For me one of the most rewarding parts of the study abroad experience so far is having so many opportunities to speak to people from different countries and completely different cultures. Never before have I had such a great opportunity to engage with people from so many different places, this is certainly one of the best things about studying abroad. I have spoken to Danish students, Spanish students, Swedish students, French students, German students and last but not least, Canadians.

I am a person who has always loved watching and playing sport, in England this has primarily involved Cricket, Football, Tennis and Boxing. In Toronto it has been really refreshing to experience a completely different sporting culture. I was lucky enough to go and see Toronto’s basketball team, The Toronto Raptors play against The New York Knicks. This was great fun and as an added bonus we were able to watch Carmelo Anthony play, a very highly rated American NBA player.

I also went to watch Toronto’s baseball team, The Toronto Blue Jays play at The Rogers Centre. Although they lost I was really happy to watch my first baseball match and the throwing and fielding was amazing to watch. The Blue Jays also got into the playoffs for the first time in over 20 years so watching them on TV was fantastic and the excitement in the city was palpable and infectious, people were even watching the post-season games in lectures. Ice Hockey is also really popular here and I had great fun watching U of T’s first team play. At some point I would like to go watch The Maple Leafs, Toronto’s Ice Hockey team play. Overall this change of culture was great because I learnt lots about sports I previously knew very little about such as Baseball and Ice Hockey. One other popular activity in Toronto is ice skating and there are a number of places in the city where you can try it such as Nathan Phillips Square and downtown by The Harbour Front. Unfortunately I did not manage to go before leaving for Christmas but I look forward to giving it a go when I come back in January!

The exchange student page on Facebook is really helpful and there is always posts from other exchange students regarding events and interesting things to do in Toronto. I found this very helpful because it informed me of countless opportunities to meet up and socialize with other exchange students which I took full advantage of. With all these events going on I was busy the majority of the time which was great as I was never bored or lonely. The Facebook page alerted me of an Exchange Student Soccer Team which I joined and had great fun playing in. Social media also informed me of Nuit Blanche, a hugely popular yearly art festival in downtown Toronto which I was lucky enough to experience with lots of other exchange students.