What is the best place to study English as a second language (for Saudi students ) ??

Question

USA,UK,Australia,Canada or New new Zealand , considering VISA , people (and number of arabian people , less is better ) & fees.

Answer 1

G'day,

I used to be an international student in Australia. I will try to help you abit...

From all countries you mentioned, Australia & NZ are most likely have the lowest cost of living, and probably the lowest tuition fee as well. In Australia, on top of that you may need to pay for campus fee (vary from each uni), Overseas Student Health Cover (abt AUD$350/yr) and text books (abt AUD$200). These are the rough estimate of the fees for your study.

Before coming to Australia, you will need to pay the fee for student visa processing and health check-up. You will also be required to take an IELTS test for indication of your English proficiency (depending which country you come from) for application to English school and for visa.

Living cost... Sydney and Canberra have the highest living cost, followed by Melbourne & Brisbane, then Perth, Darwin, Adelaide & Tasmania the lowest. I am attaching a weblink from one of the uni in Melbourne as an indication.

I'm living in Melbourne and this is what you're going to find in Melbourne:
1. First of all... some people do not like the weather in Melbourne (you can have 4 seasons in one day). However, if you read the second weblink from The Age newspaper, you will find out that the weather is still more preferable than the other cities. Sure you can have 42C day like last month, but almost immediately you'll get a much cooler weather pretty soon afterwards. It is very rarely that you got 2 or 3 consecutive days of hot weathers (unlike Sydney, Brisbane or Perth).
2. Melbourne is a city of diversity. If you are a newcomer, and you do not look 'Anglo-Saxon', you do not feel like an 'alien', since you can find almost every race in the world walking in the city. They are both immigrants and overseas students.
3. THE FOOD!! Chinese, Italian, Japanese, Thai, All-you-can-eat, African, Lebanese, Mexican, Sea Food... anything else? All available and lots of them in a very-very-very affordable price
4. Pretty good public transport system. With one ticket, you can switch from train, tram and bus. They do not always come on-time, but still reliable and improving (www.metlinkmelbourne.com.au). Good for students, since not all can afford car.
5. SHOPPING!!! Original branded clothing sold very cheap. There are even shopping tour, where the participants are taken to retails outlets just for shopping. Big temptations for ladies.
6. Crime rates... just read the third article on the bottom.
7. Night Life... hmmmm... I'll say the centre of nite activities will be Crown Casino and Docklands. Altho there are still plenty of cafe's and clubs scattered around the suburbs as well.
8. Tourist attraction. This is the area that I think Sydney is better than Melbourne, since it has most of it's attraction within its suburbs. Most Melbourne attraction are pretty much out of Melbourne, such as the gold mines in the cities of Bendigo and Ballarat, The Great Ocean Road, Lakes Entrance, Grampians, skiing in Mt. Buller etc.
9. Melbourne has a large Muslim community around Brunswick suburbs, but they are comprised by ppl from different country of origins. I do believe though that there are not too many Saudi ppl here.

Hope this helps. Good luck for your study :)

Answer 2

Ignore "Your Father". His answer is completely unhelpful. Your English is excellent and will only improve. Don't feel ashamed for not understanding. Slang is often regional. Sometimes things like "I don't give a damn" will be understood by most native English speakers, but not everything works that way. Don't feel bad about asking, your friends want to help you. I have been building up my French vocabulary recently and I find the best way to really retain new words in my memory is to write them and their definitions down. Maybe a few times. Most dictionaries will have synonyms, different words that have the same meaning. Learn one or two of those also. But it sounds to me like you're doing the right things, just keep it up, learning a language fluently takes a long time, but it's worth it. :)

Answer 3

USA used to be the perfect place before the Bush era. A friend did a 2 month program in New Zealand 3 years ago… he loved it so much and appreciated the culture.

Answer 4

Would you like to study English in England? Or perhaps USA/Canada.

Answer 5

Try Franklin College Switzerland. Classes are in english, ELS program, theres a lot of arab speaking students there, and they take care of the visa for you.

Answer 6

I'd say Canada and New Zealand, purely on the basis of hearsay and gut feeling.

Answer 7

Definitely not the US.

You will be prejudiced against more here than anywhere else.

Answer 8

move on NZ - best choice - less people , kooool condition to live on & no god damn arrests in the name of "War on Terror" like other countries (i presume u know what i mean) :)