some answers to thoughts and questions from pre-exchange me 💭

Before my exchange, and specifically before I boarded my flight, I wrote a quick post with many questions that I had at the time (you can check that post here.) Now, I am back to answer them!

Trying to keep them short and sweet, though some questions can warrant more extensive answers.

Questions and answers

What to do if craving particular foods that may not exist there (rip hk cafe)

Asian foods in Switzerland not terrible, but also selection quite limited (and pricey.) So, turns out when I went on trips to other places, I would sometimes try and search for these foods. Met with some success in finding HK cafés or something similar in Lisbon, Madrid, and London, though they definitely were not as good as things back here in the GTA.

Also, no Tim Horton’s anymore??

Nearly, yes. There was a surprise though, since I found a Tim Horton’s in Madrid! There’s a picture of it on my More than halfway abroad post.

What will it be like to not have a fellowship at the university/what will it be like outside of a CCF bubble?

Writing this now that I have been back in Waterloo for around two months, probably the biggest difference is the frequency of seeing people you know as well as the activities that go on with them.

It would be a lot more similar to what life after university might look like: gathering as a church on Sundays, and also meeting with your home group (i.e. small group/community group) on another day. Otherwise, it would require you to be proactive in meeting with others throughout the week, and perhaps not as “easy” as it is in Waterloo.

I think it also requires you to think more deeply about your faith and your time, since there are not as many things going on as it is with CCF. And how you invest time into the local church, which is the next question 👀

Also, what would it look like to depend and grow with a local church?

Big takeaway is that it takes time! I talk a lot more about this in my post on finding a church in Switzerland, but being there for a year has given me perspective when I am integrating back with a church here in Waterloo.

What is the environment like in Switzerland when it comes to religion? What does evangelism look like there?

Mostly anecdotal information and what I have heard from a few people is what follows, but it seems that it is similar to here where there is a sense of “if that works for you that is great!” However, Switzerland has also retained a lot more of its practices that have Christian origins, such as Sabbath (most places are closed on Sundays!) Not too sure on the evangelism front.

How will I meet people, and who will I meet?

From a few different places, and many different backgrounds: church, other exchange students from Waterloo, exchange students not from Waterloo, some local students, people from my classes, some Masters students, some PhD students too! Friends of friends, other solo travellers, some friends of family, and old friends too!

The schooling system is different; what will it be like? (Hopefully no ECE 350 type labs haha, ECE 252 was already quite bad)

Labs were a looooot better than they were in Waterloo, even if we took compilers at EPFL in Scala!

In general, lectures are longer but less frequent in the week, some courses have 100% finals, and everyone goes to lunch at essentially the same time. You can read more about both of my semesters there in my “3A” and “3B” posts.

How will I deal with homesickness?

I am a bit surprised I asked this question, since I recall it not being at the forefront of my mind leading up to the exchange (though perhaps it was more present as the days approached me leaving.) It was quite difficult at first, but a few things did help: staying in touch regularly with family and friends back home, connecting with a church and meeting people both in the church and at school, prayer, and a big one—time!

Where will God lead me?

Well, I did come back to Canada, so I guess He led me back 😂

But in terms of the question, I do not fully remember what I meant when I asked it, but probably something to do with experiences I might have encountered, things I might have learned, or perhaps even places I might have gone to. There were many!

What might I learn about the people, their culture and environment when I am abroad? What might I enjoy? What might I dislike?

Talked about in various previous posts in the exchange tag! But off the top of my head, I think the pace of life is not as frantic there—people seem to have the capacity to enjoy things more so than here.

I wonder if I will get to travel around (on a friendly enough budget)

Yes!! 🧳

How will I balance between still maintaining relationships I have made back home without being physically present during the year?

It is a question that goes both ways—now that I am also back from my exchange, what about those who I met abroad?

But I think for those who were at home, it was much more difficult to be in contact with the same number of people and the same quantity of time as it would be in-person. This meant keeping in contact with fewer people, and perhaps not as frequently as it would be on campus.

What might I learn about my field of study, that I did not consider/would not even have thought of if I did not go abroad?

Easy answer: Digital Humanities (did not know this was a thing before going to EPFL), and also exploring data-related things (took a course on Large Scale Data Science.)

(I will leave it at the easy answer 😛)

How will I adjust to a different environment?

A big one is time, again. (Maybe you see a common thread on this notion of “time”. Peep incoming post 👀). But yes, things that I have mentioned earlier too: meeting people, finding community and communion with a local church, staying in touch with people at home, praying and spending more time with God.

Conclusion

It is nice to look back at some of the questions I had before leaving and seeing how they ended up playing out during my exchange. Inadvertedly, it seems a lot of my questions I ended up writing about in other posts, which I guess means I did have some similar thoughts throughout the exchange.

I also think that these more exchange-specific posts will be wrapping up soon; I am sure there will be references to this past year abroad in future posts, but it might be the start of another season with other things that God has apportioned for this time.

Thanks for following along over the past year or so on these exchange posts!

See you around