Ciao!
We are two girls from Tampere, and we are currently doing our exchange in Koper, Slovenia. Koper is the biggest city in Slovenian coast, and it’s located just 10 minutes from Italian border and 20 minutes from Croatian border. This city is bilingual, locals speak Slovenian and Italian, and their English is also good. Slovenia is much cheaper than Finland, which has allowed us to travel, shop and eat out more than at home. The time is one hour less than in Finland. The weather here has been much warmer and sunnier compared to Finland. Even though the locals say, that this spring has been really cold here, we have been sunbathing already for over a month.
Koper beach walk.
Koper looks like small Italian town, with its narrow alleys and colorful houses.
The best thing about Koper is its location next to the Adriatic sea!
Studies
We are studying management and our courses here are concentrating on strategic management and entrepreneurship. From our courses we get 24 credits. One semester is divided in two periods, just like in TAMK. In the first period, we had only one course, and because of that we had only one or two classes per week. In this period we have two courses and classes 2-3 times per week. Studies have been easier than in Finland, but the study methods are the same. We have made many essays and presentations during these courses. Before we came, we thought that we could learn Slovenian in school, but they didn’t offer any Slovenian language -courses in the spring, so that was a little disappointment.
School food system is different than in Finland. Here we get this Studentski boni, which means, that school co-operates with many different restaurants who give students discounts. For example in our favourite restaurant, a big salad/pasta/pizza etc. costs only 3,07€. And if you feel like eating junk-food you can go to McDonald’s and get burger, fries, drink, fruit, salad and ice-cream all just for 2,70€!! So as you can guess, we really like this system here, because you can choose from many different restaurants. You can find these restaurants all over Slovenia.
Here is also good opportunities to exercise. School offers discounts to gyms, swimming halls etc. If you want to do your workout outside, here is this free sport park, Bonifika, where you can find football, tennis and basketball courts, running tracks and outside gym equipment.
Visiting lake Bled with our closest friends.
Daily life
We live in city center with four Slovenian girls. Our rent is student-friendly, only 160€ per month per person. We are really happy with the location of our apartment, as we can reach everything in few minutes. Our basic day without school consists of going to gym or running, and meeting our friends. Life in here is extremely relaxed which has been quite difficult to get used to, because it’s so different than our lives in Finland, but we have started to love it!
The best things here are our new friends and the opportunity to travel a lot. We have traveled around Slovenia, Italia and Croatia and visited also Greece and Austria. After the school ends, we are going to Split, Croatia and to Bulgaria. Most of the trips we have done by bus, which is the cheapest transportation, but if there has been a bigger group we have always rented a car.
Even though Koper is a quite small town, here is one big shopping mall, Planet Tuš. There you can find cinema, bowling, restaurants, night club, gym and all our favorite shops (ZARA, Stradivarius, Bershka, New Yorker, H&M etc.).
Best regards from Marja & Ronja!
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