A little bit about myself!

I am Sanyukta, a 5th year medical student in Gdansk, Poland.

Poland is a country in Eastern Europe, but they prefer “Central” European! I don’t know how much you know about it, but the first time I heard about this university the one statement that came to my mind was from my history textbook- “Germany invaded Poland and the 2nd world war began”.

Everything happened so quickly that I was barely able to keep up with all of what was going on. 

One minute I was stressed about CET and the next, there I was doing the paperwork for my Visa application. And just like that I was bidding goodbye to my parents. I was quite excited to meet new people, learn a new language, experience a different culture and the list goes on…

Gdansk is a small city in northern Poland. It’s one of the tri-cities along with Gdynia and Sopot. It was actually the first city where Germans attacked from the Baltic sea and won the battle, starting WW2! The place where they attacked is called Westerplatte. You can see the destroyed bunker and a monument in memory of polish soldiers who died during the battle. It is also the city where Solidarity trade union movement first started under the leadership of Lech Wałęsa in the 1980’s. This movement later played a major role in ending the communistic regime in Poland. So, the city has played a significant role in shaping Poland as it is today!

When I first arrived here back in 2015, I couldn’t speak a single word of the Polish language. Even though they use the same script as English, they have 6 additional letters. The pronunciations are nowhere close to English and don’t even get me started on the grammar. 

Fortunately, my course is entirely in English, but we still had to learn basic polish in our university. It was fun for me because personally I enjoy learning new languages.

Polish people have been very helpful in my opinion and have patiently bared with me even though I do not speak their language. 

One thing I have noticed is they have stuck with their language and that’s the case with most European countries. At times it gets annoying, especially when even the younger generation don’t speak English. But then I realize it’s not that they can’t speak it, it’s just they are not very confident about the language and you can’t blame them for that!

Studying medicine over here has been an amazing experience over all. I have met some incredible people from different parts of the world, made some crazy memories with them, traveled to cities I could only dream of… all of this while of course keeping my goal of becoming a doctor in mind.

Studying away from home helps us evolve and become a better version of ourselves. It’s not all fun, parts of it are difficult. You have to be more responsible. At times you come home tired to a sink full of dishes and no food and you just have to shake it off and do what you are supposed to do… survive on noodles!

Jokes apart, it is like being out of your comfort zone 24/7 for almost the whole year. But you get really good at being independent and being able to enjoy your own company which is very important. Personally, I am happy I decided to study medicine here in Poland and would gladly make the same decision again if I had to…

To end this boring introduction with a Quote I appreciate and live by from ‘The Alchemist’-

“It’s the possibility of having a dream come true that makes life interesting.”

SANYUKTA