The Joy of Sharing One’s Culture

Every time I walk into the classroom to do a presentation, I see an excitement in students’ eyes. They cannot wait to learn about a new country and experience “the travel.” Seeing the enthusiasm in their eyes gives me joy and satisfaction that my presentation will make a difference for them and that my presentation matters.

Sharing culture through presentation, fair, performance, or interview is very rewarding. It benefits the students and the presenters in many ways. For the students, it broadens their perspective, enriches their knowledge, and creates new opportunities for curiosity.  For the presenters, learning takes place during the preparation, presentation, and post-evaluation. The presenters have a unique opportunity to share what is important to them about their rich culture. They also have an opportunity to absorb the learners’ perspective. The presenters share part of themselves with the audience and ultimately impact the audience.

I’m grateful to the opportunities to present to students, share my knowledge and traditions with them, enrich their personal growth, and stimulate their curiosity to other cultures and traditions. This truly gives me joy and fulfillment.

Written by: Anna Myburgh

WSU International Student

Kazakstan 



Dealing with Challenges of being a new International Student

Being an International Student is both rewarding and challenging. Being a new student is even more challenging. Some of the challenges that the students come across are assimilating into the new culture and traditions, having language barriers, missing homeland, and following the rules of maintaining a F-1 visa status.

When I first came to America, I came across those challenges. Looking back at it, I feel that I dealt with them the best that I could. It was definitely a period of adjustment and personal growth. I made some supportive friends through the International office and health science classes. It was great to get to know other students, share experiences, and support each other by listening or advice. Every International student has experienced challenges at some point of their journey in America. It’s great to share things with others and find encouragement and support. International Service Counselors are also there to assist the students and provide the necessary support. So, don’t be discouraged if things seem difficult. Find an International office Counselor and a friend to talk to.

One of the most difficult things for me was to deal with missing my family. Luckily, I started using Skype and visiting with them over the Internet. It was great to see them every day. It definitely decreased their and my anxiety about being apart.

Other ideas that I found helpful were journaling at the end of each day, identifying what was bothering me, and looking at how I can modify my own behavior about the situation. For example, I was struggling in a few classes when I started nursing school. I had trouble understanding the scientific terminology and meaning. When I was journaling, I realized that I was translating the terminology into my language, then processing it, and then translating it back to English. It didn’t make sense and it was a very slow process. It took me at least 25 minutes to read an Anatomy and Physiology’s page! It was frustrating. Once I’ve identified this was an issue, I tried my best to think in English and avoid translation into Russian. It took some practice but I was able to learn the terminology in English and actually make sense of it in English!

Another challenge that I came across was learning that F-1 visa status has strict rules and regulations in regards to travel and campus employment (up to 20 hours per week during the school year, and up to 40 hours per week when school is not in session if the hiring department needs help). I didn’t want to be in trouble by any means. Therefore, if I had a question or a million of questions regarding F-1 visa rules, I would contact the staff at the International office. They have always been helpful and welcoming of the students’ questions.

I hope sharing my challenges might help others to realize they are not alone. All of us, International students, go through the similar challenges. Therefore, talk to your friend and International Service Counselor regarding your concerns and questions. Everyone can be successful in their journey in America. It’s truly a privilege to be here. Having an opportunity to study in America enriches personal growth and exercises one’s character.

Written by: Anna Myburgh

WSU International Student

Kazakhstan



Russian culture

Hello, my name is Anna Myburgh. I’d like to share with the readers some interesting facts about Russian geography, history, art, hospitality, and holiday traditions.

Russia is the world’s largest country. Its territory is 17, 075, 200 kilometers (6, 592, 735 square miles). Russia borders Norway, Finland, Latvia, Estonia, Belarus, Ukraine, Georgia, Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan, China, North Korea, and Mongolia. Russia also partially borders Poland and Lithuania. Moscow is the capital of Russia. Besides Russians (80%), over 160 cultural groups reside in the country. They are Tatars, Ukranians, Bashkir, Chechens, Armenians, and other ethnic groups.

