Malayna C.

I have never had the opportunity to travel outside of the country before and it was always a dream of mine to do so when I am still young and able to do everything I can. I chose Italy because I am a European history major particularly focused on the Enlightenment and the Renaissance and northern Italy is a hallmark of both of those eras. I chose Bologna because they have their own university that doesn't require me to be on a UC campus abroad, and I wanted to truly immerse myself in the culture and language.

I lived with three Italian/French students in Bologna so I would wake up and have breakfast with them before heading to the campus and going to my classes for the week. I would then hang out with my UCEAP program friends. We often went to try new restaurants, bars, and cafes. During the weekends, I tried to travel to as many places around Europe as possible.

I took a crime fiction class, an Italian history class, an Italian culture class, and an ancient Roman history class. I will say the courses were a lot easier than at Berkeley and they were very fun because they had students from all over the world, since they were the English speaking courses. I loved all of my professors and the class sizes were super small, so it was way easier to get to know them compared to at Berkeley. The courses themselves were extremely interesting and fun, focused on Italian studies that I could then apply to my travels and exploration in the country.

I loved being able to travel all over Europe for low prices and seeing everything I've only studied in textbooks. I loved meeting new people, especially international students, which was greatly assisted by my housemates. One moment that stands out was my solo trip to Paris one weekend, in which I met two Parisian students/locals and they took me out to dinner and showed me around the city.

As an Asian American student, I was afraid of facing xenophobia, racism, or prejudice. I will say for the most part, it was not as terrifying as I expected, and most people were really nice. A good tip I have is to learn the local language and speak to the locals in it as best as you can, and they tend to respect you more. I also learned to tell the difference between people who were genuinely curious about my identity compared to people who were trying to be rude or prejudiced. Be aware of how you may be perceived by people who don't commonly see people of your background and while it's not the nicest feeling, I learned to brush things off at a certain point in order to embrace having fun as much as possible.