University College Dublin (UCD)

the people in ireland are pretty nice. if i had problems to understand - especially in the beginning- they have had been helpful always. mentionable are the english courses are offered from the ucd for foreign students. they were for free and pretty good. A little bit difficult are the many different slangs in Ireland accrue form adopting the english language.

At the beginning it was quite difficult, because I thought I had a better knoledge of English: the main problem was to understand the local people; it was not a problem to understand the teachers and with time it became easyer to understand the local people. I met a lot of American people in the Residence where I was living so at the end my english was quite OK. I have to say, also, that I talked a lot in English with foreigners (German, French, Spanish, Dutch)so maybe I don't have an Oxford accent.

At the begining it was difficult to communicate and to understand. But after 1 month,the communication became easier. Now, I'm fluent but not bilingual, because at university,you listen to the courses and don't speak much, and when you are an international student, you meet more international students than local students. So during this year, I heard a lot of english, but I didn't talk so much with native speakers. My spoken english could be better!

Since English is my native tongue, it was a pretty easy adjustment for me. The Irish brogue was somewhat confusing at times, but it made the experience even better. I worked in a pub for a few months, and I occassionally confused orders because of the differences in language. I enjoyed my experiences very much.

There is no doubt that I have improved my ability in regards to the English language.Mostly I made a lot of progress in writing essays in a completely different style like the one the English-speaking countries have.To learn to built an argument and to have a solid and organised thinking.Generaly it was a great experience for me.

There was a big international community, with students from all over the world. The english spoked at lectures tend to avoid big accents. It took sometime to adjust to "irish-english". But it definitively wasnt a problem or a barrier.