Erasmus: Marie Lahetjuzan conducted the survey

Last straight line to enjoy the holidays. In two weeks, return to reality with the start of the school year. For some, this new school year will be synonymous with new goals.

Being able to combine studies and training while staying abroad is one of them. It is a very attractive and above all very saving opportunity when you are young and a student, because you often want lots of things. We thirst for new experiences, to conquer the world, in short to go and see elsewhere if the grass is greener. This allows you to immerse yourself, improve or learn a language, and meet people. This is precisely what the European Erasmus exchange program offers. Any student in university training and citizen of the European Union can leave between six months and one year, in one of the 25 European countries as well as in Iceland, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, Norway, Bulgaria, Turkey and Romania.

Adventurer at heart, Marie Lahetjuzan wanted to seize this opportunity. She took the plunge to try her luck. She first moved to Mojorque (Spain) by going to work in a vacation home. After a somewhat forced return to France to pass her baccalaureate, head to London as an au pair. For this adventurer, it was not just a question of finding « a good life elsewhere » and learning English. Whatever … Beyond the fantasies of « Over there I could … Over there I would like … Over there it will be easier to … » she felt the call for renewal. His departure was seen as a logical continuation or the inevitable beginning of something else to better build himself. The exile she had become dreamed of becoming a journalist. Never mind. It is on English soil that she will give herself the means to do so by doing odd jobs to finance her studies. His thirst for success and his resourcefulness enabled him to join the University of London, then that of Madrid via Erasmus.

Crossing the Channel with determination only as a baggage was rich in every way. “Life abroad is a constant assimilation of new codes. This is how to adapt to a local culture « ; an experience that Marie Lahetjuzan wished to share by recounting her experiences in « Erasmus, bonus-malus, the secrets of living abroad ». She talks about her university career and her three years of investigating the exchange program. “I am revealing to you for the first time since its creation in 1987, how Erasmus, often seen as a keystone of European construction, had more reasons to encourage Brexit than to encourage young English people to believe in it. European Union. “Far from being propaganda or apologizing for Erasmus, the story that she writes like a diary is a perfect accompaniment to life outside France, with its various levels of acclimatization and integration, its administrative formalities, its examinations, its doubts. She talks about her struggles and lifts the veil on the ins and outs of this experience; an investigative work that opens up reflection. What are the reasons for this new start? Advantages ? « How do you go about it and, once there, what is life like in a country when you don’t speak the language? Do you become bilingual because you live somewhere? « Will the coaching be up to the task? What helps ? What about stock exchanges and the annotation system?

Information, surveys, interviews, testimonials, advice, punctuate the pages of this informative and relevant guide in order to know, before starting the steps to take this big leap, if the Erasmus program is indeed this much sought-after El Dorado and if it is this opportunity that really changes life?

« Erasmus, bonus-malus, the secrets of living abroad » by Marie Lahetjuzan, whose second part of the book was awarded 1st prize for journalism by Kingston University in London,

On sale on Amazon in digital form and in paperback https://www.amazon.fr/Erasmus-Bonus-Malus-secrets-l%C3%A9tranger/dp/2956213229 as well as on the online gallery on Facebook https: // www .facebook.com / ErasmusBonusMalus / and on Instagram https://www.instagram.com/erasmus_bonus_malus/

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Daphne VICTOR

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