The curious case of the international students of Nepali origin (Vol. 1): My story

The curious case of the international students of Nepali origin (Vol. 1)

My story

This two volume article is a mosaic of stories about the ups and downs in life of international students of Nepali origin. In volume 1, I will succinctly narrate my own personal account of the story as an international student in Europe and New Zealand. Volume 2 will ease into the contemporary story about the international students in New Zealand.

The write up is based on my own story, and my observation and personal accounts shared with me by international students. Any omission or mis-interpretations should be viewed as the author’s limitations.

A privileged boy from Kathmandu in the Scandinavian winter

I got shock of my life when I arrived in København, Danmark (Copenhagen, Denmark) for my studies on 25 August 2002. My University started on the second week of my arrival in Copenhagen. By the third week, I had landed on my first part-time job. My first job in Copenhagen was to distribute magazines in apartments. This job was a “graveyard shift” - a typical shift started at 2AM in the morning and ended around 6AM before daylight. Weekends would start earlier around 12AM. The role involved collecting the daily newspapers, “Politiken” and “Berlingske Tidende”, from depot located in central Copenhagen, and distributing it to the households (predominantly 4-5 storey apartments) in the central and fringe kommuner (suburbs). Simple, right?

My mode of transport on and off the job was a trashy bicycle reassembled from salvaged parts. That was all I could afford back then. I vividly recall that one of my proudest moment during my stay in Denmark was when I bought a brand new bike. Danes drive to the right side of the road, in contrast to what I had been accustomed to until I arrived in Copenhagen. Until many months, I spoke only two phrases of Danish with full confidence. Those two phrases were “hi” and “hi hi”. The twin word means “bye” på dansk. på dansk = "in Danish language".

August, my month of arrival, is considered the warmest month in Denmark. By Danish standard, that is. September, my inaugural month on the job, is sort of beginning of the autumn season. In the hindsight, I was unaware and was so unprepared for what was coming, weather-wise. In a couple of week on the job, my course at the University began to progress in full speed. During weekdays, when I had to juggle both job and University, I would not have time to catch enough sleep. At times, I would be on the go without any sleep for 24+ hours. I vividly remember those times when I would be like a walking zombie. Sleep deprivation, apparently, is considered one of the worst form of torture. The University course was full on with frequent group work with colleagues. So often, my colleagues would have mercy on me and would generously offer to help me out of my sleep deprivation. At times, when they noticed that my eyelids were in the auto mode of shutting down, my colleagues would ask me to take a cat nap for a while during the group work sessions.

Soon after few weeks of arrival in Denmark, the reality and full brunt of Scandinavian winter hit me. In the middle of winter months of November to February, there would hardly be any sunshine. The sky would almost always be covered by think dark cloud hanging so low above your head, that it looked like ceiling of your apartment. I experienced minimum temperature of below -20०C for the first time in my life. And I would be on the job biking outdoors braving the howling headwind. The wind chill would probably be -25०C or even less. Tears due to this level of bitter cold would freeze at the corner of my eyes. Warm air from my body would crystallise on the periphery of my nostrils. I distinctly remember the feeling as if the cold air entered from my right ear, pierced through my brain and shot out from my left ear. Harsh. It was harsh and ruthless cold.

All those reality of life’s struggles in the early days of arriving in a foreign country occurred during the month of September and October 2003. The months happened to include the festive season of Dashain and Tihar, the two most important festivals celebrated nationally in Nepal. The home sickness was simply too much, in the face, during Tihar for the simple fact that grew up with four sisters at home. There I was braving Scandinavian chill during Tihar, including on the bhai tika day (the day when brothers receive special blessings from sisters). You may imagine what a privileged (sort of) newar boy from a typical traditional family might have gone through in his head while going through all those emotional rollercoaster.

Have you realised I haven’t yet written much about why I was in Denmark in the first place? This is the irony and the reality of our international students. They arrive in the foreign education institutions as students but life takes priority over the necessity to survive. Study comes only after that, needless to mention.

The madness of the clash of cultures

At the University of Copenhagen, not only the level of expectation sought from the course supervisors was too high but also the students were expected to lead their own study programme. My course, MSc International Development, was one of the rare few courses offered in English. There were students from more than 15 countries. I kind of felt that I was there at the University representing my country and that I needed to succeed to earn respect for myself and Nepal. I wished not only to succeed but to succeed well. That would soon prove to be an unwise self-induced pressure. In hindsight, a bit too unrealistic and so unnecessary.

One example of having to deal with a new education system was that for the first time in my entire academic life, my opinion was being sought and valued. In classes, I would be almost daily and frequently asked, “what do you think about this, Mr Maharjan”? I found those wh questions the hardest to answer. Until then, I had never learned or practiced to answer those sort of open-ended question. It was not necessarily that I did not know the answer to those questions. It was intimating because I was never trained to articulate or speak up about my personal opinion. From childhood, my brain was institutionally inculcated to be humble. Both in social and academic life. I was taught that banging my own drum was not our culture. That speaking up was rude. I was frequently being told what to do. Note, “told”, never asked. Even worse, almost always reminded what not to do - don't do this, should not do that, and so on.

