Shova’s Jour­ney from Bangladesh to Oulu as an Inter­na­tion­al Stu­dent

Nus­rat Sho­va, a media and com­mu­ni­ca­tion enthu­si­ast, is pur­su­ing her Mas­ter’s at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu. She is also work­ing as an intern at Inter­na­tion­al House Oulu and deep­en­ing her under­stand­ing about ‘Edu­ca­tion’ through her stud­ies. She says, ’ Oulu feels like a place I was meant to find’.

Hel­lo there, this is Nus­rat Sho­va. I am from Bangladesh. My back­ground is in Com­mu­ni­ca­tion and Jour­nal­ism. Along­side my stud­ies I have worked in the Mass Com­mu­ni­ca­tion Sec­tor (Tele­vi­sion, Mul­ti­me­dia House) in Bangladesh. Now I am part of an amaz­ing degree pro­gramme ‘Edu­ca­tion for Glob­al Futures’ at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu.

As a per­son I am an explor­er, always try­ing to learn new things, devel­op­ing my skills and look­ing for a way to con­tribute to soci­ety. I love nature and try to take eco-friend­ly action as much as pos­si­ble in life and encour­age oth­ers.

How did I find my way to Oulu?

I was curi­ous about the Edu­ca­tion sys­tem in Fin­land. I was look­ing for a pro­gramme in Fin­land that match­es my inter­est in Mul­ti-cul­tur­al­ism, Diver­si­ty, Inclu­sion, Decolo­nial think­ing, Envi­ron­ment, Sus­tain­abil­i­ty, respect­ful co-exis­tence and many more.

Guess what! I just found the per­fect degree pro­gramme to deep­en my under­stand­ing in these mat­ters through the lens of Edu­ca­tion. I’ve received quite a few offer let­ters from sev­er­al Uni­ver­si­ties, but I chose Uni­ver­si­ty of Oulu because I want­ed to be a part of Edg­lo. I accept­ed the offer and start­ed my jour­ney here in Oulu. Now it feels — Oulu is a place I was meant to find.

Explor­ing Cul­ture in Oulu

It’s 2026 and Oulu is the Euro­pean cap­i­tal of Cul­ture. Isn’t it an amaz­ing year to be in Oulu? While com­ing, I had no expec­ta­tions about life, com­mu­ni­ty or rela­tion­ships here except the weath­er, but I found all of them.

Along­side my stud­ies, I am vol­un­teer­ing for Oulu26 with the ‘Cul­ture Com­pan­ion’ pro­gramme where I accom­pa­ny peo­ple who may not want to expe­ri­ence the events alone. As a com­pan­ion I enjoy and cre­ate moments togeth­er with the par­tic­i­pant. I also make social media videos about the pro­gram if need­ed.

I also vol­un­teer for anoth­er Oulu26 project ‘Voic­es of Europe’ and for the orga­ni­za­tion ‘Pelas­takaa Lapset’. I got some amaz­ing priv­i­leges to explore so many cul­tures through my vol­un­teer­ing work in Oulu. Vol­un­teer­ing gives me a sense of belong­ing, a sense of sat­is­fac­tion for con­tribut­ing to some mean­ing­ful places.

Recent­ly, I start­ed my Intern­ship at Inter­na­tion­al House Oulu. I am explor­ing the work cul­ture in Fin­land for the very first time. The place is always wel­com­ing for every­one, espe­cial­ly the Inter­na­tion­al Com­mu­ni­ty. I gained some per­spec­tive of work life here. A big part of work­ing at IH Oulu means- build­ing rela­tion­ships, team­work and well-being.

Jour­ney with Finnish Lan­guage

In the begin­ning I heard a lot that ‘Finnish lan­guage is very dif­fi­cult’. I also felt the same. But as time passed by, I start­ed adding words to my vocab­u­lary, I start­ed get­ting tiny sen­tences, using some in every­day life inten­tion­al­ly like ‘aurinko pais­taa’ (sun is shin­ing) and now after sev­en months, I under­stand many Finnish words.

While I try to speak, I know maybe I am speak­ing the wrong words but every­one here is very kind about that. They always encour­age me to speak no mat­ter how lit­tle it is. My tips would be for begin­ner learn­ers like me – Don’t frus­trate your­self, stay pos­i­tive. Learn slow­ly but don’t stop the jour­ney. When you will even­tu­al­ly start speak­ing tiny sen­tences like me, trust me-

‘se tun­tuu hyvältä’ (It feels good).

Sho­va and Nature

I am always a Nature per­son. Whether I go trekking or take a walk in nature, I want to stay there for a lit­tle longer. If I am with my hus­band, when­ev­er he says, Let’s go back! My response would be ‘Please 5 more min­utes’. Then again 5 more min­utes. He laughs at my doings.

In Oulu I see lots of trees. When­ev­er I feel lots of emo­tions or feel­ings, I go take a walk-in a near­by for­est. It calms me. I always feel at home in nature. Oulu is the per­fect place for some­one like me. In Oulu I found peace.

I am spend­ing my best time in Oulu. I look for­ward to what the future holds for me here.