The preparation for my exchange semester in Sydney began last summer. This year in February the time had finally come and the long-awaited semester at UTS began.
I lived in the UTS housing directly at the university. The great central location allowed me to go to the gym in the morning so that I could spend the day after university with social activities. In UTS housing it was very easy to make new contacts and friends - both with UTS full-time students and with a variety of international students from different countries.
We all loved to go to the beach together during the day. Bondi is certainly the most famous beach - but I especially liked Coogee. The two beaches are also connected by a coastal walk - I must have walked it 10 times during my time in Sydney - you can hardly get enough of the views.
In the evening you could end the day either at Darling Harbour in one of the many restaurants within walking distance, or on the rooftop of the UTS Yura Mudang housing.
An absolute highlight of my semester was a trip to Melbourne. There we drove along the great ocean road for 2 days - an experience you can't miss when you are in Australia.
Unfortunately, the time in Sydney was over very quickly due to Corona and I decided to finish my semester from home. On my last day I walked again through the Royal Botanic Garden and drove to Manly and was incredibly sad because the time was already over.
When I arrived at home, life went on: The restaurants in Darling Harbour gave way to Lieferando (something like Uber eats in Germany) and the UTS Business Building gave way to Zoom.
Studying via Zoom worked very well at UTS and was productive and exciting from the very beginning - even group work via the Internet worked surprisingly well. UTS has a strong focus on group work and case studies. This allows theoretical knowledge to be applied very practically and I really enjoyed it.
All in all, the semester was a good experience - although not quite the experience I had hoped for due to Corona. However, I will definitely make up for it and travel back to Sydney - hoping that Corona is over soon.
Name: Laurenz May
Course of study: Finance
Country: Switzerland/Germany
Home university: Universität St. Gallen