sashay with sasha

A year ago today I was dragging my suitcase up the escalators at Lisbon's Oriente train station, ready for the second part of my year abroad - the start of a four month Erasmus placement in Coimbra, a university city 130 miles north of Lisbon. So I've decided to write about my experience in Lisbon. I started my year abroad earlier than expected as I was offered an opportunity to study at ULisboa in an intensive month-long summer course in Portuguese. So at the end of July, I left Belfast for Lisbon, unsure of what to expect as I had never been to Portugal before. Lisbon from the air My first impression of Lisbon was that it was huge. There are so many different areas of the city. Our airbnb which my family and I stayed in was in Arroios and my new apartment was in Saldanha. However, we found it easy to get around the city with the metro, which is pretty cheap and very reliable. Artwork on an abandoned building After a few days of getting to know the city, it w...

As part of my year abroad, I was lucky enough to spend four months in the centre of Portugal, in the university city of Coimbra. I knew nothing about Coimbra before I arrived, just that it had a very old university and was a great Erasmus spot. My first impressions of Coimbra when I arrived was the hills! Coimbra is very hilly, a lot like Lisbon in that respect and is full of cobbled streets, which are charming to look at but not so much when you're dragging your suitcase up them to get to your apartment. worth the hike for this view! The first few days was a bit manic. We still hadn't found an apartment where we were going to spend the next four months so that was a tad stressful. We also had to sign up to all of our classes and figure out which ones would suit us. The University is actually on a hill at the highest point of the city, which was fun. Nothing beats an early morning hike to registration in 30 degree heat! During our apartment search, we a...