In this first installment of Humans of IISMA, Ayunda shared her teaching experience in PERMAI, a community that seeks to assist Indonesians in various social and educational activities in Penang. It’s already 11 am. Time to go home. All students have been picked up by their parents, except Chacha. …

When I first stepped foot in Boston, I started listing the things I would do to make the most out of my exchange experience. One of them is to make friends with the locals and fellow international students there. I have heard how challenging making friends during your exchange program…

Sometimes we forget that many adjustments are involved in moving to a new country. These adjustments are the most basic everyday things we have been accustomed to since forever. Still, we suddenly become conscious of experiencing them in a whole new way. For example, in Indonesia, we are used to…

You go to Italy, and you see the Colosseum. You go to Egypt, and you see the Pyramids. You go to Michigan, and you see… Costco. “I forgot Michigan was even a state,” says a friend of mine. …

“Four months of studying abroad in the States” — Almost sounds like a wish. One that I’ve had for too long. I only realized how fast time would fly when I finally arrived in Michigan. There were simply too many things I wanted to do that it quickly got overwhelming…

¡Hola! Hi there! ¿Qué tal? At this moment, I would like to have a flashback with you on my journey of learning as a student at Universidad Autónoma de Madrid. Being a student there even for a semester, let alone learning Spanish culture directly in Spain, was never on my…

What would you do if your lecturers stopped showing up to class in the midst of the semester because they were on strike? That happened while I was on exchange at the University of Sussex. We received the news in mid-November that university workers — not just lecturers — across…

There is an old saying, “The more, the merrier.” But what if it’s not necessarily true? What if having less actually provides more? Children tend to possess the wildest dreams of what their future life could be. Mine was living in a metropolis. My eyes sparkled with excitement when I…

In this Humans of IISMA post, follow Monica as she allows herself to be human with her peers, only to find herself along the way. As a twenty-year-old Virgo, one of the traits that I really like about myself is my independence. Growing up in a military environment, I have…