For students attending the UA from out of the country, making the transition from one culture to another can be a long, difficult process. The presence of 28 international registered student organizations gives these students opportunities to bring their culture to Northwest Arkansas.

Michael Taiwo, president of the African Students Organization, said he wants his group to import Africa into Northwest Arkansas. Taiwo said his group has a moral obligation to educate people about Africa, and they want to change the usual perceptions of his homeland.

“People do not really know about Africa. The Africa they know is probably through Hollywood or CNN, and they don’t really reflect the situation on the ground,” Taiwo, a native of Nigeria, said. “So we feel it is our responsibility to tell people what is really going on.”

Stefan Trim, the president of the Caribbean Students Organization, shared the same sentiments about importing his own culture to the area.

“We want to branch out to others, and learn with others and to share our culture,” Trim said.

Sylvia Tran, the president of the Vietnamese Student Association, said it can be challenging to bring Vietnamese culture to Fayetteville because of the small Vietnamese population, but they have been able to grow to more than 30 members by sponsoring events on campus.

“The campus is a great place to share our culture with students,” Tran said. “We would not be able to bring awareness to people without the help of the university and its students.”

The Vietnamese Student Association has one event left this fall, the “Chopsticks Workshop,” where participants will learn how to use chopsticks, and will then use their newly acquired skills on authentic Vietnamese food.

The Vietnamese Student Association has been working since this summer on “Vietnamese Immersion,” which is the largest event they will be involved with this year. They are working with the Office of International Students and Scholars who hold an immersion every year to showcase an aspect of a certain country. Tran said the theme of this year’s immersion is “The Vietnamese New Year.”

“It will be an interactive evening and I’m hoping guests will enjoy the atmosphere, activities and food,” Tran said. “It should be a wonderful learning experience.”

The African Students Organization organizes two large events during the year to showcase African culture. Food is the main attraction of “The Taste of Africa.” African students prepared authentic African food and more than 500 people attended, Taiwo said. The organization’s biggest event, “The Sound of Africa,” is in the spring. It incorporates many different aspects of African culture including African food, a fashion show and African dances. Taiwo said he expects to see 700 people attend the event.

The Caribbean Student Organization sponsors an event next spring called “Dancing Instructions.” Dances like the calypso and limbo dancing will be put on display in what Trim said would be “an immersion into Caribbean culture.”

Working with other International RSOs is also a goal of the Caribbean Student Organization, Trim said. At the “Caribbean Cookout and Backyard BBQ” last month, the highlight was a friendly soccer game with students from the African Students Organization.

“Everyone has something to contribute,” Trim said. “At the end of the day we came here to be educated, and to be educated is not just being an impartial (bystander), but communicating and interacting with different people.”

The African Students Organization has 60 members with 21 of Africa’s 53 countries represented. The Caribbean Student Organization has 59 active members.

A group of girls sit on red couches in Hotz Hall. Scarves of white, red, black and blue with simple designs cover their heads, some loosely thrown on, others tightly wrapped. Studying together, one girl follows the other’s finger with her large green eyes, darkly lined with khol. The others chatter away in Arabic, about school, their lives and their home countries.

These five girls represent a small picture of the diversity brought to the UA campus from the Middle East. There are 100 students enrolled this fall from 18 different countries in the Middle East, according to the fall enrollment report.

Just like these girls bring a part of their culture with them here, the King Fahd Center for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies brings a piece of Middle Eastern history, language and culture to the university community. Students experience this through the classes, colloquia, speakers and the cultural programs that the Middle East studies center sponsors.

The center was created in 1993 with a $25 million endowment by the Saudi government, the largest endowment given to a foreign country at that time. The endowment helped create concentrations from five different departments at the UA, and these were anthropology, geography, political science, history and English. Professors were brought from each department to help put together courses for the center.

