Meet Misbah from Pakistan
Name: Misbah Ashraf Chattah
Home Country and City: Pakistan, Islamabad
Programme of Study: MSc Management
Personal Interests: Travelling, Book Reading, Politics
Favourite thing about Umeå University: University Library (by Lindellhallen), where I use to spend most of my time while studying different books.
Favourite Swedish word or custom: Fika
Why did you choose to enroll in your degree programme at Umeå University?
From the very beginning, I was very much eager to study outside my home city because I wanted to have an experience of independent life. But, I am from a culture where concept of study abroad is not so common so I never thought of studying abroad in the beginning. However, after completing my Master’s in Business Administration and having a global view of the world I found that it’s not impossible to study abroad from culture like mine. I made my mind, which I think is the biggest thing to achieve any goal and collected some information of foreign universities, where I found Umeå to be my first priority due its Business Degree programmes and highly qualified teachers all around the world.
What’s it like to study at Umeå University?
There is no doubt that the European education system is quite different from my home country. Here, teacher focus more on the knowledge and in depth concept about different things. While in my country, no doubt, knowledge is also important but more focus is being given on knowing everything instead of fully understanding it completely, which sometime makes it more difficult for the student to remember and understand the whole concept. Therefore, in the beginning I found it very easy at Umeå University, because for me those things were not so difficult to catch as I was from high context culture. However, after my first module I start realising that now my concept building is changing and I noticed that I have start gaining the things that I would have never gain in my home country. Different perspectives of seeing the same thing added more to my knowledge building. In addition, knowledge sharing with International student from all over the world made me absorbent for the entropy of learning business science.
Umeå University not only helped me in gaining right insight of the business world, in fact, it also helped me in my personal development. I got to know many different perspectives of different people doing the same things, which I would have never gained in my home country.
What is your impression of Umeå and the surrounding areas?
For this, I always say thanks to Allah who helped me in selecting Umeå as my first choice for studying in any foreign university. I must say Umeå is one of the best place in world for STUDIES, as it has all the world class facilities for the students. Umeå has nice university with intellectual faculty all over the world, world-class gym IKSU for all the people to stay fit and healthy, fully furnished accommodations, health facilities with one of the largest Nordic hospitals. And how can I forget to mention the splendid weather of this city, which is white with snow in winter and green in summer with its beautiful scenery views.
What do you find as the biggest cultural difference, both socially and educationally, from your country with Sweden?
Socially speaking people in Sweden are more independent especially pupils like me, who were always dependent on their family while studying. However, here people are very independent, but still they are very much outgoing, enjoy life and have different positive recreations instead of doing nothing and staying idle all the time. I have felt a great change in myself, as I am more responsible and socially active than I was before in my own country.
However, for education, I see the one main difference and that is the dependency of student on teacher. Here I found that students are not always dependent on teachers, they just give the direction and then students have to find the way of their own by research and this ultimately gives them confidence to gain more knowledge. However, in my education system the student is more dependent on teacher he or she always thinks that what teacher says is always right and all what they can get is just from the teacher and this does not make the student as confident as they should be in field of knowledge development.
Secondly. sometimes teachers also don’t like if students know more than the teachers and this develops a gap between a teacher and student, which I never felt here in Sweden, as the students are always free to ask as many questions as they can.
What you like best about the town of Umeå and its surroundings?
No doubt, I like everything about Umeå as it was my first home abroad and it gave me so much confidence that now I have seen most of the Europe and never felt afraid of anything. Umea River, its northern lights, Nydala Lake, and everything has made me very close to nature. 16-hour sun and 18 hour night has also gained me insight of the new world, where I felt amazingly different in both the seasons. My best place for recreation after studies is IKSU, where Yoga and some physical exercise keep me mentally and physically healthy and fit. Therefore, there is no one thing that I can mention best in Umeå because for me whole Umeå is, as my hometown and I love everything about this city.
What you would say to another international student thinking of attending Umeå University?
I would say this to all international students who are thinking to study at Umeå University, they can mark my words that they might think before coming here, but while leaving they will have lot of good memories that they will remember throughout their lives. Umeå is going to be the European Capital of Culture in 2014, I might not able to see Umea at that time, but everyone who will be there at that time will enjoy their studies at their full. Excellent living facilities, all the conveniences to support the study subjects, teachers like Ralf Mueller - who not only becomes the inspiration for the student but is also a true guideline - are the real essence of any institute. Moreover, I am sure all the teachers are master of their field and they have all the talent, which is required to understand the in depth concept of any subject.
