Day in the Life on Exchange in Barcelona

By Annabelle Henderson, ESADE Business School, Barcelona, Spain

I thought I’d take you through a day in my life studying in Barcelona, so you can see what I get up to on my exchange!

I chose to take you through my Wednesday last week, as it has a couple of classes but enough free time in the day too. I woke up in the morning at 7am to head to my Pilates class. I recently joined a gym which offers a pool, gym and classes so have been loving making use of these facilities. After Pilates I had a swim and went into the sauna. After that, I came home and made some breakfast before meeting my friend to go around some of the vintage shops in the city. There’s a chain of ‘Humana’ stores which are great to go vintage shopping and places all over the city. We then went for lunch at ‘Honest Greens’ which is a healthy lunch spot that does delicious food. It is such a popular spot for people to eat at in Barcelona!

I then left my friend to take the train to university which takes around an hour. It sometimes feels like a long journey but gives me time to review any pre-work that needs doing before class. My class begins in the afternoon at 14.45 and lasts for 2.5 hours. I then have a 15 minute break and another 2.5 hour class which runs until 8pm. The classes may seem long, but I genuinely find them so interesting. Esade University is really good at keeping their students engaged with the classes as the lecturers are so passionate about what they teach and frequently host guest speakers from real successful companies. We also often do lots of group projects too, which helps with getting the opportunity to meet new people as well as ensures our involvement and attentiveness.

As I finished late this day, I went for tapas afterwards to a nearby restaurant with some of my classmates. On days where I finish earlier and the weather is good, we often go from class to the beach and play volleyball or sunbathe. Exchange students tend to be really sociable, so it is nice that people are always down to do activities and try out new places. After tapas, I went home and got changed before meeting more friends in the evening. The nightlife is great in Barcelona so, because I didn’t have university the next day, I decided to go to the club. It was a really fun day where I made new friends and got to explore new places.