As an international student, people always ask me many (many!!) questions and it goes from curiosities about my home country to the whole experience of leaving my family and my friends in a different continent and coming to here by myself to start a new life. Therefore, today I will be sharing with you my perspective on the transition to college and to the United States.
First of all, I think it would be better if you knew a little bit about me before we start. My name is Julia Amorim, I am an Advertising/ Public Relations major here at UCF. I was born in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where I lived for the first 18 years of my life in a small apartment with my mom, my dad, and my beautiful dog. I always loved (and still do) my city and everything that it has to offer, especially the beautiful beaches and the stunning sunsets at the end of the day. I am an only child and my whole family is very small but very united. I have many friends there, and I still constantly keep in contact with all of them and even some of their families that are closest to me.
I have always been a person who loves to explore the world and what it has to offer. Therefore, traveling is the thing I love the most, and I got that from my parents, that fortunately did their best to provide me unique experiences that I am very thankful for. I believe that experiencing different things is what make you understand who you really are and helps you to learn so much about yourself.
“Okay, now why did you come here?”
Let me start from the beginning. When I was in High School and going through the terrifying process of deciding which universities to apply for, I got really annoyed with the impressive few options of with higher education institutions that my country had to offer. Have in mind that in Brazil you do not move to another city to go to college, you stay in your own town and choose from the options there, and Rio de Janeiro, where I lived, had the best education system in the entire country. However, I was not satisfied with the options I had. So, after doing a lot of research, I decided that I wanted to study abroad, specifically in the U.S.
Making this decision was VERY difficult because going to another country to study is hard. Why? First of all, I was coming all by myself, my parents had to stay in Brazil because they had to work (so they could pay my tuition). My friends were all staying and I didn’t know a single person here. Furthermore, in Brazil we speak Portuguese, in America, people speak English, so I had a huge language barrier to face, fortunately, I spoke English as a second language, but I didn’t know if I was able to transform it into my first language so easily. To overcome that I signed for an intensive English course after school.
Even with all the obstacles I had to face, I was determined to come study abroad. I understood that it would be a unique opportunity for me, and even if everything went wrong, I would still learn amazing life-long lessons that no other experience could teach me. But I still had to convince my parents, and surprisingly they supported me since day one, and I am so thankful for that. They gave me all the help I needed, even though I was the only one in the family that spoke English, they also dedicate themselves to help me to achieve my goal.
Now that you learned about my journey before getting here, I will be answering questions that UCF American students asked me and were curious to know the answer.
1. What was the main reason you chose UCF?
UCF has an amazing program dedicated to help international students to apply to the University and transition to the American higher education environment, the Global UCF program. Because Brazil has a completely different education system, the idea that I would have a program to help me to get used to it was very comforting for me and for my parents, that felt that this support was really necessary.
2. What was the applying process like?
As I’ve mentioned, Global UCF helped me filling my application and completing everything that was required. However, the application process was not easy at all. Back in Brazil we don’t have to apply to each university we want to get in, we just need to do a national exam in the senior year of high school, and then you receive a list of all the universities that you could get in based on your score. After receiving this list, you decide which one you want and just register yourself as a student. Therefore, I was not used to all the application process for the American universities. For that reason, it took me some time to understand what the requirements were and what I had to do before applying, and by requirements, I am not only talking about academic documents but also immigration documents.
3. What was the scariest part of deciding to come here for school?
I was honestly really terrified to come to a new country alone, but what scared me the most was having to use English, that was always my second language, as the main language. I was going to a country where people didn’t know how to speak my native language, Portuguese, so I would not only need to make new friends in other idiom but all my classes would be in English too. I was scared to fail my courses because I wouldn’t be able to catch up (fortunately, it did not happen).
