Siberian Federal University: Student Radio launched a podcast about the life of foreigners in Russia
U-Radio, the student radio of Siberian Federal University, publishes podcast “How I Became Russian” where foreigners tell how they came to live and study in Russia.
The author and host of the project is Maria Nabatnikova, a second-year student at the School of Philology and Language Communication of Siberian Federal University. She said that the idea of podcasts dedicated to international students was to show how many guys from abroad study at SibFU and live in Krasnoyarsk.
‘In podcasts, we introduce our listeners to the culture and mentality of people from various countries. Do they really think differently? Which stereotypes are true and which we shouldn’t believe? The question that traditionally sounds in every episode: “Why did you come to Siberia to study, why Krasnoyarsk?’ Maria notes. ‘The office of student and staff support and university communities for international students help us search for characters. And often, our guests gladly advise their friends to us for interviews.’.
On average, one episode gets over 1200 plays. U-Radio studio has already interviewed students and teachers from Japan, Kyrgyzstan, China, Tajikistan, Iraq, Algeria, Ghana, Guinea, Brazil.
‘I enjoy socializing, and I like to comprehend how Russians think about foreigners, it is an exchange of views and acquaintance with other mentality and cultures. In general, it is important to create projects in which foreigners talk about their life experiences in Russia. Such projects will help the university learn more about its international students and how they live and improve the quality of life and solve issues. It also opens the eyes well to other cultures. People outside of Russia must see how good it is even for foreigners here. I sent a recording with my interview to my family and some close friends in Algeria. Even though they did not understand anything, they said that they liked it, it was hilarious,’ shared Youcef Radi (Algeria), a speaker of one of the episodes, graduate student of the School of Architecture and Design, SibFU.
Announcements of new episodes and podcasts can always be found in the U-Radio group By the way, listeners can leave questions under the announcement post, the answers to which they would like to hear on the air.
‘We ask foreign students not to be afraid to come to us. The levels of proficiency in the Russian language are different that is why we send the main questions to foreigners in advance so that they can prepare well for the coming interview. Our guys are always ready to help in case of translation problems,’, Maria Nabatnikova adds.