Mr. Kazuaki Takahashi, a third year student of the School of Computer Science and Engineering at UoA has finished his one-month and a half research (from August 16 - September 27) at University of Porto, Portugal on UoA's Overseas Study Program "Medium Term Overseas Study Program" for Academic Year 2009.
Here are reports on his research and daily life in Portugal.

After finishing his one-month and a half research at University of Porto

Mr. Kazuaki Takahashi

I completed my research at University of Porto, and two weeks have already passed. It was enjoyable and I didn't want to come back to Japan. Portugal isn't an English-speaking country. In fact, almost everyone doesn't speak English, so, I had to study Portuguese. However I didn't have enough time to study before leaving Japan and. I went to Portugal without enough preparation for Portuguese language. For the first few weeks after I arrived in Portugal, I had to order foods with only gesture because I didn't know how to say it in Portuguese.
In the university, most students speak English, and it helped me. When we couldn't speak each other's native language, English was very useful to communicate. If I had remained in Japan, I might not have felt this way. The English the Portuguese speak is clear and not fast, so, it was easily understandable.