Our second day in Augsburg was another busy one! First thing in the morning, we rode the S-Bahn to the University of Augsburg, our partner school for the program. We will be working with business students from the University to present an automotive company analysis at the end of our trip. My group was assigned Hoerbiger, a company that designs steel valves and air compressors for cars, among many other products. The S-Bahn we took was punctual, clean, and ran every few minutes. It was also rather empty due to it being an off-hour. This alone was better than any public transport I experienced back in the U.S., due to the fact that Germany is so much smaller than the U.S.

Once at the University, we finally got to meet the Germans. Together, we made a presentation together about the basic info of our assigned company! After all four groups presented, it was almost noon, so we ate at the University’s dining hall, called the Mensa. We all found the food to be better than anything offered at Pitt. While we had our food costs waived, the food is not free for normal students. There are no dining plans at German Universities, but rather the students must buy their food from the hall. On the flip side, all of the food was very cheap (nothing was more than 4 Euro!), so it is affordable.

After lunch, we went on a tour of the University, given to us by graduate students that will be studying at Pitt next semester. My group was led by Melisa and Janina, who showed us the most important part of the University while comparing American Universities to German ones. For example, their tuition is only 100 Euro per semester and they only have one test for every class (the final). Furthermore, while they have University cards like us, they must manually activate them to utilize transportation services. We had to stop at the machine in the Zentralbibliothek so Janina could activate her card. We also noticed that the University was covered in green, there was even ivy growing on some of the buildings!

Our tour turned into a scavenger hunt in the city! We had to visit several churches, such as St. Ulrich’s and the Dom. These were not only old but also intricately designed and elegant. Both churches also had many graves of influential Ausburgers and crypts! There were a few questions that we had to ask local residents, and since I was the only one who could speak German, I was designated to be the asker. After a few unsuccessful attempts, I managed to get my answers. At the end of the scavenger hunt, we visited a local brewery for a treat!

Photos from St. Ulrich’s

Photos from the Dom

After we left the brewery, we meet up with our group advisors for dinner and the graduate students left us. Overall, it was another long day, but a fun one! Tomorrow, we will be visiting my company, Hoerbiger. I’m looking forward to it! Tschau!

German words Used:

S-Bahn = Street train/car

Zentralbibliothek – Central library

Tschau = Bye