Russian culture took root from East Slavs, formerly the main population of Kievan Rus.  The culture of Russian ancestors was influenced by Finns, Estonians, Mordvins, Hungarians, Turks, Denmark, Norway, Sweden, and other countries of Western Europe.  The main religion is Orthodox Christianity. It was accepted from the Eastern Roman Empire in 988. 

Peter the Great’s reforms encouraged Russian culture to overlap other European cultures.  However, Communism in the 20^th century used censorship to develop distinctive culture and art.  After the fall of Soviet Union, Russian culture became open to the world and international tourism. 

Russia is known for Stacking dolls or Matryoshka dolls.  The history dates back to Sergiev Posad (1899), a small town near Moscow, where the first Matryoshka was made. The word matryoshka stems from the ancient Russian girl's names Matryona and Matriosha, which are in turn derived from the Latin word "mater" meaning "mother".

The process of making Matryoshka dolls is lengthy and requires special skills. Birch trees are cut and stripped of bark. Then the trees are dried for up to 15 years. A wood turner crafts each doll into many pieces, smoothes, and primes. Then the artist takes over to paint the doll.

Russia is also known for its tradition of icon painting. This custom began in Kievan Rus with the acceptance of Orthodox Christianity. Russian icons are made of wood. Andrei Rublev and his icon painting “Rublev’s Trinity” are very well-known. The icons are important to churches, monasteries, and religious homes.

Russian cuisine is rich in breads, pancakes (blini), borsht (beet soup), Vinaigrette (beet salad), pelmeni (dough and meat dish), pirogis (sweet and meat pies), and shashlyk (kabobs). Russian people enjoy cooking.  In fact, “cooking with soul” is their way to demonstrate hospitality and love for the guests. Russians often spend all of their money to lay a beautiful table and please the guests.

Russia has eight public holidays. They are: The New Year (December 31st), Orthodox Christmas (January 7th), Defender of the Fatherland Day (February 23rd), International Women’s Day (March 8th), The Day of Spring and Labor  (May 1st),  Victory Day (May 9th),  Russia Day (June 12th), Unity Day (November 4th).

The New Year (December 31st) is similar to Christmas in the U.S. Father Frost plays the same role as Santa. It is a tradition to exchange gifts, spend time with family and friends, and enjoy dishes of Russian cuisine. 

Orthodox Christmas (January 7th) is a strictly religious holiday. It is a tradition to go to church and spend time with family. There is no gift exchange. Thinking about God and praying is very important to Russian people.

Defender of the Fatherland Day (February 23^rd) honors men serving in the army.  Although it resembles Father’s Day in the U.S., it is the tradition to also honor little boys and give every one gifts.

International Women’s Day (March 8th) celebrates political, economic, and social achievements of women. Although it resembles Mother’s Day in the U.S., little girls also get flowers and presents. 

The Day of Spring and Labor (May 1st) is celebrated with parades, concerts, food, dancing, and fireworks.

Victory Day (May 9th) celebrates the victory over Nazi Germany in World War II. A military parade is organized on Red Square in Moscow. It is a tradition to spend time with family and friends, enjoy Russian cuisine, and watch movies about the war.

Russia Day (June 12th) is similar to the Independence Day in U.S. It is celebrated with parade, food, and fireworks.

Unity Day (November 4^th) is a public holiday. The idea is that people of all nations unite to preserve Russian statehood. It is celebrated by laying flowers for national heroes, going to church, and visiting with family and friends.

Russian culture is rich in traditions and culture. My hope is that the readers might get the chance to travel there and sample for themselves this wonderful country.

Written by: Anna Myburgh

WSU International Student

Kazakhstan

 

Islands and Beaches in Malaysia!!

The bright, gleaming sunshine, the white sandy beach and the blue wavy sea, definitely sounds like a great place to spend the holidays. And Malaysia has plenty of amazing islands and beaches to go!

One of the famous islands in Malaysia will be Pulau Redang. Pulau means island and Redang is the name of the island. This island boasts a great marine life with coral reefs still brimming with life and fishes of all colors. You might be lucky and get to spot “Nemo” clown fishes. There is also a lagoon where baby sharks swim in some times. They are harmless since they are still babies so do not worry about JAWS the movie happening.

