Studying abroad can certainly be an adventure. Imagine taking your college experience to a totally foreign locale – somewhere thousands of miles away; in a country where they don’t look like you or speak your language. While it can be exciting, it can also be daunting. You often have to speed up the amount of time you have to get used to the place. In most cases, you only have a semester – which is about four months – to experience everything there is to experience about another country or culture. If this is the case, there isn’t a lot of room to make mistakes. Here are five common study abroad mistakes students make in college.
- Don’t bring all of your material possessions. When you study abroad, all you really need is the bear minimum when it comes to clothing and material goods. The last thing you want to do is ship furniture and other heavy items that will be expensive and a hassle to ship. Also, you don’t want to have any extra burdens. Bringing a light suitcase with the basic items of clothing will do just fine.
- Don’t become a loner. Your greatest survival method when you study abroad is to not be a loner. This means that you should make friends with people in your study abroad program and you should make friends with your host family. Being a loner can really get in the way of your being able to assimilate in a new country and culture. Also, your experience will be that much more enriching if you get to know people who live in the country you are visiting.
- Don’t be close-minded. When it comes down to it, other countries will have very different customs. Some of these customs may be shocking and not what you are used to. Even the littlest things, like food may be completely different. However, if you want to really blend in and enjoy your study abroad program, you want to dive right in and taste every morsel. The same goes for local customs. Expanding your mind is one of the greatest byproducts of a study abroad program.
- Don’t let yourself become too glued to a screen. When you are studying abroad, it can be easy to stay glued to your computer screen, especially if you have friends to catch up with in your hometown. However, even if you visited http://www.healthinformatics.uic.edu and are now taking a health informatics program, you want to unplug your computer once and a while and venture out in the world.
Don’t forget to travel further. There is a good chance that you are in a country where there is more than meets the eye. For instance, there may be other regions or cities that you haven’t visited yet. There is also a good chance that these locations are only a short train ride away. Wouldn’t it be a shame not to visit these locations? At the end of your study abroad program, you should have a lot of stories to tell.
