How many possibilities are there to celebrate Christmas in a Dutch-style in Buenos Aires? Moreover, to celebrate it together with a student from Sevilla and Colombia? Victoria Malea accessed all those possibilities the day that she decided to apply for a Santander-Latin America scholarship. She had it clear that an international mobility was part of her training plans as a student of Audiovisual Communication at the CEU-Cardenal Herrera University. When the Mobility Department announced the scholarship, she did not hesitate for a second and accepted the challenge. The destination was also very clear: Argentina.
It’s an experience that makes you mature as a person
She has good friends who helped her when she arrived there. “I went to the other side of the world; in situations like these it’s good to have someone who can guide you. The first days my Argentine friends helped me, for example to get the mobile phone contract; but soon I started the adventure of sharing a flat with a Dutch and a Colombian girl. “
Victoria remembers the first trips to the Austral University: “From Palermo, where I lived, to the Pilar campus there was an hour and a half of travel by public transport and another half an hour by walk”. It does not sound very gratifying, right? “But as soon as I made some friends we arranged for us a car pool and shared a ride in the cars of other students”. Cool, problem solved!
In the end, that’s an important part of this experience, facing challenges and overcoming them, right? “In general, it’s an experience that makes you mature as a person. You have to solve situations that you have never faced before”. In the case of rentals in Palermo, there is an extra requirement in payments: “You must control your expenses very well because the monthly payment of the rent is paid in cash”, recalls Victoria.
What has impressed her the most during the 7-month stay in Argentina was her own capacity to be surprised: “There are aspects of other cultures that we have no idea about and that are very enriching; Beyond the academic experience, there are the persons, who make you discover new places, different cultures, music that you would have never heard if you had not decided to live a period of your life abroad “.
In Buenos Aires, she discovered Las Peñas: “Every Thursday we went to Las Peñas, where wine and meat pies are served, and entertainment is provided by groups that play folklore music”. Although, a priori does not seem to be so obvious, the stay in Argentina has helped her to improve her level of English: “Living in the same house with people of such different nationalities, in a new neighbourhood for me, was the greatest adventure in the world”, she concludes.
