Secret Study Spaces of St. Gallen
I’m realizing after all this time abroad, I haven't posted much about the time I’m actually working instead of traveling the continent! Well, the last few weeks have been full of hard work. My semester goes until about June, but in April there were multiple midterms and assignments that had to be completed, so I took a bit of a travel break to get some work done.
By staying in Switzerland for a couple of weeks straight, I really got to appreciate the school and the surroundings. I only have class on Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, and since early April, I’ve only had class on Monday and Tuesday because my Wednesday classes stopped meeting halfway through the semester. With so much time outside of class, I can’t stay in my apartment all day or else I’ll go crazy. Instead, I found two new favorite study spaces: the square, and the CO/Coworking by SHSG.
The square is a new building that the University of St. Gallen just built this year that was designed with advanced architecture as a forum for communication and collaboration between cultures, business, politics, and society. In this building, certain contemporary classes are held with an interactive setup to encourage innovation. Outside of the classrooms, the rest of the space is a creative study space, with tables and couches and private study cubbies to fit your study needs. What’s extra cool about this building is that there’s a live-in executive with either current or past experience leading corporations worldwide who lives in the Square for a month and is accessible to students and faculty for questions, conversations, or advice. I haven’t met the executive for this month, but he walks around the Square with 4 bodyguards following him so he must be pretty important.
The CO/Coworking by SHSG (Students Union of the University of St. Gallen) is a workspace for students that’s actually located off-campus. To get to the university from my apartment, I need to take either the 9 bus directly to the school or the 1 bus to get to the center of town and then take what feels like 1000 stairs to get to campus. Most of the time I miss the 9 which runs every 30 minutes so I have to go on the trek up the mountain to the University of Stair Gallen. On the days that I don’t have class, though, the CO is a great place to work because it’s located in the town center, which is only a couple stops from me.
Another perk of the CO is that it’s super close to a great relaxing and socializing green where people of all ages go on sunny days - the Abby of St. Gallen. This is actually a UNESCO world heritage site, the Abbey of St. Gall, a catholic religious complex in the center of the city with a beautiful campus and green area with perfect fluffy grass to lay out on. Such a cute city! Anyway, time to get back to studying!
Bis zum nächsten mal!
Kara