The new weekend experience, ever.

Well, very good morning fellas ! it is a gloomy Sunday morning, 10.46 am, GMT +1 time. I just felling like starting my day with write a post on this blog about my new weekend experience ever, this morning. Let me begin with the description of the situation. As i said, it is a gloomy Sunday morning in Amsterdam. According to Accuweather.com, it is believed that now it is 0 degrees Celcius outside. It is snowing intensively with humidity of 93%, wind blowing 38 km/h towards North East, and visibility of 8 km as well as air pressure of 102 KPA. I think that's more than enough for the weather forecast.

For your information, this is my first winter ever. I just moved to a four-seasons country for like just five months. This winter might be the first for me, but according to many newspaper and TV news, it is one of the worst and coldest for Europe in last few decades. I can't agree more agree with that. It caused chaos in transportation system. Airports were shut, trains stops, traffic jam, and so on.

As i promise on my last post, i would like to discuss more about my "study", in order to balance the "beyond" contents of this blog. Then let's start my story of this weekend. As i approaching new year's holiday, i have been packed with exams preparation and many assignments due. Nothing can't be worse than a Finance exam in the end of December, 6 pm, snowing, freezing, even worse, the location of the exam is far from city center. Then come christmas and new year. well, i would say that it was not that special for me, but i had a good time with my friends and family as well.

I started January with a bit of sorrow and homesick feelings. Fortunately it was just last for like two days. After i phoned my mother, everything is back on track. I love you mother. hehe. At first, i have two final essay assignments due at the end of the first week of January and also i started what so called as "business study project 1 : literature review". From its name, i'm sure i gonna deal with a lot of works, reading many journals, as well as writing reviews. And it is too good to be true.

As i also have posted before, to be honest, the intensity, pace and academic rigor of my study here is somehow more difficult compare to my previous university study experience. I believe that no more i can do other than keep up my pace and just simply do my best efforts. Hence, i found that this weekend is one of the manifestations of that. Yesterday was Saturday, i just spending my whole day at home for cooking and eating from the time i woke up in the morning until the late afternoon. For me, eating is the only way to beat the cold, though. At first, i was thinking like to spend my Saturday night with my cousin, beat the cold and have some food and chit chat. But since i still have two essays due at the beginning of next week, i decided to dedicate my Saturday night at my bedroom and doing my stuffs. In fact, it was not a good weather to going out last night. so, i think i have a quite good reason to stay home. hehe.

To be honest, last night was my first time ever to spend a Saturday night to study ! doing my whole life being a student, no matter what in school as well as university, i have never ever spending my Saturday night to study ! it was a taboo thing to do for me. with no exception. no matter how bad the situation is, i always spend my saturday night with friends or family. But last night, i spent my Saturday evening reviewing several articles as well as writing my essay and i finished like around midnight. In fact, it was not as bad as i imagined, though. But somehow i still amazed with myself because finally i did it. Yes, saturday night studying. ;D to be honest, i would say that i'm doing it not because i want to, but it was because i have to.

More excitingly, i have on more experience to tell. Last night, since i only finish my first essay and still have one more essay to do, i checked the website of my university library. it says it is open on Sunday from 10 am - 5 pm. Since i need the access to the academic journal and database, i was thinking like "why not spending my Sunday at the university library by tomorrow ?". at first i was saying "no way, Arif Nindito. Come on, it is Sunday, for God's sake." but then by the time i woke up this morning, i feel like i really have to go there to, again, do my stuffs. So then, here i am, in the front of one of many computer screens at the university library on this such gloomy sunday morning, writing my blog post. hehe.

To wrap up, spending the Saturday night studying, as well as enjoying Sunday on the library are totally new experiences for me. I would never ever do these kind of things during my time in Indonesia. I promise i wouldn't. But somehow, although not with a full heart of mine, i enjoy it. Maybe it is what it takes to study at one of the world's best 50 universities ;P

I always believe that i must live in balance. Of course i know that spending Sunday at the library is not my ideal way of enjoying weekend, though. But, i have to tell you fellas, one of the most distracting as well as relaxing thing about spending a day at the university library of Universiteit van Amsterdam is the chicks ! sometimes i also wondering what the fcuk are these gorgeous ladies doing here in the library. i believe that they must be better to be there on the photograph taking sessions as the fashion models. hehehe. It is a nice fact, as well, that they are young, gorgeous, and intelligent looking. i don't know whether they are really that "intelligent" or not. but, who cares ? this library offers many good features for its students and visitors. but for me, the chicks is one of the most fascinating features of it. hehehe. Enjoy your Sunday !

Redefined learning paradigm

As the title of this blog is "Study and Beyond", i expect to write anything about my experience during my time studying abroad including all aspects of it on this blog. Therefore, i found that so far, i never write anything about the "real" study thing. If i would give the analogy of writing about food, so far, what i wrote, has just been the "sauces" of my study. Hence, i never write about the "meat" of my study yet.

