Africa is the exchange nobody back home will have done, and that's the whole point. A semester in Cairo, Cape Town or Dakar buys you cheap living, wild landscapes and a culture that runs on hospitality, you'll be fed, adopted and invited to things constantly. It's the region where both your money and your comfort zone stretch furthest.
The trade-offs are real. Expect patchy infrastructure, occasional power cuts, bureaucracy that tests your patience, and safety you actually have to think about rather than ignore. Fewer courses run in English than in Europe. You'll thrive here if you're adaptable, curious, and genuinely fine when the plan changes twice before lunch.
