First days in Freiburg

This post is a bit late but I have arrived in Freiburg, and the program has officially began. As for arrival into Freiburg I had to take a train from the Frankfurt airport, due to Freiburg not having their own airport. Initially, I was nervous about taking the train and getting lost, or missing my stop and getting lost in an unknown German city, but luckily none of those things happened. IES Abroad gave clear instructions in the pre departure packet on how to get to Freiburg from the Frankfurt airport which helped in making it a  smooth journey. Another thing I was worried about was not having room for my luggage on the train, and luckily that was also something which I was relieved about when I boarded my train, and saw special places for luggage. The most confusing part of the adventure was not the train ride itself, but rather the ticket machines. It took two or three tries in order to find Freiburg on the ticket machine, but it was found and I arrived. It was also a bit of a trek to the train station because my plane landed in terminal two, but the train station is located in terminal one. That trek was a bit of a struggle, due to having to carry bags up and down various escalators, and almost tripping and falling multiple times. Other than those two minor struggles it was a smooth trip to Freiburg. I took two trains to get to Freiburg where I transferred once in Mannheim. All together it took roughly two hours and was easy to find Freiburg.

I arrived one day earlier than the official start date so I stayed in a cute hotel, near the Munsterplatz, where Freiburg’s famous cathedral is located. The following morning on the 22nd of February I went to the IES Abroad building and got moved into my housing assignment. I am living in a “StudentenWohnheim” or student shared flat with four other university students. I have not met all of the students due to it being vacation for some of the universities in Freiburg, and exam week for the others, but I am hoping I can get to know them a bit.

Now that I am in Freiburg I have been keeping busy with orientation which started a few days ago. The orientation has included a tour of the city, meeting with our house tutor, purchasing german cellphones, german intensive language courses, and more where we have learned about the program and had a chance to get to know people in the program. Currently, we are busy with orientation, but we have also had free time to explore the city, and get to know some of the fellow IES Abroad students.

So far I love Freiburg and find it to be a cute and quaint town. I can’t wait to get to know the city better.I look forward to getting to know my fellow IES Abroad students better and starting my study abroad experience.