Jett's Study Abroad Experience
Spring 2023
Spring 2023
After how much I loved Switzerland and Spain, I thought it would be really hard for any other places to compete, but I was wrong. The rest of my trip and all the other countries I visited, blew me away just as much. So, with that being said, I'll jump right into what happened next. Porto, Portugal The day I flew into Portugal was a very rough flight because it was super early in the morning. When I arrived in Porto, I spent most of the day, until around 2:30 pm, at a local cafe just catching up on things like schoolwork and this blog. Once I checked into my hostel, I pretty much spent the rest of the day taking a nap and so that I could enjoy the next 3 full days in Porto. Day 1: Day 1 in Porto was absolutely amazing, as to this day, I still think that Porto was one of the most picturesque cities that I have ever been to. Every street was just filled with life, and with cafes of all different types. At the end of every street, you have the chance of spotting a huge mosaic church or a grand train station with the buzzing of everyday life. So, needless to say, there was never any shortage of things to say seen even by the end of my stay when I had explored a good portion of the city. But, on day 1 I spent a good amount of time just wandering around with no specific plan, as I really wanted to get a lay of the land and just find random little gelato shops, restaurants, and museums that may not be featured on any map. Just by walking around, I ended up finding some of my favorite things that I was able to see even though some of the things I saw were really small establishments that barely anyone took the time to stop at. What I saw on this day was: 1: The Museu do Centro Hospitalar do Porto, a small museum made out of a very old pharmacy that talk about the start of modern medicine in Porto 2: The National Museum Soares dos Reis, a very nice art museum that had several special exhibits. This museum was also not busy at all, so I had the place to myself most of the time. 3: The Igreja do Carmo and the Secret House. This was a really nice mosaic church that also had a secret house that catholic families would have meetings in during the time that Christianity was not allowed. The ticket also allows you to climb onto the roof of the church, which is totally worth it because of the great view of the city skyline. 4: Sao Bento Station, which is a huge a train station in the heart of Porto that is completely filled with a huge a mosaic that covers all the walls. It was free to stop walk in and look at, which is amazing especially when the mosaic looked like something that you would see in an art museum. 5: A lookout viewpoint of the Ribiera. This was a look out that allows you to have a great view of Porto and the Douro River that runs through the middle of the city. Day 2: On day 2 I realized how lucky I was with my timing in Portugal, as I happened to be staying there during a huge graduation festival that is held every year for the graduating students. I kept seeing young people around that were wearing black robes (looked almost like the wizard robes from Harry Potter) and holding these black boxes with colorful ribbons sticking out of it. The first time I saw one of the students, I thought that it was a costume that they were wearing, but as it got to be later in the afternoon, I started seeing tons of students wearing these robes. Once it got to be about 5 pm, the life in the city exploded with excitement as the festival had really started and everyone started to party. I didn't know anyone there, but I walked around the festival and watched the street performers and got some food from street vendors. Even though I was only visiting the country, I felt so excited about this very local and important event. While the festival was fun though, I still saw a ton of other things earlier in the day, which included: 1: The Capela das Almas (The chapel of souls), which was the most beautiful on the mosaic churches that I saw. The whole building including the steeple was covered in a beautiful blue and white mosaic. 2: The Church of Saint Ildefonse. which I also consider a sister church of the chapel of souls as it was a bit bigger but followed the same build and mosaic. I was not able to go inside of this church though as the mosaic was getting fixed and there were huge gates around the church. 3: Went to a Gelato shop and watch some street performers since some Beatles songs. I never knew that gelato was so good in Portugal since I've only heard of it being in Italy but trust me when I say that the gelato in Portugal truly rivals that of the Italian gelato. Day 3: My third and final day in Portugal was probably one of the best days. That initial excitement of visiting such a beautiful place was still in full force as I went out for another day in Porto. What made this day even better was that there was still a buzz in the air from the graduation festival that happened the night before, so while the streets were cluttered, the people were still excited. To celebrate my last day, I of course had to get more gelato (the mango and strawberry flavors), but I also decided to go for a bit of a walk to a terraced garden area that overlooks the Ribeira of the Douro River and the beautiful Portuguese city scape on the sides of the valley. The spot that I ended up sitting and enjoying, had one of the best views of my entire trip as I got to look out over all the pinkish/red roofs of the city cottages and townhouses. From this spot I could also see 3 of the six famous bridges in Porto, along with the gondolas that run along riverbank to take people from the upper part of the city, so the lower riverwalk area. After enjoying the view, I followed this small hiking trail that ran along a path that was below a small cathedral. The view was good of course, but the draw of this path was a little stray cat hotel. While I think these cats are pampered by all the tourists, they were set up with a little wooden box that provided them with shelter and offered a place for people to feed them and give them water. At the end of the hiking trail there was a very sketchy looking concrete catwalk, that I decided to skip since it looked like it was crumbling, and it protruded out of the side of the cliff over the river. By this point in the day, it was pretty much time to get ready to catch my flight to one of the countries I was most excited about especially since I had a friend there that I was going to meet. So, the rest of the of the day pretty much consisted of me running back to my hostel and packing my things really fast so I could catch a train back to the airport. Before ending off this blog post, I want to say that I found Spain and Portugal to be really different. To me, Spain felt very different from the rest of Europe, except for the fact that the public transport was top notch as it is in most European countries. In Spain you could really feel the history, including in when it was under the rule of eastern cultures, but in Portugal you could really feel the Christianity driven culture. Of course, Christianity was very prevalent in both countries, but I could feel that the eastern cultural history of Spain was more relevant in everyday cultures. Also, initially people told me that there were lots of people that are pickpockets and scammers, and that lots of people are selling drugs, but I found this to be relatively minimal compared to what I was expecting. I felt very safe the whole time I was in both countries, and even felt pretty good when I had to carry around my luggage/backpack with me. There are absolutely bad areas in every city, but Madrid and Porto felt very secure to me and the people in both cities were incredibly friendly. The point is though, visit Portugal and Spain if you have time as both are incredibly rich in culture, people, and food!
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July 2023
While I attend the University of Hawaii at Manoa, I was born in Littleton Colorado and grew up in a rural area. When I moved out to Hawaii for school, I quickly found my groove in Shidler College of Business as a triple major studying Marketing, International Business, and Quantitative Economics, and I was later chosen to be one of the Shidler Global Leaders. This and several other scholarships, including the Johnson Scholarship, gave me the amazing opportunity to go spend a semester abroad in the United Kingdom.
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