Respect

Respect 

Respect and insult are one of the major topics of discussion these days due to the terrorist attacks in France. Many authors have written a lot about it. Therefore in this post I am going to share my experience of respect in Scandinavia and Pakistan.

In cross cultural communication it is really important to understand the values, so respect is one of them. If you do not give due respect that is considered normal in that society, then it can be considered as offensive or insult. On the other hand if you give respect that is not required it becomes a weird act. And the ways respect is given is also very complicated; it has both verbal and non-verbal ways. Verbal are easier to get, but non-verbal are kind of complicated and I have not seen much information or understanding of this among Asian and European people and most of them end up in conflicts. Because the reaction to disrespect is also very different. Some people change behavior like end the contact or relation, some people say it directly and that is considered rude by others and some people in extreme cases become violent and that is not good for a multi cultural environment. Anyways this is personal reflection based on social experiences. Anyone can disagree. 

Respect in Pakistan:

Let’s start with Pakistani culture. In Pakistan there are some groups that must be given respect no matter what, If you do not do that you will be considered as offensive and disrespectful by all of the people around you.  According to my personal experience some of those groups are

1-      Pakistan Army
2-   Parents
3-      Islam
4-      The country
5-      People Older than you
6-      People more educated than you
7-      Teachers
8-      Women (Uneducated people are an exception)
9-      Religious people (Changed a lot after war on terror)
10-  China

The way of respecting is that you show love to them. Do not question them. Cannot look in the eyes while talking, showing your best side of the personality, seek their attention and always go first and greet them (in case of people). Most of the time parents and teachers are advising you be respectful and disciplined. For example, you can not eat or talk in the classroom or conference room, it is a disrespect to the teacher or the boss. You can not sit among the older generation and there are plenty of actions that are considered as disrespectful. Therefore everyday from morning to evening you get a lot of lectures or lessons from someone older than you, telling you that you were disrespectful and those people consider it their duty to teach you, how to be respectful. 

Popularity can also be considered one of the factor. Therefore if a politician gathers a lot of people than he is considered as respected. Here is an example of a typical political address. 

There are some groups that are always both hated and respected. And you can see extreme emotions of love and hate about them

1-      Politicians
2-      Media (Mostly Criticized)
3-      Judiciary
4-      Sports personalities
5-      China, Saudi Arabia and Iran (Mostly loved)
6-      America and western countries (Mostly Hated)
7-      TV or film actors/ actresses
8-      Singers
9-      Your official boss
10-  Foreign customers or tourists
11-  Industrial tycoons
12-  Feudal
13-  Different races
14-  Rich people

Every person has a different opinion about different institutions, people or groups. Generally most of the people agree that money talks and the people who are rich are very powerful and majority of the people do not give you respect if you are poor. Due to this complicated structure of inequality there are a lot conflicts that exist. And for the right understanding of the values it is important to have a good relation with the people.

Respect in Scandinavia: 

On the other hand the Scandinavian society is very different. There is a law in Sweden that says that you are not better than anyone else. Kids are educated in a much lesser competitive environment. Therefore equality is given more value than anything else in Swedish society. If you are bragging about yourself to make a good impression, it is considered as a negative act. 

Sports personalities have much respect among Scandinavian. Football player like Zlatan Ibrahimovic is one the most respected people. After sports personalities royal families in Sweden and Norway have a lot of respect. Some people like to talk about them. A lot of singers from Scandinavia and abroad, Djz, local and foreign TV actors or celebrities are also among the people who are given respect. But showing respect is still different, you can see a super star on the street and still not so many people around him/ her. They can feel very normal on the streets. On the other hand in eastern countries the fans normally go crazy when they  see their ideals. Following is the picture of a famous Bollywood actor and his fans waiting for him early in the morning on his birthday 

Majority of the people like USA as a country and many people criticize that as well. Russia is not a favorite country among many Scandinavians.  

Religion or religious people is not given much respect in the Scandinavia and it is considered OK to make fun of the religion. No matter which religion it is. 

