Nele Borkenhagen – Odessa, Texas

My year in the United States was a great experience. I flew to Odessa, Texas and studied Business Management at the Odessa College. In the beginning I was kind of nervous – a different language, a different culture and I didn’t know anybody. But as soon as I got there, all my doubts were gone. My new teammates welcomed me friendly and I directly knew that the season was going to be fun!

Although the first practices and scrimmages were a little confusing, I really enjoyed the fast and athletic game. After a very short time I got used to the language and had no problems to understand my coaches and teammates anymore.

I lived in the dorms at the Campus – and I can just recommend that. You get to know a lot of people, especially other athletes. Even though in Odessa there aren’t lots of free time activities it was easy to make new friends. Besides you always have somebody around to talk.

Spending the last year abroad changed my way of thinking and acting. It is nice to live with your family because your mum is doing most of the household. Even though you help her, you aren’t really independent and it isn’t necessary to think about everything.

Living on my own led to the fact that I appreciate the comfortable living at home even more. Doing laundry, cooking and cleaning bathroom, kitchen, living room and the own bedroom aren’t the greatest activities. But I’m so thankful that I was able to make all these experiences. I grew in my personality, improved my language skills and learned a lot about the different culture. Therefore I would recommend everybody who has the chance to study abroad: Take this opportunity, you definitely won’t regret it!

I found friends for live and I’m looking forward to meet them again as soon as possible.