Universitӓt Tϋbingen
2014 Semester One
BA POLS
Arrival Procedures
I arrived in Tübingen about a week before class was due to start. Tübingen is relatively easy to get
to - I just flew in to Stuttgart airport and asked the airport staff where to get the bus to Tübingen.
The bus takes about 45 minutes and costs a few euro (you buy your ticket on the bus).
When I got to Tübingen I was a bit confused as to where to go at first. The bus will drop you off at
the main bus stop, which is next to the Hauptbahnhof (main train station). If, like most exchange
students at Tübingen, you are staying at Waldhäuser Ost (WHO), you need to get to the street
address Fichtenweg 5. To do this you have a couple of options. You can get a bus (from memory,
you can get 2, 3, 4, 5 (very slow!!) or 6 - but double-check this, it will say WHO at the front of the
bus). Get off at the stop « Ahornweg » and then ask someone how to get to Fichtenweg 5 - don’t
worry if you don’t speak German, most young people speak English! However, because you’ll
probably have a lot of stuff with you, my recommendation is to get a taxi. Private taxis are available
at the main train station (if you are looking at the station entrance, the taxis are on the right). A taxi
to Fichtenweg 5 will cost you about 10 euro.
WHO is probably the ideal place to live as a New Zealand exchange student in Tübingen. It’s a
large complex of apartment buildings, some furnished, some unfurnished, and all of varying quality
(I ended up paying around 120NZD per week). I knew people staying in various apartments at
WHO, and they are all very liveable and affordable. Exchange students are spread out around the
apartment buildings - if you have a shared apartment, you will be living with German students of
various ages and won’t be placed with other exchange students. WHO seems like it’s far away
from town/university, but because it’s so popular there are buses going down to town every couple
of minutes - it’s actually more convenient than the other residence halls that might appear closer to
town. WHO is also really close to two supermarkets: TREFF 3000 (cheaper) and Edeka (nicer). It
even has its own club, Kuckuck, which has insanely cheap drinks and is open till 4am. NOTE:
bedding is not automatically provided at WHO, and you will need to pay about 30 euros when you
arrive to rent it. Also, bring an Ethernet cable with you when you arrive if you want to use the
internet.
The initial administration to sign up at Tübingen can be pretty frustrating. In the first week I
struggled to find out what I was actually meant to do to get the whole process started. I
recommend that you email the exchange coordinator (in my year it was Simone Hahne) and ask
what to do, but basically you just go to the exchange/international office with your passport and
they will give you tips on what to do next. Try and get your matriculation completed as soon as
possible (this involves going all over town/university to pick up various documents!) as you need it
to sign up to classes. Signing up for classes can also be a bit daunting compared to Otago - once
again, it’s not immediately clear what you’re meant to do! I studied Politics and also American
Studies papers (which I credited to my Politics degree at Otago), so I can only really give advice on
those. There’s a building called Brechtbau at the university (just ask for the location when you go to
the exchange office; it’s on Friedrichstrasse, the main street) which is like the Burns building of
Tübingen - pretty much all the arts classes are held there. In the first few weeks you can go to the
noticeboards on the ground floor of Brechtbau; on the noticeboards there will be a list of all the arts
papers you can take, what times they are held and how many credits they are worth. There are
heaps of papers in English, so you should have enough to choose from. Remember, for your
degree you will probably need to take 4 papers worth 6 ECTS each (which will credit back to your
maximum 4 papers back at Otago) plus another paper or two (which won’t credit back to Otago) to
make up around 30 total ECTS. It can be hard to work out what level each of the papers is
equivalent to, so you will probably have to email your department supervisor at Otago a few times
to confirm your papers. Also remember that « seminars » are different from « Vorleisungen »
(lectures) - they are small classes, generally at a higher level than lectures, and usually require
class participation as part of your grade. To actually sign up for the papers, you can either do it
online once you’ve matriculated, or just attend the first class and ask the lecturers to sign you up.
Academically, classes at Tübingen aren’t very challenging, but required a bit more work than I
expected to do on exchange. Attendance at class is compulsory (you are allowed a maximum of
two absences) and each class is about an hour and a half long. Furthermore, at higher levels, most
politics students at Tübingen have to complete a long essay for each paper in order to qualify for
the full 6 ECTS, so I had to do a few 10- or 15-page essays throughout the semester. If you are in
the same boat, I recommend that you ask your lecturer whether or not you can be exempt from
some requirements since you are an exchange student - for example, you could ask to do a brief
oral exam instead of writing a long essay. This worked for one paper for me, so it’s worth a shot.
Even if you have to do big essays, though, native English speakers have a big advantage and
exchange students usually get good grades.
Tübingen is a great town to live in. It’s a small place, much like Dunedin - you could explore all the
best parts of the town in about a day. This makes it comfortable and easy to get around, especially
because the bus system is really convenient (in case you can’t be bothered walking). In sunny
weather, the best places to hang out are the Neckarinsel (the island in the middle of the river), the
steps of the Stiftskirche (the big church in the old town), the Altebotanischegarten (the botanical
gardens near the university), and Bebenhausen (a beautiful little German town about half an hour’s
walk away from WHO - the forests and fields around here are great). Food-wise, there are plenty of
cheap kebab places that do great food (my favourites are Kalender (for meat-eaters) and
Kichererbse (for vegan kebabs)), gelato stores, bakeries, pubs, and others to choose from. If you
are in town and pressed for time, the MENSA at University also does cheap lunches and dinners
with plenty of options, but beware, these can be a real mixed bag!
Tübingen is a student town like Dunedin, so the nightlife is also really good. The biggest club is
Top10, which is definitely worth visiting at least once. The student association also throws plenty of
parties throughout the semester, and almost every week there will be a party at Clubhaus hosted
by different university faculties. Kuckuck (the WHO club) was basically my second home, since it
was so convenient and so cheap.
Travel-wise, Tübingen is quite well placed to get to a number of worthwhile tourist destinations.
Stuttgart is a quick bus ride away, and Munich is about 5 hours’ bus ride away. Strasbourg in
France and Lake Constance on the Swiss border are both about 3 hours’ train ride away. There
are also plenty of little towns and castles to be discovered in Tübingen’s region, BadenWürttemberg. Travel tip: get a group of 5 people together and buy a Baden-Württemberg day ticket
at the train station if you are planning on travelling around the Baden-Württemberg region by train this makes things much, much cheaper.
Money-wise, I found Tübingen pretty affordable considering it’s located in a wealthy European
country. I am a very bad budgeter, so I cannot put an exact figure on what I spent, but it was
somewhere between $7,500NZD and $10,000NZD (including flights and travel) - again, quite
reasonable considering this included plenty of reckless spending on my part. Remember to apply
for the Baden-Württemberg Stipendium before you arrive - this scholarship is worth 2500 euro, and
will definitely help!
In conclusion, my semester in Tübingen was a great experience, and I would thoroughly
recommend it to anybody interested in living and travelling in Europe.