“The Middle East is a region made up of many different aspects and we represent that diversity, unlike a lot of schools that just focus on political science,” said Tom Paradise, a UA geology professor and former director of the center. “We have teachers that are specialized in many different areas.”

Former President Bill Clinton played a big role in the establishment of this center, said Adnan Haydar, a UA Arabic professor and head of Middle East studies from 1993 to 1999. Clinton was governor at the time and he asked Prince Bandar, the brother of the king of Saudi Arabia, to help.

Haydar came to the UA in 1993 with a vision for the program that emphasized the modern Middle East and literary translations. At one point, Haydar had only 15 students and was teaching a total of 24 credit hours. The number of students who enroll in Arabic I now is around 64, Haydar said.

There was an increase of students interested in the Middle East because of America’s involvement there, especially in Iraq and Kuwait, with the Gulf War and, more recently, the Iraq War, Haydar said.

“It’s a politically favored language,” said Alia Biller, a psychology major and Middle East studies minor. “Learning Arabic gives a better understanding of the culture and history of the Middle East.”

Through the program, the campus has grown to accommodate students from the Middle East to study at the UA and to send American students to various universities in the Middle East, whether it is to study Arabic, anthropology, archeology, politics or art. This year, the center is supporting five students from Middle Eastern countries such as Turkey and Iran. Many students from the UA also plan to go or already have been to the Middle East.

“I’m planning to go to Syria in the summer to study archeology,” said Bilal Ziada, a sophomore anthropology and Middle East studies major. “I joined this center because it always seemed like my natural path.”

Another popular study abroad program in the Middle East is spending the semester at the university in Amman, Jordan. Biller had taken three semesters of Arabic before she went to Jordan in the spring of 2009.

The hardest part about studying in the Middle East was adjusting to the different culture and to their ideas, Biller said. They were very nice, but some of them got their ideas of American women based on TV shows like Desperate Housewives.

“I thought I was open minded before I went, but studying abroad really gave me a different sense of the world,” she said. It made “me more aware of the political situations going on there” which can be quite different than “perceptions that people get from the news and from movies here.”

The program encourages traveling to the Middle East and helps pay for the students who are majoring in Middle Eastern studies to study there. There were 41 Middle East studies majors and minors in 2009, a significant increase from the 28 total majors and minors in 2006. Since Middle Eastern Studies can only be a second major, these numbers aren’t as large as other majors offered. However, students from many different majors take classes involving the Middle East.

“Classes are filled because people are interested and curious,” said Joel Gordon, director of Middle Eastern studies. “Headlines generate class attendance especially since these students are looking for different perspectives.” Gordon teaches a survey of classes, but his specialties lie in Modern Middle East and Egyptology.

The center also brings in notable speakers who have experience in the Middle East or extensive knowledge about it. They recently brought in two speakers to discuss the Palestine and Israel issue, one that has been catching headlines for years.

“There is a growing openness in our community to want to understand and explore,” Gordon said. “Our common goal is to turn people’s horizons outward.”

The essay topic was this:

“‘When you learn something from people, or from a culture, you accept it as a gift, and it is your lifelong commitment to preserve it and build on it.’ –Yo Yo Ma

In light of this quotation, write an essay describing a personal experience that helped shape your character and international outlook. Explain what the experience was, how it changed you, and how you intend to apply this lesson to your life.”

The winner of this year’s competition was Oluwafemi Michael Taiwo, a chemical engineering graduate student who wrote about an experience with a visitor in his native country, Nigeria. Taiwo is currently the president of the African Student Organization.

Taiwo said he was “at once excited and humbled to win the essay competition.”

Taiwo’s essay is printed here.

