Study Abroad
During my senior year of high school, I made the biggest decision of my life to come to the USA to get my bachelor’s degree in Biochemistry. After coming to the US, I have learned a lot of things in how to manage my time in having both work and study at the same time. Coming to a new environment especially away from family is by far one of the hardest things I faced in life. During my freshman year of college my immigration advisor made me sign-up for a KSP class called "Education and Culture in the United States". This class was designed to help international students with the cultural shock that they might face when staying in the US. I was able to learn different things on how the U.S. differs from my culture. For example, I learnt that in America people value time as they have a way of thinking that time is money. What I mean by that is the belief every day spent should contribute something towards your goal, achievement and planning. Back in my country I didn’t understand the value of time, I can spend a day watching a movie or just sleeping, now after I came here, I was able to learn about value of time and how to use it very wisely. I plan very ahead of time of what my week will look like.
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The other culture shock I received is that a lot of Americans are always cheerful and show a smiley face to anyone when walking by. At first, I never understood because in my culture you aren’t to smile or show any gesture to strangers. Thus, through time I was able to understand that it was the culture and I have adopted it now that I have lived in the US for three and half years. In addition to that, the other major thing I realized as being an international student is how language is very essential. Being able to speak English fluently I was able to express myself and stand for my rights. This gives any English speaker the power to stand up for themselves in any circumstances. The other thing is that I was able to make new friends and share my culture, where I came from, and the norms and values I had in my country. This helped me to be socially active and interact with several people all around the world.
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Understanding a country’s culture also includes the political and demographic differences from where I came from. One thing I love about the American system is that no one is above the law and women have a lot of rights that are respected and implemented. For example, in my country politicians abuse their power for their own personal gain, the right of the people isn’t respected. I realized when I came here how the people are subject to any matter, the politicians serve the people and that has amazed me, and I want my country to be like that to have a law where everyone is below that law. Moreover, I was able to live in a very diverse community, which in fact has helped me to interact with different people and learn about their culture and able to introduce my culture to others. This has helped me to work in teams with other people and be flexible with the change of environment. My personal framework from intercultural engagement is having an open-minded perspective and it always a smart move to take good things from others. In fact, I want to help other students from my country to have such opportunity and have the chance to explore what the outside world looks like.
Artifacts : https://www.mnsu.edu
