Ahmed Shata (FMF): "I fell in love with Spain"

 Erasmus+ studies in Spain

Hello! My name is Ahmed Shata. I am a third-year information systems engineering student. For my Erasmus+ study exchange, I chose Madrid as my destination to study at Universidad Carlos III de Madrid (UC3M).

On January 23^rd, 2022, I packed my luggage and flew to Madrid, achieving a goal I had since I joined Vilnius Tech. And then all that came later was simply amazing. In this article, I will talk about my five-month experience at UC3M.

Academic Life at UC3M

Let’s begin with the courses offered at the university. UC3M offers a variety of English-taught courses, both technical and liberal arts courses.

As an information system engineering student, I found it relatively easy to make different combinations of courses before mobility and get approval from the faculty coordinator.

The registration process at the beginning of the semester was smooth. I registered for all the courses I wanted except for one, which the university didn’t offer any places for it.

In general, I really liked how practical the courses are at UC3M. The university puts emphasis on providing practical-oriented education. At least for me, there wasn’t an easy course. Every single course had some projects which needed actual work to be done.  Since a high percentage of the final grade is based on continuous evaluation, I got to spend a decent amount of time, doing labs and preparing for midterms, which were quite a lot too. For most of my courses, I had from 2 to 4 midterms.

One thing I really admired is the diversity present in classes, having students from the US, Canada, and many other European and Asian countries along with the Spanish students.

Besides, the professors were understanding, and I didn’t encounter any trouble communicating with them. They helped me to work all my issues out. Also, they shared previous years’ exams.

However, I would like to point out that studying at UC3M is quite challenging and it takes some time to get familiar with the university system. Summing up, trying a new academic setting was very beneficial even though it was a bit challenging. But it’s totally worth it!

Living in Madrid

Apart from studies, living in Madrid has made my exchange period in Spain so special. Madrid has a very good transportation system and is quite affordable for students. On my first days in Madrid, I bought the transportation card for around 4 euros and then charged it with a monthly ticket for 20 euros, which offers unlimited rides on buses, metro, and trains.

Also, finding accommodation wasn’t that hard. I’d suggest searching for a room in a shared flat since staying in the university dorms even in a double room was way more expensive.

There are a lot of websites where you can find apartments; however, some of them require a one-time fee of 150 euros. Personally, I used a website called Idealista to rent a room in a shared apartment which was 3-minutes away from the university. I paid a monthly rent of 250 euros plus the bills which were, on average, 40 euros. I lived with 2 Spanish students at UC3M, who were very nice and friendly.

One thing to note is that the engineering school is located in Leganes which is 30-minutes away from the center of Madrid.  Since Leganes is quite boring for students, I recommend finding accommodation in the center of Madrid if you don’t mind having a one-hour trip back and forth every day.

In my free time, I had plenty of options for activities to do, including day trips to nearby cities, hiking, partying, language exchange, visiting museums, kayaking or just chilling at El Retiro Park, etc. In such a lively city, you can never run out of things to do. To find out about some of the activities going on, you can use apps, such as Meetup or Guruit. Also, some organizations, including ESN, BeMadrid, and Smart insiders organize different kinds of activities, and some of them are free.

One of the things I liked about Madrid is how easy and cheap it is to travel to other Spanish, Portuguese, and French cities as well. During my short stay in Madrid, I planned my own trips to Granada, Cordoba, Malaga, Valencia, Barcelona, Lisbon, and Porto. 

Some practical advice

I’d recommend learning some Spanish if you are going to Spain since in most cities people in the streets, shops, and restaurants don’t speak English at all. The only exception was Barcelona, where English was widely spoken. Knowing some basic phrases would help a lot in your daily life. Unfortunately, the Spanish courses at the university are somewhat expensive and not so useful according to my friends who took them.

Talking about the expenses, the scholarship amount was enough to cover my essential expenses, but since I love to travel, I spent a bit more money. To save some money, I’d recommend booking your flight tickets with an ESN card a month or more in advance before your departure to the destination country.

To sum up, my study exchange at UC3M was great. Despite that there were some days when I was really stressed and had some sleepless nights to keep up with deadlines and midterms, I fell in love with Spain and got the opportunity to try a lot of new things. I got out of my comfort zone, made new friends from all over the world, and made memories that I’m going to remember forever. In these few months, I had as much fun as I had in my first 3 semesters combined.

I strongly recommend you to choose Erasmus+ and take advantage of such a great opportunity, and definitely, Madrid, with its rich culture, strong university academics, and awesome student life would be a great option.