Yes, it's an amazing city with numerous museums, parks and coffee houses. I was fortunate enough to get to know Vienna even before my Erasmus exchange, so my decision wasn’t hard. But the big role for me was the language. I have been studying German before and I wanted to improve my current knowledge.
FH Wien University of Applied Sciences
Everything about university is well organized. The Erasmus coordinators provide you with all the information and are always there to help if you need them. All the courses I took were in English which means we also had some guest lectures. They were from USA so we experienced another teaching approach, which was very interesting and we had a lot of fun in those courses. Of course there were some courses that were not that much fun, but nothing you couldn't manage.
The university itself is a big glass building with a big cafeteria and coffee shop. Every floor has a smoking area and the balcony and the area where you can study. All in all it is taken care of students in the best possible way.
Professor from the United States
Stereotypes and reality
It is true Austrians are really organized and precise. You need to get a paper, document or permit for almost everything. BUT as FH Wien student you are lucky, they provide you with all directions and information you need. Also the employees in all the offices you have to visit at the start of your exchange are really nice and helpful. As long as you are nice to them everybody will try to do their best to help you.
Austrian culture and habits
Austrians are not much different than Slovenes. The one thing that caught my eye was that they are really polite and completely respect the rules. For example no one will cross the street at red light even if there are no cars and it’s midnight.
Like use they like to enjoy with a cup of good coffee, but in a completely different level. Vienna has a lot of Kaffeehauses (traditional coffee house), where people gather and stay there even for a couple of hours.
Café Sacher Cafe Demel
Places
You can visit sightseeing places in Vienna individually with your friends and almost everywhere you get the student discount. Or you can go on short trips with the Erasmus student network. They take care of everything so you can relax and enjoy your time with your Erasmus friends. For example they organized trips to Prague, Budapest, Bratislava, wine tasting and ski trip and much more. I would definitely recommend you to visit the palace Hofburg and palace Schönbrunn with the world’s oldest ZOO. And in December Christmas market in front of the city hall.
Schönbrunn Palace St. Stephen's Cathedral –Stephansdom
St. Stephen's Cathedral –Stephansdom
Christmas market
Old Danube
Student meals
There are NO student meals as in Slovenia. In the university we have a cafeteria, where you get a discount with your campus card. But even with the discount everything there is really expensive. So the best thing you can do as a student is to cook by yourself.
There is one option though. Vienna is very famous for its Würstelstands, this are the fast food stands where you can choose from big variety of sausages served as hot dogs. Also a big hip right now are the noodles. You can get them at the same stands and a lot of them also serve sushi and maki. The best one for noodles is Happy noodles at Schwedenplatz.
Happy noodles stand Würstelstand
Würstelstand
Accommodation
On this picture you can see my room, it’s bright and it has its own bathroom and kitchen.
Is very expensive! The company OeAD Housing is the one that most of the Erasmus students uses for finding the room. They find you a room for sure, but just to get them looking for you, you need to pay 750€ deposit. It depends what kind of a room or apartment you want, the prices are usually between 300€ -500€ per month. If you are patient enough and have no problem with maybe getting some furniture on your own, you can also look for the apartment via online real estate companies.
I share an apartment in a student dormitory, which is cheaper for me but you never know what kind a person will you get as a roommate. In my case I was lucky with the first roommate, she was a really nice girl. But the next one... Ok she is nice, but she smells. I’m lucky to have so many great friends from my Erasmus group so most of the time I’m not at home. I just wanted to point out that you must consider all the possible options when you’re deciding about your accommodation. J
Night life
There are a lot of options for partying. You can go out almost every night in the week. There are some bars, pubs where you can attend at a solid party with student prices. And there are some posh clubs, which are really expensive and also have a strict dress code. On Fridays and Saturdays U-Bahn (metro) goes the whole night so there is no problem with getting home. All the other nights you need to take a taxi, which can get really expensive.
Student prices:
- Ride Club (Cocktails from 0,50€)
- Travel Shack
- Charlie P's Irish Pub
- Prater Dome
Monday night - Ride Club
Posh clubs and bars:
- Club Passage
- Volksgarten Disco
- Grelle Forelle
- Medusa
Transport – Public transport
All you do is use public transport. As a student you get a semester ticket for 75€, when the normal price is 150€. With public transport you can get pretty much everywhere really fast. With this ticket you can take the U-bahn (metro), Strassenbahn (tram) and the bus. In the rush hour U-Bahn drives every 2 minutes.
Costs
Vienna is a very expensive city. As I mentioned before my rent was 305€ per month and it was one of the cheapest. Prices of grocery and other home supply stuff are similar as in Slovenia. The biggest difference is in prices of services, restaurants and various tickets, they are really expensive. So there is no way that scholarship would be enough to cover all the costs. You need more money as in Portorož.
Pros & Cons
Vienna is a fabulous city and if I could do the exchange again next year I would. I've meet a lot great people from all over the world and some of them became my great friends. I got to know different cultures and people with different backgrounds.
The only con about Vienna is maybe the fact that is so close to Slovenia so for some of you this wouldn't really mean to go on Erasmus exchange. But trust me, despite the short distance Vienna is a completely different and amazing world! J
I hope I gave you some useful information and if you have any more questions don’t hesitate to contact me.
Mit freundlichen Grüßen,
Kristina Pangos
tina.pangos@gmail.com
- Club Passage
- Volksgarten Disco
- Grelle Forelle
- Medusa
Transport – Public transport
All you do is use public transport. As a student you get a semester ticket for 75€, when the normal price is 150€. With public transport you can get pretty much everywhere really fast. With this ticket you can take the U-bahn (metro), Strassenbahn (tram) and the bus. In the rush hour U-Bahn drives every 2 minutes.
Costs
Vienna is a very expensive city. As I mentioned before my rent was 305€ per month and it was one of the cheapest. Prices of grocery and other home supply stuff are similar as in Slovenia. The biggest difference is in prices of services, restaurants and various tickets, they are really expensive. So there is no way that scholarship would be enough to cover all the costs. You need more money as in Portorož.
Pros & Cons
Vienna is a fabulous city and if I could do the exchange again next year I would. I've meet a lot great people from all over the world and some of them became my great friends. I got to know different cultures and people with different backgrounds.
The only con about Vienna is maybe the fact that is so close to Slovenia so for some of you this wouldn't really mean to go on Erasmus exchange. But trust me, despite the short distance Vienna is a completely different and amazing world! J
I hope I gave you some useful information and if you have any more questions don’t hesitate to contact me.
Mit freundlichen Grüßen,
Kristina Pangos
tina.pangos@gmail.com
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