The academic year 2016-2017 came to its logical conclusion. The session is over, graduations too. Most students collect their bags and plan a summer vacation. And students from abroad are not exception. For some graduation from Lublin’s university is a great start of a career, for someone – a push for self-development, but for others studies have just begun, and, therefore, first vacation after the first year are coming.

Most foreigners in Lublin – are, first of all, students. They are young, active, open to the world, people that are looking for new experiences and emotions. Lublin – the city that united everyone. That is why the point of view of new students is very interesting and important. That is so because they open town quite differently, on their own way.

In this article we want to share first impressions of foreigners about Lublin. We will try to sum all their thoughts about how  they saw Lublin for the first time. All respondents came here from completely different cities, countries and even continents. This article reproduce a collective image of Lublin through eyes of foreigners, including Ukraine, Belarus, Uzbekistan.

All respondents drew attention to the fact that Lublin is a very active city. There is always something that is going on here. For everyone the city was a big mystery. For someone Lublin seemed to be very calm town, ideal for studies. But someone, contrary, saw Lublin with incredibly fast life movement, speed of action and general atmosphere of constant development. Someone realized that Lublin is a city, where you can fully realize yourselves. Almost every respondent emphasized the well-developed structure of the city. All noted the quality of local transport, calling it “extremely well built body”. Especially they like that it is always easy to get to any part of the city.

Students also noticed that although the city is not very big, however there are a lot of places where you can relax. These are restaurants, cafes, different dance clubs and discos and many many other. That is why Lublin for them as students is the city with a very good entertainment system. Some respondents drew attention to the constantly maintained cleanliness of the city and a large number of so-called “green” centers, where you can relax in nature. Especially everyone likes the Saxon Garden  and Botanic Garden.

This is how the 1st year student of the John Paul II Catholic University of Lublin (KUL) said about the city: “The city, even though it is small, has plenty of opportunities for recreation and all necessary places/things for normal functioning, and has well-developed infrastructure.”

Students could not help remembering about night Lublin. Everyone was charmed by the colors of the city, especially of its old part. All noted the wonderful scenery during various events, particularly impressive in their view was the Christmas and the New Year’s Eve.

All also mentioned the incredible number of festivals. Especially they liked the Juwenalia festival and the festival of Colors.

Students emphasized that Lublin is a city where they met many new friends who have become very close to them. That is why they feel really comfortable here, almost like home.

Olena Hryb