Come here! Free lunch for students!

University meals are really expensive here. In comparison with 1 pound for lunch at my home university, here a normal warm meal costs around 4 pounds and you still get lesser food. And it´s not much economic to spend 4 pounds for lunch every day. It´s much better to cook, if you have the possibility. For students who really don´t have money there is the possibility of free lunch in some of the churches around university. So far I saw at least 3 churches with this service and today I decided to discover what is this all about. Still these free lunches for students seem strange to me. In the Czech Republic I think only people who could get some free food are homeless people, definitely not students.

So I went to the nearby church and they offered me and my friend a 10 cm long hotdog and a little cup with soup. It wasn´t a full lunch, but it was a warm snack and it was for free so why complain. If you sat there long enough, the (mostly older but very nice) ladies from the local parish were going around and inviting you to eat what was left.

My lunch today

Honestly, I´m not sure if this is somehow profitting for them. They have to put quite some money to such activity because there was at least a hundred of students at the time I came. Of course, it is kind of public relations strategy. On every table there were leaflets of different kind. One was inviting us to discuss with a minister of this church in case of any insecurity in terms of faith or just life. And there was another one encouraging us to leave a lovely message to someone on St. Valentines day. This was very strange to me too. Even though it´s nice, I percieve St. Valentines as a commercial feast and if I should show my love to somebody, it should be comming from inside, not from a tradition on some specific day.

Possibility to join a discussion with minister

Valentine´s day 

When leaving, we passed a small library where you could borrow a book of any kind, but mostly about God or something connected with faith. Among others, there was a book about different kinds of dogs and how to take care of them or a book called Jesus and Divorce. Well... I even didn´t know he was married. What is this church about? :D

To conclude, having free lunch is very usefull for students in UK with these prices. For churches it is a good opportunity how to get in touch with the young population all around. If this is the right way how to do it or not I´ll let you decide on your own. But to me it wasn´t pushing experience at all. I think if anybody is in need, he has at least an opportunity where to talk to someone. Or get a warm hot dog.

Little library

Jesus and divorce, law and order...

Crazy weather and early spring

I was planning to write about weather sometimes, but as some topic when I will really not know about what to write. But today something perfect hapenned!
As you know, when I came to Belfast it was very windy. So windy that the airplane looked like a kite. Two hours after my arrival to airport a snow "calamity" started. It was snowing, but streets were a bit wet, no frozen layer on the ground. Then over night it was snowing more and in higher parts of city there was quite a white pillow.

Do you remember this picture? The most snow I´ve seen here.

Even in the center there was layer of snow for some time. But in 2 days it got totaly reversed and sun was shining whole day. In between it looked like God went mad and was playing with clouds. Sun, snow, snow, rain, snow, sun, rain, sun, snow, rain. Then it was lunch time and whole cycle repeated. Even when it´s sunny the wind is pretty strong. But I´m getting used to it. Last few days the rain is just occasional. One day it´s a bit under 0°C, another one a bit above 5°C. The weather here is just changing a lot from one day to another, from one hour to another.

Snowy campus

For me it is still fine here. I´m reading news from home about temperatures of -29°C so I feel happy in this pleasant fresh air. Other international students like swedish are happy in simmilar way, people from Texas or France hate it. That´s actually quite funny. Nevertheless, people in streets wear either tshirts or normal 0°C clothes or some kind of fashion, which really doesn´t match cold weather. Now being cool means wearing light sneakers and trousers ending above ankles. Somebody obviously wants to suffer for beauty.
Today it was beautiful day, sunny, not much windy, a bit cold. On the hills around the city you can still see snow. It looks a bit like czech mountains. And in this optimistic time I saw this at my feet! Spring is comming!

Flowers along the pavement!

Motto of the day: There´s nothing like bad weather, there are only bad clothes.

Blooming flowers no.2.

It´s hard to see, but in the back there are the snowy hills.