Courtesy Photo

“It started like any other vacation. It was the family custom to move to the rural parts of Northern Nigeria to spend a few weeks during the holidays. The only difference this time was that we had new neighbors. They were a large family from Comanche, Okla., and they had been in Nigeria, my country, for a month prior to our arrival. I quickly made friends with Manso, one of the 11 children of the family. Manso was about my age – I was 16 at the time – and height. He was as athletic as I was and we used to run up the mountains together every morning. He also loved soccer and we could play the game together all day. But that was where the similarities ended. Manso had an unusual calm and grace about him; he would allow you to do all the talking while listening with rapt attention. He quickly became the go-to guy during conflict resolution. I was Manso’s antithesis – garrulous, brash and impertinent. I was the go-to guy when people wanted to start a conflict. I admired Manso’s persona but I did not try to be like him because I believed he inherited it: After all, everyone in his family had similar traits.

Then came my birthday. Manso brought me a fetish looking stick as a gift. It was a normal stick except that it was embroidered with purple, orange and black fabric and it had an eagle feather at one end and a turkey feather in the other. He explained to me that they were Indians from Okla., USA, and that what I had in my hands was referred to as a Talking Stick. The Talking Stick, he continued, was used during a council meeting. The holder had the right to speak while holding it and everyone must listen. This, he told me, was to help prevent discussions from degenerating into cacophonies. They believe that whoever holds the talking stick has within his hands the sacred power of words. The eagle feather, for instance, represents high ideals i.e. truth as viewed from the expansive eye of the eagle and the turkey feather symbolizes peaceful attitudes necessary in every successful dispute resolution.

For the rest of the holiday, the Talking Stick was with me everywhere I went. Whenever a friend wanted to say something, I gave it to him and reminded myself that I must not interrupt him until he was through with what he had to say. This forced me to listen empathically. Also, when it was my turn to speak, I would hold the stick bearing in mind that my words were sacred and I am bound by them. I lost the Talking Stick during one of my morning jogs through the mountains but the lessons in effective communication that it taught me was life changing. I am a better person now because I met a Native American who so willingly shared with me the gift of his culture.”

Prabuddha Lohani, an industrial engineering student from Nepal, said he is disappointed in some of the most recent Nepali national news.

Last week, prime minister Karima Begum slapped one of her employees five times for sending an old car, rather than a new car, to the airport to pick her up.

“She was acting stupid and without class,” Lohani said.

He said that the incident was not an isolated event: It is common behavior for leaders in Nepal to abuse their power.

“Another minister smashed the window of a car when the driver stopped the vehicle without telling her he was about to stop,” Lohani said.

He also remembered an incident during the reign of another minister, when a forestry officer was locked in a room for several hours because he said something the minister didn’t like.

“Everyone in Nepal is going insane from these things,” he said.

In Lohani’s opinion, the Nepali people have too many hopes and dreams but not enough direction to do achieve those goals.

“There is no law and order in the country; people are controlled by their emotions,” he said. “This (incident) is just a small picture of Nepal politics. It’s getting worse every day.”

Lohani said he thinks that the brunt of the problem is that many citizens let all the responsibilities fall to the minister or leader at the time and that they are not concerned with the greater good of Nepal.

“People need to wake up. You are the one to change things,” he said. “(Leaders) are not the people to tell us what to do; we should tell them.”

Demonstrations and protests are constant in Nepal, which is part of Lohani’s concern.

“When demonstrations are going on, there is no business, no work, so people don’t have money to feed their kids,” he said.

During these times, class time is reduced to 10 to 15 days a month and some students have to walk for hours before taking an exam.

In Nepal, there are 22 political parties. Lohani said this is because everyone has their own idea of how the government should be run, but then they are not satisfied with their leader when they realize he or she can’t fix everything.

Lohani said he doesn’t think a new constitution would help because the leaders do not follow what they write.

Whale hunting in Japan has been a controversy for some time, but the controversy escalated recently when the country announced its largest hunt in decades. Commercial whaling was banned in 1986, but Japan has continued to hunt whales with the excuse of conducting research to help manage the whale population.

Humpback whales, endangered since 1963, are back on the hunting list in Japan since the population has grown to what it says is a “sustainable level.”

