Type of housing: On campus

Arranged by: Host university

If returning, I would choose: Apartment/House

Why? The 'Batiment A' where most Erasmus students are placed is truly dire, nothing could be worse than this accomodation. The University continues to claim that this building is in its "last year" but to the best of my knowledge it continues to exist.

Personal comments:
Dire, truly horrific. Shared toilets for males and females. Only two working toilets for a floor of 40 students, and similarly one very small kitchen for 40 rooms. 1 washing machine and 1 dryer for the c.a. 160 students in the hall. Security very poor, one of the ressidents was running a barbour shop in the common room with 'clients' coming from other parts of town for a haircut. Atomosphere at night very intimidating with serious concerns for female ressidents. Random males would regularly knock on girls doors late in the evening claiming to have met at some previous time.

Describe host city: Students interact with the local community without much university involvement

Nightlife, Travel: Takes place mostly outside the university/student environment

Activities: Takes place both within and outside of the university/student environment

Personal comments:
The Shamrock bar was a common meeting-up place for Erasmus students and has a good party atmosphere at night. Zen is also quite cool, being a few tram stops away from the campus. Travel opportunities are very good in Mulhouse - you can get to Basel in 20 minutes with the TER and there are quick links to Strasbourg, Besancon and also Paris. This can prove useful on Sundays when hardly anything happens in Mulhouse itself!

Course recommendations:
There was a free French course provided by the University for foreign students that took place every Thursday and Friday. It covered everthing from cultural references to pronounciation to grammar. I found it an excellent help to my French. Also there's a language learning lab called CLAM where you can pick up a new langauge in your free time.

Personal comments:
The Internet access and library were pretty dissmal -the library closed at 6 every day as did the computer rooms. This was very inconvenient for foreighn students who do not ahve PCs. In order to print any course work I had to take a trip to the city centre!

Language of instruction: French

Main source of funding:
An ERASMUS grant

Other sources of funding:
Family
Student loan

Work opportunities:
I didn't want/need to work

Personal spending habits:
Food was less because it tends to be slightly (but not much) cheaper in France; my phone expenses were less because I had an internet connection in my room. Beware of the prices of drinks in bars though! Spent more on travel because there were loads of things to see, generally.

Travel: was more expensive than at home.

Nightlife: was the same price as at home.

Food, Overall, Telephone, Housing: was less expensive than at home.

I wish I had known...
Can't think of much, really.

In my opinion:
Most people loved it.