Maastricht Adventures – The Netherlands

As the locals would say: hoi hoi! Going on an exchange is

something I have always wanted to do and deciding to go to

Maastricht was the best decision I could have made. The place,

the people and the experiences to be had were absolutely

amazing and I would recommend it to anyone. Here’s just a short

glimpse of the adventures I had over my 5 months in the

Netherlands.

Getting prepared

For such an organised person, deciding where to go

and sorting out my application was pretty spontaneous

and a bit last minute. If you’re not that big on

researching either, don’t fret because even though a

lot is up to you to figure out (where to go, what

courses are on offer, booking flights and

accommodation, etc.) a lot of support is given to you by

the Uni. Thankfully Shannon from student recruitment was super

helpful and made the whole process a lot easier and stress free.

There were several steps I had to go through before I was given the

all clear. I had to decide and apply for where I wanted to go and

what courses I wanted to do, have my application okayed by

Waikato Uni, who then put through a nomination for me at

Maastricht University’s School of Business and Economics. My

grades and the fact that I was in my second year made me a

good candidate and pretty soon my application was

accepted and I was booking flights and accommodation.

I booked flights through STA who were able to get me

some great deals and I found my accommodation

through a student

website called

Maastricht

Housing. Paying a

lot of money at

the beginning was

pretty daunting

but looking back, it was money well spent. I was lucky

enough to receive a Waikato Management School

International Exchange Scholarship which knocked

$2,500 off the final bill which was really helpful.

Figuring out which papers I could take which fit my degree was extremely important as I

wanted the papers I took to count. I had to research the papers on offer and hope that my

course convenors would agree to credit them – which thankfully they did. To the right is a

photo of one of my lecture halls in Maastricht (very different to Waikato!).

Love at first sight

Flying in to Amsterdam and catching the train to Maastricht, I remember thinking: “wow this

is crazy!” Maastricht is absolutely beautiful and I was in love with the place from the very first

moment. The first two weeks spent living in a new country are incredibly exciting and

extremely overwhelming at the same time. The key is to be open to

everything and make sure you don’t hide in your room Skyping 24/7.

Living in a building full of exchange students meant we were all in

the same boat wanting to have fun and meet new people. My 20th

birthday was on my first weekend and previously I had been worried

I would spend it alone. Turns out I couldn’t have asked for a better

place or bigger group of new friends to make my night one to

remember!

I arrived a few days before orientation week to get settled

in before Uni started. There were heaps of dinners and

parties organised by Uni clubs for us to get a better look

at student life in Maastricht. This included the passport

party where a fellow Kiwi and I painted our faces in All

Black colours to represent some NZ pride. There were

also traditional Dutch dinners, pub crawls and city

tours which were an awesome way to get orientated.

First on the list of things to do was buy a bike – a

must-have in the Netherlands. I asked around and

eventually bought a

second hand bike which

became my most prized possession on

exchange – I would’ve been lost without it.

Uni orientation was very similar to that of first

year O’week – lots of free stuff and intro

lectures, the tutors were all very helpful and

there were plenty of clubs and Facebook

groups to join to ask questions. Maastricht

University uses a very interesting teaching

style called Problem Based Learning

(PBL) which I would recommend

researching before you

decide to go. Basically it’s all about self-teaching and

group development. There are no lectures (apart from a

few guest presentations), only tutorials of about 10-13

people. I actually enjoyed this way of learning because

I prefer in-class discussions to lectures but it did require

a lot of extra work (reading) out of class which was a bit

stressful at times.

Discovering Europe

Travelling in Europe can be super cheap and easy as

everything is so close together. The first trip I made was

to Amsterdam with a group called Way2Go who

organise a number of student trips throughout the year.

Amsterdam was a busy and exciting city where we saw

some awesome things including the ‘I-Am-sterdam’

monument, the Heineken brewery, Anne Frank’s

house and too many canals to count.

My next trip was a weekend with an old family friend

in Berlin. It was lovely to spend some family time in

an actual house, eating real home-cooked meals. It

was the weekend of the Berlin Marathon so we

spent some time exploring the

city, watching the runners and

enjoying the live music.

I have always

wanted to go to Ireland and when we spotted some

ridiculously cheap flights to Dublin a group of

us jumped at the opportunity. The city had a

unique charm about it and the accents and

live music was to die for. We explored the

castles and enjoyed plenty of Guinness and

cider – I would recommend this trip to anyone

thinking of going to Europe.

After having been there in 2011, I was

determined to go back to one of my

most favourite cities in Europe; Paris. I travelled with

two other friends by night bus and we spent the weekend being

typically French – drinking coffee, eating croissants and climbing

to the top of the Eiffel tower.

A couple of my close friends were Belgian so we decided to

make a family trip to Belgium – just

a short train ride away. We picked

up one of their cars and made day

trips to Brussels, Bruges and

Ghent. It was awesome to be in a

car for a change and spending the

weekend with a group of my closest friends was

really special.

My last big trip was to Prague with Way2Go. I loved this city so

much and we were able to spend 4 days and 5 nights here.

Travelling with such a massive group was really cool as I could

mingle with lots of new people I hadn’t had a chance to meet at

other events. My favourite part was

visiting the Lennon wall and climbing to

the top of the clock tower to see the

most amazing view of the city. We did

the famous Prague pub crawl which

was an awesome night and ended in a

five-story club; the biggest in Central Europe.

The food

As almost everything we did revolved around food I thought it only

fitting to make a special mention of how amazing it was. My friends and I made frequent bike

runs to the Vrythof square where we would eat ice-cream or waffles at 9pm. This became a

tradition as did countless coffee and vlaai (Dutch for cake) dates with the girls. Wherever we

travelled we tried all sorts of traditional food including Belgium fritz (fries) and chocolate,

croissants, goulash and more.

One of my favourite things to do was visit the local market to buy heaps of

fresh fruit and veges. At the end of December, Maastricht became home to a beautiful

Christmas market which was always full of delicious

food and various Christmas stalls and rides. We had a

lot of lovely evenings spent here after our exams were

all done.

If you want to know more about this awesome

opportunity or want to keep reading about Maastricht in

particular, feel free to have a read of my blog at

kiwiinclogs.wordpress.com.

Thanks and good luck!