Interested in taking part in a Summer Programme? Visit our Global Opportunity Centre web pages for more information on opportunities, bursaries available and how to apply.
School of Pharmacy and Pharmaceutical Sciences International Summer Study Placement Where did you go? I went to Washington State University, in Spokane, Washington State. What motivated you to take up a Global Opportunity? It was such a new opportunity! I had never been abroad on my own, never been on a plane before and never Read more
Cardiff Business School Summer volunteering placement Where did you go? I went to Fiji with Think Pacific to volunteer for a month, helping children with English literacy and numeracy on a 1-to-1 basis and also coaching sports. What motivated you to take up a Global Opportunity? Firstly, I believed that many of my skills (such Read more
안녕하세요 (an-nyeong-ha-sae-yo!) My name is Laura, I am a 3rd year Neuroscience student and this summer I attended Seoul National University International Summer Programme. Seoul is a vivacious city and the young person’s paradise, with a hundred and one things to see and discover and I will do my best to condense it into a small Read more
Ever wondered where your favourite TV series are filmed? We’ve put together a list of your top TV series and their filming locations including fun facts and travel tips for you to be inspired to visit the very same spots! Game Of Thrones Where is it filmed? Castillo de Zafra, Spain and Croatia Interesting facts: Read more
We spoke to George Leonard, a Cardiff Alumni about his experience working as an Intern in Colombia. George, from London, studied Spanish and Italian at Cardiff University. Following a year studying abroad, he spent the summer taking part in an internship with InternColombia where he taught English at an NGO in Bogotá – La Fundación Read more
Hi everyone! I thought this would be a very important topic to discuss since it’s that time of the year when we start to think of our year abroad options or about a summer internship. You have all these amazing opportunities staring right at you, all different countries, activities and program, but which one do Read more
At long last, yet seemingly all too soon, the month-long Yamagata project is over and I am safely back in the UK, still a little jetlagged but otherwise no worse for wear. The final week seemed to go the quickest; I can barely remember the order of events, but I will do my best. One Read more
At long last, here is part three of my adventures in Yamagata. My apologies for the delay – it’s been a pretty busy week as usual. To pick up where I left off, we’d collected our new translator and then immediately after we visited a Japanese castle. We made a quick stop at a foot Read more
We stepped off the plane bright eyed and bushy tailed with a touch of jet lag and made our way down to passport control. The flight was reasonably long and quite turbulent however, each one of us had sat next to a super friendly person, who reassured all of us that the next four weeks Read more
The past week has proved busy but highly productive, not to mention enjoyable. Already it feels as if I have been in Yamagata forever, and I wouldn’t mind if that was the case. In terms of work we have been busy weeding rice paddies, weeding vegetable patches, weeding an athletics track, weeding a flower garden…yeah, Read more
Yesterday I arrived in Tokyo but was too tired to update after so much walking – my apologies for that. These past few days have been quite hectic but fun. I met three of the other volunteers in the airport and we all caught the dreaded 12 hour plane together. When we finally arrived in Hong Kong, Read more
So here I am; the day has arrived and I’m off to the airport to start my adventures in Japan. The past few days have been filled with a never-ending stream of advice from my parents about travelling and staying safe, and I have packed everything I could ever think of needing in any potential Read more
Yesterday evening we had a Sinhalese language lesson, where we learnt some basics including greetings, how to say our age, where we live and basic body parts. The Sinhalese language has a whole other alphabet so our teacher broke down how to say the words in syllables. Sri Lanka only gained independence from Britain in 1948 Read more
Today in Sri Lanka is a public holiday for to the full moon. Everyone celebrates by wearing white and going to worship at the temples and places of Budda. Everyone in Sri Lanka is very friendly, coming up and saying hello in the streets and wanting to know where you are from and trying to help Read more
Today we went to the science fair at Ubon Ratchathani University. We left at around 9.30 and travelled on the school bus with some of my G.12 students. I don’t remember much of it, but my students have now seen how I look when I sleep on a bus. I was still a bit tired Read more
So today I had my G.10 class that I was dreading first thing at 8.30am. It sounds silly to say that I wasn’t looking forward to a class, but it’s true. They can be the least well-behaved out of the students I have, but they also have the most to learn and can be the Read more
So today was a difficult day, looking back I think it was mostly my doing though. I had three lessons today and I was still a bit tired from the weekend. This had affected my lesson planning as well, and because the lesson plans weren’t as well thought out, the lessons lagged too. I had Read more
Today I managed to sleep past 8am. It was great. I packed and updated my blog in the morning before we left. I also, however found out that there had been a bomb in the early hours of the morning in Hua Hin. Some of my friends back home had messaged me to make sure Read more
Today we had the day of school to hold a ceremony to celebrate mother’s day. If you’re confused about why mothers’ day is in August, it is because in Thailand mothers’ day is on the same day as the queen’s birthday. This is because the Thai people see the queen as the mother of their Read more
So today marks about three weeks until we leave for Bangkok. Even though we’re six weeks through the placement, it doesn’t mean that I am any more ready for each day. Thailand still manages to surprise me practically daily. Once example today was my G.10 class, they were about twenty minutes late to their lesson. Read more
I was back to my normal classes today. As much as the younger years are adorable and it was really nice having a Thai speaker leading the lesson, I did slightly miss my own classes. I must have been quite excited to see them again because I woke up around 6am and decided to get Read more