4. Did you immediately feel welcomed to America, or did it take awhile to adjust?
Fortunately, I felt welcomed here since the beginning. Before arriving, I thought it would be hard to make friends and to adjust to everything, but I was not. All the Americans I meet in my first weeks here were extremely nice and made me feel very comfortable here. Although in the begging I was the one scared to make friends because I thought my English was not good enough, all of my new native-English speakers friends were okay with me making mistakes and they did not judge me for that, as I thought they would, but they helped me to practice and to fix some mistakes.
5. Have you ever faced prejudice because of your international student status?
I do have some limitations and requirements that American students don’t because of my Visa, or immigration status. Although I don’t face any major prejudice that has big consequences in my academic or personal life, I still feel I am always behind the domestic students, because they were always part of this culture, and I am still adapting to it. Academically, I have study twice as hard to get the good grade I always desire.
6. How are universities in Brazil different than the universities in America?
It is completely different. It is funny to talk to my friends about my university here and their universities there because everything is different. There GPA is called “CR” and it goes from 0 to 10, not to 4, like in America. All the class credits are count differently, so while here we usually have 5 classes a semester, back there Brazilian have 8 or more. Also, there are 2 semesters per academic year, January to June and July to December. I do not know a lot of specific things because I have studied at a University in Brazil, I can definitely say it is very different systems.
7. What do you miss about Brazil?
I miss the food. It was really hard to adapt to American food and all the heavy and spice seasoning every single food has. I went to visit my family in Brazil during the winter break and I feel like I came back 200 ponds heavier.
8. How long did it take you to adjust to UCF?
No too long, but it was not easy. I see people that take months to get used to the life in a big university like UCF, but I got used to it very quickly. I started UCF during the summer semester, so the campus was pretty empty, which was good for me to get used to the huge campus before the craziness. I was also able to have smaller classes, which was good for me to practice and improve my English before getting into the big auditoriums with hundreds of other students. Thus, UCF and its students are very welcoming, and this helped me to adjust very quickly.
9. Is it hard to be so far away from home while at school?
Yes, but I think almost everyone has to deal with being away from home while at school. Almost all my friends, being them internationals or Americans live in different city or state of their parents and that comforts me because I know that I am not the only one dealing with the facts that I am away from my family and friends. But I talk to my parents every week and sometimes every day, we keep our close relationship even being far apart.
10. Were you nervous about making friends when you first started here?
YES! I was terrified! I was very shy before coming to college and I think that being in a position where I had to talk to new people and make friends, otherwise I would be alone, changed me completely. So with time I started to be more outgoing and making friends was not a nerve-racking situation anymore.
11. What cultural things that we do in America that people in Brazil would never do and vice versa? What’s the biggest cultural adjustment you’ve had to make so far?
Brazil and the U.S. have very similar cultures, so coming here was not a dramatic change when it comes to cultural traditions and behavior. However, I feel like Americans are more serious them Brazilians, they know when is time to have fun and when is time to be serious, while in Brazil people want to have fun all the time.
12. How did your family feel about your decision?
My family supported my decision to come study abroad, they helped me in every step of the process. Just like me, they understood that this experience would change my life in such a positive way and that it was the best for me.
13. Have you gotten homesick? If so, how have you dealt with that feeling?
Sometimes I miss my home back in Brazil. I try to deal with this calling to my family and friends and talking to them, asking about their lives and having a conversation just as we would if I was there.
14. What are some American dishes you were either surprised you liked/wanted to try?
I know it is not a big thing but I loved American fried rice. I was really surprised because I thought that that was no chance that it American rice would beat Brazilian but now that I have tried I am obsessed with it.
15. What was your perception about America before you moved here and how has that changed since you’ve lived here?
Before coming to America I thought that it would be really hard to make friends and to find jobs opportunities because I was not from here. I had in my mind that Americans were all part of a closed community that I had to work extremely hard to be a part of. However, when I got here I realized I was wrong, Americans are such and welcoming people and they made me feel like this is my home now. Therefore, I am so happy I chose this country to come.