkeling so far. There were a lot of corals to observe and the fish were coming in my direction in an even kind of scary but beautiful way. On the way back, we stopped to see an immense Buddha image craved on a mountain!

I do not think that any other partner university can offer such great trips and experiences! Thank you Chulalongkorn, Amm and Professor James Haft!

Especially Indonesia, Laos, Thailand, Brunei, Vietnam or Cambodia are the popular destinations. It’s so crazy how fast the whole semester passed by. In already 5 weeks some of us are going to fly back home. It is definitely the time to summarize our semester abroad.

As all of you know we had a tragic accident in Langkawi where Alex passed away. It was a huge shock of each and every one of us and it was hard to deal with his loss. But the cohesion among our group was amazing. Everyone tried his best to support the people that were really close to Alex. All together we organized a memorial to take a leave of him. How the group stuck together during that horrible time was amazing, and the most important experience for me personally. To get that close to strangers within 2 months was an awesome feeling that none of us expected. Even it took some time until the normal life continued, everybody could close with the loss of Alex. Our Dekan Prof. Dr. Castolus Kolo flew to Kuala Lumpur to support us dealing with the accident. It was a great help for us wherefore we want to thank him.

The Limkokwing University

The student life here in Malaysia and at the Limkokwing University is really relaxed, and the standard is way lower than in Germany when it comes to classes, assignments and exams. The organization of the University is unfortunately not that good and sometimes pretty chaotic. Even we are almost done with our semester, we still do not have a student visa and no access to the student portal. But beside of that, Limkokwing is a nice place for socializing and to get in touch with people from all over the world. The plaza is the place to meet to have lunch or coffee, and even when people don’t have classes they go there to chill.

The Limkokwing University created a really nice community so that the students really identify themselves with the University. The student ambassadors organize Parties, Fashion shows and bazars and invite the students to participate and to bring in their talents. For example, last weekend the Limkokwing University hosted a big event for the King’s birthday, where more than 2000 people were invited u.a the Prime minister, the owner of the Limkokwing Univerity and many other important people from politics and economy. The whole event was organized by the student ambassadors and run just by students. Four of us participated as models for the fashion show where we presented the outfits that have been designed by students of the Limkokwing Fashion Club . A dance crew, a choir and singers entertained the guests and created an awesome Party. The event was really professional and an exciting experience for us. Especially for design and fashion students the Limkokwing University offers a lot of opportunities to self-actualize, because of events like that.

When it comes to Malaysia and Cyberjaya, it’s the people that make this country so interesting and exciting. All of us made friends from Syria, Pakistan, Brazil, Kenya, China and basically from all over the world. The variety of nationalities, cultures, believes and point of views is incredible and allows us to get insights we would never get in Europe. There is no day that we don’t have discussion about politics, the right way to live a life or religion. Even the views are different everybody tries to learn from each other and it is admirable how open minded the people are.

Even we don’t live in Kuala Lumpur itself we spend a lot of time there, especially on the weekends when we go out for party and shopping. The shopping malls are gigantic and the clubs and ars in Bukit Bintang offer any kind of drinks, food and music. At nighttime the city get revived and the people spend their evenings outside to have dinner and drinks. The lights of the city and especially of the Petronas Towers are incredible. It is definitely worth it to go to the sky bar right opposite of KLCC to enjoy the view. To go out for clubbing is always fun, even the clubs close down around 4 am.

Beside Kuala Lumpur there are not that many interesting cities in Malaysia, but the landscape is beautiful. Especially the small islands on the east coast like Redang, Tioman or Perhentian are awesome. These are the best places to enjoy the nice weather, the beautiful beaches and the untouched nature. For people who love to travel and hike Malaysia is country worth to visit. As Malaysia is pretty close many other countries and the flight are pretty cheap, it also a nice opportunity to explore a lot of Asia.

I guess that none of us regrets to choose Malaysia for the semester abroad and everybody enjoys it. Now we are going to enjoy our last few weeks or months (some of us stay here until February) and then it is time to say good bye and the serious side of life continues as soon as we are back in Germany.

First of all, I want to apologize for being late with this post. The standard Thai time delay should be fifteen minutes, not one week, but I’ve got a good excuse for that: While we are experiencing extraordinary things to write about nearly everyday, I wanted to write especially about our latest trip as we traveled together with the whole course and the university staff.

Unfortunately, many of the Thai festivities like the Thai New Year Fest Songkran are taking place in spring, when we’re already back in Germany. That is why we have celebrated another beautiful festival as much as possible: Loi Krathong, what can be translated as “to float a basket”, where small boats with candlelights are given to the rivers and the water goddess to wash away the sins and to make wishes. The ceremonies take place around the full moon evenings of the 12th month of the Thai lunar calendar (Tip for next year’s students: around the 25th November 2015) and we went up north to discover the origins of this tradition.

After a six hour ride in our very comfortable bus, we arrived at our hotel in Kamphaeng Phet, a small town in one-to-two-hour distance to our real destinations Tak and Sukhothai. The fact that there weren’t enough rooms in nearby hotels already gave us a hint on how many people, both Thais and tourists, headed to the same destination.

On the first evening in Tak, which is located near the Burmese border, we were able to shop a little on the street market (e.g. buying the very best bluetooth speakers of all time -.-) before the celebration started. After the local monks chanted for half an hour, they finally started to float the baskets one after another with the goal to create a long chain of lights. There should have been a competition of which village can build the longest chain, but we left before that due to the uncomfortable weather (= “buddhapeepee”).

On the second day, we visited the Si Satchanalai Historical Park near Sukhothai, where the first Siam Kingdom ruled around 700 years ago. Especially for those who already visited the ancient capital Ayutthaya, the temples looked very familiar because the Thais had rebuilt the temples in the new capitals in the same way they have been before. Nevertheless, it was interesting to see and climb up the different chedi and to have a moment of silence, what is a very special occasion when you are used to the steady BKK noise level.

At the same evening, we finally arrived at the main event of our trip. The Loi Krathong celebration in Sukhothai, where it was originally founded, was built around the ruins of the ancient city. We had tickets for the big theater, firework and light show at the Wat Mahathat temple and saw a nice performance with elephants and actors defying the heavy rain. We again weren’t lucky with the weather (reminded me at “Hamburger Schietwetter”), but still enjoyed the show very much (see the first picture).

While most of the group headed back home after a visit to the Kamphaeng Phet National Park, nine of us traveled further to Chiang Mai in the very north of Thailand for relaxing a little bit more before the project phase (suddenly) appears. We are in agreement that Chiang Mai is definitely one of the most beautiful cities and regions Thailand has to offer. You should make sure that you include this region into your travel plans to see some nice rainforests, where you can do thrilling things like ziplining and abseiling (no, that’s not what you think!), experience the traditional Yi Peng festival where you light up lanterns and watch them fly up high into the sky or drive along the river Ping with a motorcycle. I heard that there are also some really astonishing temples, but we had seen enough for now. Maybe next time, as we definitely consider going there again.

I want express our thanks to Bum, Amm and James for organizing this great trip and for helping us with the alternative route to Chiang Mai!

That’s it for today, now we’re getting our projects done to have time afterwards to see as much of this beautiful continent as possible.

Marcel Peter