There is a big divide between Swedish and Norwegian people on the basis of respect for their countries. Norwegin people love to show their love about their country, talk about the histroy, having Norwegian flags everywhere and feeling proud to be Norwegian. Generally you can not talk against Norway or the teams that represent Norway abroad. The biggest day in Norway is the national day of Norway. Here is a picture from that day

In Sweden, it is not appreciated to show respect and love for the country. On Swedish national day you will not observe any similar thing. In Sweden you can say anything about the country and normally people will not react. 

In the recent days i have been inquiring many Swedish people about the respect,whom do they respect and how do they show respect. Most of the time it is a difficult question for them. All said that we just learned to be respectful to the older people from our parents. The rest everyone should be respected. And showing respect like opening doors for women, paying for others or doing similar things is not that much important. However one can still see that people have different behaviors towards some races, due to the laws against racism no one want to talk about it. And that is one of the reasons that integration is still a problem in Scandinavian countries. Many people are open towards it but there are many people among both immigrant and local communities are not open about it and their behavior can be disrespectful towards each other. Ignoring someone or keeping silence is normally a reaction if someone do not respect someone. 


The concluding remarks are: Life is very easy when you respect people for what they are. 

Memories of 2014

Memories from 2014

Life is quite uncertain. We can never predict what is going to happen. Circumstances change us as well. But we cannot really see the change in ourselves until we compare it with the past. 2014 has passed, seems like yesterday. Today I am trying to document some of the stories from 2014, that I can look back after many years and see how much changes, I have been through. I tried my best to keep a fair balance between staying in touch with all the people I know and meeting new people. I am really thankful to all the people who were there during 2014 and shaped my memories. I want to write a lot of stuff, but since it is public so I am writing carefully and will try to make it interesting for the readers. Let’s do it on monthly basis

January 2014:

I started 2014 while at work. I did have some plans for the year, some things happened according to the plans and something happened not according to them ….

This is 2014 firework picture in the background. I have celebrated new year eve 2015 in the same city.

January was full of traveling. On 2^nd January I went to Istanbul, Turkey. It was an amazing trip. 

Then I went to Karachi, Pakistan, met my niece for the first time after her birth. After that I flew to Lahore, Pakistan and attending the wedding of my cousin. At the wedding I met a lot of relatives after so many years. After Lahore, I went to Lalian, Sargodha and then back to Karachi, Pakistan. The love and hospitality I got was amazing.

After staying a few days in Karachi, I went for traveling in Sindh province. I went to Mehrabpur, Ghotki and Gambat. Met many of my relatives and then came back to Karachi again. From Karachi, I came back to Borås, Sweden. Just after arrival in Sweden I received an interview call from Rolls Royce for the graduate program.

As planned I travelled from Borås, Sweden to Trondheim, Norway. After a couple of days there I travelled to Ålesund for the interview at Rolls Royce. And then came back to Trondheim, Norway.

February:

During February I got back to student life at NTNU, Trondheim. The winters Olympics were in progress, many people were busy watching them everywhere. I started writing my thesis. Attended some job fairs, theater, more parties, TEDx Trondheim event and met many nice people.

On14th February we went for a Ski trip to Oppdal, Norway with Msc. Project Management students. It was one of the best trips; I really remember it until now. I saw northern lights as well. The best thing about February was that I joined the gym.

March:

March started with some awesome cricket matches in Asia cup. Pakistan won two very close matches, I was really happy. There was a workshop and concert with DNV GL in January. There were again a lot of events, dinners and parties. The best one was the last party with UKA gang.

I did curling for the first time. It was really great. Did a case study with Shell. Wrote a lot of job applications and continued writing my thesis. Continued my Norwegian language course as well. The month ended with the cricket world cup.

April:

On the first April I did Skiing for the first time. I fell down so many times; I think it was the first day after my childhood when I fell so many times. After that we had pillow fight in the city center. The days were long. The social life was awesome as usual. I lost my phone. I went on some trips as well. We went to visit Roros, Norway and in the end of the month I visited three cities in Netherlands. In Netherlands it was happening; one of the biggest festivals called the king’s day. I spent king’s night at The Hague city, kings day at Amsterdam and then I went to Enschede, Netherlands. It was an amazing dutch experience. 

May:

May was an awesome month. I travelled to northern Norway. Saw the amazing lofoten islands.

