University of Helsinki

Bring warm clothes, never forget that you would hardly see the sun during the winter, which might be pretty depressing... And don't forget that in a month or two you would for sure start hating snow.

You can travel to Estonia, Russia and Sweden because of its nearest location. There is a foreign-student list via email that lets you know about activities, events... even you can ask and somebody always answer your question. FOREIGN-STUDENTS@HELSINKI.FI is an e-mail list meant for distributing * * information among foreign students at University of Helsinki and other * * interested parties maintained by the volunteers of ESN-U-Helsinki. * * * * To subscribe or unsubscribe send an email to: * * Majordomo@Helsinki.FI * * * * Instructions are available at the ESN website: * * http://www.helsinki.fi/hyy/esn/eng/lists.html *

Save before coming to Finland. It is a beautiful country and there's lots to see, but even though students have 50% discount in transport, still transport is expensive. If you like travelling you are gonna enjoy Finland and thneighbour countries, as long as you can afford it, of course. To those who smoke I would recomend quitting smoking. Smoking in Finland is forbidden in most places, such as cafes, universities, flats, etc. It is not fun to be smoking outside when is -30 degrees!

Finland is a beautiful country - very clean and safe. If you have a strong desire to learn Finnish, you may wish to consider schools in Turku, Tampere, or Oulu, where knowledge of English is less common. If you're finding it hard to meet local students, at least take advantage of the international student activities. You may not meet any Finnish students, but you will definitely make friends from all over the world (and find new countries to visit - I ended up traveling to Sweden, England, Estonia, Russia, and Austria, plus many other countries. Also, take advantage of the cruise ships going to Sweden and Estonia - they are a blast! Good luck and happy travels!

I would finally comment on the approach of university administration that it does not consider on any possible conflict regarding the issue of transfer of credits at the end of terms.Also I suffered from too burocratical stuff such as extending of my resident permission and obtaining public transportation card. All those problems could be prevented from occuring if the university administration had dealed with them on behalf of their prospective students before.

Go to Finland... don't even doubt!!