Fig. 5: Zimmer- und Wohnungsvermittlung Universität/ETH Zürich by Kevin S. '19
aka ETH Zürich dorm tour!
I’m finally back in the US of A after 6 continuous months abroad, and it’s been refreshing to not have to rely on my broken A1.2 Schwiizerdütsch to get around on a daily basis. Random things I’ve dearly missed: In-N-Out, Asian food, sourdough bread, cheaper prices, and Home.
The past few weeks, I’ve been settling in to my summer studio apartment, interning the 9-to-5, cooking, and adulting (read: making sure I pay my bills on time). Oh, and studying. I finished and turned in one final paper for Human-Computer Interaction, but I still need to prepare for my Intro to ML and UbiComp finals in a few weeks. I’m also half-way thru with my 12-week internship (time flies!), and am also preparing for the collegiate championships during the first weekend of August.
In the meantime, I’ve somehow taken over 138 GB of photos this year, and I’ve been slowly going through all my pics and videos. I put together a short tour of my dorm and room in Zürich with the help of my fellow MIT exchangers.
Student housing is run by an external company called WOKO that owns several apartment complexes scattered throughout the greater Zürich area. I got really lucky to be placed in one just a few blocks away from the ETH main campus. All the rooms are singles, with additional common spaces in each dorm, suite-styles in others.
Two of the five other MIT exchangers, Wings Y. ’19 and Riley D. ’19, were also placed at the one I’m in, Culmannstrasse 26. Monthly rent is subsidized to a mere CHF 500-600.-, probably the only reasonably-priced expense during my stay. Most of the other residents are full-time students attending either ETH or the University of Zurich, from undergrads to PhDs coming from all throughout Switzerland, Europe, and the world. It was such a unique mix of nationalities, ethnic groups, and languages that were spoken, probably something that I’ll never experience again. I even went on a trip to Barcelona with a bunch of my dormmates to watch my suitemate conquer the IRONMAN–just incredible!
Shoutout to everyone at Culmann for a great semester, and to Floor 1 for being the best floor too!