Accommodation adventure and a bit of boring finances

I´m exhausted. It´s 21:12 ZULU, 3.2. 2015. I came to Belfast on Wednesday 28th of January. Tomorrow it will be one week. And only now I have accommodation where I feel good.
The thing with Erasmus accommodation is following. You will probably have everywhere the first right to occupy some university residence, but while people going to eastern Europe will make money on Erasmus scholarship, people in western countries will use all the scholarship only on accommodation and the rest like food and fun they will have to pay from extra budget. Personaly I find this very unfair especially because here is everything including food three times more expensive than in the Czech Republic but salary of my parents and my savings are valuable still in context of my home country. Whereas UK student can come to us and earn some money by Erasmus even though for them it would be less painfull to buy here food and other stuff.
That means I wanted to save at least part of my scholarship to be able to go for a beer sometimes or just eat whatever and don´t use much extra money. In western and northern countries (UK, Sweden, Finland,...) it´s often possible to find an accommodation in private sector, which is sometimes nearly half of price for university accommodation. So I was looking and I found.
I found a seriously looking comapy handeling more flats around Belfast. They had nice webpage, they were very comunicative, nice talking. So I decided to trust them and pay my deposit. Photos of all the flats looked nice. They had free room from beginning of February. And after we exchanged lots of emails, we agreed on me taking it and paying the deposit to book the place for me. I was happy because they seemed fine and I needed somebody like this when I was looking for a flat over half of Europe.
So this was the reason why I ended up in need to spend my first nights somewhere else. I hoped the best way will be to contact the girl from my faculty who was in Belfast for autumn semester, that she will live in some nice place. I knew she was living far away from center but I didn´t know it will turn out to be a social living old house full of dust, without heating and warm water and with messy kitchen. It also smelled like such house. But I think the biggest problem for me in these houses is not that they are old and a bit messy, but that I am allergic to dust and other nice things in old houses. So I had running nose all the time, it was hard to breathe... And I was looking forward into my private sector flat.
When I came there, first thing which I recognized was awefull smell. Totaly awefull. Totaly gross. I don´t know what it was. Then I saw kitchen, which smelled in a different way, because there was also a washing and drying machine for clothes and obviously nobody was caring about opening windows. I can´t talk about the fridge. It wasn´t dirty but smelly like hell. On stairs there was a carpet, but in the house was no vacuum cleaner. And the carpet looked accordingly to it. And of course was totaly dusty. So before I went upstairs to my room, I had running nose again. In my room was window, which was possible to open only for 2 cm. And on a wall a gray blight. I called her Emilka. Last thing which killed me was totaly green shower. And everywhere the horrible smell. Lastly there was nobody in the house using central heating so it was very very cold. Outside -4°C and not proper window. What can I say... I was very happy. But I didn´t have another accommodation. So I went to buy pillows and duvet and bedsheets. I haven´t slept peacefully since I came to Belfast. Still waking up, having need to blow my nose, dry and swollen eyes. And I really couldn´t use the green shower.
After two nights in my new flat I went to university accommodation and asked them if there is still some free place for a poor Erasmus student. They were very helpful and in half a day I made everything needed. I packed again and with all my luggage (and now also with duvet, pillows and bedsheets) I moved into Grant house university residence. I am so tired of still carrying my luggage over whole Belfast. Totaly exhausted I finished my first day of lectures with hot nice shower. I was doing "Oooh" and "Aaaah" all the time. It was best experience of my life. But I don´t want to know what other people from the residence now think about me and showers.
Maybe it looks like I´m crying here a bit, but what I was trying to say is that anything can go wrong even though you were trying to prepare for it. And the university is hopefully able to help you too if you would appear in such situation. Consider wisely if you want to save money or if you want to have certainty. And think about sources from which you gain information and contacts. I think I didn´t do anything totaly wrong but still I experienced quite a lot during this first week. And here I am, finally in university accommodation without all of my scholarship. Thanks God I have such great parents who will help me survive here. Hi Mom and Dad!
On the other hand, thanks to all of this I was in a quarter where even Belfast inhabitants often don´t go in their entire lives, I got to know lots of local people, I discovered a lot about bus system here and I lost some prejudices. I would call it a full experiencing of Erasmus potential... I guess not much people here in residence could say that :D.

Motto of the day: Shit hapens. Anything can be solved.

