MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY-Sydney - Student Exchange Report: Semester 1, 2011 - Bali Kavi

MACQUARIE UNIVERSITY- Sydney
        Student Exchange Report:
            Semester 1, 2011

                                                 Bali Kavi
                                               S11050114
                                              BSC – CS/IN
                                   bali_kavi@hotmail.com

General Overview

Undoubtedly, Internationalization is a vital component in the fabric of any University;
therefore, the Student Exchange program is a very active division supporting fair bit of students
to go overseas each year. Apparently, Student Exchange represents a very real investment in a
USP student's own future. Being transplanted from the familiar to the unfamiliar provides a
unique opportunity for self-discovery, as well as personal, academic, and professional growth.

USP predominantly has few exchange partners worldwide, with study opportunities available
for students of all interests and backgrounds.

If you are pretty much trying to decide where to go on exchange and for how long, your troubles
are now over. I have the answer for you: Macquarie University for a semester. I had a magnificent
time and I know that everyone else there did too!

I have not opted to keep this report very comprehensive and sophisticated but rather fairly petite
and simple so that you don’t feel bored or probably pass out whilst reading this.

Acknowledgements

Before even narrating my experience, it’s indisputably wise to thank the following people for
their fabulous efforts in supporting me during my MQ Academic Exchange, semester 1, 2011.

      The University of South Pacific and the Exchange Committee for laying this opportunity
       and allowing me the honor of representing as a USP ambassador.

      Macquarie University for working in conjunction with USP to make this exchange
       scheme feasible.

      Ms Sala Vakalala who you would have noticed has had her name printed on every
       student exchange report. A person managing all the sophisticated documentations and
       visa formalities surely deserves such nobility. She is actually pretty sweet!

      Matthew Louie, my Education Abroad Advisor – Macquarie University.

      My parents – my mum for calling me every day (crazy at times) and dad for tolerating
       my gigantic expenses since beer was never meant to be cheap!

Where it all started?
Hardly do students at USP get to be acquainted with the exchange schemes available. I was
pretty much on the same boat until I landed on the student exchange web page while surfing
the university website after quite long. I never knew that exchange road-shows existed and
unfortunately couldn’t attend one. However, I just surrendered an application and that’s it,
soon I’m a USP ambassador to Macquarie Uni – Cheers!

Macquarie University is a well accredited university in Australia regarded as the top most
research university in the country. Macquarie, Sydney is a town with great student spirit and
beautiful scenery. MQ is one of Sydney’s oldest universities that attract the majority of
exchange (international) students from all over the world every semester. The American’s love
it because of the awesome nightlife and so did I.

Pre Departure – the hectic stuff!
Had you been reading other exchange reports, you may have principally realized that pre
departure prep is never easy. Unlike the rest, I’d rather keep my discussion pretty simple and
explicit.

Work stack tends to get tedious before you finally get to board the plane. Liaising cross credit
matters, taking IELTS test, undergoing medical examinations etc are some of the matters you’ll
get stuffed with, and trust me, it’s not what you’ll love or enjoy.

Given the sophisticated nature of the pre departure requirements, it occasionally does get bit
chaotic, for example, getting your visa approved just few hours before the scheduled flight.

Therefore, for all you prospective exchange scholars, take it easy, chill and every obstacle would
definitely seem effortless.

Life at Macquarie University
Conquering a pretty small 3 hour flight, it was sweet to explore the Sydney terminal once more.
Australia was never new to me and spending over 20 weeks at Macquarie was something to
quite look forward to. Orientation week went sweet with heaps of stuffs to do. Trivia nights,
harbor cruise, theme parties were some of those.

As the semester began, like most, I had also enrolled in three courses of which I had attained
credit transfer approvals prior to departure. This isn’t a problem if the course coordinators are
relatively considerate but trust me, not all are. Overall the academic routine was alright and
was not very different from that of USP.

The School system

Like any other university, Macquarie had the similar notion of lectures, tutorials along with
practical’s for various different courses. Our computing faculty had bit of work stack with quite
a bit of assignments and weekly submissions to probably keep the students in shape. I wouldn’t
say USP lacks adequate facilities since the new state of the art ICT edifice is by far one of the
best in the pacific.

Macquarie University boasts a perfect new library which just opened few weeks back. What’s
fine is that students are permitted to eat and drink whilst studying. Here’s a glimpse of it.

iLectures

A technology whereby the ultimate live lecture is recorded and uploaded on the web favoring
students who can’t or don’t wish to practically attend the lectures. In this way, lecture
attendance was quite optional and this was why I hardly got to physically see my lecturers or
who they actually were!

