Traveling
Traveling to your study destination and back
Arrive at the study abroad destination approximately a week before the start of the semester. It will make it easier to settle in and find long-term accommodation. It will also help you get the most out of your orientation and the first days of classes because you’ve had time to recover from jet lag. Please note that you must apply for a student visa before the semester starts. For this reason, we don’t recommend you travel to the destination earlier than 1 week before the start of the semester. Read more about :
Some students go to Asia weeks before starting the study program to go backpacking and don’t have time to apply for visas at home. You can, in some cases, apply for a visa from another country’s Indonesian/Thai/Japanese embassy – but keep in mind that it is not always possible to apply for a student visa from anywhere else except your home country. It is recommended to travel after the semester rather than before the semester start.
If you want to travel after the semester and don’t know your returning date, ask your travel agency their policies and fees for changing a return date on an airline ticket or buying a ticket with an open return date. Shop around to find the best deals.
You can book your flights after you’ve gotten the initial acceptance letter from Asia Exchange. Note, however, that if the semester dates on our website are still tentative, they may change.
We are cooperating with the travel agency STA Travel. They offer flights tailored to our study abroad programs with special benefits for our students.
STA Travel is a specialist for affordable flights all over the world. Especially students and young adults benefit from their affordable and flexible fees, which are unique to STA Travel. Like we, our partner STA travel emphasizes personalized, high-quality service. Instead of an anonymous online flight search, after filling out the form, you will receive a flight offering tailored to your study abroad program by the STA Travel staff.
Traveling in Asia is very affordable – you can explore the continent even while on a student budget.
Get to know the public transportation system even though taxis are cheap. It’s not only ecological but also the most economical form of transportation.
Using the subway is one of the most convenient means of transportation in the cities where it’s available. Bangkok has a very small-scale subway network and it’s mostly substituted by the Skytrain (Bangkok Mass Transit System, BTS), which will take you from A to B above the city in a jiffy.
Scooters and motorbikes are very popular among the locals in Asian cities. However, we recommend you use them at your own discretion because the risk of accidents is much greater than when traveling by car. In Phuket, the monthly rent for a scooter is about 40 EUR.
Walking in the cities and their surrounding areas can be very rewarding. It gives you a chance to see local life unfolding from the viewpoint of the average city dweller and you can pop into numerous little boutiques, markets and restaurants.
Bangkok is called the center of Asian air traffic. Its airports are very convenient when traveling to nearby destinations with budget airlines, the most popular Air Asia. You can fly to other destinations in Thailand (e.g., Phuket, Krabi and Chiang Mai) or to neighboring countries (e.g., Hong Kong, Hanoi, Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Bali, etc.) very easily.
