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Taiwan in a Weekend
Singapore -> Taipei One of the great things about living in Singapore is the travel opportunities, and getting to go away on weekends. Last term me and my friends went to watch the lantern festival in Pingxi and spent the weekend in Taiwan, here’s how we did it. Day 1: Taipei So the flight to Taiwan takes around 4 hours, depending on which flight you get, so after arriving we made our way to our hostel. To get to the hostel we took the MRT, in the airport you can buy both phone sims and travel cards. The Taiwan metro card is also a key chain, and they’re very cute,…
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Moving to Singapore: Helpful extra info that’s useful to know!
Ellie Thompson, NUS, Singapore Let’s be honest, moving to the Singapore is stressful, from trying to get your bag to match cabin weight, to saying goodbye to all your home friends. It’s overwhelming and more than a little bit manic. So, to help with this stress, here’s a small break down of information that should make the transition a little bit easier! Money In Singapore card and cash are used frequently, so it is very rare to come across places that do not accept both. That being said I would really recommend bringing cash with you when you first arrive. Food for both UTown and PGP are in Hawker -Type…
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Semester Two as a Year long exchange student
By Chloe Coradetti, Mechanical Engineering, The National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore Hellooo Manchester, After having the time of my life travelling during 6 weeks over Christmas Break, it is time to go back to Uni! The majority of exchangers stay only for one semester. Therefore, the National University of Singapore was expecting a whole new batch of fresh new exchange students. I was excited to meet some new people and be one of the “ancient” … basically a local Lah (singlish exclamation mark). Additionally, the deeper bonds created during Christmas while travelling with my UK exchanger friends is going to be greatly valuable as they were almost all staying…
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Christmas Holidays
By Chloe Coradetti, Mechanical Engineering, The National University of Singapore (NUS), Singapore Hello Manchester, I hope that you had a lovely Christmas holiday, I sure did! Here is a formatted report of my adventures in chronological order.
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First Few Weeks in Hong Kong – Initial Reflections
Anthony Bladen – The Chinese University of Hong Kong I have been at CUHK for almost three weeks now and while everyone at Manchester has just finished exam season, here at CUHK we only have one more week of classes until the Chinese New Year break – meaning I have a lot to talk about!
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Where has the year gone?!
By Alex Ure (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong) “Hong Kong is a city of paradoxes, where bamboo coexists with concrete, and temples are neighbours with Gucci” – Hong Kong Coconuts. I read an article about a foreign photographer, Kyra Campbell who really captures the true essence of Hong Kong. The article has already initiated my reminiscence of Hong Kong, and I haven’t even left yet! I really will miss the diversity of this culture. Superimposing the ‘old’ and ‘new’ juxtaposed features of Hong Kong together in one photo is really representative of life here. Below is one of my favourite photographs of hers, merging skyscrapers with dried fish –…
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Chinese New Year – Gong Hey Fat Choy!
By Alexandra Ure (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong) I cannot believe that February is drawing to a close, now the Chinese New Year festivities are over and mid-terms are around the corner, I need to get my head down (I’m writing this post first though, as it’s much more fun!). Spending Chinese New Year in Hong Kong has been amazing; many exchange students took the week off as an opportunity to travel. I was intending to travel to Borneo, but had so many issues with booking flights that I couldn’t go. This has been somewhat a blessing in disguise as I’ve been able to experience the CNY festivities in…
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A gentle reminder
By Callum Campbell (National University of Singapore, Singapore) With all the travelling and the constant tropical climate it has been really easy to forget the real reason why I am in Singapore – to study. The upcoming exams, however, have acted as a gentle reminder of this aspect. With only a couple of days now until I finish and travel back to England, it would be easy to lose track of revision, but it is important that I maintain my determination and motivation over this last stretch. What does not make this easier is the fact the majority of other exchange students have finished and left to travel around the…
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A second home
Living on the doorstep of South East Asia
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Academic Differences – UK to HK
By Alexandra Ure (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong) SUBJECT CHOICES Despite choosing and finalising subjects before arriving in Hong Kong by utilising the online subject choice information for PolyU, which was both informative and useful, I still ended up changing a few modules in the Add/Drop period. Unlike Manchester, you can choose any subjects from an inbound exchange list and change your subjects in the Add/Drop period, which is the first two weeks of the semester. I attended my scheduled classes and additional subjects that I thought I might be interested in, in case I did not like or find the modules I had already chosen to be suitable.…
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Settling into life in HK
By Alexandra Ure (Hong Kong Polytechnic University, Hong Kong) So Hong Kong has been my new home for two weeks already, I have no idea where the time’s gone! It feels like so long since my departure from the UK and I’m surprised at how easily I’ve settled in and how welcoming the country is as a whole. There is perfect marriage of East-meets-West here which I think has made the transition of moving here so easy! I really cannot stress enough how amazing and intriguing I am finding Hong Kong is, I absolutely love it and can’t wait to really start immersing myself in the culture. The locals are…
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My First Week in Singapore
Kyran Clarke (National University of Singapore, Singapore) I’m all settled in now after my first week in Singapore. It has been a very hectic but enjoyable week. When I arrived I was met by my National University of Singapore (NUS) buddy. They stayed with me for half a day and were incredibly helpful. Not only did they help me get to my accommodation but they showed me around campus, pointing out all the major places which saved me a lot of time and made getting around a lot easier. They also helped me get an EZ-link card (allows you to get on public transport) and a Singaporean phone card which…
A study abroad journal by students, for students.
