T-minus 19 hours

In less than 19 hours I will be arriving in Antwerpen, and leaving home in only 12 - the nerves have officially set in!

I finished packing this morning, and I have my passport, some clothes, a couple of textbooks and some bits and pieces - what more could an intrepid law student need? If I've forgotten anything important I'll just have to do without or buy another one over there! As I'm travelling on the Eurostar I have a limit on my baggage - luckily not the weight - where I can only have two medium items (apparently a length of 85cm and below is 'medium' - this seems pretty large to me!) and a piece of hand luggage, so I haven't been able to take things like bedding, kitchen utensils or towels, meaning I will have to buy these things when I arrive or the next day - all part of the fun of moving via train!

My journey will be made up of 7 stages - car, train, walk, train, train, train, walk - and take just under 7 hours to cover the 399 miles from door to door. Lucky I enjoy travelling! I've packed my Dutch vocab book, the Cityspots guide to Antwerpen, Terra Incognita (a fantastic book about a woman's travels through Antartica) and some food and drink to enjoy along the way.

When I arrive I'll be meeting my landlord to collect my keys, move in and unpack. I suspect the remainder of my evening will be taken up with locating dinner and possibly some form of bedding! Wednesday is going to be a relaxed day of settling in and exploration of my new neighbourhood before I start my EILC on Thursday and suddenly have to get my brain into learning gear again after a summer off - eek!

As a mental break from language studies I've just booked my ticket for Laundry Day next Saturday. No, this is not a national day of clothes washing - the Belgians aren't (quite) that weird. It is actually Belgium's largest one day music festival, conveniently held a 10 minute bike ride from my room on De Beuckerstraat in the Antwerpen Zuid district. According to www.laundryday.be it started on a Saturday afternoon (the traditional laundry day) back in 1998. A local block party in Kammenstraat turned into a success - there was no stage, 1 live band, 1 disco bar, only 500 people and due to rain the party had to end early in the day. Nowadays it has moved to Nieuw Zuid, has 13 stages, 140 acts, around 60,000 partiers and lasts for 12 hours regardless of the weather. Sounds like a good time and a good way of learning about Belgian music, plus it's only 29 euros - detailed review to follow!

So having zipped up my suitcase, buckled my rucksack and entrusted my cat to my mother for the next year, my last night in England for 4 months draws to a close - next stop, Belgie!

A roof overhead and a suitcase full of textbooks

Despite my optimism in my last blog about getting a room to live in, there has been much drama over the last three weeks! It turned out that Paardenmaarkt was rented out from under me (not the only time it would happen either!), then Stijfselstraat wasn't complying with the Kotweb rental agreement so I didn't want to risk living there.

Not to worry, I told myself, there are plenty of places to rent in Antwerpen. Now that may indeed be true, but getting hold of one, or even just a landlord  to discuss terms, is mightily difficult. Approximately 40 emails, 3 false alarms, a variety of hideous looking properties and a lot of hair pulled out later, this morning I heard back from a studio on Carnotstraat for a great price - it was available! Fantastic I thought, and immediately asked about paying the caution. Sadly, mere hours later disaster would strike in the form of a previous tenant leaving the place in such a state that it would take 2 months to repair the damage. Despairing, I got the telephone and started trying to find somewhere by speaking (bad) dutch. Still nothing.

Luckily, just as I was beginning to wonder whether I am really meant to be going to Antwerpen, I got an email about a room I'd been enquiring about (but that wouldn't be available until 15/09/11) saying that I could rent it, and that the landlord would let me stay in his daughter's empty studio until the room was available.

Hallelujah! After much anguish and despair I have managed to find a 13m2 room sharing a kitchen and bathroom with two others on De Beuckerstraat not far from Antwerpen Zuid, the Schelde, Konig Albertpark and the number 12 tramlijn. It even has a place to store my bike. For only 250 euro per month including my utilities, central heating and internet, it's a bargain!

Filled with excitement and relief about finally sorting my accomodation out I began packing my new stripy suitcase with bits and pieces and ticking things off my to-do list. Book accomodation? Check. Photocopy important documents? Check. Order a local map? Check. Buy a guidebook? Check. All in all a very productive day, despite the awful interlude in the middle. 18 days to go!

Welkom!

At long last UA have sent me my welcome pack! It's full of useful things like a map of Antwerpen, my acceptance letter (in both English and Dutch), an information booklet on all things UA, information about the Erasmus Student Network and approval of my module options. Marvellous!