Belfast city tour

So today I managed 4 important things.

• To move into my new flat
• To go on Belfast city bus tour
• To buy my duvet, pillows and bedsheets
• To eat my first fish and chips and to drink Guiness beer

I am happy thanks to all of this :). But today I would like to write mainly about Belfast as a city. Old Belfast had a castle and was on a bit different place than Belfast today. The old center you could find under biggest McDonald in city now. The name has it´s origin in irish Béal Feirste, meaning mouth of the sandbanks, which refers to an underground river in Belfast called Farset. This river is closest to the surface on the place where blue fish statue is. Guide told us that whoever kisses the fish will become smart. I think it´s some kind of twisted irish humor. Watching the stupid people kissing fish statue.

Person kissing fish and becomming smart

City of Belfast is still very proud of building Titanic which was manifestation of great Victorian engineering. People sometimes forget this in light of the tragedy that hapenned. Belfast inhabitants like to say "Titanic was fine when it left from here. Problem was english captain, scottish navigator and canadian iceberg." In Belfast there is beautiful building of Titanic museum. It should remind us of the shape of the ship. Unfortunately, from height it seems more like an iceberg.

Titanic museum

In the storage where parts of Titanic were stored are Titanic studios now. It´s one of the biggest studios for shooting movies and series. Now it´s place where Game of Thrones is produced! In the docks there is another valuable thing in Belfast but this one I don´t understand much. There are 2 giant cranes, 134m wide, one is called Samson and the other one Goliath. Don´t ask me what´s so cool about them :D. They look absolutely horrible on any touristic object in souvenir shops.

Goliath and Samson

Interesting places are high walls which separate areas where the conflict between unionists and republicans were the most rough. It´s possible to see levels, how the walls were built higher and higher thanks to better and better shooting abilities of both sides. Now the walls are filled with peace messages, notes, quotes and signatures of visitors. I´ve joined them too.

See the levels?

My note for you!

Free us all from the prison of mistrust, misunderstanding and misdeeds...

All around Belfast there are also beautiful murals. Most of them are pacifistic but the newest ones are starting to be of any possible kind for example history and so on. I will make a mural hunt for some other post.

Mural

I am planning to make also hunt for romanian beggars (locals told me there are thousands of them). I´ll have to ask them if they are really from Romania. It seems there is much more of them in the evening. But I´ll have to approach to it systhematicaly. Another hunt I plan is for CCTV cameras. Belfast is full of security cameras. They are everywhere you look. Only in the city center there is more than 200 of them. They watch us day and night. But who are they?
There is also a beautiful cathedral and lots and lots of different churches. They even have here something which looks like a Big Ben.

Cathedral

Cathedral

Clock tower

I nearly forgot about city hall. It is center of city center and perfect point how to orient yourself in city. Around it starts most of the city buses. If you look at it, it reminds of Capitol.

I think I provided you now the most famous things. Other smaller and maybe not so known will come during the semester. They are all very cool too :). The city feels somewhat small, it is sometimes dirty like all other cities but there is unexpectidly lots of parking lots. Probably because of bombing.

Motto of the day: Every university city is probably quite old and has rich history. No matter what city you choose to study in, you will be surprised how many interesting things you can meet there.

