Experience report – Rosa van den Boom, Lund, Sweden
Name: Rosa van den Boom
E-mail: rvdenboom@gmail.com
Exchange semester: Spring semester 2015
Academic year: 2014-2015
Host University: Lunds Universitet
Country:Sweden
The arrival and after..
I arrived on Monday the 12th of January 2015 in the afternoon. Together with two other girls from Tilburg
University I flew to Copenhagen airport, the closest airport to Lund. When we arrived, there were a lot of
students from Lund University to guide us through the airport to the train station. They helped us buying
a ticket and got us on the right train. The train ride from Copenhagen to Lund is 40 minutes so we got
there quite fast. When we arrived at the station, there were again a lot of Lund University students to
waiting for us at Lund Central. There we had to wait for small busses to pick us and our luggage up to the
building where we had to register ourselves. But this took literally hours… We had been waiting for about
2,5 hours before we finally could get into the van to drive to the registration building. The problem here
was that they only had two vans and a lot of people who just arrived, so that simply took way to long.
So, finally we got to the
building where we had to
register ourselves. Some
employees of Lund University
were waiting for us and helped
us with the registration
process. We got the keys from
our accommodation and an
information package with
information about our Lund
University e-mail-address,
accounts, etc. There were also
some students who provided
some information about
welcome activities and we
could immediately buy the
tickets for the events if we
wanted to. Also we got a Swedish SIMcard for free. After that we were brought to our accommodations.
Basically everyone’s accommodation is organized by the University itself. A couple of months before our
arrival we could subscribe for accommodation and send our top 3. It was hard though to choose between
the different accommodations since you don’t know a lot about them, they location, etc. Luckily I knew a
student how had been to Lund the year before so he gave me some extra information about
accommodations he preferred and which not. On the basis I’d sent my top 3 and in the end of November I
got the news that I was selected for Sparta. A university building with so called ‘corridors’. I shared my
corridor with 13 people. We shared a kitchen and living-room and I had a bathroom for my own use. You
only get one offer from the University which you can accept or not. If you don’t accept it, it’s up to you to
search an accommodation yourself. I’m happy with the fact that I got the accommodation from the
university, but I think it must have been possible as well to get a room myself. This system is quite well
organized, the only disadvantage I think there is, is that you they don’t really take you budget into
account. Sometimes simply can’t pay the rent of the accommodation which they got an offer from, and so
they have to reject it for that reason. Luckily, I haven’t had personal experiences with that.
Lund, the University, the City
Lund is a small charismatic city in the south of Sweden. It has a lot of old buildings and typical Swedish
houses in various colors, the streets mostly have brick pavement. One of the ‘must-see’s is the Dom
church, located in the center of Lund. Lund also has got a big city park and a botanical garden which
contains the prettiest flowers. There are also different museums and other places to visit. Lunds
University has got faculties located throughout the whole town. Some faculties like economics and
engineering are located quite close to each other. The law faculty is located in the middle of the city center
and is one of my favorite university buildings. Especially the library in the law faculty looks nice and oldfashioned (but in a cool way).
When you want to do sports you don’t have to get bored as well. There are two main gyms in Lund:
Gerdahallen and Actic Sports. Gerdahallen is one gym which is located in the centre of Lund. They have a
big fitness-hall, they offer group lessons and have an indoor tennis court. Actic has two gyms located in
Lund. They also have got a big fitness-hall, group lessons and one of the Actic gyms has a swimming-pool
as well. There is also an independent tennis-association in Lund, Lunds ice hall where you can play icehockey and ice skating and there are also various places where you can play football. Altogether, you can’t
have an excuse to not do sports!
Lund also has a lot of cafes and restaurants. A common place for students to go are the nations. These are
a kind of student associations and very important in the life of Lunds’ students. All of they have their own
bar and some of them have clubs where students can go a night out. The nations also provide lunches
during the weekdays and some also dinner. In the weekend almost all of the nations offer a brunch. That
all for a fairly cheap price! But there are also a lot of cafes where you can have lunch, diner, or of course
FIKA! Cafes I’d like to go were for example: Café D’Italia, Ebbas Café and Inkognito. For dinner I liked
V.E.D., M.E.A.T. and a Greek restaurant (which I forgot the name of…).
Dance you do mostly in the clubs of nations and on Wednesdays we always went to Herkules, a club in the
centre of Lund.
Differences between Lund and Tilburg is the charisma that Lund has, because of the old buildings, brick
streets, etc. On the other hand, I like the nightlife in Tilburg more. Or especially, to be able to have a drink
on a terrace on a Friday-afternoon in the sun. They don’t have that many terraces in Lund.
Study life
In the first period of the semester I took the course ‘Enforcement of EU law’. I liked the course but it was
quite similar to the Dutch course ‘Europees Recht in de Praktijk’. Though the teachers were really good.
For this course we had to write a group essay and had to take an exam at the end of the period. For the
second period of the semester I took the course ‘Introduction to the Legal System of the United States’.
This wasn’t the course of my first preference, but I didn’t get chosen for the other one (International
Private Law). Afterwards, I’m happy that I took the US law course. It was very interesting because I didn’t
know anything about American law and the Common law system yet. Also we had a huge variety of
different people who taught us. This made the course more interesting. At the end we finished with a take
home exam. In the beginning I still had to get used to the Legal English being used in our classes and
especially in the second part of the semester I had difficulties with that. Use of extra material was
sometimes hard, since we had to buy a book
which was quite expensive to use for only
one period. Workload was for both courses
okay. For the second course the workload
was a lot higher though, often we had a lot
of readings to prepare. They I don’t regret
choosing this courses and wouldn’t wanted
to take part in other courses. I learned a lot
to work for myself and to participate more
in class, also under pressure and when I
didn’t know that much about the obligatory
readings.
