Monterrey is the third biggest town in Mexico. It´s the capital of the state Nuevo Leon, which is located in Northern Mexico, near the border to Texas, USA.
I study at Tecnológico (short: Tec) Monterrey from August the 5th up to December the 12th 2019. I´ve booked an apartment via airbnb for the first week of my stay (in order to find a better place during the first week), which was quite cheap, but it has to be announced that the Mexican living standards are very different from our German ones.
Monterrey is about 9.500 km far from Berlin, my hometown. There is no other way getting there than by plane (except you want to cross the Atlantic Ocean by ship, which would take around two weeks). After my 18 hours flight I finally arrived at the Airport of Monterrey at 6pm. On the recommended arrival day (which was the 5th of August, the Tec Monterrey offers a free Transport service from the airport to the campus of the University. I arrived on the 3rd of October, so I had to get to my apartment on my own. Therefore, I used the Uber App. Driving around in Monterrey by Uber is much cheaper than the platform is in Germany. For the route from the airport to my apartment (about 30 minutes) I paid 180 MX$, which is around 8,50€. Searching for a place to buy my groceries, I ended in a huge supermarket, called H.E.B., which is convincing with his variety of products, from the freshest fruits and vegetables I´ve ever seen in a supermarket that size up to technological devices. The onions looked like polished and the salad was watered the whole time hence it won´t spoil.On Monday, the 5thof August, my first day at the campus of the university started. The University offered a walking tour over the campus, all international students had to register themselves and in the evening there was a welcome dinner in order to get to know all the new international students and to make new friends!
For the international students there is an organization, which is planning events and parties. The orientation week was full of these and every event was completely fully booked and sold out after a few hours! There was a barbeque night, a yacht party and a Welcome event for example in the first week. During the semester there will be a huge list of other events, parties and festivals, where all students have an opportunity to participate. In Monterrey there are many bars, restaurants and night clubs which are open not only on the weekends, so it’s time for going out nearly every day! In Monterrey everything is much cheaper than I know it from Berlin, which is quite good for a student.
The Center of Monterrey is nor very big and not full of sights like other Mexican cities. Monterrey is very industrial and therefore the center is quite small and could be seen in a few days! There are many museums, which are really interesting because of the history of Monterrey. Also there is an artificial river, Paseo Santa Lucia, which is very beautiful! You can walk along the whole river on the Riverwalk and also do a little boat tour on it!
After my first week in Mexico I’m really surprised of all the new impressions I’ve got and all the great people I’ve met here! I’m really looking forward to the rest of my stay!