                          Academics Apart – The Social side
Making friends and expanding your social network is not the easiest thing to do abroad. Joining
the local social clubs such as Iclub may help (not for me) but if you are an athletic person like
me, Sports definitely does help.

Sports – A must!

In my first week of school, I got to learn about the Macquarie Super league football club. They
were running trials for the new season, and this was what I had been looking for. The trial went
pretty well and I was one of the youngest players selected for their first team. I was informed
that no one from Fiji had been registered in the NSW Super League and that I was probably
going to be the only one. It didn’t take me long until I was one of the favorites for our head
coach. Everyone In the team likes to talk about Fiji and perhaps that was the reason I was being
loved and treated pretty well.

Ostensibly, my talent didn’t go to waste and the football season was reasonably really good. I
reckon taking active participation in sports really helps you socialize better and formulate heaps
of friends. In just days, my facebook friend list stretched.

Australian University Games.

Each year, Universities from around Australia congregate to compete in various different
sports. This year we headed to Canberra in this chilly weather with temperatures hitting to at
least 3 C’s at dawn.

There’s hardly much to share about Canberra except the politics of Gillard. It’s a pretty quiet
capital territory of Australia where you can almost count the number of people on the streets
on a Sunday. I had the opportunity to represent Macquarie University being selected in their
football squad. Overall MQ did really well finishing 4th amidst all the other Uni’s. I thought our
team photo was worth sharing.

The Crazy Bit – It’s Party Time!

A little about Sydney life

Sydney is a vibrant and dynamic city which has been named the “World’s Best City” eight times
by Travel and Leisure magazine. Magnificent waterfront dining with a superb selection of food
can be found at Sydney’s Circular Quay, with the stunning backdrop of Sydney’s famous Opera
House and Harbor Bridge. Nearby are charming old shops, pubs and cafes that line cobblestone
streets in The Rocks, which is part of “old Sydney”. The Rocks is surely awesome.

                                       Vibrant Sydney after dusk

                                     The Core aspect – Party!
                                            The party strategy:

  Let’s pick up the pace, let’s shake the blues away, let’s make the parties longer, let’s make the skirts
    shorter and shorter, let’s make the music hotter, let’s all go to hell in a fast car, and keep it hot!

Beyond doubts, anyone on exchange does get to party much but that’s even more crazy and
legit for a party monster like me! Considering the formal nature of the report, it would not be
wise to share all the legit fun I conquered but a fair bit should be fine. It’s always even added
fun carousing with the Americans who are assumed to be the best party makers in the world
(maybe).

Nightlife glimpse

I still remember hell lot of sleepless nights and massive hangovers. Those times were just
fanatical. Wednesday night parties at the Ranch Hotel were always something to look forward
to.

            The Ranch                            Black light party – Spot me if u can!

Every Wednesday was “Uni Nite” at the Ranch hosting all the different and massive theme
parties like the traffic light party, toga party, black-light party, ski party and much much more.
Since these nights were always off the hook, I never missed any and neither should you!

The unibar always had something in-store every Thursday night following similar concept of
theme parties pretty much seeing everyone get wasted. Apparently, It also operated during the
daytime.

Friday and Saturday was basically the city, preferably “The Rocks” or the Cross. Actually, I got
to do PUB CRAWLS at times with my football team and that was always fun. BEER BONG on
the other hand was pretty new to me since we never did that back home. It is a racing game
using a large funnel to rapidly consume a large amount of beer. Though this stuff was fresh for
me, I never went down during my spins.

The American pastime of “BEER PONG” was one of my favorites. It’s a drinking game in which
players throw a ping pong ball across a table with the intent of landing the ball in a cup of beer
on the other end.

Because I had heaps of families around, I would sometimes jet off in the weekends to meet up
with them as campus life was not always charming in the weekends, especially Sunday
afternoon (boring).

                           A brief look at the Aussie Culture
What Sydney couldn’t offer, Melbourne did. Whilst meeting up with a traditional local guy, I
got to try out their local musical instruments. Most well known is the didjeridu, a simple
wooden tube blown with the lips like a trumpet. It’s pretty long and quite hard to play.

                         Attempting to play the didjeridu – Melbourne city!

Conclusion
Twenty weeks of school at Macquarie University finally ended in mid July. Leaving Australia
was not easy but it was always good to be back at home. Above all, Australia is just 3.5 hours
away, I can always come back.

You may have read the recommendations from other scholar’s reports. Exchange scheme is
literally a good choice molding you to become more independent and confident. It’s the best
way to have adventures, make friends, travel, and party whilst adding value to your USP
degree.

As for the social aspect, you may be excited, rather you should be, but you need not forget
about the academic courses that need ample attention.

To sum up, studying at Macquarie university was totally off the hook!.