Social life
Most social activities were organized by
I*ESN and the nations in Lund. As I told
before the nations are kind of student
associations who play a huge role in Lunds’ student life. A lot of students, both Swedish and exchange, go
party in the nations. They also organized pub night, game nights and some nations also had mentorgroups for new students in Lund. This was a good way to get to know new people. Also, especially for
exchange students, there is I*ESN, an organization we’re also in Tilburg familiar with. They organize a lot
of activities, from an egg hunt expedition during Easter, to a pubcrawl in Copenhagen and canoeing. Also
big trips to, for example, Lapland and Sint Petersburg. The I*ESN activities were one of the best ways to
get in contact with other exchange students. My friends were mostly exchange students. I had a lot of
Swedish people living in my corridor, but we didn’t do much more than a polite talking while cooking.
Swedes are quite closed so it’s hard to really get into a conversation with them. I met a lot of friends
through my mentor-group and most of all, through the law faculty. My classmates were also my best
friends. And, to be honest, it is not hard in Lund to get to know new people. Every week you meet new
people when you go to a party of a ‘friend of a friend’, but also in the library or during lunches you can
easily meet new people.
I did quite some travelling during my exchange. I visited different cities in Sweden: of course, Lund,
Malmö, Ystad, Stockholm, Göteborg, Helsingborg, etc., etc. Visited Copenhagen and some other places in
Denmark, went on a cruise to Helsinki and Tallinn. But, my most amazing trip was the Lapland trip. We
went to Saäriselka, the Finnish part of Lapland and also to the Norwegian part of Lapland. This was the
most special trip I’ve ever made. We did husky sledging, visited a reindeer farm, and as a highlight: we
saw the Northern lights! A trip I’ll never forget.
Living in Sweden
Everyone knows, or thinks, that living in Sweden is fairly expensive. I can both agree and disagree on that.
During my exchange I of course had my Erasmus grant to spend, got my student grant, got some money
from my parents and saved a lot beforehand.
Housing is Sweden really varies between
different accommodations. One is newer,
one has its own bathroom, the other is a
studio flat, etc. I was quite lucky with my
room and paid around € 360,- per
month, which was quite cheap compared
to the other rooms. With my student
grant I was able to pay my monthly rent.
The trips you’re making are the most
expensive ones. But, of course it is up to
you if you want to save your money by
not making (big) trips or you’re likely to
spend your money on trips rather than
food and drinks. It really depends on the
way you’re used to live back home. I
made some expensive trips, where the
Lapland trip was the most expensive one.
Maybe I could’ve been able to save
money on that by booking it myself
instead of going with I*ESN, but I never regret going with them and everything was well organised. Also the
amount of money you spend on food and drinks is up to you. In general you can say that the prices in the
supermarket are more expensive than the prices in Dutch supermarkets. But, if you really check the offers
you must be able to cook a meal of similar prices as Dutch food. Of course, cooking for a group is always
cheaper than cooking for yourself. And now the most painful point, alcohol. Yes, alcohol is really expensive
in Sweden. Where you pay around € 3,- for a fairly good bottle of wine in the Netherlands, you pay at least
€ 6,50 for a bottle in Sweden. If you don’t like to drink it doesn’t really matter of course, but for people who
do like to party with some alcohol, it can be a big part of their spending amount in Sweden.
During my exchange I didn’t really check what I was spending. Of course, every now and then I did, but I
also just enjoyed myself and went out for lunches and coffees if I wanted to. But the Swedish living is quite
adjustable to the amount of money you’re able to spend.
Culture
As I mentioned before, I didn’t expect to have a big culture shock when going to Sweden. These
expectations were quite a good guess, but not true in every aspect. Swedish people are really kind. They
are always willing to help you if you ask, and a big plus is that their English is really good. They are also
really polite against each other, which makes Sweden a pleasant, easy going country to live in. I did expect
a culture shock in some way though. although Swedes are really helpful, they are also quite closed in a
personal way. They are really nice on the surface, but it takes a while to really get to know them
personally and you have to put a lot of effort in it to make them trust you before they will open up.
Nothing wrong with that, but since most Dutch people are quite open and straight forward, I couldn’t
always understand there way of behaving. I think that also contributed to the fact that it was hard for me
to make Swedish friends and I kind of give up to that. I hope they will open up more to new people and
make people feel more comfortable around them. I learned about my culture, is that we sometimes can be
more patient and that our straight-forwardness is not always a good thing, because sometimes feel that
it’s rude.
Personal development
The biggest thing I learnt during my exchange is that you have to enjoy everything as much as possible! I
already had that kind of mind setting but being on exchange really made me feel that even more. I learnt
that every culture is different and that that’s
beautiful because you can learn something
from everyone you meet. I personally learnt to
open up more to people, not being just kind,
but to show my feelings more. Also I learnt,
and I try to, to be more patient before I say
something straight away. Though, I wouldn’t
do anything different then I’ve done, because
everything that might not been as good as I
expected, I turned into a learning moment for
myself as well. I will remember my friends
from my exchange forever. We got so close in
such a short amount of time, they became my
friends and family at the same time.
Tips and tricks
I would definitely recommend Lund University as an exchange destination! The university is ranked fairly
high on the list of best universities and the education is really good. Also the student life in Lund is great!
Since there are living so many students in Lund, a lot of the social life in Lund is based around students.
You will never get bored! 