Saaya Nakahara, a UA Japanese student, believes there is a prejudice against Japanese because of the whale hunting.

“I just want people to understand: We are not just killing them for nothing. They are to eat, and I am pretty sure there is a limited number they can kill,” Nakahara said.

Scientists in Japan collect data from the dead whale, and then the meat is packaged and sold. Japanese consider whale meat to be like any other fish, and it is a traditional Japanese food, Nakahara said. It is something her grandfather has eaten since he was young, though Nakahara herself never eats whale meat, she said.

Whale meat is becoming less available and uncommon for meals, Nakahara said.

A June 2006 independent Japanese opinion poll by the Nippon Research Centre showed that 95 percent of Japanese never or rarely eat whale meat and 69 percent of Japanese do not support whaling in the Southern Ocean, according to Greenpeace International.

“Because whales are getting extinct; part of the reason is because of us,” Nakahara said. “(The government) is trying to limit that.”

Miran Gichki is a political science major from Pakistan. On Nov. 12, there was a suicide bombing in Pakistan against the International Services of Intelligence, and 32 people were killed as a result.

Gichki shares his view of the source of trouble and how to rid the nation of it.

Pakistan is in the transition to democracy, but Gichki believes it is far from a resolution of any kind.

“Our representative organizations are weak,” he said. “When they are, nationalism can grow.”

Gichki thinks that will leave little room for democracy as the military controls almost everything. The weakness of those organizations is linked prominently to religion and propaganda.

To improve the political situation of Pakistan, Gichki said, “It is up to the people to (ensure) mass political participation. It rules out the military and the elite.”

The main problem is that people who stand up for their rights are labeled “traitors,” he said.

Pakistan is a nation with the sole purpose to have national unity, and this is the main goal of propaganda. To reach that unity, religion becomes the scapegoat.

“Pakistan used to be part of India … so we have five major ethnicities, but one main religion,” he said. “Religion is the only common point; otherwise, we are totally different people.”

As a result, the propaganda is centered on Islam, and Gichki finds that too many people add to the constant atmosphere of jihad against the former Soviet states and against India. “It has raised religion above all (other things) and is brainwashing everyone,” he said.

Gichki finds it hard to believe that Pakistan has taken little blame for supporting the Taliban and Al Qaeda in the nine years that the United States has been at war.

“(Pakistanis) usually blame the U.S. for the Taliban’s formation, but I think the state is to blame,” he said. “The truth is that Pakistan held the ropes for everything going on in Afghanistan.”

Gichki came to that conclusion because Pakistan had been a safe haven for the Taliban for so many years, but when the U.S. left the area, Pakistan supported those groups even more.

He felt that both the U.S. and Pakistan are to be equally blamed because they were using people and exploiting them against India.

Gichki suggested reforms for the International Services of Intelligence and for the military because, “Elections are a façade for order … the military controls even the ‘civilian’ government.

“Once the transition to democracy is fully made and the representative organizations are more stable, people can have more power,” Gichki said.

Shadi Jamshidy, a UA architecture student from Iran, was visiting family for the summer when the Iranian presidential election took place.

Mahmoud Ahmadinejad, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, Mehdi Karroubi and Mohsen Rezaee were the candidates. Ahmadinejad won the election, but pressure from multiple governments prompted a re-election. Ahmadinejad took that election, too.

In response, the popular candidate Mousavi asked Iranians to protest the election results and the Green Revolution was formed.

Months later, Iranians are still protesting, especially the students of Tehran University, who protest every day by fasting from the food in the cafeteria, banging on their empty plates and yelling, “We don’t like the government.”

Jamshidy’s political view became a priority in her life as she experienced her family’s passionate discussions and witnessed her friends’ demonstrations on the local campus when she arrived in Iran last summer.

“(Our parents’ generation) experienced the change from monarchy to democracy, so they remembered those times and wanted to support Mousavi,” she said.

