Houda Bechar
Luana Pleşea, 11.06.2015, 14:43
Houda Bechar comes from Casablanca, Morocco. She is 21 and she came to Timisoara in 2010, when she was 17 and she had just taken her baccalaureate exam. She decided to go to med school and she is now finishing her fourth year of study at the “Victor Babes University in Timisoara. She would have liked to study in Morocco, but came to Romania, to join her brother who had already been living here for two years.
Houda Bechar: “My first year was amazing, because … well, I didnt travel a lot. Everything was new, so I didnt even feel the time. It was just as if I had closed my eyes and when I opened them I was at the end of the year. Because for me, everything was so new, the city centre, Bega, the University, the parks, everything was so nice here.
We asked Houda what she liked best in Romania so far: “Maybe Christmas, yes. In my country, we dont celebrate Christmas. We have vacation days, Christmas vacation, but we dont celebrate Christmas. So it was kind of cool when we had the tree downtown and also the fireworks for the New Year. Its also good that its a religious thing, because it brings people back to religion. So its good that they have this.
She found it easy to integrate in Romania, particularly in the academic community. Generally speaking, the Romanian society does not seem to her very different from the Moroccan one, because there are many similarities in terms of behavior: “In the first year that you get to the University, there are so many people, coming from so many other countries, and Romanian people in general are nice people. I cannot think now of one Romanian that was bad or mean to me. I mean, you meet people who do want to socialize with you, who dont want to go out with you. But its ok, because after a while you have a group, and you belong to a certain group or you belong with certain people who are very cool, and who have different religions, different backgrounds, a different social or economic statute. Its not so hard to integrate in the society here, neither with the international students nor with the Romanian people.
What does Houda think about the Romanian education system?
Houda Bechar: “So you have the professors, who are good. They are not just some people who come there and just want to teach. They are good professors. You have the lecture and then after they will give you links, or even some of them who have the books they will even give you the books. If theyre in electronic format, or if theyre not already provided in the library. But most of the time its already there in the library. For the newer books, our professors give us the electronic format or give us links so that we can find what we need. I know that in Morocco they do exactly the same, but not for the English system, for example, but in the French system. Then, when you have the labs, you also have your assistant whos there teaching you.
As for the relationship between teachers and students, Houda sees it as quite fair: “A professor is a doctor or a surgeon, for example, he has other things to do as well. But when hes in the class he explains things and every time at the end of the class he always asks whether we have any questions for him, so that he could explain. From a professional point of view, if you just ask a professor, you get the answer. Maybe some professors dont like a specific student, but this is personal, its not professional. I havent seen professors showing it. I havent felt it, really, like a professor whos putting pressure on a student because hes coming from here or his skin colour is this…
During her first year in Romania Houda did not travel much, but later she started to explore the country, and she liked it a lot. She has visited Bucharest, among other places: “Baile Herculane is a really nice place. And Cluj Napoca, which is very beautiful. Bucharest, but I didnt like it. Bucharest reminded me of my city, the city where I was born and raised. Its a big city, there are too many people. In Timisoara its more calm, you have the Square and you have places where you can just go and sit and see people. In Bucharest everyone is just so pressed, especially in the central part, where I was most of the time, because I had things to do there. Everybody is just running, theres too much traffic, too much noise… But it is a beautiful city, if you go there during New Year, for example, as I did, there were fireworks, it was amazing. And we were watching them from a balcony, with some friends… That was really beautiful. But to go there and to live there – no. Id rather stay in Timisoara, or go to a small, calm city somewhere else.
Houda Bechar likes extreme sports, she used to practice aikido, and her favourite spot in Timisoara is the Childrens Park on the banks of River Bega.
