During the first week of July 2022, I reprised my wonderful Erasmus+ PAS (Administrative and Services Personnel) experience. I had already carried out two Erasmus+ PAS stays beforehand in Italy, first in July 2017 at Roma Tre University, and then in 2018 at the University of Eastern Piedmont. Following two years of pandemic, which made undergoing these personally-, academically-, and professionally-enriching stays all but impossible, I was once again able to venture forth thanks to an invitation from Jane Scott, the Director of Marketing & Communications at Queen Margaret University in Edinburgh, Scotland, to learn about the work of the members at her university unit, as well as interact with them, practice English, share the experiences, activities, and initiatives that they carry out there as well as those that we carry out here at the UMH.

Queen Margaret University is located on the eastern outskirts of the city of Edinburgh, but getting to and from it in just a few minutes is easy, either by bus or train. QMU is found in the coastal municipality of Musselburgh, a peaceful and very pleasant place and one that offers numerous undergraduate and graduate programs.

What’s more, I was able to visit the magnificent city of Edinburgh once again, and walk along its famous and emblematic avenues, such as the Royal Mile and Princess Street, climb the hills to Arthur’s Seat and Calton Hill, enjoy its culture, its music and its bagpipes with their characteristic sound setting the ambience for the city’s streets, its castle, Parliament, Palace of Holyroodhouse, the friendly and cordial residents.

And thanks to this Erasmus PAS experience, I was able to practice quite a bit of English.

As such, I hereby encourage students, faculty, and staff to take advantage of, learn from, and undergo Erasmus stays. They enable learning much more about the teaching, research, and management efforts at your own university and those you visit, you learn languages, other cultures, and gastronomy, and meet wonderful people at other universities.