Student Report
Name of the University: University of Hong Kong
Exchange semester: Fall 2013
I. PRACTICAL INFORMATION
Before leaving Norway
Most of the practical information was given to me through the International Office at BI or
from HKU by email. There is a lot of valuable information given so make sure to read it
before you leave. If you have any questions to the University they usually respond fast by
email.
I recommend to make yourself a bit familiar with Hong Kong Island by Google maps etc, and
your student hall location before you leave. This may help you guide taxi drivers etc if they
are uncertain of your desired destination.
Applying for a visa
There are two ways to apply for visa. Both of them are well described at the packages BI
International Office sends out between March and May. As I recall, one way to apply for visa
is cheaper. That is because you have to do more paperwork yourself. I chose the more
expensive one and my visa was delivered by a courier a couple of weeks before my departure.
I think I payed a couple of hundred NOK.
Remember to check your emails frequently, also during your vacation.
Travel
The flight to Hong Kong takes about 15-20 hours, depending on the route. I travelled by Qatar
Airways, which took about 16 hours. Generally, the Middle Eastern airlines are cheap on the
airfare between Oslo and Hong Kong, so it is worth checking out. I payed around 8000 NOK
both ways for my flight.
On arrival in Hong Kong, you can choose to take a taxi to your destination or the train to the
Central Station, and take transport from there.
The taxi ride cost about 350HKD from the airport to Hong Kong Island and takes about 50-60
minutes. The train cost about 120 HKD and takes around 25 minutes to Central station.
Most of the taxi drivers speaks English, but the quality may vary. I recommend to bring the
complete address and a printed map of your destination to make sure you arrive at the correct
place if you decide to take a cab.
Also, I recommend you to travel atleast 1 week before the semester begins. It is a lot of
practical terms to be sorted at the school, and it is better to have everything sorted out before
the lectures starts. It is a big city and a big school, so it takes time to get yourself oriented.
Housing
I was provided housing by the university two days before my departure. Before I could move
in, I had to stay at a hostel for 1 week. The hostel I lived in charged me about 200 NOK each
day.
After my stay at the hostel I moved in at Residental Colleges, which is located around 20
minutes walk from the University. It was completed in 2011 and houses 2000 students,
whereas 1/3 is internationals.
I recommend applying for housing provided by the University because renting in the private
market can be both difficult, expensive and sometimes dangerous. If you haven’t received any
housing by the University, it usually sorts itself out in a couple of days, HKU has a lot of
experiences handling exchange students .
Costs
Housing and rental prices are very expensive in Hong Kong. I recommend you to live in a
student hall. I payed 9000 HKD for my stay at Residental Colleges, which lasted from 28th of
August to 21st of December. At the library store at campus, books are about 20-30 % cheaper
than here in Norway.
At and around campus there is a lot of cheap meals. Most of them varies from 25-50 HKD.
Generally it is more common to dine out at restaurants than to prepare dinner at home. Many
restaurants around Kennedy Town (where most of the student houses are) charge 40-70 HKD
for a hot meal.
Transport is very cheap in Hong Kong, included the cabs. Buses cost around 4-10 HKD, the
tram cost 2HKD and the MTR cost around 10-30 HKD (depending how far you travel). If you
are taking public transport by the MTR (metro), buses or tram, make sure to buy a Octopussy
card. It is very rare to pay by coins using these kind of transports. The card can be obtained by
any MTR stations and can be recharged at any 7/11 store etc. On the other hand, most of the
cabs only accept cash payment.A cab ride from the University to Central station will cost
about 50 HKD.
Culture and language
All students are fluent in English, though some of them have accents. This is also true for the
teachers. At first it was difficult for me to understand some of the teachers, but after a couple
of weeks it was fine. Generally for me, there was no language barrier between students or the
teachers. However you might encounter some language difficulties on local restaurants, bus
drivers, old Hong Kong citizens etc.
There is a lot of ways to experience the country and the culture. There is a lot to see in Hong
Kong and as mentioned, transportation is cheap. Hong Kong is surrounded by mountains,
parks, resorts and beaches, which I strongly recommend you to visit. Also, it is relatively easy
to visit other countries aswell from Hong Kong.
For foreign travel, I recommend you do that either before the semester start or during the
reading week, which is around middle of October.
II. ABOUT THE SCHOOL
Hong Kong University is a public university located on North West Hong Kong Island.
Founded in 1911 during the British Colonial era, it is the oldest tertiary institution in Hong
Kong. Today HKU has 10 faculties with around 25 000 students in total, where international
students compromising around 24% of the student population. It is ranked as the number 1
university in Asia and 26th in the world according to the QS 2013 world ranking.
Course registration
Each course at HKU has 6 credits, so to get a full semester you have to choose 5 courses. The
courses are chosen from the faculty websites. You registrer the courses electronically from the
HKU web portal.
Remember also that BI has to approve your courses. It is wise to chose more than 5 courses
for approval from BI. This is because if you want to change your courses in the add/drop
period in Hong Kong, you can do so without consulting the International Office first, since the
course you want to change to is already approved.