This is a picture at 12AM at a beach in Lofoten. It did not get dark at all.

After the trip to lofoten the most amazing day arrived. It was national day of Norway. People were dressed so nicely. Everyone was out that day. I always recommend all of my friends, if they want to visit Norway, they should at least be there on 17^th May.

After the national day, I attended the graduation dinner with my Msc. Project Management class at NTNU on May 22^nd. And then it was the time to say good bye.

The chapter of Norwegian student life was finally closed after the graduation. The very next day I moved back to Borås, Sweden. The days were warm and sunny. I joined my job again and kept working on my thesis.

June:

The month of June started with the thesis presentations of my International Project management class. I met my class fellows after a long time. I travelled with some friends to south of Norway again.

This is the picture from Porsgrunn, Norway.

The weather was nice, so we were often going for swimming. On weekends we were going to Gothenburg. There was a nice international food market in Borås. We went to varberg, Sweden for a couple of times and some of my friends from NTNU visited me in Borås. The month ended with a great relief and accomplishment of my Masters thesis.

July:

In July the football world cup was in progress. So we were normally going out to watch the football. During July nothing great happened. There was not much to do at work either. We were going to lakes for swimming. And were also visiting the cities nearby. In the end of July a friend of mine visited from Abu Dhabi. 

August:

August was full of concerts. It started with a live performance of Snoop dog. Than it came the way out west festival in Gothenburg and then we attended a concert with Otto Knows. There was a nice Gothenburg cultural festival as well. Later the way out west festival 2014.

A picture from Icona pop concert at Way out west 2014

 I ate Pakistani mangoes. I was mentor for two students at University of Borås and 13 students at Chalmers university of Technology. So I also hang out with my mentees in August. I attended a lot of events for welcoming them. So I spent a lot of time at Gothenburg during August.

A picture from welcome activities in Gothenburg for new students at Chalmers University.

 I casted my first ever vote in an election.  In the end of august I was fully beard for the first time in my life. I was selected as an ambassador of Isfit 2015.

September:

September was special because I received the result of my master’s thesis and I started Chinese language course at Chalmers. Met some really nice Chinese people in Borås and Gothenburg as well.  The rest it was busy at work, so it was kind of a usual working month.

October:

After a busy September I went to Pakistan on holidays. October was great. It was warm in Pakistan. I spent Eid with my family. Met most of the relatives, spent a lot of time with my niece. She started crawling at that time.

This is a picture of us hanging out J

 Met again with my friends and discussed about the great old times. Things have changed a lot. Attended a lot dinners with family and friends. I still miss all the hospitality and great food from Pakistan.

After I returned from Pakistan to Sweden, me and my friend Majid went to Hungary and Austria. It was also one of the best trips ever. Our hosts treated us really amazing.

This is a picture of us at hearos square Budapest.

November:

The November started with the Halloween. Chinese language course was there. I was applying for jobs as well on regular basis. There were interviews going on as well. And the workload was also very high. Something like managing in between was going on. I was elected as a council member of Swedish Engineers association.

I went for an interview in Kristiansand, Norway. On my way I stayed in Oslo. I met some of my friends. It was a great get together. I am very thankful for their hospitality.

This is a picture from the city center of Kristiansand.

In the end my residence permit expired and I applied for a new visa. It was also a lot of work to do for that. I attended some nice lunches and dinner during November. In the end of the month Christmas dinners started.  

December:

The month of December was great in start when I received my master’s degree. I finished my Chinese language course at Chalmers university. Two people from NTNU and one person from Pakistan received noble prizes. But a tragic incident occurred in Peshawar. It was really sad and I have no words to express my feelings.

I travelled to Fagesta for another interview. And I also sent many applications during the month of December. The Christmas dinners were over and we had a personalfest. That was a memorable event.

This is a picture from New Year’s Eve.

The 2014 has departed and 2015 has started. There are so many things that I want to remember from this year and use the lessons learnt for a better 2015. I wish a really awesome 2015 to everyone. 

