Fletcher (Sem 2, 2022)

My Exchange at McGill University

I had heard about the exchange through the University of Auckland, and my family recommended I went on the exchange. Despite my reluctance to go on exchange at the beginning, I am extremely happy I did it looking back. When I first arrived I was missing my parents and already counting the days before I could go back home. I was in a new city, surrounded by new people in a place I did not know well at all. That changed very quickly and within three days I didn’t want to leave and tried to savor every moment.

I was in an exchange residence with a bunch of other students from around the world, all in the same boat as me which meant we were all there to live life to the fullest. The amount of connections and lifelong friendships I have created with people all across the world has blown me away. The accommodation itself was nice enough, we were all staying in an old church that had been retrofitted for students which was very cool. However, it was never about the accommodation for me. It was all about the experiences I had with people.

Canadian food was decent enough, they have a specialty dish there called poutine which is hot chips with gravy and cheese curds on it. It’s pretty unhealthy and indulgent, but when you’ve been skiing all day it’s very warranted and hits the spot. Asides from that I highly recommend trying homemade maple syrup.

The courses that I took at McGill were all really interesting with amazing teachers. I took a french class, two European history classes, and a politics class. I learned a lot from all of them. Montreal is now one of my favorite cities. I am considering returning and living there at least for a few years. It’s an amazing city with kind people and a lively party scene, it is the Canadian equivalent of Dunedin, a great student city.

Not to mention how great of a country Canada is – compared to Auckland the cost of living is very similar, food was pretty expensive so we needed to be smart about where we shopped. With all my friends that I met in exchange residence, we all wanted to travel the country and so we took trips to the Rocky Mountains, Nova Scotia, and Quebec city, all of which are beautiful.

The whole exchange overall was a wonderful experience and it has opened up so many opportunities for me. There were very few challenges but the biggest one for me was understanding the Quebecois french accent, it was a very different french to what I was used to hearing and I still struggle to understand it at times. Had that not been the final semester of my degree I would be very inclined to do another exchange.

Q&A

What were some of the highlights of the academic experience at your host university?

I really enjoyed the history classes that I took, there were lots of interesting concepts and topics I learned about. Also the immersive experience of learning French meant it improved exponentially.

Would you recommend any particular activity/activities unique to your host country or university?

Go to Banff, do camping frosh at McGill, go skiing, among many other things.

What are your top 3 tips for future students attending your host university or going on exchange to your host country?

1. If you go to Montreal, do your food shopping at Segals Market. Supermarkets are very expensive so if you can find food markets where everything is cheaper, such as Segal’s I highly recommend it.

2. Try and get into a residence with other exchange students, they will all be in a similar boat to you and will want to have lots of travelling experiences.

3. Buy good winter clothes as it gets very cold.

How much did you budget for your exchange? Was this enough? Were there any lessons learned that would help future students budget for their own exchange?

I was lucky enough to find a job in Montreal so I could earn money while I studied, with all the extensive travel I did expenses were a little high so getting a job helped a lot. Also finding places where you can get cheap food such as Segal’s market was a lifesaver. Had I shopped at mainstream supermarkets the whole time I would have spent a lot more money.

What are your most significant takeaways from your experience abroad?

For me, I think it was coming out of my shell and developing into an adult, living so far away from my parents and having to take more care of myself meant I developed a lot.