Visits for the sun
Dr. Nuriman Nuriman is so fond of the Netherlands he has visited every year since 2006. This time he is here for two and half months working with Dr. Willem Verboom in molecular nanofabrication at the UT's Faculty of Science and Technology. Nuriman, an Indonesian, says. `Holland is really nice for everything, the sun, life, but seriously, the research is very good, and the people friendly and helpful.' According to Nuriman Indonesia is becoming more democratic. Reformation has begun and corruption is being tackled by the government. But all is not well in education. The main problem is the infrastructure. He says, `People finish university and come back to Indonesia and find it difficult to get the equipment they need, like an instrument. The budget is better now, but they need to address their educational program, like how to manage their resources, build infrastructures, and improve their policies.' Nuriman completed his PhD in Australia and lectures in chemistry at the University of Jember in Indonesia. `Having studied in a western country, I saw the system working well. It was safe. Here the education is more complete than in my university.'
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| Dr. Nuriman Nuriman |
Education for every kid
Hailing from Santiago, Chile, Natalia Rodriguez Pareja, a newly joined PhD candidate at the Faculty of Engineering Technology, thinks the Dutch are really friendly and are a happy-looking bunch. She finds the Netherlands a nice place to live.
It is not very often that one gets to hear about the South American nation she is from. According to Rodriguez Pareja, `ours is a country in development. It has its fair share of problems, like the inequality of incomes between the upper and the lower strata of the society. This problem will only get worse with the current economic crisis. It is now totally up to the scientists to help find more efficient and clean ways of utilizing our resources in a better manner.' She has one true wish for her country, that every kid could have a good and equal education, for their as well as their country's better future.
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| Natalia Rodriguez Pareja |
Unity for India
`The Netherlands is not corrupt. People don't ask you for a bribe. The Dutch are friendly and help make us foreigners feel at home.' These are the words of Santosh Avvannavar, a PhD student in physics at the UT's Faculty of Science and Technology. Compared to India, Avvannavar's home country, the Netherlands is safe. He says, `I can walk around here in the evening and feel safe. This is not possible in every part of India.' Avvannavar mentioned the recent terrorist attacks in Mumbai, and he commended European transparency, saying, `There is no proper system in India, because of corruption they are struggling to make everything more transparent.'
He went on to discuss the problems in Indian education, stressing how they reach beyond the boundaries of learning and intrude in people's private lives. `There is a lot of inequality in salaries and it makes families compare. Someone with a really good education can earn a lot less, for example, than someone working in the software industry. If we standardize salaries with a base scale, people will want to work more as a nation, not only for themselves.' He thinks anything is possible with good governance, and would like to see India collaborating more with European nations on these kinds of issues. `I feel proud of my country when things are improving. My wish for India is that people work in unity.'
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| Santosh Avvannavar |
Made in China
The twenty-seven-year-old Rong Zhang says living in the Netherlands is `quite relaxed' and less stressful compared to living in China. `I think it's quite important for personal development to have interest outside of studying, she says, `I think we are not machines. A person cannot only work and study,' she says. Zhang comes from Nanping city in the northwestern Fujian province and is pursuing a master's degree in Business Administration. `In China, you work a lot every day, even on the weekends. You don't have time for yourself like you do in the Nethelands. You start studying at the university in the morning to late in the evening.'
Last May when she traveled to China, the soaring rate of inflation alarmed her, `The price of everything was so high. Everything is around 25 percent higher in price than the last time I was in China. We had quite a stable economy for a period of time, and this year it made a big impression on me how things have changed. We are only producing low-cost products and not knowledge-based products.' She shuns the perception the world has of China's products marked with the label `Made in China,' and says, `It's not good for long term developments. I want to work a few years to gain experience here, and after I have the knowledge and experience then I can go back to China to really apply my theories and use the knowledge of how things work here.'
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| Rong Zhang |
Beautiful Japan
Having lived in London for a long time, Dr. Yasuyuki Miyoshi is used to westerners, and yet was surprised by the Dutch. `I'm amazed they speak such fantastic English and that is why I don't speak Dutch. I can speak English to everyone.' Although Miyoshi hasn't been back to his home country of Japan in a few years, he would still like people to know more about it, other than it's location on the map and that it manufactures things. He conjured a magnificent image, saying. `Japan has an advanced nature, being elongated. In the north there is snow, down south you have a subtropical island like Okinawa. Seventy percent of our land mass is made up of mountains. We have a beautiful landscape, just like the Alps in Europe.'