During Jamshidy’s stay, the election affected every move she made. She had made plans to visit family and old friends while she was there, but those plans changed as the election put a damp mood on the nation and few people traveled.

“No one believed that Ahmadinejad won twice as many votes as Mousavi,” she said. “Everyone got depressed.”

Even though many people wanted to respond to Mousavi’s request that people go to the street and protest the election results, the stakes were too high for some.

“If you go to the streets (to protest), you don’t know if you’ll be coming back,” Jamshidy said. “Security guards work on commission to beat and arrest one person, they get $250 each.”

Jamshidy’s family lives in Tehran, the capital of Iran, where she says the view of government varies drastically from the rest of the country because of the social status.

“We call the government a ‘potato government’ because they bribe small-town (people) with money and potatoes,” she said.

Jamshidy and her friends were frustrated because so many people attended the voting polls and rules were more strictly enforced than usual.

“They usually would supply more ballots as they needed them and give (voters) more time if the lines were too long,” but this time, the ballots were not refilled and the remaining voters at the cutoff time were not allowed to vote.

Iranians living temporarily in other countries are allowed to vote, as well, so the voting process does not start until a certain time to allow for time-zone differences. Again, this year’s election was different.

As Jamshidy’s friend Golsa waited in line after driving from Fayetteville to Tulsa to vote, she received a call from another Iranian friend: The election results were being tallied and her vote would not be counted.

Coming to a coed university like the UA for undergraduate or graduate education can be a challenge for many Saudi Arabian students. In a large part of Saudi Arabia, sexes are segregated until postgraduate education, except for family members. Students, faculty and even staff are either all male or all female. Aside from professional atmospheres where mixed sexes are required, such as a hospital, most workplaces are segregated, as well.

Sefat Al-Warsh, a Muslim woman from Saudi Arabia, said that it was difficult when she first arrived and began taking English classes.

“I couldn’t interact with males. For a year or more I separated myself from other classmates,” Al-Warsh said.

She didn’t speak to men, and when she attended class, she would try to choose a seat close to other women or move her seat as far away as possible from the men in the room.

Now Al-Warsh has overcome that cultural issue, she said. She has dealt with it by thinking of this as only a temporary period in which she is required to work with the opposite sex.

“I can talk to (men) or sit close to them, but I don’t keep them as a friend. I am trying not to lose that custom,” Al-Warsh said.

Not everyone has the same difficulty Al-Warsh has had, she said. Female students who come from areas of Saudi Arabia that already have mixed schools adjust more easily to the level of interaction between sexes in the United States, she said, and men, even from segregated areas, also adjust more easily because they don’t feel the same pressure to keep traditional customs.

Al-Warsh is at the UA on scholarship, and by Saudi Arabian law she must have a male companion accompany her. Her two brothers live with her; the younger one is here on scholarship himself and the older is here as her companion. The purpose of the male companion is to protect her and have someone responsible watching over her, but Al-Warsh said custom and law don’t always meet up with reality.

“I do everything – buy the groceries, wash the dishes. I keep all the responsibility,” Al-Warsh said. Many times it is the women who take care of the men and keep the honor of the family, she said.

When she returns to Saudi Arabia, she plans to become a professor in an all-female university. It is a more comfortable environment for Al-Warsh because she doesn’t have to keep the restrictions of her religion and culture. She can leave her hair uncovered, use make-up and wear fitted clothes.

“I have more freedom … I can live my life as a girl,” Al-Warsh said.

The king of Saudi Arabia, Abdullah bin Abdul Aziz Al Saud, recently opened a new coed university, but Al-Warsh doesn’t approve. She is afraid it will cause problems in a society that has not adjusted to mixed-gender interaction.

King Abdullah succeeded to the throne in 2005 and the new university is not the only change he has made. He also appointed the first woman to the Saudi Council of Ministers as deputy minister for women’s education in 2009.