Cultures and Interaction

by Sherein Salem (Egypt)

Making a local connection Serbia

As a Professor I was invited to give a course “Food additives; Toxicology and Safety”, July, 2017, Kosovo. Actually, it was my first time to even hear about Kosovo and to know that it is a recently independent country from Serbia in the east of Europe and Pristina is the capital. Though, I used to travel to many countries for attending international conferences, this time was my first experience to teach international students from many countries all over the world. At Pristina International airport “Adem Jashari”, I was very impressed with the surrounding lovely nature which I noticed elsewhere till arrived the university building for the international visiting professors. At the opening ceremony I noticed the friendly nature of the kosovan people and their kind welcoming was much appreciated. At night, I was very worried thinking about my course students and if they could accept me easily as a foreign professor and how our different cultures may represents a great challenge and how could I manage this in a simple easy way? The first day of my course, I awaked very early and was the first to arrive the course lecture to give them a good model for respecting lecture and to be familiar with the place and to be relax. With kind smile, I met my students and start my talk with my pleasure to be their professor for this short course and to get mutual benefit from each others. Firstly, I asked everyone to introduce himself, his country, his major field, and what he expected to gain from my course and if there any certain topics he keen to learn then I introduced myself the same way they did. From day zero, I make everything clear for my students regarding the course syllabus among the 14 days and how they will be evaluated and the tasks they will need to finish and I gave everyone a handout including everything regarding our course with a model exam which they expected to have by the end of the course. In the working days, my lecture was about 3 hours daily, two hours for the study topic and the remaining one hour was to discuss together any topic related to life and I listened carefully to their opinions which amazed me a lot. In the weekends, The University organized a very wonderful excursion to the most famous and beautiful places in Kosovo like; 1- Newborn Monuments; it is created in honor of Kosovo independence at 2008. 2- The famous building for the national library of Kosovo. 3- Prizren which is definitely one of the most picturesque places to visit in Kosove with a gorgeous Ottoman-influenced architecture. 4- Serbian Orthodox Church which is beautiful and historic. 5- Go caving in Peja with the nearby Rugova Mountain. 6- Air high five Bill Clinton’s enormous hands as Kosovo feels a kinship with Bill Clinton who came to their aid and rallied NATO to defend them in 1999. 7- Many wonderful mosques as Kosovo is considered a Muslim country. Honestly, I have enjoyed a lot visiting these places in a company with my course students and let me say that having tours together make us much friendly. At the end of the course, all my students have successfully passed their exams and I gifted the best ones together with a certificate of appreciation. Also, I was keened to give everyone the word to give us his feedback and impression about the course and asked them also to write me short words in my memory notebook, I was very impressed by their words which let my tears dropped down. At the last day and during the end of courses celebration, we were representing a family team and having impressing feelings to each other, we also insisted to share each other contact and took many pictures together. By sorrow everyone said goodbye with a promise to keep in touch with each other. Now and after 3 years, we still in contact in a Face book group and sharing together everyone life achievement. In the end; No matter our language is, No matter our color is, but the really matter that we are brothers inhabit the same earth.