We´re living in a world of prejudice and preconcieved ideas

I have so many topics to write on this blog which I planned. It´s uneblievable. But today I need to write something which is very actual. Because I again found out that when I worry and get in anxiety, it´s without a reason. Because I think about possibilities which could hapen but I don´t know if it will be so. So lets see the history, I invite you for a tour with preconceived ideas of mine. And I hope in the end you will tell yourself at least - Oh, I need to start not worry so much and just enjoy my life :).
Even before going to Belfast I was worried about lots of things. This whole semester was a bit crazy for me. I was worried about quitting my relationship and starting a new one. That was a good thing to worry about. But everything has it´s limits. And when the issue got solved, it was for the best. Then I was worried if I will be able to finish my courses this semester. I wasn´t a good student lately and then I also failed some exams. So I was worried if I will even have enough of credits to be able to go to Belfast. I was seeing myself not being able to study again. I hated the courses, I wasn´t self-confident about my abilities. I am convinced that if I wouldn´t be thinking so much, I would do much better in the exams. Worrying is slowing me down, making me less effective, less focused on what I should do.
I worried about my accommodation too, because I was handeling everything from half of Europe distance, I didn´t see the flat, I needed to send a deposit ahead, last days the comunication with the company handeling the flats was not so good as usual and I was hoping that today I will already be in the flat. But they didn´t give me a call. So I was worried again if I will really make it to the flat as I should and everything will be alright. We´ll see how this topic will end.
As you could see in last posts, I was worried a lot about living in Belfast. I heard lots of bad things, I heard a lot of rumors, I met a dead body in a street... My host here in Poleglass (the crazy quarter) doesn´t have a job. And he doesn´t even live much in his own house. He´s more in his sister´s house. And as I had some picture of the quarter, I was also afraid a bit of people here, not feeling safe. But today I really needed to see my mail and in the house I stay in is no internet, to go to center takes time and money, I was waiting for a call to leave the house... So I was a bit desperate and when my host came home I asked him if he knows where to get a connection. And he invited me to his sister´s house. So I was a bit afraid again, that´s what I do.
His sister lives with family 3 minutes walking from my house. She has 8 children, 2 of them are still living with them. And all people in house are playing some traditional irish instrument or play in some irish band. The sister also has 6 college degrees from times when higher education was free in UK. So she studied law, europian and american history and I don´t remember what else. But she invited me to spend some time with them this evening and it turned out to be very pleasant and lovely and I had one of the most inspiring talks in very long time. We went through topics like artificial intelligence, governments gathering personal data and where it´s heading, causes of war, need for armies... We talked about reputation of the quarter and how people are afraid of it even though nobody was there and how our prejudices make us criminalize innocent people. They also made me a delicious tea with milk and let me see my email :P. I had such a great and inspiring time there. And they even invited me for their family party, hurray! I went "home" with very pleasant feeling and for the first time with no fear somebody will kill me on my way.
As a bonus I got an email from a person who will acommodate me tomorrow. So I hope everything will go fine. (That´s the difference. Let´s hope, don´t worry. And enjoy what you have.) Sometimes it´s interesting to observe how much things are screwed up just because I waste my energy for worrying. And some people see it and give me well meant advice, but I´m kind of dumb in it. So thanks João for neverending support :-*. Start is to realise it, notice when it´s hapenning and then try to reconsider if this is really the time to worry. So lets go for another day!

And don´t forget, guys...

Let´s hope, don´t worry!

PS: I think there are 2 kinds of hope. Anxious hope that nothing bad will hapen (that´s worrying too) and positive hope for something epic in your future. I mean the second one :-P.

Motto of the day: Sometimes we close our eyes and don´t see the good stuff around just because some stupid idea was planted in our head. Open your eyes, look up to the sky and see :)

Our beautiful campus and university

If you don´t know yet, I´m studying at Queen´s university in Belfast, Northern Ireland. It occupies quite a big area. Campus is near the city center. That means most of faculties and students accommodations are in the same area, including botanic garden and 2 cultural halls - Elmwood Hall and Whitla Hall. Elmwood Hall used to be a church but university bought it and made a nice hall for lot´s of different events. Whitla hall for some reason reminds me of buildings from so called first republic of Czechoslovakia.

Whitla Hall Belfast

Janáček´s theatre Brno, try to compare

Elmwood Hall Belfast

The university itself is surprisingly young. It was founded in first half of 19th century. Despite that the main building looks like from some fairytale and is ridiculously beautiful.

Main building of Queen´s university

Behind the main building is court from which you can enter the best study place ever - the Great Hall! You can feel like in Hogwarts. I swear I could see an owl behind the window. It´s one of these big halls you can know from other older universities like Cambridge or Oxford. It is a place for students to study or you can book it for some special events. On the walls around you there are paintings of important and famous former students of university. It is interesting how the painting style is changing through time. Some of them are very modern.