Although the country is experiencing problems with corruption and bureaucracy in pensions, he says, `It's a good country. If it was more independent and mature, people outside would know about it as well.' According to Miyoshi, the Japanese pension department is about to be disbanded due to corruption. Records were lost and people are still not receiving the correct amount of pension. He says, `It's an enormous problem. Japan looks more towards America on things like social security. Maybe they need to shift towards what we see in Europe. We may pay more tax, but I don't care if I know I will get it back afterwards.' Miyoshi has a post doctorate position in applied superconductivity at the UT's Faculty of Science and Technology.
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| Dr. Yasuyuki Miyoshi |
'Long live India'
`Nothing really surprised me. It's not a shock. It's a typically western country,' says Pankaj Chauhan, expressing his impressions of the Netherlands after spending one year studying Financial Engineering, a relatively new joint disciplinary master's program of the Department of Applied Mathematics and the Department of Industrial Engineering and Management. Nestled in the northern region of India, the city Jhansi is the place he calls home. In his opinion, the major issues facing his country at the moment are terrorism and poverty. `I think terrorism can be solved, but people don't want to solve it.' He says that terrorism is a difficult problem to remedy because it requires political will in the region and an end to fighting over the disputed border in Kashmir. Chauhan also points to the endless cycle of poverty as another crucial issue, which deprives many Indians of basic life sustaining needs, such as, enough food, clean water and adequate shelter. `If there is poverty,' he says, 'then there is no education, and the cycle continues. The poor are exploited and each new generation is exploited. We should do something about it.' In the past, according to Chauhan, many of India's well educated who possessed strong technical skills were hired by U.S. companies. Through this process, much of India's talent left the country. Nowadays, he reflects, Indians are returning to Indian to contribute to their society by setting up colleges and charities. `They know people from abroad so they have links. When you have contacts, you can ask them to help India. I think it will take some time, but it will work.'
What is his one wish for his country? `Long live India,' he says with a smile. `We don't want to become the U.S., but we want India to gain respect everywhere. We should not have any charges of human rights issues. We should live and let live.'
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| Pankaj Chauhan |
A little more sun, please!
Dimitris Christoulis from Athens, Greece, is a post doctoral researcher at the Faculty of Engineering Technology. It has been only a month since he joined the University of Twente, and he is very satisfied with the scientific research as well as the services offered.
A proud Greek, Christoulis is saddened by the recent developments in his homeland. Big demonstrations and riots against the police as well as the state have thrown the country off gear. Accumulation of many social problems has snowballed into this unpleasant scenario, according to him. He says, `social scientists should try and understand why the citizens, especially the teenagers, are so angry with the Greek state. By singling out the kernel of the problems, they could come up with policies that are fair to everyone, including teenagers and immigrants. I really wish the New Year will find my country as well as the rest of the world in peace. We all should remain optimistic and try our best to establish a peaceful state of affairs.'
Christoulis likes the Netherlands and its people. He says, `I feel the Dutch are friendly, cool and gentle, but this country would be even better if the sun shines a bit more frequently!'
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| Dimitries Christoulis |
Honking horns in Dubai
A master's student in Business Administration, Shamin Akhter hails from Dubai, one of the seven city-states in the United Arab Emirates. In the last decades, the massive expansion and development of this once tiny fishing and pearling village has left an indelible mark on the city. Akhter says, `Everything is man-made in Dubai. There is a lot of traffic and pollution. The other issue is parking. Each household has four or five cars.' Akhter's family in Dubai owns four cars. `We all travel in different ways in the morning. We don't have the benefit of public transportation like it is in the Netherlands.' She relishes in the convenience afforded by the Dutch public transportation system, `I love it here. I don't have to drive.' For six years while working as a supervisor for a bank call center, she commuted for three hours by car to her workplace. `People come from all the different Emirates into Dubai. They spend two to three hours on a journey to get to their workplace. It's just the roads and the workplace. You go home just to sleep. You don't have time for your family or friends.' In the future, she hopes Dubai officials will focus on solving the traffic and pollution problem, and also adopt a better respect for nature.
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| Shamin Akhter |
Environmentally friendly way of living
Having lived in the Netherlands for about two years, Xiao Ma thinks that this country has a very agreeable atmosphere for any foreigner to instantly merge in and have fun. He is a PhD candidate at the Faculty of Engineering Technology, and he finds the environment at the University of Twente very conducive to pursue research.
On being asked about the key issues facing his country, Ma says, ‘the difference between the rich and the poor starts to jeopardize the economy, as the poor still form a big fraction of the total population. There are other issues as well that are typically encountered by all the developing countries. To this end, scientists can help in finding a way of living that is economically more robust and environmentally friendly. That is the way to go.’ His one wish is for China to have a grown economy that is stable, with good, steady standards of living for all the citizens.
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| Xiao Ma |
