Deirdre Lynch, a student of Commerce at NUI Galway, is currently enjoying a once-in-a-lifetime experience on a one-year exchange programme in Hong Kong. Her desire to travel combined with the fact that Hong Kong is one of the leading centres for financial services worldwide greatly influenced her decision to apply for this specific exchange programme and she couldn’t be happier with the outcome.

She explains: ‘I have always wanted to travel, plus with China becoming more dominant in the world economy I thought it would be an ideal opportunity to experience that culture first-hand.

The courses are somewhat similar to Commerce in NUIG in that I am studying Business Statistics, Micro Economics, Managerial Accounting, and Marketing Engineering. However, it is very different in that there is a much heavier workload and we are constantly being assessed and having to prepare numerous presentations. The local students work very hard so it is quite competitive.’

But it is not all work and no play as Deirdre has taken full advantage of her surroundings at every study-free opportunity that has arisen. She explains: ‘I manage to get away from study for the occasional weekend. One weekend I visited Shenzhen. This is the closest Chinese mainland city to Hong Kong. Another weekend, I went to Thailand, which I loved. I visited three really beautiful palaces: Macau, Taipa, Lamma Island and Po Toi Island, which are all islands within an hour of Hong Kong. I also spent a week with the family of a classmate teaching English to twelve-year olds in her local primary school.’

She is clearly making the most of her exchange programme – committed to her studies and taking in as much of her new surroundings as possible. ‘I would recommend doing an exchange programme to anyone’, she says, ‘because you get to meet students from all over the world, visit amazing places and experience a new culture. Plus the weather is fabulous.’