Why i left Pakistan

Why i left Pakistan  

I spent around 20 years of my life in different cities of Pakistan, i have my family, my friends, my childhood, teenage, my first job and so many other memories related to my motherland. Now it has been a while living away from all those things. Today i might not exactly remember, what i was thinking at that time, but i would like to document what i remember from that time when i decided to leave the country. Everything you achieve in your life cost you something. You loose somethings to gain somethings. 

I will start from the following picture

This is a picture from January 2004, the time when my life was going through one of the biggest changes in my life. I got admission and joined one of the most popular engineering universities of Pakistan. It was like a dream come true. I still do not have the words for explaining the excitement i had at that time. This is moment that most of college graduates in Pakistan can dream of . An example is that; this university is located in a province of over 30 million people and less than 800 were enrolled at the university at that time. How i got in, it is also a long story. I will write about that some other time.

At that time my father was a pensioner and jobless for six years. The only source of his income was the pension money. It was around 3500 Pakistani rupees. And our family expense was over 10,000 rupees per month. And there was no luxury in life. We never owned an apartment. Our family owned just two bicycles and the some savings for our education. All of his savings were going towards an end. The education is very expensive in Pakistan. All of my siblings were also studying. We were living in a small town named Taxila cantt near the capital of Pakistan. I was 17 years old, i moved to the biggest town in the country, with a totally different culture. The city is highly populated, have a huge industry, a lot of opportunities to grow. The negative side is high street crime, high stress between different ethnic, political and religious groups.

I grew up with the thinking that if you want to have a better economic and social stability than you must be educated. Since my childhood no one appreciate to do sports or other activities than just studying. The teachers threatened everyone that you will end up being a very poor person or drugs addicts if you do not study. The parents used to tell their kids that they have given up their dreams over their education and every second person you meet asks you about your studies. In Pakistan the difference between the rich and poor class is immensely huge.  You can notice it everywhere in society. The only feasible and sustainable way a middle class person can be richer is that if he/ she have a good education. The salaries of engineers, doctors, management staff and accountants are much higher than school teachers, bus drivers, restaurant persons or any other professionals.  Entrepreneurship and any relevant ideas were not there around me. Therefore the education and good job became a believe of my life.

Yes i was excited because i knew that i was going to become an engineer. It was studying at a state owned university, it was affordable as compared to private sector universities. The engineers were being respected everywhere in the society, they had reasonable incomes, their parents were proud, and they were enjoying nice rides as well. And then the dream bacame a reality. I graduated .....

This is a picture from March 2008 from the convocation. I was a graduate engineer. At that time i was working in a Hongkong based multi-national firm. I was earning around 16000 rupees a month. Things changed a lot between 2004-2008. My family moved to Karachi. My brother was in the final year of his bachelors of Engineering. My father was also working at a floor mill. Our family's income was around 30,000 rupees. And our expense was also somewhat close to that. I was owner of a motor bike. But.....

So many ground realities changed. During all those years the country's economy was on a continuous decline. Our family had a loan of around 300,000 rupees. We still did not own a house. Me and my bother were planning to study further as the bachelors was not considered as enough to get to the higher management in Pakistan. Most of the people were already enrolled into the masters programs in the country and the one who could afford to go abroad for studying went abroad. The biggest pressure were the loans. They were taken from the relatives. My father never took any loan in his entire life before i started studying in the university, and he was always stressed because of that. He could not pay them by any means. Our family's income and expense were matching and there was no way that we could afford to a pay a loan that was 10 times more than the total income of the family. My mother went through an operation. The medical care in a private hospital costed so much. Our family did not have any savings left for health care, higher education, buying a house and weddings. A normal home at that time was costing around 3-5 million Pakistani rupees and a normal wedding costed around 1 million rupees. So a person who earns only 16000 rupees can not dream of achieving these things over a year or in 5-10 years. I started doing MBA in the evening but due to the high tution fees i could not afford it and i quit after one semester. 

I was doing great in my professional life. I was happy with my social life. But the economics and future goals were not supporting each other at all. Raising prices for everything triggered this thinking of getting a better income. Going abroad for studying or work was popular among the graduates of my university. Me and my friends were always diccussing about these issues. Most of the time there were negative feelings associated to the future of young and educated people with in the country. Every second person's opinion was that it is better to live abroad and there were many people who were struggling to get out of the country to live a better life. The rich people were leaving country because the security situation was not good enough. With a Pakistani passport there were no possible ways to travel or work in many countries. And it used to cost too much time and money to get a residence for visit, studies or work in any developed country. A reliable survey at time showed  that over 80% people of Pakistan want to live abroad.  

