{"id":4585,"date":"2019-10-25T01:11:30","date_gmt":"2019-10-25T05:11:30","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/?p=4585"},"modified":"2019-10-25T01:11:30","modified_gmt":"2019-10-25T05:11:30","slug":"frank-is-abroad-really-that-cheap","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/2019\/10\/25\/frank-is-abroad-really-that-cheap\/","title":{"rendered":"Frank: Is Abroad Really That Cheap?"},"content":{"rendered":"

You\u2019ve heard the tale. \u201cA semester abroad is cheaper than one at BU.\u201d I heard it on my first tour of COM. I\u2019ve heard fellow COM Ambassadors say it on their tours. I\u2019ve even said it on my tours and now that I\u2019m abroad in London, I\u2019ve gotta say the rumors are true. A semester abroad is definitely cheaper than one at BU. Well, um, it\u2019s <\/span>technically<\/span><\/i> cheaper.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

It\u2019s true that when the semester bill came I did end up paying less, but I failed to account for a few things when I applied for my abroad semester. The first one being maybe the most obvious: airfare. I\u2019m from Puerto Rico. I\u2019ve been hoping on planes all the time to get back and forth between home and BU, but for some reason the fact that I\u2019d have to pay for an even more expensive plane ticket to Europe completely slipped my mind during the whole process. Imagine my surprise when the modest $160 plane tickets I usually bought so far off in advance had become almost $800 ones. Buying these tickets also proved to be a terrifying endeavor. Like, I know Boston and I know Puerto Rico. They each have like one airport and a half. London has three airports. Three full airports. Can you even imagine how terrible the headaches me and my mom had while trying to buy these tickets? Thankfully BU offered a group flight, or else I really would have not figured it out… Like really? Three airports? Do you really need three airports?<\/span><\/p>\n

Another thing I just fully blanked on was the fact that both the UK and Europe have their own currency. \u201cWhat? They don\u2019t use American dollars?\u201d Yeah, they don\u2019t. I know. Crazy. A non-american country that won\u2019t take American dollars? It\u2019s honestly preposterous. The thing that stings most about it though is that you essentially have to become an economist while you\u2019re abroad. Every single day, you wake up, brush your teeth, check the updated conversion rates, and cry because you\u2019re not living in the parallel world without borders and a shared currency. Oh and also: did you know that banks have a thing called \u201cinternational transaction fees\u201d? It\u2019s as terrifying as it sounds. Essentially every time you pay for something with your American card the higher ups at your bank go \u201chmm, this poor fool seems to be out of the States, how about we make them pay for the mere attempt to use their money, won\u2019t that be a hoot!,\u201d and then they have a big ol’ laugh as they strip between 25 to 50 cents from your bank account. Yeah, well I\u2019d like to see you laugh when I decide to start Venmo-ing all my friends for groceries. You\u2019ll get these 25 to 50 cents from my cold dead hands.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

You might think I\u2019m having a miserable time abroad. That honestly couldn’t be farther away from the truth! I\u2019m truly enjoying my time here in London! London is a great city that I honestly wouldn\u2019t have been able to visit were it not for BU. I\u2019ve gone to Spain and Ireland, I\u2019ve met some really cool people here in the abroad program and in the general London area, and I\u2019ve taken some of the most fun and interesting classes in my entire college experience. I can\u2019t really put into words how much of a great time I\u2019m having. Honestly, I think every BU student should go abroad AT LEAST once! But only if they can afford it. What I\u2019m trying to say with all this is that you should really think beforehand if you should go abroad. As much fun as I\u2019m having, if I didn’t have a job during the summer I would probably be struggling really hard to get by. Going abroad is actually a bit of a strain on your wallet and like every big financial decision you make, you should really think it over. If I started saving up money for abroad earlier than this past summer, I would honestly be less stressed about the whole experience. So before you pay that $55 non-refundable application fee remember that when COM Ambassadors say it’s cheaper to go one semester abroad, they only mean it <\/span>technically.<\/span><\/i> Really think about if you want to go abroad before actually going. Or go to DC or LA. Those might be actually cheap. I hear they take US dollars.<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You\u2019ve heard the tale. \u201cA semester abroad is cheaper than one at BU.\u201d I heard it on my first tour of COM. I\u2019ve heard fellow COM Ambassadors say it on their tours. I\u2019ve even said it on my tours and now that I\u2019m abroad in London, I\u2019ve gotta say the rumors are true. A semester … Continue reading Frank: Is Abroad Really That Cheap?<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2018,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[44437],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2018"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=4585"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":4586,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4585\/revisions\/4586"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=4585"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=4585"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bu.edu\/comblog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=4585"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}