Student Blog

By: Lucy Dabbs, Georges P. Vanier Secondary School, participant of the 2017 Beijing International Education Exchange (BIEE)Summer Camp.

Have you ever gone into one of those saunas at the public swimming pool? Where you walk in and it's like stepping into, well, like stepping into a room full of hot, steamy air. The air kind of weighs down on you, slowing your breath and clinging to your skin. That's what we are met with as our curious faces emerge from the airplane and step onto the stairs leading to the solid ground of Beijing, China.

By: Lucy Dabbs, Georges P. Vanier Secondary School, participant of the 2017 Beijing International Education Exchange (BIEE) Summer Camp.

By: Katlyn Bieber, Thompson Rivers University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

By: Alice (Ruo Ran) Wang, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

By Mariam Ali, Simon Fraser University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

By Cheryl Olvera, Simon Fraser University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

Growing up in a young country like Canada, I felt the history we learned in school about kings and queens was so mythical and in a land far far away… then I went to one of these lands far far away!

By: Alice (Ruo Ran) Wang, Kwantlen Polytechnic University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

I am sitting on the train heading to a small town in Germany called Kassel. The quinquennial contemporary art festival—documenta—is taking place there and as a budding art historian, it is imperative that I visit it during my artistic pilgrimage. After two weeks in Paris, I am looking forward to being in a smaller city. Big cities have their glamour and dynamics, but it is in the countryside that we find the space and air to breath.

By Mariam Ali, Simon Fraser University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.

Last summer before my exchange to IEP de Strasbourg, I remember being so nervous about my exchange, asking myself how I would fare abroad. One year later I’ve changed in so many ways, growing as a person while improving my French and my knowledge of the world.

By Cheryl Olvera, Simon Fraser University, winner of the 2017 Stories from Abroad Scholarship.