               Pulau Langkawi is another island that grabs tourists’ attention. There’s an international airport located on the island so it is possible to fly straight to the island. Moreover, the island is duty free; hence everything is without tax, which means things are cheap! The first thing you will see on this island will be a giant eagle statue. The beaches are wonderful and there are a lot places to visit too.

               Next is Pulau Penang, this island does not only have great beaches, but delicious variety of food, cultural heritage tourist spots, and a city full of shopping malls to add. This island is connected to mainland Malaysia by a bridge and is actually a huge part of the state of Penang. People enjoy going up to Pulau Penang for the beach, food and the famous tourist spots.

               Port Dickson is another place to consider for an amazing beach holiday. It is the closest to Kuala Lumpur, the capital of Malaysia, a 2-hour ride at most to get to Port Dickson.

               However, we Malaysians do consider the beaches around the east coast of Malaysia are more beautiful as the sand is whiter and the sea brimming with marine life. And Pulau Redang and Pulau Tioman are located at the east coast. 

Written by Jen Juan Wong (JJ)
WSU International Student 

Malaysia 

WSU Students enter Imagae Cup, are Finalists!

 

Please vote every day in support of your international classmates.

WSU students Parbati Sanjel (Nepal) and Tauseef Hemayet (Bangladesh) and Chase Lundstrom (USA) of "The Miracle Workers" are currently in first place in the software design category of the Imagine Cup Project!

The team has designed a sleeping pad for infants to help prevent Sudden Infant Death Syndrome (SIDS) and other respiratory diseases. The sleeping pad monitors the infant's heartbeat, breathing and movement, sending the data to a PC which in turn sends alerts via a Windows Phone application using Microsoft Visual Studio.

To vote for "The Miracle Workers" design, text "Miracle" to 45444 or tweet your vote: @mstechstudent "I am voting for #Miracle in #ICPeoplesChoice." See how their design works by checking out their YouTube video here.

For more information about Image Cup, please visit here: Image Cup Info

For More information about Team Miracle Workers, please visit here: Team Miracle Workers

How to Vote for our WSU students: remember, you can vote everyday!

 

Voting can be done every 24 hours between now and May 19th. 

There are two ways to vote.  Help the students and vote twice each day, once by each method-

1 1. Log onto Facebook and click this URL to be taken to a Facebook application: http://meme.ms/hd4xk3.     

2 2. Text “Miracle” to 45444

By Voting You Are Eligible For A Chance To Win These Weekly Prizes:

Prize Period	Prize
Week 1	One HTC HD7 Mobile Phone (Unlocked) (ARV: $284.99)
Week 2	A prize package consisting of one 4 GB Xbox 360 with Kinect (ARV: $249.99) and two Xbox 360 Wireless controllers (ARV: $59.92)
Week 2: Special Saturday April 14 incentive only! (12:00 AM – 11:59 PM)	In addition to the weekly prize, if more than 5,000 votes are collected Saturday April 14, one winner will receive a 12 month Xbox LIVE Gold Membership (ARV: $35.99)
Week 3	A prize package consisting of one Acer Aspire S3-951-6646 - 13.3" laptop (ARV: $799.99) and one Arc Touch Mouse (ARV: $59.95)
Week 4	A prize package consisting of one Beats by Dr. Dre Studio Headphones (ARV: $299.95) and 3200 Microsoft Points (ARV: $37.98)
Week 5	A prize package consisting of one Acer Aspire S3-951-6646 - 13.3"laptop (ARV: $799.99) and one Arc Touch Mouse (ARV: $59.95)
Week 6	A prize package consisting of one 4GB Xbox 360 with Kinect (ARV: $249.99) and 2 Xbox 360 Wireless controllers (ARV: $59.92)
Week 6: Special Saturday May 12 incentive only! (12:00 AM – 11:59 PM)	In addition to the weekly prize, if more than 5,000 votes are collected Saturday April 14, one winner will receive a 12 month Xbox LIVE Gold Membership (ARV: $35.99)
Week 7	A prize package consisting of one GAEMS G155 with Xbox 360 250 GB Console (ARV: $499.99) and one 12 month Xbox LIVE Gold membership card(ARV: $35.99)
Grand Prize	A prize package consisting of one Acer Aspire S3-951-6646 - 13.3" laptop and one Arc Touch Mouse (ARV: $859.94) and one LifeCam Cinema (ARV: $79.95)

Thank you so much your support!