The stark reality in the different approaches to teaching and learning never occurred to me so clearly until then. I was a product of an education system where the goal was to be an expert in taking exams and scoring higher grades. How much percentage did you score in the annual exam was the sole indicator of success. Learning was hardly ever consciously or proactively offered at school and college. As a student, I have no recollection of making learning a conscious choice. Those things were completely missing from the pedagogy environment, unfortunately. Back then, education almost was mostly about, “passing in the upcoming exam”.  It was more a vicious cycle of route learning, regurgitating and forgetting.

The ongoing cultural shock since arrival and the countless instances of not being able to deal with or respond to the basic language and simple etiquette would occur frequently on a daily basis.  The cold and dry danish humour continued to be something I could not fathom to find a trace slightest funny even after three years of my stay over there. The resulting embarrassment from such lack of social skills started to morph into shame. Knowingly or inadvertently, it gradually contributed towards a greater degree of withdrawal from other than must-do activities or social exchanges.

Happy days - gradually and finally

In 2003, about a year since arriving in Copenhagen, things started to change. I started to build networks, and finally got a job as a crew member in Burger King at the heart of Central Copenhagen. The store was one of the busiest in the entire Denmark. It was situated at a prime location in Vesterbrogade, which is one of the busiest streets in Copenhagen. The store was right in front of Tivoli which is the second-oldest operating amusement park in the world. It was located only about 50 meters from rådhuspladsen (City Hall Square). Though it was almost always crazy busy, I loved my new job. My first reason for the new found happiness was that it was an indoor job. I no longer needed to navigate -20०C in bone chilling conditions. I chose night shifts as they paid twice the day rate. I worked long hours. At times, I would do back-to-back full shifts during summer months when there would be no cap in student hours.

In about one and a half year, with the money saved, I made a trip to Scandinavia, Western Europe and Australia before heading to Nepal for my masters’ thesis. In June 2005, I graduated with Masters in International Development. I did it with good grades. In my research methodology paper, I scored the highest you could score in the Danish grading system. By the end of my stay of three years in Denmark, I had a degree in my hand. I managed to forge life-long friendship with colleagues and teachers from the University. Some of them are very close to my heart even until this day, and we still keep in touch on an on-going basis. I learned new cultures as I had colleagues from all over the world in my class. I learned to speak a few new languages (Spanish and Danish), albeit only a limited number of phrases (in addition to “hi” and “hi hi”, and "uno, dos, tres"). As part of my course in 2004, I travelled to South Africa with about 50 University students from three different Universities of Denmark. It was an exchange programme with Universities in South Africa. That exchange taught me a lot, both about the course material and the post-apartheid South Africa.

Doing it all over again - similar story and different place - but better results

I arrived in New Zealand on 25 September 2005. In the first week of my arrival, I had an interview in a consulting company, Anzdec (now FCG Anzdec). Of course, I did not get that job. It went to someone with 15 years of experience in the United Nation. As I continued to get turned down from all the jobs (maybe 20+) I applied for, I took on odd jobs of working in fast food outlets (Burger King and Mcdonalds) and call centres. I did phone surveys. I braved the Auckland rain and wind to door knock in Papakura and Otara in the evenings of winter months to sell Sky TV packages to customers as the world was eagerly waiting for the FIFA World Cup of 2006, held in Germany (the one in which Zinedin Zidan head butted Marco Materazzi, and managed to blow up the final match).

Once I realised that my European degree was not more than a piece of paper in the land of the long white cloud, I decided to enrol for another Masters course at the University of Auckland. The course began in mid-term 2006. Unlike in Denmark, this time, I decided to focus on my studies and did not work while studying. However, I ended up stacking up a huge amount of student loan at the end of my University days. Student life was not as bad as that was in Denmark. I guess, I had learned to navigate my way in the Western education system by then. On 13 November 2007, I was awarded the “most promising student” on my achievement in the first year of the course, Master of Planning Practice. In May 2009, I graduated with honours.

A few good things started to happen in 2007/8. I was working as a planner in Incite, a consultancy based in Central Auckland, Symonds Street. I went back to Nepal in 2008 and trekked in the Annapurna Region. I taught a Resource Management Law course for one term at the University of Auckland. Most importantly, in August 2008, I was offered the role of Policy Planner by the former North Shore City Council - my gateway to the professional achievements in New Zealand. All this occurred even before I received my formal degree from the University. Within few years, I paid all my student loan. Within few months of joining North Shore City Council, we bought a house in Auckland in February 2008. My parents visited us in summer of 2009/10. We had our first baby girl in 2010.

The graphical accounts of my personal experience above is deliberate reciting of events. The purpose is to remind us the reality of “what it takes” to arrive to the shores of a new country as a self-funded international student. It hopefully paints a picture of what do we go through as we build our lives one piece at a time. Bit by bit.

I have told my success story, hopefully, to give us hope that there is a light at the end of the dark tunnel. Things will change, if you hang in there.

The curious case of the international students of Nepali origin (Vol. 2)

Painting a picture of a typical Nepali international student in New Zealand

Coming soon …