The Great Hall

Another supercool place is library. In comparison with Masaryk University in Brno where all of the faculties have it´s own library, Queen´s has one giant library and one smaller in Medical and Biology center. It got an architectural reward, because it´s very eco-friendly. The place is huge and for nerds they have special reading room - CS Lewis reading room inspired by Narnia. There´s a table with map of Narnia, Lewis´s quotes all around and door is in form of the wardrobe through which you could enter the other world. Nice lady taught us that if you struggle to open them, you should help yourself by pulling a tree on right side of the door. In front of it is a carpet with Aslan :-P.

CS Lewis Reading Room

The library is huge. You can study and watch trees in Botanic Garden, which is part of campus too and good place to hang out or run. But i have to admit, I wasn´t there much yet. So I guess it´s opportunity for another post :).
Except Botanic Garden, there´s lots of places for students to sit and study or rest. In the library there is nice café, another one is in front of the main building in Student´s Union. In Student´s Guidence Center there is even coffee for free and another fine place to sit is in International and Postgraduate Student´s Center. As you can see at Queen´s there are many student centers :-P. And of course all around campus you can use benches to sit or just sit on grass, if it´s not raining again. I think I can get use to this environment.

Motto of the day: Only being in different university than yours is a great experience. You can see lots of cool stuff you couldn´t see at your university. I´m thinking even university can make you love studying just by creating you lovely and nerdy environment.

Welcome and Orientation week (Punk day 2 and other days)

After welcome and orientation week I managed to make some bus using system. Of course the bus wasn´t even going the right direction and instead of going around university I ended up in center. But after few tries I somehow in cooperation with driver always got out of the bus max 10 minutes walking from home or university.
As I was looking forward to the center to feel safe, today morning (29.1.) 200m from main university building a guy was stabbed to death and we went for lunch around the forensic tent. http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-northern-ireland-31034980 My safety feelings were sealed by talk given to international students by police, who said that in center this is very exceptional and especially university is very safe place. The only not safe places are just some quarters where international students will never get. At this point I started to laugh a bit. Much helping wasn´t even frequent repeating of "We´re here to help you and keep you SAFE, guys". You know how you stop believing things when you hear them thousand times? (Later we were also told that for turists Belfast is one of the most safe cities. And when I was searching some BBC news to get to know about the place, I found these results. http://www.bbc.co.uk/search?q=belfast The frequency is in a way amazing.) Everyday you meet at least twice or threetimes honking police car or ambulance. For me it is really a lot.
Anyway, university is really beautiful and people here are very nice and helpful and speak much more understandably. They gave us huge pile of materials, information books and leaflets. The program mostly consisted of talks on different topics like student activities, organizations which will help you with different issues (accommodation, studying, development, carrier, sports), process of enrollment, and enrollment itself. After this process I today got my students card! With historically worst card photo I´ve ever had :D. But I can handle that.
There is really everything at Queen´s university including activities like underwater hocky club. And they have so many people working just on service for students and different advice centers. There´s even sexual health advisor and food and beverage manager who gave us epic talk about how to eat healthily and how to handle your alcoholic drinking schedule with a good care for your body. I like how they are opened and understanding towards students. They don´t consider redundant to say us things like "If you don´t drink, it´s ok to say no." "Don´t be afraid to ask us to speak slowlier." or "If you don´t remember our website, just try to google who could help you or ask."
The best part of Welcome and Orientation week was probably campus tour and traditional Céili with live music and learning how to dance some basic irish dances. It was a great fun and good way how to get to know more people. And I understand now that cowboy dancing is based on irish dances. I think we were dancing nearly the same dance once at a children camp when I was 12 or so. But with leather hats on our heads.
After evening Céili everybody went to city center for beer. I needed to catch last buses so I went away. It will be probably harder to make some friends in this group of people. I feel before starting to socialize I need to have a safe place to stay and possibility to walk home when I want and get back to university when I want.
I will describe beauty of university in next post with some photos and immediately after that I´ll tell you something about beauty of the city. On Sunday I have Bus City Tour! So I hope I´ll get to know the place better too.

Motto of the day: The university is good base for everything you need. They will have lots of organizations to help you with anything that could come up. They are here to help you enjoy your stay without troubles.