Get Together Day for Exchange Students – Spring 2015

This year the spring Get Together day was on 3rd of March. 

The day for me started early and stressed, every possible thing that could go wrong was going through my mind, “What if they never catch the bus”; “What if the Riihimäki exchange students won’t come”, but I didn’t dare showing my stress so I tried to keep it cool. I headed to school to the event venue and made sure that at least everything was ready for the people who would show. While I was doing that I got a message from one of the Riihimäki exchange students that said that their train was late, but at the same time the Valkeakoski exchange students arrived and they were a big group so I started getting excited. The exchange students started the program by picking some small morning snack and some coffee or tea, giving them the possibility to get to know each other and to get to know me, the person who sent them a thousand emails.

As we headed to the event venue it was my presentation of HAMKO which was going to start the event and that went as normal and boring as it could go, so once it was done we had a bit time left before the other presentation so some of my “smooth jokes” started to crack up. After that we had the presentation of Susanna Saarinen, the person responsible for the international affairs of HAMK and during the presentation the person with the highlight presentation of the day was there, Brian Joyce. Once Susanna was done, Brian took over and started showing why he was highly recommended to me as a great presenter. The words can’t sum up the amount of excitement he gave the students. He made them try Salmiakki, talked about the culture and how to use your exchange studies on your benefit and also gave the students opportunity to create network with him. 

As the first half of the day was over, we were heading now to the exciting events, our visit at Häme Castle and the Bowling alley. 

Our tour guide at the Häme Castle was awesome, very detailed and full of interesting facts, so it kept most of the people interested. The tour lasted 45 min and then we had about 30 min of enjoying the Castle by ourselves. 

The last part of the day was approaching as we were heading to the bowling alley. The teams were divided randomly and the fun started. We played for quite a long time and did a lot of networking. The end arrived pretty soon and everyone hit the road home, except that I still had my Council of representatives of HAMKO meeting. But I really didn't care much, I was happy about the outcome of the day.

blog story by :

Gramoz Shpendi

Internationality, RDI and labour market relations

+358 44 722 1007
gramoz.shpendi@hamko.fi