I projected my life, many years ahead of the time. I analyzed all my available resources. I talked to so many people about different possible scenarios in future. I ended up with a conclusion that i have to leave the country for good. How i planned to leave, how many efforts i did for that is really long story. I will write about it in future. But after 1.5 years of my graduation i managed to moved to Sweden and i completed my Masters in one year. With the efforts of our whole family we managed to get rid of all of our loans.  And the most important thing that matters to me that my father and mother were very very happy.....

Erasmus report

Erasmus report

Host Institution: Norwegian University of Science and Technology, Norway

Home Institution: Chalmers University of Technology, Sweden.

Written by: Usman Saeed (July 2014)

Part One
1-   Preparations:

Norwegian University of Science and technology, Trondheim (NTNU) was my first choice for exchange studies; I applied during my first year of Masters in International Project management and got nominated for the exchange studies. Therefore I was really excited. I applied for Erasmus in February 2013 and got nominated for Erasmus in March 2013.

The response of the NTNU international office was quite late. But they already said on the facebook page that they accept almost all students that are nominated for exchange. I was nominated for two semester in the mid of March 2013 and within a few days I submitted all the documents at the Chalmers International Mobility office after applying online (The information of applying online is provided by the Erasmus coordinator). But I received the official confirmation of admission from NTNU in the mid of June 2013. The documents include the learning agreement, transcripts from chalmers, copy of the passport, the print of the online application that has been submitted at NTNU.

After nomination I started the facebook group for NTNU International and Erasmus students autumn 2013 and in a few days the NTNU made it an official page. So there were a lot of prospective students that discussed many issues on the page, tried to communicate the information about residence, permit, costs, courses and especially future roommates on that page.

The insurance was covered by Kammarkollegiet. The information can be seen on the following link

http://www.kammarkollegiet.se/sites/default/files/insurance_during_education_abroad_student_ut_1102.pdf

The cost of living in Trondheim is around 8-10 thousand Swedish kroner per month. The Erasmus grant is around 200 euro per month. Therefore it is necessary to have own funding. Swedish citizens can apply for CSN.

Since I had a lot of luggage therefore I booked a train ticket from Gothenburg to Trondheim.

 2-    Accommodation:

NTNU do not assure the residence for the EU and Nordic country citizens, for the rest of the world they guarantee accommodation. Most of the Swedish students contacted Svenskar I Trondheim group on facebook or used their personal contacts to find the accommodation in the town. The cost of accommodation in the town is around 3500-5000 Norwegian kroner depending upon the location and size of the room. Normally the rooms are shared.

For non European students NTNU provide a booking code to book an accommodation. SIT is an organization that has thousands of houses in Trondheim, there are many student villages spread around and in the city. I got the house in the biggest student village called Moholt.

Figure 2:  Moholt student village

In moholt there are two kinds of houses, one is in Moholt Alle, and they are relatively new and modern. The other one are Herman kragsvei, they are relatively older and cheaper. In moholt the student apartments are shared between 4 students. The room was around 10 square meters and was furnished. The kitchen and bathrooms were new and two students shared one refrigerator. There was a dishwasher in each apartment in Moholt Alle. All students were responsible for cleaning of the common rooms, if the common rooms were found dirty then all of them was fined by SIT. So some houses have cleaning problems and some houses had very good coordination between the residences. Since it was a multi cultural environment, therefore every house had its own story. In short it was a great fun experience to live at Moholt and I personally recommend everyone to get a room in Moholt, because it is the center of student activities. A lot of student bodies have basements in the moholt for gathering and parties. International student union, International club of Trondheim, Erasmus students’ network and some students also organize a lot of parties in the basements and their apartments throughout the semester.

 The monthly rent for a room in Moholt Alle was 3355 NOK and the security deposit for the room was 5000 NOK that has to be transferred at the time of signing the contract.

