Alan doesn’t want to stay in the Netherlands, but now that he is here

What are foreign students looking for in the Netherlands? An education? An experience? A challenge? All of that, says Alan from India, and much more.

‘Cycling to Zuidlaren is fun and very educational.’ Alan Prasad (25) does not like half-measures. ‘I want to get to know Dutch culture, ordinary life here, ordinary people. That’s just the way it should be, I think. Otherwise, I might as well have stayed in India.’ After completing his master’s degree in Data Science for Life Sciences at Hanze University of Applied Sciences, Alan had a conversation with his supervisor. One of the things he was thinking about was following a PhD track in Nijmegen (where he interned at Radboudumc). ‘But soon after that I decided working at the University Medical Center Groningen suited me better. I can do a PhD later. Or not, you never know how life will turn out. My plan was to go back to India after my master’s, but look, I’m still there. Even now I have the idea of going back. But first this.’

‘What the work entails exactly, I don’t know yet, but it will be similar to what I did in the masters’

Alan will become a junior analyst in the UMCG’s Intensive Care Unit on 1 October. ‘My supervisor is the senior data analyst. What the work entails exactly, I don’t know yet, but it is clear that it will be similar to what I did in the master’s programme: fiddling with the huge amount of data we have on patients these days.’

The UMCG is familiar territory, as Alan and four other master’s students worked on a brain disease project here in 2023. He can’t say too much about it because the outcomes must first be assessed by medical scientists, but what he can say is this: ‘We had to map out the genes that play a role in Alzheimer and other brain diseases.’ He suddenly looks quite serious: ‘It is important to state clearly here that it was not research into the causes of Alzheimer’s.’

‘I could have gone to another place in India, but that would also have been far from home’

The five Hanze students received high marks for their performance. ‘For this project, we were given the assignment and the final goal, the path to that goal we had to completely determine ourselves. For me, that took a huge amount of getting used to, but I really like that approach.’

Alan Prasad studied Computer Science at Mahatma Ghandi University in Kottayam, a city of half a million people in southern India. ‘After my bachelor, I wanted to continue my studies. I could have gone to another place in India. But that would also have been far away from home, so why not go one step further? My sister studies in England, so Europe was the obvious choice. I knew some Indian people who were studying in the Netherlands. They recommended Groningen to me, because they knew I like quiet places. And they were right. I went to Amsterdam. It’s a beautiful city, but far too many people and traffic. Groningen is uncluttered.’

At first, the biggest test was the homesickness, the loneliness

Alan knows Groningen pretty well; he worked as a meal delivery man. Cycling around Groningen to earn some extra cash. ‘But of course the emphasis was on studying. I wanted it to be a success. That was quite a job, because the master’s contained a lot of biology and chemistry, I think sixty per cent of the programme. I had to learn all that. Yes, you are right, Indians are quite competitive, me too, I think. I also like to put myself to the test.’

In the beginning, the biggest test was the homesickness, the loneliness. ‘Yes, I admit that. My family, my friends, I missed them very much. Not that I told my parents, why worry them? My mother called me every day, she still does, by the way. Just for a few minutes, just to hear if things are going well.’

‘At Hanze I met people who made me feel welcome, I am very grateful to them’

And what about Dutch people, ah, the Dutch. ‘I’m not much for lavish parties. I like a good chat. I meet quite a lot of people who are interested, strangely enough mainly the older people. At Hanze I met many people who made me feel welcome here. I am very grateful to them.’

Alan can now understand those people quite well. ‘Reading is also okay, at a beginner’s level. But I prefer not to speak. I’m taking a course at the University of Groningen for that now, so who knows, maybe I’ll master that too.’ Not that he will need it much for his work, where he can get by with English just fine. Nor will he need Dutch for a longer stay in the Netherlands. ‘No,’ he says, ‘my future lies in India, I think.’

Is there nothing then that surprised him unpleasantly…. yes, there is, the GP

Alan wishes to learn Dutch and for as long as he remains in the Netherlands, he wants to get to know the Netherlands a bit better. In Zuidlaren, he visited museum De Wachter. ‘That’s a beautiful mill that mills grain and flour. I also saw wonderful, old steam engines. And there was a man showing how to make wooden shoes. It was incredible.’

Of course, the Netherlands is very different from India. ‘The streets here are so neat, everything is clean and well regulated. The traffic! The Dutch obey the rules, that is unthinkable in India.’ Is there nothing, then, that surprised him unpleasantly. Yes, there is. ‘The GP. Everything has to go through the GP. I had pain in my throat, but I couldn’t go to the hospital to have a picture taken. First go to the GP, they said. And then the GP said: take two paracetamol and we’ll see if it goes away. Okay, it did pass, but it was weird all the same.’