At first, i thought, studying abroad at the university level is just another university study but in a totally different circumstances of environment and so on. Well, it is totally true. As i already wrote many times in this blog, it dealing with many differences of the environment. Starting with the most obvious thing like the weather climate, to more subtle issue like values differences. These things, of course, would make your study experience more challenging. That's if we would like to talk about the "sauce" of my study here.

Moreover, if we would like to talk about the "meat" of my study, i also found many substantial differences. The most obvious difference between my academic setting here and the setting at my home country is the academic term. i used to study under semester-long term, which gives me 14 weeks to cover all materials of a specific course. In contrast, here, i have to suit my self to study under the quarter term system which only gives me 7 weeks to cover all of the materials of the course. To be real, it is totally fast. You really need to keep the pace. Otherwise, i think, you gonna easily flunk. The consequences of this rapid and steady system is that everything gonna be shorter and faster.

I gonna elaborate more about what does it really means by "shorter and faster". First, you can't expect that much from your lecturer. You really need to cover most of the materials by yourself. Make sure you already read the material beforehand (before the class) because the lecturer would not cover those things in depth. They gonna only explaining the outlines and the only way to go deep is by raising question. The the thing is, how could you raise a question without knowing what you wanna ask. Second, you gonna need to spend more time reading the book by yourself. In case of me, i used to "eat" a textbook within 14 weeks. But now, i have to "eat" it within only 7 weeks. No mid-term exam, nothing. 7 weeks, then final exam. that's it. There are also several minor challenges, but i think those two are the most important.

Above, i explained more about the practical thing. Well, i think the more fundamental difference that i experience is the difference in the nature of the university study itself. what i mean by this is that in Indonesia, somehow, i experienced that they still teach you many practical things in the university. In case of my field of business, they will still teach you practical things about business like how to write a business plan and so on. I think it is more American approach of business education being implemented in Indonesia, especially on my previous school of Fakultas Ekonomi Universitas Indonesia. I'm not saying that they are not teach you practical stuff in the curriculum, but in contrast, instead of teaching you how to write a business plan, they prefer to teach me how to write a research proposal. I think this is typical European approach of business education as a science in university level. Otherwise you enrolled in MBA program, i believe they will teach you more academic and theoretical stuff than practical things in BSc or MSc programs. In short, get yourself used to academic journals instead of business magazines, and academic papers instead of company management's reports.

To be honest, it is a totally new settings for me. I'm not used to it. Therefore, i take it as new challenge. I felt, somehow, it is really intellectually challenging. Back there, they use to teach me to be a businessman or a manager. Now, the teach me to become a researcher in the field of business. They want me to become a social scientist. ;D *lol*. Maybe this is how the university study should be like. In fact, university should be dealing with the issue of knowledge creation instead of simply use and apply it. Then now, i gonna discuss how those differences also require different approaches.

Before i departed, i already know that during my study here, i should give more efforts than what i used to gave back there. For a student with a lack of study time like me, the overall GPA 3.18 over 4 was a not-bad achievement. I used to only study during the exam period, but of course i did my assignments. Although i already knew it that i have to change my habit, i still didn't change it after like five months studying here. The result is even to pass the course is quite hard. I passed the courses i took, but it was just passing. I can't excel with that same-old same-old approach of study.

I know that i need to improve my learning abilities and efforts in order to achieve my academic goal. Fortunately i also still have several other interest other than just business and economics, i also interest in the field of education. several weeks ago, i found a paper from Carlos M. Rodriguez that discussing about the importance of academic self-concept and the outcome expectation in regard to academic performance of university students. I found it very interesting. I also attended the seminar about study skills provided by the university few weeks ago, i know the concept, but i still not applying 100%. And today, i feel like i have dig more about improving my study skills.

I need to, again, learn how to learn.

I believe that there's no such term as "late" to learn. That's why today i look up at the psychology of learning section of the library and found out a book titled "How to Study in College" by Walter Pauk. The book was published in 1974, but i found that the content is still totally relevant today. Now i totally realized that to keep up in the university, it is not enough to just study like the way i did it since elementary school until the first two years of my university study. improvement on my study skills is unavoidable.

I have to redefining my learning paradigm, sharping my academic settings, and tuning my study skills. It is not enough to just be able to read and write. it is more about how you read and how you write. well, i agree that it's not always necessarily to study hard. therefore, i believe that we all have to study effectively and efficiently. I should be an independent learner, more self-regulated student, and a life-long learning person. Moreover, in order to perform academically, i am not only need the skills, but also the more important thing is the motivation; which insyaallah i already have enough. The issue of learning is a whole complete system that includes psychological, sociological, practical and even spiritual aspects.

In conclusion, i have to redefine my learning paradigm. There are still a lot of things that i would like to share about this particular subject. I promise to write more about it in the future. But for now, since my clock already shows 00.30 a.m GMT +1, i really need to sleep. It suppose to be a part of time-management, which is also very important in study. hehe ;D

Never stop learning and improving our learning capacity as well as capability. As Walter Pauk said, "Only you can educate yourself."