New Country, New Culture, New Life.

Three studentes from Poland and the Netherlands decided to go to Portugal to study journalism. They wanted to know something about living in another country, the things in life that are the same, but they also notice they are in a different culture everyday. How is that working out?


“When I arrived in Coimbra, I immediately noticed that people here are really willing and able to help you” said Karen, from the Netherlands, so her first impressions of Portugal and his inhabitants were good. But not everybody has the same experiences. Natalia, who is from Poland, had not such a good start. Without friends, and no place to live, she felt confused. After a couple of days, she realized also that people here are very nice, and she started to feel at home in Coimbra.


For five months, Coimbra will be their hometown. “We feel comfortable here, and have fun everyday, but some things are quite different than in our country” Marta tells that she can really get used to this sunny weather, because in Warsaw it’s much colder this time of the year. “Also people are more organized but this doesn’t bother me because I’m always late” Karen notices the same, because in her country people are more uptight and always in a hurry. “At first, all the time I was thinking, come on, everything is taking so much time, but now I feel I can be laidback here, and I don’t have to worry about stuff like that” Not only the people in other country’s are different, the traditions are also. Karen tells: “In my country, we celebrate the birthday of our queen, Beatrix, on april the 30th. Everybody is partying all day long outside on the street, and we all wear clothes that are in the same colors as our national flag” Poland also has a lot of tradition, for example at Christmas evening, the whole family comes together and they have 12 different dishes. “You have to try a bit of everything, so by the end of the evening everybody is really full, but with a lot of energy to sing Christmas carols”. Like always, the cuisine is really different in our countries, so during Erasmus we learn how to make traditional dishes from other parts of the world. In Poland we always make kopytka, it’s a mix of potatoes, flower and egg and you eat it with mushrooms and cream. It is delicious but really heavy because you need a lot of energy during the cold months in Poland. In the Netherlands, we have some traditional food as well, for example pancakes or hutspot , a mixed dish of carrots, mashed potatoes and onion. We were really surprised to see, that Portuguese people eat rice and fries at the same plate, because we are used to eat either rice or potatoes, and not both. Also Portuguese people eat a lot of fish, but that is the same as in the Netherlands.


What also really surprised us, is the fact that there is no central heating in our houses. In both Poland and the Netherlands it gets really cold during winter, and we heat up our houses, drink hot chocolate and watch movies, but here we still stand outside Bigorna at nighttime. We couldn’t imagine that it never gets so cold here that you might need a heater.


So, when we compare all these things, you can see that there are a lot of differences, but also some things that we all have in common. Life and culture is an interesting part of Erasmus, because you get to learn so much about other countries.

Marta, Natalia & Karen