So my 12 modules (6 per semester at 5 ECTS) will be:

• Consitutionalism in a European and International Perspective
• Law and Globalisation
• Institutional Law of the EU
• International and European Protections of Human Rights
• European Economic Law
• External Relations of the EU
• European Competition Law
• Law of the WTO
• Advanced International Law
• European Private Law
• European Information and Communications Law
• European and Comparitive Discrimination Law

The first 8 are compulsory... I mean, who ever actually wanted to study economic or compeition law?

The ESN information is very exciting - I've already signed up for their Buddy system where I'll be paired with a local before I get out there who'll be a friendly face upon arrival and give me hints and tips on the best places to shop, eat, go out (to be shared here!). They also have organised lots of events for the first week of semester at the end of September in their Ice-Breaking Week, which should be lots of fun.

Looking at my academic calendar, I discovered that my Christmas holiday starts on Christmas Eve! I immediately ran to my laptop to find cheap transport to the UK to get home for the holidays before the prices sky-rocketed or the tickets all sold out, and managed to get a fantastically cheap flight from Brussels Int. Airport. After talking to my best friend about our New Year's plans (we always spend the eve together) we decided that since this year it is my turn to host, we'll spend it in Antwerpen! Flights back to be booked as soon as we've agreed on dates. Yay!

Re: accommodation. After sending what seems like hundreds of emails (but is probably only about 15 or so) I have gotten two responses that say they have a room available in a shared building. Both of them are within 5 minutes walk of Stadcampus, 10-15 minutes from Grote Markt in the historic centre of Antwerpen, at a reasonable price within my budget and include internet in the rent.

Stijfselstraat looks like a nice - a 16m² room in a house with 4 others with shared facilities and utensils for 270€/month. Paardenmarkt is a 13m² room in a building with 30 others and a bathroom to every 2-3 people and shared kitchens for 300€/month. As soon as I have pictures of Paardenmarkt I'll make my decision - probably Stijfselstraat - and pay my advance!

Only 41 days to go!

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? It's...the Eurostar train

In my excitement at getting my final okay from Universiteit Antwerpen - due to the bilateral structure of the Erasmus scheme both of my uni's needed to approve every aspect of my year abroad, including my courses, so of course there was the inevitable bureaucratic delay - I went ahead and booked my transport to Belgium despite not having anywhere to live yet.

First I looked at flights, only to discover that if I want to fly into Antwerp itself I have to go via Copenhagen at incredible expense and length. This seemed rather ridiculous to me, so I looked at getting into Brussels and then getting a train up to Antwerp, only to find it cost around £150. Again, ridiculous. Apparently, flying just isn't meant to be!

Thank goodness for Eurostar - a connection from my local train station to London, a zippy train to Brussels Midi and a speedy connection to Antwerpen Centraal, all in less than 7 hours and for less than £80. Pretty good going for a distance of around 400 miles!  Actually, this is less time than it takes to get to Dundee from my location in England, bizarrely enough. Plus I earn loyalty points for every journey I make meaning eventually I'll get a trip for free - ideal for visiting friends (and family!).

So, come the 30th of August I will be donning my rucksack, zipping my suitcase and heading off on an adventure in Belgium, leaving my Dundee life in storage and my cat at my mother's - who knows where I'll end up going and what I'll be doing!

I'd better pack a tent if I can't get a room somewhere soon though...!

The preparation begins!

In 8 weeks I will be landing in Antwerp (or as the locals call it, Antwerpen), an oft-passed by city in the Flanders region of Belgium on the border with the Nederlands.

Why? To spend ten months learning - not only how to speak Dutch - the ins and outs of twelve areas of International and European law at Universiteit Antwerpen on their exchange programme.

Having been awarded a scholarship for a 3-week intensive language course before I start classes at the end of September, my time-line of preparation just got cranked up a little! Accommodation to find, transport to book, textbooks to buy, packing to be done, a bike to be hired, goodbyes to be said...the list goes on.

Step one: find somewhere to live. Perhaps easier said than done when trying to figure out the property lingo of another country, what a reasonable price is (and how that translates from Euro to GBP!), what a lease can and cannot say and do, which is the best area close to Stadcampus (City campus - my Dutch is already improving! Not hard since I began with zero comprehension...) and the city centre...

Thank goodness for Kotweb! This little gem of a website is a collaborative project by all higher education centres in the city with set regulations and a fantastic search engine you can use to look around by postal code or by proximity to your campus. Needless to say, I have been using this site a lot in the last few days! Having found a few likely prospects, emails have been sent and I'm now anxiously awaiting replies and hoping they haven't already been leased.

When I've managed to find somewhere, my next battle will be trying to find cheap transport from England to Belgium. More to come soon!