Tag Archives: planning

Entry #1- pre-departure panic phase

Hello all! Stephanie Caverno here, kicking off a blog about my journey to Copenhagen, Denmark, and hopefully other European destinations. I leave for Denmark in exactly one week, giving me plenty of time for anxiety attacks about forgetting something, freaking out and futilely trying to learn Danish, and sharing the whole ordeal with all of you. 

If you’re still with me, I’ll start out with a little about myself and my hopes for this blog. I am currently a junior at PSU studying Supply Chain Management, with a minor in International Business. I was born and raised in the Pittsburgh area, and come from an obnoxiously Penn State proud family. We have a Nittany Lion shrine stoically poised in our front yard. I think that says it all.
My primary goal with these entries is to help out future study abroad students. I’m sure there will be things I don’t pack that I should have (commence nervous breakdown) and things I pack that I could have done with out. I hope to share cool places around Copenhagen that I find; where to go and where to avoid. 
The only advice I can give at this stage is PLAN EARLY. If you get papers from your study abroad program in the mail, open them, read them, and study them that day. That second, even. There really are a lot of steps involved in this process, and everything takes an excruciatingly long time. If you need to get a passport, get it early. Get everything you need done for your Visa out of the way as soon as you possibly can. I made the classic college student mistake of procrastination in this department, and my life turned into a Stephen King novel with me running around the streets of New York City searching for sanctuary in the Danish consulate. It was a mess. Don’t go down that road. 
Another goal I have is to keep my friends and family up to date on my life. I especially want my mother to be in the loop when I find a European hunk, marry off, and decide against coming home. (Kidding of course, mother.)
I am incredibly excited to start this journey. I hope to make this blog into something useful for future students to read and plan for their travels, and for me to someday look back on and fondly remember my own. 

Location: Greensburg, Pennsylvania

Plans, plans, plans…

As I mentioned in my previous post, I have a couple of trips in mind that I would like to take while I’m here.  The most immediate is to London (tomorrow) and then Dublin the weekend after.  Actually, this is going to sound kind of crazy, but the next four weekends are booked (or planned anyway, not booked just yet…).  The plan is: London, Dublin, Paris (longer trip – that is my Reading Week, more on that later), and Scotland.  Dublin will be for a couple of days, Paris for four days, and Scotland for two days and one night.  The Scotland trip, for those of you who have checked my dates on your calendar, will be Halloween weekend! 

Apparently Halloween is a bit different here, not as big I guess.  This is a shame as a) I LOVE Halloween, and b) the lack of excitement means no Reese’s and no candy corn, two things I also love.  Much to my dismay, the British have not discovered the miracle that is chocolate and peanut butter.  What could be a more natural and perfect combination, I ask you?  As such, I am having my mother post me some Reese’s (I’m not cheating!  This is pretty much life or death).  Originally, we were going to go to London for Halloween, but one of the other internationals thought that Scotland would be much more exciting – I believe we are going on a tour of a haunted castle (scary!).  All of this trip planning is making me very excited.  I think I will wait to tell you all about the other trips I have planned; I wouldn’t want you to get too overwhelmed (or jealous).  I have plans to see ‘Chicago’ with two of my friends who will be in London the same weekend, and I would like to get some shopping in at Camden Markets on Saturday.  Very excited about both of these!  I would also like to do some of the touristy things, like visit the landmarks and such.  We are so close to London though that I would like to devote and entire trip to this.  More to come about that trip later. 

I suppose I should move onto my courses now.  Reading Week, as I mentioned earlier, is one week during the term when the sit-in class is not held.  Basically, you just don’t have that class during that week.  Generally, all of the reading weeks for each of your courses should line up (if they are in the same department), and the result is a week of no class.  The intention is to students to get a head start on work, essays, projects, and the reading for the rest of the semester.  In reality, many students just use it as a vacation, which is partly what I am doing.  But I am dedicating TWO whole days of my reading week to studying…

Outside of reading week, I believe I finally have my course schedule figured out!  I have class Tuesday, Wednesday, and Friday – so a break during the week is nice (and unusual – Penn State should adopt this system).  I am rather excited about my courses.  The teaching style is a bit different, as is the assessment of grades, but it will be an interesting experience.  Outside of class, I have been enjoying time spent in Canterbury and around campus.  I did have a bit of culture shock last weekend though – I met one of my international friends for coffee in the city centre at a Starbucks (yes yes, I need to branch out) on Saturday, and we literally got kicked out of the store at 7:30.  With the exception of the pubs and McDonalds, everything downtown was closed.  I was so shocked!  Isn’t it against Starbucks law to close before 10 PM?  Apparently not.  Needless to say, I do not plan on spending long weekend evenings in any coffee shops downtown. 

