New blood to the Brazilian studies

Christina and Juul both just started their first semester at Brazilian Studies at Aarhus University. Their first week, the so-called” rusuge” was full of new impressions:

Christina:
The introduction week, beginning Monday the 24th of August 2015 was the start of a brand new chapter for a lot of people including myself. Actually ’a new book’ would fit better, because the next few years will be filled with so much, that solely a single chapter isn’t going to be enough. That day I was really starting a whole new book, a book that will be stuffed with all things Brazil; its rich history, language, culture and politics. I can only imagine that this book is going to be exceptionally interesting once it is done and I have a bachelor in Brazilian Studies.
In the plan for our ’introduction week’ the first thing the tutor was writing was;” you are now guaranteed 3,5 years with a lot of exciting and challenging tasks”. This sounded amazing, so I had very high expectations for my start at Aarhus University
And there I was, standing with a group of new people and I wondered where they are from, why they are here, what their connection to Brazil is and how many already speaks Portuguese. The introduction week was filled with information about Brazil and a bunch of new friendships. All in all the first week was terrific; I could do a week more!

Juul:
A great mixture of fear, nervousness and anxiety… This is how I felt when I tried to find my way around campus the first day. The same thoughts kept running through my mind: “What if I don’t like the study?”, “what if I can’t figure it out?”, “what if I don’t get any friends?” and then the games began… Name games, facepainting each other, the awkward presentations and a whole lot of information. Our tutors did a great job telling us everything we needed to know in our class of 12 people. 12 nervous anxious newcomers, who did not know the first thing about the University Life.
The tutors gave us an insight of the music and culture of Brazil. They even made us participate in a quiz about Brazil, but how am I supposed to know which city is known for having the biggest homosexual population and that voting is mandatory?!
It only took 2 days and 60 shots each, before we really started bonding. One night we had a BBQ-party with the other area-studies. Suddenly I found myself surrounded by Brazilian, Chinese and Arabic students, and I was filled with joy thinking about the fact that I’m going to spend the next 3,5 years with these people.


The new students of Brazilian Studies

Written by Juul van de Voort and Christina Andersen-Stolberg



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