St. Clare's: home away from home, being a foreign student in Oxford"Where are you from?", "How long are you going to stay here?" and "Who's your roommate?" are the three most uttered sentences during the first days at St. Clare's as people from all around the world meet and share the same great experience every year. Curiosity, wanting to learn English and to know other cultures are the main motivations for spending time in Oxford. Of course, there are other reasons for coming to study here, but everybody has the same goal: learning while having a good time. At first, St. Clare's is a college, but it is more like a big shared house where everyone feels good. The atmosphere is serious, but also really nice and ideal to live in for some time. Some students are here for some weeks, others for some months, or even one year. But all are "in the same boat", and far from their homes. For this reason, there is solidarity and moral support between them. When the lessons are done, the most interesting thing in this exchange is the opportunity to meet people from other countries. It's a really memorable experience; an opening of the mind and a way to improve your sociability. What could be better than such an experience to understand Europe and other continents? Aren't we the new generation of a world where everybody has a voice? What better school of life than living all together? At the beginning you feel more comfortable with people from your own country, but after a few days there is a natural attraction born of curiosity and feelings that brings people closer. It's also thanks to the activities organised by St. Clare's. So many amazing sports like rowing, punting, golf, dance, or cultural programmes and trips are proposed during the whole year. You might be pleasantly surprised, really satisfied or completely enchanted, but anyway, you'll go back to your country with an "Oxford homesickness"! Julie Robin,
Belgium |