Tips & Advice for an Erasmus in Athens

In the following section, you are going to read all the information about scholarships, transportation, the best spots to live, and how to make Athens your home for a semester or a full year.

The Erasmus Scholarship

When you are going on an Erasmus, you inevitably have questions about money. Here are the 3 main helps for students:

The scholarship (Crous): As you are still a French student from a university in France, you can be eligible for this scholarship. Then, every month you receive a certain amount.

The Erasmus+ scholarship: To be eligible for this grant, funded by the European Union, you will need to complete the document provided by your university when submitting your Erasmus administrative procedures. Once your scholarship has been accepted, you will receive it twice. The first time, you will receive 70% of the grant in the following month after you arrive in Athens. For the rest, you will receive at the end of your Erasmus, once going back to France. In total, I received around 2 500 euros for one year.

Support for international mobility: For this scholarship, which is also financed by the European Union, eligibility depends on social criteria. In other words, if you are eligible for the Crous grant, you can also be eligible for this one. You should also have a look at your region because some regions encourage international mobility, and the eligibility varies from one region to another.

In my case, I was only eligible for the Erasmus+ scholarship.

The best neighborhoods

The location of your accommodation makes a difference. Indeed, as in any city, there are the best spots to live in. Here are the best neighborhoods for me to choose from as an Erasmus student:

Ambelokoipi/Gkyzi: These two places are neighboring districts. Just for you to understand, Ambelokoipi is both a neighborhood and a metro station. So, I lived in Gkyzi for 9 months, and I was really happy with the neighborhood. First, it is well served in terms of transportation. Indeed, I was 8 minutes away by foot from the metro station of Ambelokoipi. Ambelokoipi is on the blue line, which is the more modern metro line and the one who cross Athens from the airport, to the center of Athens, and to the port. Moreover, there are loads of buses passing through the district. I was at half an hour by bus from the university, and 10/15 minutes by bus and metro from the center. I was also well located in terms of supermarkets and local markets; I had a supermarket just on the corner of my street, and almost every Saturday, I went to a local market in Ampelokoipi. Last point, as a person who loves practicing sports, I had a playground to play basketball 10 minutes by foot from my apartments, and a park 20 minutes by foot. I really recommend those neighborhoods.

Exarchia: Exarchia is the spot of the Erasmus students. Most of the people I met lived there. It is the most lively and dynamic district for students. Indeed, most of the cheap bars are in the streets of that neighborhood. More than that, it is also well served in terms of transportation, especially buses. If you are in Exarchia, you will take more buses than the metro. In fact, Exarchia is in the middle of two metro lines - the blue and the green. For each line, you have to walk a bit to reach one, approximately 15/20 minutes.

Zografou: This neighborhood is great if you want to be close to the university. There are two campuses at NKUA. In your case, as an English Bachelor's student, you are going to the Philosophy building in Zografou. One disadvantage is that you are a bit far from the center of Athens. Then, even though there are buses, it is not the best place for transportation.

Two other neighborhoods are also famous: Victoria and Omonia. On the one hand, in terms of location, there are 2 good spots to live in because they are well-served and close to everything (the center, shops...). On the other hand, Victoria and Omonia are 2 neighborhoods where you can feel easily insecure, especially at night.

Transportation

The transportation in Athens is quite good.

I had an Athenian transport card for Athens and its region. For a student, you need to know that you have a discount. To have this discount, you will have to show your acceptance letter for you to justify that you are studying in Athens. Therefore, I had a card for the metro, the buses, and the tramway.

There are 3 different metro lines in Athens: the first and oldest one, the green line; the second line is the red one; and the most modern, the third line, is the blue line. All of the lines are passing through the center of Athens, Syntagma, and Monastiraki. Only the green and the blue lines are going to the port, Piraeus. And, one advantage of the blue line is that it is the only line that goes directly to the airport, while the other lines require a change. However, it is really easy to change from one line to another.

About the buses, there are a lot of them everywhere in Athens. There are bus stops on every corner, and that can take you wherever you want in Athens.

The tramway mainly works on the coast. There are 2 tramways: one along the coast, and another that goes from Syntagma to the beach. If you want to go to the beach, you can either take a bus or the tram.

Travelling in Greeece

I had never traveled by boat as much as I did before going to Greece. Indeed, taking a boat became as usual as taking a train in France.

All the boats to go to the Saronic and Ionian Islands, and the Cyclades leave from the Piraeus port. The Piraeus was a half hour by metro from my apartment, so it was really easy to go.

There are loads of different companies to travel through the islands, and the size of the boat consequently differs from one destination to another. For example, when I went to Crete, I took a night boat on which you have the possibility to book a room. While, when I went to the Saronic Islands, the boats where more little and had only a few seats as the crossing went between 1h30 and 2h30.

Even though some destinations could seem a bit far away, the boat remains cheaper than going by plane.

To travel on the mainland, I mainly used rental cars. But some of my friends were using the Ktel buses. The Ktel buses are the equivalent of the Flixbus in France.

About the rental cars: It is as easy as hard to rent a car in Athens and in Greece in general because most companies have criteria for renting. First, it is easier to rent if you are 23 years old or older. I do not say it is impossible to rent a car under 23 years old. We actually found some companies who accepetd to rent us a car with someone 21 years old. Another point is to have a credit card instead of a debit card. Some companies only accept credit cards because with a debit card, you can incur taxes.

Discover my travels !

Make Athens your home

I am the kind of person who needs to have habits to feel that I belong somewhere, and Athens was my home for 9 months. Then, I am going to tell you some habits I had there.

It was kind of easy to create or replace habits in Athens. Indeed, it is a big city, so there are always things to do. One of the habits I had was going to the local market on Saturday in Exarchia. There are local markets in France, but in Greece, it is something more spread throughout the culture. For instance, in the supermarket, I quickly noticed that there were not a lot of choices of vegetables and they were not as good-looking as those at a local market. Therefore, almost every Saturday, I went to buy vegetables at the local market with my friends.

Another habit I had was playing basketball with my friends. Almost all the neighborhoods of Athens have open playgrounds where you can play basketball, volleyball, football, or even tennis. Then, twice or three times per week, we gathered in an open playground to play basketball. Once my friends, with whom I played basketball, went back to France, I replaced it with running in the parks of Athens. There are 2 parks in Athens: the National Garden in Syntagma, and the Pedion Areos between Gkyzi and Kypseli.

The last habit I want to share is working in coffee shops with friends. As my campus was a bit far away from my apartment, I did not want to take a half-hour bus to work. Then, with some friends, we gathered in coffee shops to study. It is a thing that a lot of Greek students do too.