Summer in Spain

By Ms. Sirima Sangnark

I’m Sirima Sangnark, an Intercultural Studies and Languages student minoring in Spanish.
I received a scholarship grant from MUIC to study Spanish at the University of Santiago de Compostela, Galicia, Spain from August 5 to 30, 2019. I stayed in the northern part of Spain where there is a richness of nature and cultural diversity. Moreover, I have gained a lot of experiences and greatly improved my Spanish skills.

The Spanish course at University of Santiago de Compostela helped me a lot to improve my Spanish language skills, especially in terms of speaking. The course was designed not only for studying the Spanish language but also to learn Spanish culture. We had cultural workshops three times a week to learn aspects of Spanish cultures, including dances, food, and songs.
I met many classmates who came from China, UK, Taiwan and Brazil and they became my friends. This is a great opportunity for me to improve my oral and listening skills and make friends with foreigners.
I stayed with a host family. My host mom is a very warm person. She is very open-minded and generous. I felt that I have another family there. Also, I had a great opportunity to speak Spanish everyday, helping me to improve my skills.  During weekends, I traveled to other cities like A coruña, Pontevedra and Vigo.  I appreciated the beauty of Galicia. There are beautiful beaches, cathedrals, and mountains.
After I came back, I gained more confidence to speak Spanish and make friends with foreigners. I learned a lot of vocabulary that I can use for speaking, and I also now have better listening skills. This helps me a lot to have confidence while I am speaking Spanish in my classroom. I have more confidence to do presentations and speak with my teachers. I can apply my knowledge in my Spanish literature course since I learned about Spanish culture there. My summer in Spain is the best summer I ever had in my life. It is one of my best memories.
Ms. Sirima Sangnark, a student in the ICCU program (now known as ICIC in the new curriculum), is a recipient of MUIC’s Foreign Language Ambassador Scholarship grant in 2019.