Upon returning to College Station, everyone I saw wanted to know about my study abroad experience in Portugal, which has made me think back on the past two weeks. As I reflect, I have compartmentalized the trip into two aspects: the ?study? part of study abroad, and the social part that occurred outside of scheduled time together.
In regards to studying in Portugal, I really appreciated how we were given the opportunity to experience entrepreneurship in Portugal firsthand, rather than just learn about it in a classroom. Nearly every day we would visit a company, from varying industries and sizes. On the bus, we would get a little bit of background on the industry, but that was it. No formal class setting. Then, upon arrival, the companies would take us on a tour, and sometimes we would have the opportunity to talk to some of the executives at the company. This was really helpful for me, as I am a kinesthetic learner, and it is rare to find classes in college that can help me learn in this way.
The social aspect of the trip ended up being so different than what I had initially thought it would be. I came to Portugal with two of my closest friends and kind of assumed that we would just stick together the whole trip. But on the contrary, we meet so many new people over the course of those two weeks. We often laughed about how funny it was that A&M essentially shipped a group of 25 strangers internationally and just expected us all to get along. Everyone in our group was so unique; from different majors, class years, clubs, hometowns, etc. we could not have been more different, but this helped to make the trip even more fun.
My main reflection after being back from the trip is that I can already tell that this will be a memory I will look back on fondly for the rest of my life. It is truly a once-in-a-lifetime experience and I would 100% recommend it to anyone.
