Dubai: It’s kind of like Shangri-La meets El Dorado on the Arabian Peninsula. Some people imagine palm tree-shaped islands, hotels that look like sailboats and palatial condos owned by oil barons and vacationing celebrities. In most people’s minds, Dubai is paradise.
Nahela Nowshin, a second-year mathematics/economics student from Dubai, had something else to say about the place she calls home.
“Some people here think that everyone from Dubai … must be so rich, but that’s not the case. They think Dubai’s a magical place, but it’s just like any other city,” Nowshin said. “Once you’ve lived there, you just get used to it.”
Nowshin had to get used to it herself when her family moved from Bangladesh to Dubai 10 years ago.
She describes Dubai, the most populated emirate in the United Arab Emirates, as a very cosmopolitan city that has all the creature comforts of an American metropolis: Starbucks, McDonald’s and strip malls.
Coming to Los Angeles last year was an easy transition for Nowshin.
“When I came here, I didn’t have culture shock. The place was new to me, but other than that, the people and everything … I wasn’t in shock,” Nowshin said.
As a trilingual student who speaks English, Bengali and French, and who has lived in multiple countries, Nowshin is a prime example of what it means to be an international student. In her travels and experience in a high school with more than 100 nationalities, she learned to respect others’ views, backgrounds and traditions.
Now in the United States, Nowshin relishes her independence.
“I like my freedom. I’m living on my own,” Nowshin said. “My mom doesn’t do it for me anymore. My dad doesn’t do it for me. I have to make every single decision.”
Although many American universities accepted Nowshin, she chose UCLA instead of Carnegie Mellon University, University of Washington and other California schools.
To increase her independence, she recently started a job working for UCLA Transportation & Parking, and continues to volunteer with the United Nations Children’s Fund. As for her future, Nowshin sees herself continuing in an academic role.
“I want to pursue research and grad school at the same time. That’s basically where I see myself,” Nowshin said, “I think research is really interesting.”