The University is realy strict when you can change your courses. You can only do it in the
add/drop period which last two days (1st and 2nd of September). After that, you can’t registerer
or drop courses.
Academic calendar
Arrival date:
First day of the semester:
Last day of classes:
Examination period:
Any special events/holidays:
Other:
21st of August
1st of September
29th of November
2nd of December
Reading week
Introduction Week / Weeks of Welcome:
At the beginning of every semester, the Centre of Development and Resources for Students
and the Office of International Student Exchange Office organize an array of orientation and
adjustment programmes, which aim to soothe the transition of the newly arrived non-local
students. These include cultural adjustment session, Library Tour, City Tour and outings..
Amongst the program there is a welcome party and other activities to help you intergrate into
HKU campus life. I recommend you to attend atleast some of the activities to get to know
new students.
Social activities
As at BI, most of the time, exchange students and local students keep to themselves.
Therefore most of your social life will probably be around other exchange students. There is a
party culture for the exchange students, wheras the locals rarely drink alcohol. The best
chance to get to know the locals is to be assigned to group projects together.
However if you start talking to the locals, many of them shows interest making a
conversation, and are interested to hear about Europe and Norway.
There is a lot of student activities on HKU campus. Many of them contains just Hong Kong
students and banners, information and language are only in Cantonese. Therefore it is most
common to find activities together with other exchange students, such as playing football at
your halls.
III. ACADEMICS
In the classroom / Course materials
The teachings in the classrooms are very similar to BI, but generally there are fewer students
in each classroom. The teaching style for the lecturer is very similar as in Norway. Sometimes
it is not uncommon that the local students whisper to eachother throughout the whole lecture,
making the classroom a bit noisy.
One thing that is different from BI is the tutorials. Those are group sessions containing around
15-30 students which is compulsorary. Here you solve problem sets together which most of
the time is given out in advance. However it is not required to complete the problem set
before each tutorial, but it is highly recommended, due to the speed the teaching assistant.
Therefore the workload throughout the semester seems more than at BI. However, during the
exam period you are more prepared, if you have completed all your tutorials.
One other thing that also differs from BI is that in most of the couses at HKU is that you have
compolsurary work assignments. Usually you have 3-4 of them in each class, and generally it
makes around 10-15% of your grade.
Of my 4 Finance courses, the levels are somewhat higher than at BI. Throughout the work
assignments, tutorials and the mid-term the level is somewhat the same as at BI. However, the
final exam is generally much harder. But if you find the Finance courses at BI manageable,
and you want a Finance degree, I would not hesitate to pick the finance courses, but excpect
to work more than you would do at BI.
Some courses, the final exam is largely based on the lectures wheras most of the exams are
based on lecture notes, tutorials and work assignments.
Library and technology
The Library facilities is similar to the ones at BI. You log into a computer using your student
id and password. Though the computers have Office programs and such, they lack some
programs we have at BI, for instance statistical programs.
At the start of the semester it is easy to find a free spot, but during reading week and the exam
period (for many locals they start mid October) it is very hard to find an available computer if
you don’t arrive early in the morning.
Description of courses
Course code & name
FINA 0301
Derivatives
ECON 0302
International Finance
ECON 0207 Monetary
Economics
FINA 2802
Investments and
Portfolio Analysis
BUSI 0023 Operations
and Quality
Management
Master/
Bachelor
Bachelor
Exam form
Prerequisites
Approved
as
Elective
Some Finance
courses
‘’
2-hour
written/multipal
choice exam
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
‘’
Comments
The Derivatives course is very similar to the course offered at BI. The level at both schools
are about the same.
International Finance and Monetary Economics are very strong macro economic oriented
courses, As for an exchange student on the beginning of the 3rd year from BI, we only have
one macro economic course. These two courses accually demands a prerequisite in
intermediate macro economics, so these courses are hard to follow if you don’t dedicate a lot
of time to them.
Investments and Portfolio Analysis is a 2nd year course at HKU and it is relativiley trivial
throughout the classes, work assignments and tutorials. However the final exam is relatively
hard.
Operations Management is a course I didn’t like that much, probably because of my more
interestment in fnance. This course is about the supply chain of a company. This course can
substitute the course “Strategy” which is a 3rd year mandatory class for Finance students at BI.
Every course had work assignments, mid terms and final exams, except Operations and
Management. Here you have a group presentation for the class at the end of the semester.
Also, in the Investment and Portfolio Analysis class you also have a group presentation,
though this is much shorter.
On a final note, how will you sum up the exchange experience?
The exchange semester in Hong Kong has been terrific! You get a chance to challenge
yourself outside your comfort zone. It can be compared with being in a party where you don’t
know anyone, and you have to make an effort in adapting yourself. If you have a strong
interest in Finance, Hong Kong is a great place to spend a semester. For the locals, this
university is very hard to get in to, so you are exposed to many intelligent students throughout
the semester.