Now that it’s my last week here in Croatia, I thought it was the perfect time to write this post. I’m Jasmin and I’m a third-year physiotherapy student from TAMK. I spend three months in the small city of Vukovar doing practical training in the city’s hospital.
My practical training here is interesting as things are done very differently from what I’m used to in Finland. I got to work in 11 different therapy methods inside the hospital, some of which are not used in Finland, for example Vojta therapy. Working culture is very different, I’d say partly because of how different the people in Croatia and Finland are. In my opinion, people have a more relaxed attitude to work here. The most noticeable difference that I couldn’t properly get used to, was that a lot of therapy rooms were used by multiple people at once instead of the one-on-one appointments that we are used to in Finland.
The biggest challenge I have faced during my time here is the language barrier as English isn’t as widely known in the area as I previously thought. Also I was the only exchange student at the moment, so it did push me to get to know the local people who were able to talk with me.
In my spare time the greatest experience for me was meeting locals. The culture is different from Finland, so by getting to know local people, I was able to see the way of living a lot better. I made friends with other students, spend time with them and went out with them. This way I also got to know some differences of our studies like the fact that in here the studies are more theory based. Some hospital workers also invited me to their family homes, and I got to see the way of living as well as try some local foods and drinks.
Aside from Vukovar, I was able to travel to a few other Croatian cities; Osijek, Opatija and Rijeka. I really enjoyed especially Opatija and Rijeka as they are coastal cities. The photos from the posts are from Vukovar, Opatija and last is Rijeka. All in all, I enjoyed this experience a lot.
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