“A Week of Firsts”: September 21-27
The week of firsts…first day of classes, first family dinner, first global experience class, and first weekend excursions. On Monday students were nervous and excited to board the bus to campus for their first official day of college classes. Students quickly found their classrooms and settled into college life. Monday evenings is our weekly night for family meals. These meals serve two main purposes, first to provide students with one “worry free” meal a week and secondly, so staff can connect with students and touch base about their weekends and upcoming week. The staff will decide on the menu each week, rotating some staple favorites, and adding new Greek foods for the students to try. This first family dinner received rave reviews by the students!
Tuesday evening we held the first Global Experience class, which is the 1 credit service learning course that all students are enrolled in. This course also has the 30 hour service learning component where students have been placed in various service learning sites on and off campus in Thessaloniki. Many of the students have already begun meeting with their service site and those who have not will be meeting in the upcoming weeks.
All that said, the weekend trips were the real highlight of the week: ACT organized both a Beach Trip and a Sailing Trip. One ISA went on each of the trips and each wrote a short piece about their experience below.
Beach Trip- September 25-27, 2009
By Jillian Pammett, ISA
From September 25 to the 27th, 20 students from NUin joined an ACT trip to Halkidiki, an area of Greece to the southwest of Thessaloniki and rumored to have some of the best beaches in Greece. Students explored Ouranopolis, which means “City of Heaven” in Greek, a charming town on the third peninsula of Halkidiki. The group also enjoyed a boat trip down the coast to Mt. Athos, a relaxing stay on the beach in a beautiful hotel, and a tour through the ancient caves of Greece. This was a great adventure for all the students who went.
Sailing Trip- September 25-27, 2009
By Alex Plum, ISA
All of the NUin students have been adapting to the sea-side city of Thessaloniki, and Greece as a whole, quite well; so much so that some have already felt comfortable enough to travel on the weekends. Seven students decided to take to the high seas of the Aegean for a fun and relaxing weekend of sailing on forty foot yachts. We boarded the boats Friday evening and motored for two hours to one of the largest fishing ports in all of Greece, Michaniona. The students had the opportunity to go out and experience the Greek culture on a much smaller scale than that of Thessaloniki. On Saturday we set sail for a small, secluded beach, which may very well not have a name. The water was beautiful and the weather was perfect. Nea Moudania was our next stop of the day. Again, it was a small fishing town where we could dock our boat for the night. We were all excited to take our captain out to dinner. The students said to him, “Just order everything for us.” This ended up being a great decision. We ate everything from fresh octopus to fish egg dip (which to be honest everyone seemed a bit skeptical about). In the end, everything was amazing. Sunday may have been the most memorable day of the three. We arrived at the five-star, SANI Resort. Our boats moored approximately a quarter mile from the beach and we all swam ashore through the crystal blue water and ate some great Greek food at the sandy beach restaurant. And yes, it was as picturesque as the photos online suggest (http://www.saniresort.gr/page/). At the end of the day we relaxed while eating Gelato and taking some great photographs of the scenery. All in all, everyone came to the conclusion that the weekend sailing was one of the most relaxing and unique experiences of their lives. Our captain was a true professional and the boats were top notch. Going back to school on Monday was difficult to say the least.