IESN Traffic Light Party

Traffic Light Party organized by IESN at the end of September in Studentcafé De Beurs. Let's go out on Thursday and party!

People from International Erasmus Student Network organized thematic Traffic Light Party and as I had nothing else to do, I joined. The theme sent a clear message – your relationship status. Like on the traffic light, you were offered at the entrance 3 colours – green, yellow and orange. Green signalized that you are single, orange people are off limits (well, there is a saying that boyfriend is not a fence nor an incurable decease, but let's leave this now) and yellow… how knows, maybe secretly in love with someone or in complicated phase or a romance. Quite easy, no need to get a special outfit. I hoped that my fellow Czech exchange students would join me, but I didn't manage to convince them. The party was scheduled to start at 10 p.m., so I was there like 10.30, at the entrance picked up green bracelet in exchange for my ticket I bought for 2€ at the ESN office a week before and I entered the pub...

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Labels: Erasmus, Pretty Girls, Pub

Salsa dancing lessons on Tuesdays

I got a link from a friend offering free salsa introduction lesson. I decided to check that out as dancing lessons would be nice to attend. After the first lecture I can say that from now on, my Tuesday night is the salsa night.

Let's dance Salsa! I never danced salsa before but why not give a try? Niki posted link on her profile and I checked the website of www.salsabrisa.com. They have also an English version which is pleasant. Not that I have any problem with understanding basic written Dutch but still, I appreciate that. The website stated that the first "Open lesson" started at 8 p.m. I was not sure what I should expect, but they wrote that no partner is needed. I hoped there would be more girls than during my last dancing course of Zouk, but later about that. The location of the lessons is near the Hoge Brug on the left side of the river in club D'n Hiemel, which is about 10minutes biking from my place. I also found another Salsa lessons in Maastricht, but the place was a bit far away, so I wished that I would be satisfied with this one.

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Labels: Art, festival, Pretty Girls, Salsa

First trip behind the borders – Lanaken in Belgium

It's sunny Saturday, ideal time for some bike trip to explore the neighbourhood of Maastricht after our first week at SBE at Maastricht University. The one of the closest Belgian town to Maastricht is Lanaken, so let's ride there.

I've been in Maastricht for almost 3 weeks now, but I have a bike only for a week. I wanted to use the first free Saturday with sunny weather for a trip. I convinced my fellow Czech student Zuzka to come with me. Bára had to do some stuff for school, but she said that we should stop by on our way back. Great idea, bike trip and then dinner together when we could discuss our first week at Maastricht University. I was not sure which direction to take, so why not to the nort-west to Belgium? I was curious if I could spot some difference there.

We met at 2 p.m. at my place and with a simple map in hand, we started out first bike trip. Biking in the Netherlands is fun and easy. Traffic is made for that, cyclist have enough space. No the case of Belgium. First difference spotted. But on the other hand the only other thing that signalized that we crossed the border was the sign. Later on the buildings we different too. In Maastricht and general in the Netherlands the architecture of regular houses is very similar and simple with mostly dark colours used. The suburbs of Lanaken were on the other hand were full of large houses and each of them was different to the others. Like as rich people would live there, a bit more similar to the Czech Republic but there you cannot see any trees close by.

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Labels: Beer, Belgium, Bike, Czech people, Erasmus, Sightseening, Weather

SBE Introduction day for Exchange Students

There are a lot of exchange students at School of Business and Economics every year and in order to present the Faculty of the Maastricht University and to provide people with contact with other exchange students, SBE organizes Introduction Day.

As I mentioned in the last article about SBE Master's Introduction Day, I kind of took this introduction day at SBE twice. But I am really glad as each of those two days provided a bit different experience and as a result, I know more and I also had something interesting to do and I met a lot of people. Obviously I made the same mistake twice – I can't find any any pictures of the day, but I definitely took some and there are only a few provided by the University so the description has to be enough.

Introduction day for Exchange students is compulsory – you have to be there to get your Student card and let the UM know that you arrived and also to get all necessary instructions. And you also get a plenty of additional stuff including quite useful student handbook. You can also find it online, but printed version is more handy.

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Labels: Bank account, Bike, Czech people, Erasmus, Library, PBL, Pretty Girls, Sightseening, Study, University