Inside Dubai

Many students on the MSU Dubai campus shared the sentiment that a visit from ASMSU was long overdue.

Once myself and MSU Dubai’s council members met with ASMSU representatives to establish a proper constitution for the MSU Dubai student government, I said, “I wish you would have come earlier … back in our freshman year.”

For the last year and a half, our student council members have tried to run the student government without fully being aware of its rights and responsibilities.

The lack of a constitution really limited the effectiveness of our student government. As a result, students here would not come to us with their issues because they felt, and rightly so, that we couldn’t help them.

When ASMSU members Kyle Dysarz and Kristy Currier asked students to voice their concerns, so that those issues could be taken back to East Lansing, many students did just that.

Students mentioned they would like to see more electives, have a more effective way of communicating with their academic advisers in East Lansing, and have access to a recreational facility.

Student council members here all are hoping that by March, MSU Dubai finally will have an established student government.

Students here also are excited about the LeaderShape conference that takes place in Michigan in May.

Thanks to Denise Maybank, associate vice president for student affairs and services, last year two students from MSU Dubai were able to visit. And this year four are expected to go.

Many students are trying to do more on campus so that they can get nominated for the conference, and it’s so good to see more students getting involved.

Despite the distance, all of us want to have more interaction with students back in East Lansing. In the meeting with ASMSU, many students kept asking if there were students back in Michigan who were interested in studying here in Dubai. Students from East Lansing who are reading this, please come! MSU Dubai students would like to have you.

I hope this is not the last visit that ASMSU pays us. In three short days, Kyle and Kristy have helped students here understand how to run a student government and deal with student issues.

I remember teleconferencing with ASMSU members last spring, but it was difficult for us to interact with students we’ve never seen in real life through a television screen that was not only blurry, but had poor voice quality.

I haven’t come across a student yet who has objected to ASMSU’s visit. And I don’t think I will.

At 11 p.m. the night of the Alamo Bowl, a bunch of Michigan State students and professors are gathered on MSU Dubai’s campus wearing their green MSU t-shirts, chanting and singing the MSU Fight Song. We’re all impatiently waiting for the game to start, but we aren’t at Spartan Stadium. Instead, we’re watching thousands of miles away on a projector screen, which is streaming the game live, at Michigan State University’s campus in Dubai.

I gave up a guaranteed college admissions offer in the States for the chance to attend MSU Dubai. I remember the goose bumps I got when I first heard the campus was opening here. At the time, it felt a little more like fate. I applied in July to MSU Dubai and waited to hear back. I knew I was risking it. If I didn’t get in, I wouldn’t be going to any college for another semester or two.

Two months later, I got a phone call from an admissions officer who said she wanted to give me the good news in person and I still remember responding with loud squeals of delight and relief. I was going to be a Spartan – how cool is that?

It’s been a year and a half since. I’m a sophomore at MSU Dubai, and although I missed my orientation week, I feel pretty much … at home. Being part-Pakistani and part-Tunisian and having spent my life growing up in Pakistan, Qatar and the UAE, the word “home” sometimes is difficult to nail down. But I consider MSU and Dubai to be home.

In a typical classroom at MSU Dubai, I’m surrounded by students who all come from different countries, such as China, India, Iran, Russia, Canada, Lebanon, Nigeria, France, Jordan, Palestine, Syria and Egypt, to name a few. We don’t have much in common in terms of culture or ethnicity, but we are all here to get an American education and we all get to experience the diversity Dubai has to offer. Although I am a sophomore, I sometimes feel like a senior because I’m part of the inaugural class and, as a result, I have no one to look up to.

One year ago we had to sing the MSU Alma Mater in front of President Lou Anna K. Simon and many other dignitaries at MSU Dubai’s opening ceremony, but no one knew how to sing the Alma Mater song. We had to look up YouTube videos of students in East Lansing singing the Alma Mater. That’s how we learned the MSU Fight Song as well.

I hear that the East Lansing campus is huge and during the winter there is snowfall. MSU Dubai consists of two floors and is surrounded by many other international universities in a place called Dubai Academic City. Here, we are surrounded by desert sand and, on windy days, experience heavy sand storms, which can prevent students from getting to class.

Occasionally, if you’re lucky, you might spot a camel or two loitering around the area alone.

Welcome to Michigan State University in Dubai.