On the way home I bumped into my housemate who I discovered had just moved to the Czech Republic to do his Erasmus - a common study exchange program found across many European countries in which you study at a sister university whilst drawing an income from your home government. Fancy that!! Study in another country and get paid to do so…. My new friend told me that all universities in Europe offer this and the student has a choice of Erasmus or an internship for 6 months. Amazing! It’s simply amazing how much cross border cultural exchange europeans have - living and studying abroad.

We also spoke of various things, including but not limited to the Syrian Crisis. I also learned that in the Netherlands they have a concept of “Colonial Guilt” which makes them more neutral at times like this. Not dissimilar to Germany’s “WWII Guilt”.

We had a fascinating conversation about various things and even briefly touched on politics, where I discovered that the Dutch are open minded and not only do they allow for Cannabis use but also have already got same-sex marriages.

I started wondering how constricted Australia was and perhaps how much Catholicism shapes the policies we enact….