The video of the house in Moholt Alle can be seen on the following link

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=66LZVsGhzsU

Moholt is at a walking distance of 20-30 minutes’ walk from both Gløshaugen and Dragvoll campus and just 10 minutes by bus. Many students buy the bicycles at the start of the semester and sell them before departure. The monthly bus card called the T-card can be purchased from www.atb.no .

There is one big laundry in the moholt. The laundry costs around 20 NOK for one run. The laundry cards are provided by SIT and they can be recharged online. There is a smaller laundry at moholt alle as well.

Figure 3:  Laundry at Moholt

   3- Language:

NTNU offers free Norwegian language courses to the Erasmus and international students. For getting admission in the courses the students have to apply in time.  The information about the course is provided on the following link

http://www.ntnu.edu/studies/international/norwegian-requirements-and-courses

If you think that you are better in Norwegian language than level 1. Then they take a test before the start of the semester and if you pass that, you can be given admission at level 2 or level 3 depending upon the test results.

 The basic Norwegian language can be learnt online as well on the following link. It is a very good online resource made my NTNU. It has the curriculum of Norwegian language level 1.

http://www.ntnu.edu/now/intro

    4-Social Activities:

Trondheim is known as the best student town in Norway and the reason for that is the social life. There are so many opportunities to do an unlimited amount of activities. The city has three universities and over 30,000 students. The biggest student society is student samfundet I Trondheim. It organizes a lot of events for student throughout the year. It runs totally on volunteer basis and if you work at student samfundet, you can make a lot of Norwegian friends.

Figure 4 Student samfundet i Trondheim

Every second year it organizes the biggest cultural festival of Norway named UKA. There are over 1500 volunteers that work on UKA, it sells over 80,000 tickets and it lasts for almost the whole month of October.

  

The office of international relations provides a lot of opportunities to make a lot of new friends during the orientation week. There is a lot of information provided about Norway, practical tips about living, things to do, exams, social activities and information about how to integrate in the Norwegian society.

Figure 5: A free bar b que party for international students organized by international office during the orientation week

Fig 6: International Students gathered for information and welcome meeting at Student samfundet on first day of orientation week. 

Fig 7: A lunch organized by international office on orientation day

It is easier to make Norwegian friend if we understand their social life. They normally hang out in groups and the groups are normally closed. For example you can be part of a football team, then you will spend a lot of time with that football, but you are not allowed to bring your friends in that group. Every Norwegian is part of some different groups and they spend a lot of their time in these groups. However they are normally shy and act very friendly when they are drunk. There are plenty of parties if you are part of a group to get closer to the locals.

On the other hand it is much easier to be a friend with international students. There were around 1800 international students around us during the orientation week. There were all from all over the world and they are quite open. There are three student organizations for international students, also having many Norwegian students as well in them.

1-    International students Union

2-    Erasmus Students network

3-    International club of Trondheim

Then some smaller countries and regional based organizations are also there. These organizations arrange a lot of events, parties, trips and activities for the students. ESN have a buddy program where they try to provide an international student a Norwegian buddy. But there are always more international students signing up than Norwegian students. You can find more information about these groups on their facebook groups as well.

Figure 6: International students on Norwegian national day (17th May)

SIT also have some activity houses in the student villages. Where you can go in the evening, play some games or take some coffee with the friends.

There are also some student bodies at each faculty and study programs. The funding to those student bodies is done by SIT and the departments. Besides these student bodies, there are also students in the student parliament.

Fig7: List of different student bodies at NTNU

For sports, NTNU have one of the biggest sports unions in Norway. It is known as NTNUI. It has more than 12000 active members and over 50 activities. NTNUI owns a lot of gyms, grounds and facilities around Trondheim, specially the student cabins. It provides a lot of opportunities to live a healthy and active life. More details can be found on www.ntnui.no. A lot NTNUI member have won many competitions on domestic and international level.

There are still more stuff that a student cannot simply find out in one complete year. There are also organizations like amnesty international, project management institute, teknologiporten, TED talks, bridge NTNU and so many other organizations that are working to make student experience valuable. And if you want to experience all of these, you should always be ready to go out and participate. It is an experience that will stay with you for forever as one of the sweetest memories of life time.