Other than this, nothing terribly interesting has happened since my last post.  I attended a Vineyard Church service, which was similar to the ones at Purdue in some ways, though the services at Purdue were much, ah, tamer than the evening service here.  Needless to say, I will not be attending the evening service again – I think I will opt for the morning service, or check out the local Methodist Church.  Overall, I think I’m adjusting well to life here (possibly because it is like a mini-Penn State), which means that I am growing to like it more and more daily.  There are more similarities than I realized (like how I handle schoolwork, cooking, student events, difficult roommates…). I can already tell that I am going to have trouble adjusting in the reverse – I won’t know what to do with myself once I get back to the States!

Generally, I do not feel like I’m missing out on a whole lot while being here.  Of course there is Penn State football – but there is always Penn State football.   If the Yankees make it to the World Series again, I may have to retract that initial statement, but for now it stands.  As for the Colts, well, they are just looking OK, and the Superbowl will happen after I return home.  I did have a moment of excitement in the gym earlier this week – one of the students lifting weights was wearing Colts shorts.  In my excitement, I approached and asked if he was from the States.  The answer: no, but he loves American football and plays on the team here (yes, they have a team!).  He loves the Colts as well because “Peyton Manning is a GOD,” after all (his words). 

With any luck, the weather will continue to remain nice for the weekend [disclaimer: ‘nice’ here means not cloudy, it does not mean not rainy.  It never stops raining, even when the sun is shining], and some quality shopping/touring/show-watching will happen!


Location: Canterbury, UK

packing is hard…

So I am only allowed to take two suitcases with me on my trip to England, and I am sitting here in a pile of shoes trying to narrow down the pairs but it doesn’t seem to be working. Packing is hard. I am terrified of even starting on clothes considering I may not have room for them with all the uggs, sneakers and heels I plan on taking. Oh well… at least London has great shopping! haha. Anyways, the summer has just flown by and I can’t believe that in about 3 weeks I will be on my way to seeing the world. 

Of course I plan on visiting PSU a few more times before I leave considering how much I will miss it, but I am so excited to get my trip started! To all of you who have begun your travels hopefully everything is working out perfectly and it is the time of your life, and to those, like me, who are still panicking about packing, don’t worry! Everything always has a way of working out in the end, so that is why I have taken my fourth break of the day to write this blog (I have faith that my packing will come along just fine… although I am sure that it will have to wait until the day before I leave!). 
Until my arrival in Bognor Regis… peace, love, and PENN STATE!

Location: my room, Pittsburgh PA

Still in the States…

Hey Everyone,

My Name is Daniel McGee and I am going to Rome this summer through the Architectural Engineering Rome Program. I am a second year AE and I am looking forward to a great time this summer! These past few weeks have been filled with packing and planning for the summer abroad, as well as finishing up my current semester. I find it is getting harder to concentrate in school right now since I am getting excited for it to end because that will mean the start of my stay in Rome!

I am leaving for Rome on May 7, the friday of final exams week, and I have a ton to do before that! I am hosting a dinner on Monday night to finalize our plans and preparations for the trip with a few of my friends. It will be fun to collect as a group to talk about everything that we all want to do and experince while we are over there. We have a ton of plans for the 7 weeks — Venice, Pompeii, Florence…The list seems endless. I hope I will have time to post everything I do!

I just got back from the first Geoblog meeting where we learned how all of this works — Afterwards I met a lot of cool people with great study abroad plans. I really look forward to reading about their adventures abroad, so I can see what some other cultures are like. So far, this Geoblog sounds like a great program. Even though I will be going through my own adventure in Rome, I will get to chat with other Penn State students each on their own adventures. It will be cool to swap stories and experiences with all of them.

Anyway, I have some goals for the future posts of my GeoBlog —

1. Discuss the Architecture of Rome. Since I am an Architectural Engineering major, in my opinion there is no better place to study abroad than Rome because of the rich architecture that I will find there. All of my classes involve architecture in some way, so I will be fully immersed in the architecture aspect of the culture. I hope to discuss with my blog readers some of the things that I learn about the architecture here as I go.

2. Share the foods that I will eat. I am planning on gaining about 20 pounds (or should I say kilos?) while I am over there since I am expecting that I will have some of the best food that I will have eaten thus far in my life. I plan on sharing some of these dishes with all of you in hopes that I can convince everybody to come to Rome.

3. Create a guide for future AE’s going on this same program. I hope to write about some daily activities and schoolwork that I will do while I am here. Hopefully I can create a good guide to what is expected and what kinds of things future AE’s will experience on this trip. I will write about great places to visit, great restaurants to eat at, and so forth.

4. Learn from other Geobloggers. Even though I will be having a great time in Italy, I hope to use this Geoblog as a tool to connect to other study abroad students across the globe. As I said earlier, I met a bunch of other people today who have great trips adventures planned. I look forward to reading about those adventures.

Well, that’s all I have for now — I will probably write another blog post before I leave for Rome when it gets closer to the departure date. So for now, Ciao!


Location: 520 E Calder Way, State College PA 16801