Memories of University Challenge by George Dabies – Palestine

I’m writing now to tell you a story which had a major effect on my life; this story talks about the moment I changed my major when I was at university. I have been interested in English literature all my life, I swore up and down that I was never going to change my major, and after finishing the tawjehi exams (general secondary examination in Palestine) I registered at university and chose to study English. I said that I would go to college an English major and graduate as an English major student, but future plans don’t always stay the same, and this is my story. In the first semester of the first year of university things didn’t go well. I said, it does not matter, it could have happened because I have not yet accepted this new situation, so I stayed with the English major until the end of the second semester of this year, when I realized that I didn’t belong to this major nor with the people in it. This year was a chance because I discovered myself and found that my skills and abilities fit into other fields. That’s what happened when the nursing department at university made a visit to some marginalized areas and I participated in the visit. They had many activities there, like diabetes screening, and holding an awareness lecture for the residents of the area. The lecture talked about many subjects such as early marriage, how to save yourself from diseases, and how to do a breast cancer screening by yourself. The lecture was mostly for the women there because many are either uneducated or they didn’t complete their education. After the visit and seeing how the nursing students dealt with the patients there, I found that my personality fit in with this humanitarian field. I found that I have the ability to deal with all categories of people, I have the ability to help others face and overcome their problems, and I realized how much I wanted to do that. In addition, there is always something new to learn in the health sector, and I love learning new things, and I was sure that I could provide the best care for my patients. Because of all these things I started thinking about changing my major, and after 3 weeks of thinking, I decided to switch from English to nursing. I didn’t take this step alone, but after talking with my parents and seeing how they supported me when they saw that I was determined on this change, I changed to nursing. My parents were very supportive, they talked to me about this change instead of panicking, they started buying me books about nurses and nursing life so I could understand the nursing major much better, also they suggested that I move to a university with a stronger nursing program. They really believed in me and didn’t leave me alone, and this made me stronger when I made this change. After graduating, I thank god because this step changed my life and I will never regret it. Now I’m working as a nurse and I love my work, and I always renew my knowledge in the field to keep up with every changes that occurs. Nowadays I’m proud of myself and of all thing that I do and the things that I will do. So, the moral is that everyone changes their minds and it’s much better to change it and do something you love instead of something you don’t.  

This is just one example of the important work produced YaLa’s citizen journalists, a program funded by the European Union’s Peacebuilding Initiative in order to enable young leaders from across the Middle East and North Africa to document and share their experiences of the region.