Exchange with Other Institutions Having School-to-School or University-Wide Student Exchange Agreement/ETH Zurich/Oct 2-Dec 27, 2018

The Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Zurich popularly known as ETH Zurich is one of the leading university in Switzerland and ranked in the 11thplace in the world university 2018/2019 ranking by Times Higher Education. It was founded in 1855 to serve as a driving force behind Swiss industry and since then the university have succeeded in gathering and training talented people which as a result have enabled them to produce 21 Nobel Prize winners.

The number of students is approximately 18 thousand with international students accounting for approximately 38%. ETH Zurich is famous worldwide not only for its ranking as one of the top universities in the world but also because Einstein spent some time teaching there. (Einstein’s locker is on showcase there).

Before going to ETH Zurich, I made some preparations and sort information regarding, accommodation, weather during my stay, Zurich transportation system, and standard of living. I was lucky to have met an ETH Zurich student who were doing and exchanged program at Tokyo Tech. They assisted in helping with finding a suitable accommodation at a fair price of 600 CHF (Approx. 66,000 yen) which is quite cheap for the room size and the facilities. Living expenses is quite expensive in Zurich, however I learnt that if one prepares their own meals most of the time and rents a bicycle for moving around, one can live within the same living standards as Tokyo.

I visited ETH Zurich as a visiting researcher to the Institute of Transport Planning and Systems under Prof. Kay. W Axhausen’s research group. My research was focused on modelling an agent-based transport simulation (MATSim) scenario for Lagos, Nigeria. The objective was to show to apply MATSim to Lagos Household Travel Surveydata to show a microscopic model of traffic flow inLagos State.Upon my arrival I was introduced to members working with MATSim who were ready to guide and support me throughout my research experience at ETH. I was allowed to sit in for an ETH class on Agent Based Transport Modelling.

Further analysis was then carried for traffic count validation and travel time accessibility calculations. The last two weeks of my research time was spent on writing a working paper about my results. Given the amount of time available for the research, the purpose of the visiting research was met and expanded to reveal further improvement and future work necessary to achieve better results. This involves expanding the baseline traffic scenario for Lagos to include a more detailed public transport network because at the present stage of the traffic scenario generated, public transportation is not fully modelled as para-transit which has a 46% modal share in Lagos is not properly simulated.Furthermore,is to include freight to the network and model the whole population of Lagos using population synthesis to create synthetic persons representing every person living in Lagos.

Beyond research work, I had a wonderful time at the ETH Honggerberg campus where my research group is located. The members of my research group are amazing people, very supportive and contributed a great deal to help me in achieving my research objectives. Lunch time was a great opportunity to know more about them as the group members mostly ate lunch together at the Honggerberg campus cafeteria. On some days when the Prof. Axhausen is around, he would join us. We also had brown bag seminars biweekly where we all ate sandwiches prepared by the institute while listening to one student in the group present about their research.

I used some weekends to visit recommended sites in Zurich as well as go to the Christmas market in Germany. With a Schengen visa or a Swiss professional visa (which I had) one can visit countries in the European union. I also spent Thursday evening at the Thirstday Bar, a student organized bar at the CHN Building in ETH Zentrum campus. This way I could interact with some of the students freely and participate in some activities organized there such as candle making.

For my accommodation and expensesas have been mentioned above, I was lucky to find a shared flat in a central areabefore arriving in Zurich. My living expenses were always below 400 CHF per month as I prepared most of my meals myself and ate a few times at the campus cafeteria. I used abike to commute to the nearest ETH campus and took the ETH free link bus to Honggerberg. This was until it became too cold to use a bike and I had to buy a monthly Zurich pass for about 80 CHF. This allowed me to use the trams, buses or trains within the Zurich city zone and for my commute.

In conclusion, my study abroad experience at ETH met more than my expectations and afforded me an opportunity to learn from great minds in the field of my interest. I also learnt a lot about the Swiss culture, was ableto expand my network and develop relationships with interesting people. My message to those interested in study abroad is that, it is a great opportunity to expand your view of the world, meet interesting people, and learn new things from diverse perspectives. So if you have even a tiny chance to study abroad, do it.

Here are a few pictures to share my experiences.