Three years ago I took one of the best decisions of my life : to apply for Erasmus in Poland. When I had to set up my candidate file it was a little difficult to me, because a lot of papers are needed and my parents were not really happy when I told them that I wanted to go abroad for one year. I will always remember, when I received a positive answer, I was at the university library, and a lot of happiness, stress and doubt came to me at the same time.
4 months later, I was landing at Warsaw, in Poland. We were two, an acquaintance left with me, she was such an important support to me (because sometime Erasmus can also be hard) and she became a real friend. The firsts days were difficult, because we did not speak Polish at all (even our English was miserable), also rent a flat was really hard. Some days later, we met an Italian girl and she will be our next flatmate, and our friend for life. One week has passed, we found our flat, I discovered my new university and I met a lot of people from all over the world during the integration week.
Months went by, and at the moment you realize that you miss your families and your friends, you doubt about your choice, you want to go back to your home country. And one year later, everyone is leaving. Your feeling is honestly weird, you want to go back to your home country but at the same time you do not want to say goodbye to all the people you met during this year, because you know it is probably the last time you see everyone together again.
I will recommend to everyone to discover Poland, because most of Polish people are truly friendship, the life is very cheap, and they have a lot of delicious food (Pierogi, Zurek …). However, Poland is a country with a cold weather in Winter, and also, during that time of the year, the sunset is at 3 p.m., so it is a little depressing.
I think, my Erasmus experience changed my life forever. I had the opportunities to travel a lot, inside Poland : Wroclaw (my favourite Polish’s city), Gdansk, Cracovie … but also abroad : in Greece, Sweden, Latvia. It gives me the desire to go everywhere across the world. Now, I am not afraid about going abroad alone, speaking with foreigners people. According to my family and my friends, when I came back I was a totally different person : I became autonomous, independent …
« You will never be completely at home again, because part of your heart will always be elsewhere. That is the price you pay for the richness of loving and knowing people in more than one place. » Miriam Adeney
Important Words :
To apply : candidater
To set up my candidate file : monter un dossier de candidature
An acquaintance : une connaissance
Months went by : les mois ont passés