Visit Kuala Lumpur Malaysia

Firstly, “Cuti-cuti”  means holidays. And Malaysia is a great destination to travel and explore during your holidays. Malaysia consists a variety of cultures, foods, festival celebrations, dance and art from the different races of Malay, Chinese, Indian and minorities.

There’s all kind of places to visit in Malaysia. However this time, the destination is the heart of Malaysia, the city that represents the pride of Malaysia, Kuala Lumpur (KL), the capital. The moment you touch down in Malaysia, you will realize the grand and enormous airport, Kuala Lumpur International Airport (KLIA). It is a pretty great shopping area to get last minute souvenirs and items from Malaysia. 

Next, the monumental building that is one of the world’s top ten tallest buildings with a height of 1483ft (451.9m) and consisting 88floors, the Petronas Twin Tower. It is the tallest twin towers ever built. And it is possible to climb the building, but you have to get there early as there will be a queue waiting and only a certain number of people are allowed to enter. Moreover, the base of the twin towers is a shopping complex with the latest fashion brands existing. There is also a philharmonic orchestra if you are a fan of classical music, and a huge park outside for a picnic or a stroll.

Moving on, Bukit Bintang (Starhill) street is the place to go to for shoppers, as it is a street filled with many shopping complexes and hotels. It is a street filled with life, especially at night, when there will be street performances and vendors, not excluding the bars and bistros. It is a great place for a night fill with fun and excitement. Other great shopping complexes for the shopaholics will be Midvalley, Gardens, Ikea, Curve and 1Utama that is one of the world’s top ten largest shopping malls.

How about food you say? Well, you can always enjoy your meals at KL tower rotating restaurant. KL tower is a tall building slightly shorter than the Petronas Twin Tower and located in the middle of town. So, you can enjoy your meal and look over KL city skyline, or amazing night view. However, I recommend you to head to Look-out Point. The place is just few minutes away from KL yet still overlooks the whole KL for a splendid view, but with more variety of food choices from the numerous restaurants there. And these restaurants offer various foods that represent Malaysia. 

There’s a whole lot of other exciting places to visit in KL, the museum, aquaria the state-of-the-art oceanarium, Chinatown and not mentioning the delicious, scrumptious food of Nasi Lemak, Bak Kut Teh, Roti Canai, and so on. So, head to the airport and catch the next flight to Malaysia for the upcoming holidays.

Written by: Jen Juan Wong

WSU International Student

Malaysia

Learning Korean Words

Learning Korean words is easier than one might think. Learning another country’s language is very tough. There are many ways to learn a second language but it is a time consuming process. At first, you have to understand that language’s structure and grammar. And later you should learn vocabulary. And lastly, you will learn their culture and nuance. Of course, there is no exact order in which you learn the different aspects of the language. You can learn culture and nuance while you are learning grammar, structure and word.

Korean language is very hard to learn for foreigners. Even some surveys discovered that Korean language is one of the most difficult languages to learn in the world. At Winona State University, I am meeting many American students. But I haven’t met someone who is learning Korean. So here is one way for American students to easily communicate with Korean students in Korean. Korea has been affected by America. Some of the Korean words are from English. In other words, even  American students who don’t study Korean are still able to understand some of the words. There are many similar words and if you check the roots of the words, you can easily apply them to communicate with Korean students. Below is a list of words that are same in Korean as they are in English. But be careful because although they are used in the same way, the pronunciation is a little bit different.

Game, note, dollar, bus, video, shopping, camera, chocolate, coffee, cup, Christmas, television, piano, pizza, hotel, taxi, table, news, radio, shower, ice cream, juice, fork, knife, sports, menu, card, jacket, pen, cidar(sprite), T-shirts, motel, files, bags, key, USB, zipper, percent, image, sheet, channel, TV, fast food , lobby, party and so on.

