Bali: Janneke Schneider

After attending the information event about a semester abroad in sport, it was immediately clear to me that I definitely wanted to spend a semester abroad. When I found out that you can also apply for a semester abroad independently of Erasmus at the University of Kassel and that the courses will be credited to you, it immediately occurred to me that I would prefer to go to a warm country and then bridge the cold winter in Germany there. After several hours of fascinated research on the Internet to find out which countries would allow me to spend a semester abroad studying sport, I came across the Study in Bali website. As soon as I read about Bali, images of dream beaches and turquoise blue water, yoga and surfers jumped straight into my mind. I read through everything carefully and then decided relatively quickly to spend the 2018/2019 winter semester in Bali and sent an online application to the Study in Bali team. Study in Bali offers the "Sports and Physiotherapy" course as a 15-week program at Udayana University in Bali's capital Denpasar (costs 1900 euros, but includes everything, such as tuition fees, excursions, etc.). I booked my return flight online via Sta-Travel. They had by far the cheapest flights because there is a discount for students if you show an international student ID at the airport. If you didn't already have one, you could easily book it through Sta-Travel for 15 euros. When I was accepted by the university, Study in Bali invited me to join a Facebook group. I joined up with a few people who were on the same program as me (some of whom were on a different course, e.g. architecture) and we booked a villa in Canggu together for the four months. We were advised to book accommodation via the website www.auslandssemester-bali.de/Unterkunft. You can choose from many different villas in different areas of Bali, most of them even have a huge pool. I paid around 300 euros a month for the accommodation (which is roughly the same as the rent for a month in Kassel). In hindsight, I think I would have booked my accommodation in Bali first and only booked a hostel for the first few days, because you can always find something in Bali that you personally like even better or is in a nicer part of the island or you meet people there at university with whom you get on really well and can then look for something together. I myself changed accommodation after just over a month and then went to "Damar Emas Guesthouse" together with my best new friends from university, where it was really wonderful! I can really recommend it to everyone. They even had their own laundry, where you just had to quickly drop off your dirty laundry and for the equivalent of 1-2 euros they washed, ironed and folded all your clothes and brought them to your room. What you should definitely allow more time for is the visa application. You then have to extend the visa in Bali itself every 30 days, so 3 more times in total. I also made sure in advance that I would receive a grant for studying abroad. It's definitely worth the effort. I then received 1900 euros in Auslandsbafög, which you don't even have to pay back like with normal Bafög. What you should definitely do beforehand is to get vaccinated (hepatitis A and B, typhoid, rabies and Japanese encephalitis).

I flew to Bali at the end of August and was picked up at the airport by a driver. This airport pick-up service was provided free of charge by the organization. One of the first things I did in Bali was to rent a scooter. You can't do anything in Bali without a scooter! To be allowed to drive a scooter, you have to get an international driving license in Germany (from the road traffic office). When riding a scooter, it is important to always wear a helmet, no matter how warm it is, firstly for safety reasons (the traffic there is very chaotic at the beginning) and secondly because the police often check you and like to pull foreign drivers out of traffic. That's why you should always have all your papers with you, otherwise you'll have to pay a fine. This has never happened to me, but it has happened to a few fellow students several times. You can hire a scooter really cheaply on every corner in Bali (around 40 euros/month and a helmet is also included). On September 1st there was a welcoming dinner at sunset on the beach, where we ate traditional Balinese food and got to know our fellow students. Two days later there was an orientation day at the university and then lectures started. There is a dress code for students at the university. You should make sure that you don't wear flip-flops, that your T-shirt covers your shoulders and that your trousers are above knee-length, but this was actually all seen quite casually and it was completely fine to go to university in a top and Birkenstocks. The timetable then looked something like this (a few things, such as a seminar in Physical Health and Fitness in the gym every Tuesday, were added).

A university day starts with a half-hour scooter ride to the university after breakfast. Most of the students do not live in Denpasar itself, but in areas by the beach. The lecturers there held their lectures in English and were all very friendly and helpful. We were usually finished with the lectures by lunchtime. Regular attendance, which is checked every time, also counts to a small extent towards the final grade. The water sports course, for example, which was run by a local surf school, was also part of the course. We also all had a Bahasa Indonesia language course once a week, where we learned the most important words and phrases for communication. We also had to give a short presentation in groups of three at the end of the semester. In another course, we talked a lot about sport in Indonesia and also worked on sports science topics, such as the principles of training, which we then had to apply, document and evaluate ourselves the next day in the seminar at the gym. We also discussed sports therapy measures in another seminar. Every Thursday was excursion day. For example, we visited a yoga studio (once traditional and once yoga in hanging mats), went rafting on a river, went canyoning or went to a cross-fit studio. We also had several workshops (massage workshop, Bali healing, surfboard workshop, etc.), where we always received a certificate of participation at the end. It was even possible to acquire our Open Water Diver certificate, which is the first level of diving training, on two additional days via the university. We had Fridays off, which meant that we always had enough time to explore the rest of the island and get to know the country better over the three-day weekend. In the middle of the semester, there was also a two-week vacation ("midsemester break"), which you could use to prepare for the upcoming final exams, but of course also to go on excursions to neighboring islands such as Nusa Penida or Nusa Lembongan. I flew to Java for a week during the two weeks and went on several volcano tours there. At the end of the semester, I traveled all over the island for another three weeks and ended up on the super beautiful paradisiacal Gili Islands, where you can dive with turtles. The Balinese are all incredibly friendly, always smiling people, even though they often don't have many material possessions. I ate lunch and dinner almost every day in a warung (that's the name of the small local cheap restaurants/street stalls). They usually serve either rice or noodles with various vegetables and chicken. You get a huge portion for 20,000 rupiah, which is a little more than 1 euro. Bali is a paradise for vegetarians and vegans! Everything is always super tasty