Moving into a new flat in Maastricht

Changing from Erasmus to regular master student is time for change - my sublet contract expired with no possibility to extend it, so I had to move. I got lucky so I found exactly the same room from the same landlord just a new steps away from previous place of living.

Good bye to my old room, source: my picture

I was not very fond of the fact that I have to move. Great thing is that I got accepted by the Maastricht University for master programme which could be also taken as time for change, but I think we had a good thing going with my flatmates and I also got quite familiar with the place and the room. Idea of moving was also a bit scary because I was worried about finding a new place – I remembered the previous searching process I done in June and July. In the matter of a new place I got lucky – the landlord of the flat owns more places and he offered me a place to stay since February – also a subrent as the girl living there was going to the world for an internship. Cool thing was that it's the same block of flats so I do not have to take all my stuff to the other side of the Maastricht.

Holland trip – Nijmegen, 's-Hertogenbosch, Utrecht

Travelling and walking sightseeing of cities is more fun when you are in a group. We were five - four Czech students and one French student and decided to see the city of Nijmegen. But we seized the day and visited also 's-Hertogenbosch and Utrecht. Let's discover Netherlands!

Our Discover Holland trip group in Nijmegen, source: my picture

I have been to the Netherlands for 5 months but during that time I didn't travel much. I wanted to explorer the surroundings of Maastricht by bike and I also visited some cities a few years ago. I like to travel, but I prefer to do sightseeing with friends, as it's more fun than just walking alone. Netherlands is not a big country and it takes about 5 hours to get by train from the south to the north. But trains are not cheap for foreign visitors, so you carefully have to search for special offers. One of them is the "Dagkaart" (Dayticket) that you can buy in some shops from time to time. As regular price of such ticket is 48€, in special offer you can buy it for 13€. As I had such a ticket and it was about to expire I was glad that we agreed on a trip. Let's discover the Netherlands!

Period 2 at Maastricht University – summary

As I always did on my blog when I wrote about my bachelor studies, I am now going to summarize the exams and my courses I took in period 2 during my studies at SBE at Maastricht University. But not only the courses are described in the article, we cannot forgot the overall experience.

Exams at MECC, source: my picture

After I got acquainted with the rules at Maastricht University during the Period 1 I was no longer worried about the local school system. As an Exchange student I enrolled myself for courses not from one master track and therefore in second period at SBE I also met completely new people in my tutorial groups (there were a few Infonomics exceptions obviously). I first thought about writing separate articles about each course but than I realized that it's not necessary and also it's more interesting to have a shorter summary. Also the exams were very similar this time – both written at MECC, which is also a quite interesting story for someone, who is not familiar with practices at Maastricht University. Well, as I recently got to know, there are different practices at different faculties and even study programmes, but let's generalize it for the case of written exams As I may have (or also not) mentioned, I attended Intellectual propety law and Information Society (EBC4027) and International competitiveness and Antitrust policy (EBC4026) courses.

Short summary of my winter holidays

Christmas break is over and it's time to get back to Maastricht to continue with studying at SBE. Today I will talk about the time I spent in the Czech republic and than about my superb weekend in Maastricht before period 3 started.

My favourite Maastricht University hoodie, source: my picture

I was home for three weeks and now it's time to return to Maastricht University. I really appreciate the fact, that all exams are written before the Christmas break. I could enjoy my holiday and relax. On the other hand, waiting for the results has an opposite effect – getting more and more nervous whether I passed and how. As I didn't fail any exam in the first period, I had now 3 weeks of free time. As I only visited my country – Czech Republic – for a few days at the end of October, I was looking forward to seeing my friends and family again. Christmas is an ideal time for stuff like that and after spending the New Year's Eve with my university buddies, time was going faster than I realized. I enjoyed great Czech beer, which is one of the things that I really miss in Maastricht. I spent during last two weeks quite a lot of time in pubs despite the fact that I am definitely not a big drinker.

Visit of Eindhoven on the way back to Maastricht

Detailed description of my flight from Brno to Eindhoven and than my own special Eindhoven city tour and shops sightseeing before taking the train to reach my destination of Maastricht.

I went to Brno on Thursday to make sure I get on the airport on Friday on time and also to visit a friend of mine. We didn't plan to do sightseeing of the city, as I already know it a bit, but just to have a chilled and relaxed day. Actually, for me it was also better to arrive a day earlier to Brno so I had enough time to get to the airport and not miss the plane due to some travel complications.

Brno Airport

Sleeping girl at the airport, source: my picture

I was a bit worried, that they will cancel my plane as not many people want to travel on Friday the 13th. But for me were most of those Fridays in the past just normal days. Ok, I missed the first tram, but I got at the Airport one hour and 40 minutes before my flight was scheduled I took some photos after crossing a very icy road and then entered the airport. Hm, not many people there, but at the security check funny thing happened. A blond girl, young (about 20 years old I guess) was travelling obviously for the first time only with the hand luggage as I do not have any other explanation. She had in her bag several big bottles of cosmetics like liquid soap, hair spray etc. and the small ones not in a plastic bag. I know that this security rule is a bit strange, but anyway it's a rule. She was very surprised, that the security guy threw her stuff away and put small bottles into separated plastic bag. And of course, a bit latter when I was sitting in the departure hall, she came in and phoned some friend describing him, what such a terrible thing happened to her and she could not understand why. Nice distraction of the day