AIFS Abroad: Study, Intern, or Study & Intern in Spain

A typical day includes class, hour 40 minutes each, starting around 11 o´clock. Classes are small enough to interact among students and get to know your professor. I normally would walk back to my apartment just 3 short blocks from campus and cook myself lunch before walking back to campus for my last class of the day. After my final class I would meet up for dinner at my apartment with my four roommates where would normally all cook our own meals. Our apartment was spacious and overlooked a very busy part of the city. We had two bathrooms, one big kitchen, with an even bigger living room, and I experienced the luxury of my own bedroom. After dinner it was normally a cheap bottle of wine until around 10 o´clock, when we would prepare for the long night ahead. We would offically head out to a bar close to one of one million clubs around 12 o´clock before finally arriving at our club of choice before 2 a.m. The night would end hours later early into the morning. If it was a thursday night, we would enjoy a long sleep in the morning and an even longer weekend of fun.

From the personality clash to the poor food and small quantities of food served, homestay was an issue. I recommend staying away from homestay as apartment gives more freedom and more space. I did not get along with my house mom and it made the entire experience rocky. My roomate and I are 20 year old guys that eat a lot and we made that apparent, but the quantity of food that was prepared for us never sufficed. I lost 6 pounds while being abroad. I´ve also heard of friends that lost 10-15 pounds due to the lack of food available in the homestay. Also, we were not allowed to use the kitchen to even prepare our own food so we were handcuffed. I wanted to buy food to keep in the house and cook if I were hungry but was denied permission to by my house mom. Also, we were not allowed to shower during the day which did not make sense. Something small like this becomes a huge inconvenience when there is no reason to be enforcing this ridiculous rule. Also, dinner is at a strict time. If you are out enjoying a Barca game or a drink with friends and cannot be home for dinner time, you have to cancel and you´re left to your own devices to feed yourself which means more money spent. I spent half of my time at a friend´s apartment wishing that I would´ve chose that living option. For some reason, homestay is more expensive than the apartments which shouldn´t be because my house mom clearly did not spend a lot of money on my roomate and I. Up to this point this review is strictly about the homestay living accomodation because that is the only major issue I encountered while abroad. Everything else about this program was amazing and exceeded expectations. The trips and events were amazing and the staff was phenomenal. When you´re thousands of miles from home it´s comforting to have a staff that genuinely cares. I would definitely recommend this program to any student wishing to study abroad, you will not be disappointed. Some of my friends got lucky and were blessed with an amazing homestay family. They ate until full and conversed with a large family on the regular. My house mom was a single women that lives with cats, just something to keep in mind. I would recommend staying away from homestay, unless you have a specific reason to choose one, because it´s a toss up whether it will be enjoyable or not.

This was a great program and I couldnt be happier that I studied abroad. At first it was hard but as time went on I really loved being here and as long as you can get over the first hump its a really easy city to live in with a lot to do.

I really enjoyed how the classes here are so different than back at home. For example, my 7 Wonders class really gave me a great outlook on not just the city but Spanish history in general. While it was hard to adapt to a different standard of living, it was definitely something that I don´t regret and will keep the experiences with for a lifetime. As a look back on it, the difficulties were minor things that just took time to adapt to such as the way laundry was done, the inability to take a long shower, living in close quarters with people I didn´t know that well and the food.

School was pretty structured. I took harder classes than most I feel like because the length of my homework and classwork was more extensive than others. It was hard to motivate myself to do the work because I was in the ¨studying abroad´´ mindset. However, I was taking political science classes and I am used to extensive reading and writing but I came in thinking it was going to be easier than my home university. It was really useful and informational though--I learned a lot!!! Classes are around an hour and a half so sometimes I got restless but for the most part, teachers would present a video and then lecture or some in class activity which I liked. It broke up the class a little bit so we weren´t just listening to lecture! Classes went a little later than most do at home. I got out at 7:30 each night and was home by 8, but considering that we didn´t eat each night until like 9, it wasn´t a big deal.

Getting used to eating at weird times for us was a struggle but we got used to it real quickly. If you are living with a host family, I would recommend going to the grocery store and buying your own snacks to have throughout the day so you are not waiting on them entirely for your meals.With that--make sure to tell your host family about the food you do not care for. It will be really helpful for you and for them. Also, they might get frustrated if you don´t tell them then down the line, they serve you something and you don´t like it.

You also need to get used to walking everywhere. It was an adjustment for me because back at home, everything is so spread out so I am constantly in my car. Here, you can walk to everywhere or take the metro. FIND THE 3 MONTH pass as soon as you get here! you will end up saving some money by getting that one instead of the 1 month unlimited! but also don´t always rely on the metro because walking is good for you and you get to see where everything is in relation to everything else!!!!! Spending most of your time traveling underground on the metro isn´t that fun!

Spend time in Barcelona because its your temporary home. Traveling was fun, but also staying here and exploring everything about the city holds a lot of value and you will be thankful one day for it! you will know all the secret local places that no one else got to see if they were always traveling!!!!

I loved Barcelona and wished I was here longer!!! AIFS was an amazing program to go through!

Barcelona is a beautiful and culture enriched area. The apartment was near both campuses, the academics were great (we went on field trips to museums and the roman walls as well as being encouraged to think outside the box and get creative), the AIFS staff was warm and welcoming, and the excursions were fantastic. I would recommend this to anyone, I´m so lucky to have had this chance. I´ll be missing the cafe con leches and walking by the Sagrada Familia every day on my way to class.

The first couple weeks were difficult due to homesickness however the program has made me appreciate my experience a lot more. At first its kind of hard to believe that you are in Spain and that you have the world at your fingertips and it is a lot to take in. However the program has exposed me to new cultures and it has made me want to go visit more places and know more things. I feel like everyone should take a semester and go abroad because I have learned so much not only about Spain but about myself. AIFS resident directors have answered any question I have had to the best of their ability and I felt like my needs were met. Looking back on my experience in Barcelona, I would say that I would not trade this experience for anything in the world.

I knew I wanted to study abroad, but I had no idea where. I quickly chose Barcelona without doing much research or putting much thought into it, and I sure got lucky! There´s something to do here for everyone, whether you enjoy visiting local beaches, trying new tapas or taking salsa classes. I got a chance to visit a few new countries as well, but enjoyed every minute here. Barcelona brought me to new experiences with new people and I will cherish my time that I got here. I will even miss sweating in the Metro, trying to understand the Catalonian people , and struggling to adapt to the small apartment life. I will sure to be back Barcelona!