Below are words from America but they are slightly changed in Korean. So if you check their roots, you can easily understand it. We call it Konglish(Korean English) in Korea. 

Here are some Konglish words! Handphone(cell-phone), Remocon(Remote controller),Aapart(Apartment), colla(Coke), Aircon(Air conditioner), ball-pen(pen), Handle(Steer wheel), Sign(Signature), One shot(Bottom up), Vinyle bag(Plastic bag), Conning(Cheating), Dutch pay(Split the bill) and so on.

Written by: Seung Hoon Song

WSU International Student

South Korea

Jeremy Lin

Have ever heard about the ‘Linsanity’ or ‘Lin-Possible’?  One Taiwan guy who is named Jeremy Lin is now taking over the National Basketball Association (NBA).  It is no longer just big in Asia but in the world beyond the U.S.  Actually, one month ago, no one could imagine his amazing activities like now. Most people even didn’t know his name. He is just the one of the unknown oriental players no more or no less but the situation is completely changed. Right now, he became the hottest player in NBA and he has made people startle every game by showing terrific performance. His remarkable activities make new words such as ‘Linsanity(Lin is insane because he showed incredible activities)’ or ‘Lin-possible(There is nothing impossible for Lin’. He has renewed his career high every day and surpassed his limit ability. The wind which seemed to be gone as quite becomes the remarkable typhoon.  The world is falling in Jeremy Syndrome.

 He born in LA and his father was Taiwan and his mother was Chicness. Although he was totally Asian, he was really tall and had a good sense of various sports, especially basketball. When he was a high school student, he did a good job and showed his talent for basketball. From that time, he was dreaming of being a NBA player. However, he had to go through discrimination on the court or off the court because of the reason that he was just only the Asian. In addition, many people had a negative opinion about his dream because there was a stereotype for Asian sport player and there was no history that Asian player became a successful NBA player. In fact, A hundred of thousand people who played the basketball are dreaming of being a NBA player because NBA is the best stage for them. However, most people failed to come true their dream because it is really competitive to enter the NBA team. Just some players succeed to enter the NBA team and only a few people gained fame and survived in the NBA as a star player. Despite these negative prospects, Lin didn’t give up his dream and took a step one by one to achieve his goal. When he was senior high school, he failed to enter universities which were famous for the basketball such as Duke, Stanford and North Caroline. He had no choice but to find the other university which was not well known for basketball to maintain his dream. He decided to go to the Harvard University. Playing basketball in Harvard is really hard and big challenge for him because Harvard has no scholarship system for sport players and he had to study hard to catch up with the classes.  

He endured these hardships and finally entered the Golden State in NBA. Although he achieved his dream but adopting in NBA was not easy.  Of course, he was a great player but there were tons of competitors and it was hard to overcome physical limit. He had a hard time to deal with big American guys and he needed to find solution to overcome his weakness. He didn’t show impressive activities at that time and then finally he was kicked out his first team.  He didn’t give his dream up and practiced more hard to survive in NBA. Next years, He tried to apply for draft again to enter NBA team again and was pointed by New York Nix. Despite going to the NBA again, he couldn’t get the chance to show his ability. Nix picked him as a substitute and just for marketing strategy. He had no choice but to play in minor league for NBA. Meanwhile, he got a chance to make a debut because of other people’s injury and he dramatically grabbed the chance. He showed insane performance at his debut game. After that, one unknown player has become the hottest player who blew up in NBA right now. In fact, many experts agreed and praised his recent activities but they have been concern about him. If other teams are accustomed to his play, they will get to know how to defend him and then he will have a hard time. In fact, many other NBA teams are studying and analyzing his style and trying to find this weakness.  

Anyway, he has showed unbelievable ability in every game regardless of these worries. After retiring Yao-ming, many Asians have been craved to enter new Asian NBA star and Appearance of Jeremy Lin hold their attention.  Right now, no matter what he comes from Taiwan, he becomes a hope and hero for everyone who enjoy the NBA.   

Written by: Suk Hyun Jung

WSU International Student

South Korea