Today marks the official half way through point of the teaching programme. Doesn’t mean we are more adapted to teaching or to the environment. Unfortunately after a weekend of little sleep, we were all a bit under the weather this morning, definitely some more than others. It meant that Kate did her lessons with Hannah Read more
This morning we had cereal for breakfast. I’ve never been a fan of corn flakes and the milk may have tasted different, but it was nice to have something familiar other than toast or pancakes. Although I am loving having pancakes and toast instead of rice. Today I had a few exciting lessons. In my Read more
My only class today were my G.10s in the morning. They were so late moving from the classroom downstairs to the one I was in upstairs and some didn’t pay attention for parts of the lesson. I ended up just doing the waiting for them to stop talking before I talk because I don’t want Read more
Ben was back in school today! He’s still a bit ill and still as busy as ever, so he couldn’t make it to my lessons to translate. He had to sort out papers for the midterms that G.7-12 have next week (Hannah’s and my year groups), so it’s a reasonable excuse. It does also mean Read more
Today we had a much appreciated lie in, and an endless supply of toast, which was even more appreciated. We also got to play with the dogs before breakfast. Needless say it was a great morning. After getting a taxi to Central Plaza, which Aum had called for us, we met up with Eleanor in Read more
I’m not sure if the lack of sleep or if I was the Chang the night before was making me feel bad, but I decided to take my berry tea and pug-shaped tea dispenser into school today. According to the others, my pug tea dispenser apparently looks like a pig! Today was our last morning Read more
Today I woke up to find the wifi was working again! It had mysteriously stopped working the night before. It didn’t interrupt anything important like Netflix, just talking to my Dad. For breakfast we had an endless supply of pancakes for breakfast – it was wonderful! I also had them with grapes and I can Read more
This Saturday morning we woke up at 6.30am, not because we were going crazy after two weeks in Thailand, but because we were going rafting at 10 at Sirindhorn Dam. I had packed for rafting the night before and managed to put a few clothes aside for Chiang Mai. I managed to leave the room Read more
The Friday before classes started, we had our orientation at Sciences Po. Do you remember the painful small talk of the first week on university that left everyone wanting to print the answers to the generic questions on a T-Shirt? Eventually it starts to sound like some sort of Academics Anonymous meeting; ‘Hi, my name Read more
This morning was great. As much as we still had to get up ridiculously early, we did not have to dress for school. Why? Because we were going on a school trip! Today we were going with G.10-12 to plant rice in the principle’s fields. These trips happen often at the school in the upper Read more
Every Thursday the students wear their scout or cadet uniforms to school. It’s incredible and everyone looks really smart. Apparently in Thailand scouts is mandatory so you don’t get a non-uniform day if you aren’t a part of a group. That just does not happen. The cadets do a drill whilst the morning assembly takes Read more
My first impression of Bangkok was endless traffic I could see out of the window of the minibus from the airport to the hotel. Except when I fell asleep, but even that was because of the traffic on the roads. When the six other English Teaching Assistants (ETAs) I was travelling with and I got to the hotel, our main Read more
What’s so great about getting up at 3.30 am on a Wednesday in June? No, it was not the fabulous sunrise. Nor was it baked beans on toast with a mountain of cheese. I, Samantha Edgson, had decided to spend my summer holiday in Thailand. And naturally an early flight that meant getting up at Read more
Wow, really! Such a programme is just a fantastic way to spend your holidays. I did a German course in GLS Schule in Berlin, after which you will never put spacebar between some words [in German many long words are made up of two or more words ‘stuck together’] The programme meant that I could Read more
Pre-departure The best feeling was when I received an email congratulating me on my success in achieving a grant to study abroad. I had the option of choosing where to study as long as it was for at least a month and in a recognised institution. Salamanca seemed ideal for me as I had always Read more
Well, I’ve been in Los Angeles for 11 days now, and have had the most fantastic time. Getting moved in was pretty nerve wracking (just knowing which way to cross the street can be a challenge sometimes!) and it’s taken me a good week to get settled down in a proper routine, but its been Read more
Hello, my name is Olivia and I spent 4 weeks in China this summer completing a Chinese language course at the prestigious Xiamen University. Xiamen is in the south of China as is said to be one of the most beautiful places to live in China which could be largely down to its lovely stretch Read more
Spending my summer studying in China has been a fantastic opportunity, the China university experience is very different to that of the UK but is equally enjoyable. My course at Xiamen University, in the Fujian province of South East China, focused on learning Mandarin with classes on the Chinese economy, culture and business in the Read more
After a 30 hour journey and several flight delays, we finally arrived in Hong Kong. The first shock occurred as we stepped out of the cool air conditioned airport, and into the hot and humid weather. The sweating had begun. Something you have to get used to in China. After our failed attempt to acclimatise, Read more
Travelling in China is always an experience and today’s trip to Gulangyu Island was no exception. If you’ve never travelled in a densely populated city before, you’re in for a surprise. In order to get to the island we had to get 2 buses and a ferry all of which were absolutely packed. Imagine a Read more
NI men hao! (Hello!) it’s the end of my first school week here at the Overseas college in Xiamen and I’m well on my way to settling in. I arrived in Xiamen on 29th June from Hong Kong where the climate is almost identical to Xiamen (but there is more air-con and a lot less Read more
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We're looking for enthusiastic students who are currently abroad, or are soon going abroad, to share their experiences and write for our pages!
If you're interested, get in touch by emailing us at go@cardiff.ac.uk
