Life in Lithuania: small country with a big heart
Lydia Lysenkova
Choosing a university is a crucial decision in your life. It is like a marriage: you agree to stay with it in times of sorrow and happiness. Sometimes it is an arranged marriage, where your parents make the choice for you; sometimes you follow the advice of your friends.
My name is Lydia and I am a girl from Belarus that once made a decision to change her life and move to Lithuania. I enrolled at Vilnius University as a bachelor’s student and now continue my journey as a master’s student. I guess it means that my “marriage” with Vilnius University and Lithuania was successful.
Why people choose Lithuania? It is a popular place – if you go to the old town in the evening, you will hear at least five different languages. Many international companies opened their offices here (as booking.com did recently). Moreover, Lithuania is a country of start-ups: if you want to start something, it is a great place to do that. Government supports start-ups, so opening a new company is a fast and easy process. It means that graduates have many opportunities both starting their career in a global company and starting their own business.
Lithuania in a good geographical location; an ideal place for crazy travellers. There are discounts for students, so you can buy tickets for 20 euros both ways. Besides, the professors will treat you as their colleague and never look down on you. If you want to make a trip to, say, Italy and you need to skip one lecture for that, nobody will against it if you mention it beforehand. Once, I wanted to leave home early for the Christmas vacation and my professors let me pass all my exams before leaving.
Vilnius is a city that allows you to express yourself: if you want to dance, there are many dance studios, if you want to sing, there are many places to do that as well. There is always something going on in the city – you will never get bored. There are karaoke nights, quizzes, food festivals, etc. In addition, many student organizations are trying to gather people together. Crazy costume parties in the bars and clubs, movie nights, volunteer projects, excursions around Lithuania and in foreign countries.
Lithuania is full of people from all over the world. When you arrive for your first lecture, you will meet people from South and North America, Asia, Africa, and Europe. For me, that is the best part of studying in a university. It is not just about learning: university is necessary for making valuable friendships. You would never meet all these amazing people without it.
In addition, students usually come for a semester or two. This means that during your four years here, you will meet around 120 people from all over the world. The students also have many opportunities to go abroad for an internship or a semester of studies. This way you have amazing experiences and have something worthy to put in your CV later on. Vilnius University allowed me to spend a part of my studies in South Korea and then go to the Netherlands for an internship.
To sum up, why Lithuania? Why Vilnius? And why Vilnius University? To put it simply: you will never feel lonely here. People around here are amazing, they care about you and try to make Lithuania feel like home. Vilnius is cosy. While it is the capital city of Lithuania with tremendous infrastructure, it still maintains the beauty of its history and the atmosphere that you are welcome here. And Vilnius University has it all – warm people, quality of education, and tons of opportunities.
People come here and want to stay forever. Will you be the next one?