The wonderful Near East

Mario N.

If one goal of your semester abroad is to explore several different cultures at once while at the same time studying in a known and comfortable environment, I can strongly recommend Tel-Aviv University as the base of your endeavours. Though the young city of Tel-Aviv and its university represent a fairly western style, it is located at the center of the only state in the world with the majority of its inhabitants being jews and is further surrounded by various Arabic countries that offer interesting insights into their culture.

This report addresses everyone who is about to or has already made his decision to choose Israel as his destination and will give testimonial to the experiences I made. Further, I will give you a few hints in regard to the organization of your semester abroad. The report is structured as follows. First I will describe the preparations that were necessary, complemented by a short guide on Israel, Tel-Aviv and the Tel-Aviv University. The second part of this report will then consist of my personal experiences during my stay in the summer term of 2013.

Humus on the beach

Julia V.

The last 5 months in Tel Aviv were the best time in my life. I am so glad that I had the courage to go abroad and gave up thinking: "oh no, I have to add one semester". Be brave - you don`t have the chance to get such experiences in any other way. For me Israel / Tel Aviv was the right choice and I can only encourage other students to spend a semester in Israel and especially in Tel Aviv.

Tel Aviv University

Nils Z.

„You are going to Israel? But what’s about the bombs over there?” I received this kind of reaction from many people after telling them about my intention to go Tel Aviv for studying abroad. Certainly, German news coverage about the Middle East mainly focuses on negative issues like terrorist attacks or the controversial settlement policy, and therefore makes it difficult to perceive the current state of affairs in Israel in a positive way- but Israel is so much more!

Tel Aviv University

Sven D.

Tel Aviv – the best time in my life! Legendary – this is probably the best description for my 7 month stay in Tel Aviv, Israel. I have never guessed that I would say that Israel is not just a beautiful country, but it is also very very rich of different cultures, interesting religions and very international people. And the best: It is not as dangerous as it seems! Honestly, in the streets I would even say I felt more save than in Germany. The people are all friendly and helpful and as a German citizen you are more than welcome. Because of all these aspects I highly recommend this place for studying abroad!

Tel Aviv University

Jonathan B.

Before going to Tel Aviv in July 2010 I had to deal with some considerable organisational issues. Firstly, I had to apply for the IS:link student exchange programme, which, at that time, had just been introduced as a student exchange network for Information Systems students by the chair of Prof. Ulrich Frank of my home university in Essen. Luckily, application and enrolment was rather uncomplicated and I could turn my attention to other important issues, like visa and finding an accommodation in Tel Aviv. As I said, IS:link was still in its founding phase at that time. Therefore, organisation was sometimes not that easy for me. However, due to being one of the pioneers in the IS:link program, many experiences were even more intensive. Furthermore, I was not the only student going from Essen to Tel Aviv in the summer of 2010 (see our group picture below).