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Every month, Study International invites you to a conversation with an international student, graduate or professor about the beauty, boldness and benefits of studying abroad.2023 Study International Ciencias Sociales Educación Escritos y Comentarios sobre Viajes
Episodios
  • Dreaming of publishing a book? This YA fiction author got her head start in the US

    Dreaming of publishing a book? This YA fiction author got her head start in the US
    Oct 28 2025
    Maryam: Hey, what's up guys? Welcome back to the Extra Credit Podcast. If it's your first time tuning in, this is a series where we speak to international students, graduates, and faculty members worldwide about the beauty and perks of studying abroad.I'm Maryam, your host. If you're active on BookTok and Bookstagram, or if you’ve simply got a passion for writing and dream of breaking into the publishing world, our guest, Mae Coyiuto, has some tips to share with you. From all the way in the Philippines, Mae Coyiuto is best known as the author of the teen romance novel, Chloe and the Kaishao Boys, named one of the New York Public Library's top 10 books for teens in 2023. The story itself is one I'm sure many of us can relate to.A high school girl in Manila named Chloe wishes to attend college in the US, but her overprotective dad keeps setting her up on arranged dates. Why? To keep her from studying abroad. Now, just like the main protagonist of the book, Mae Coyiuto herself dreamed of studying in the US. And fortunately for her, she did. Mae, welcome. We're very excited to have you here with us today. How are you?Mae: I'm good, thanks for having me. And I feel like you should be the one to pitch my book to other people. That was way better than what I usually do (laughs).Maryam: (Laughs) Now, in your book, while Chloe wants to study animation in the US, she faces some pushback from her father and family members who want her to study back home in the Philippines, just like her cousin, Peter, right?Mae: Mhmm.Maryam: As someone who shares the same heritage with Chloe and who has also studied in the US yourself, was this theme inspired by a true story or perhaps your own experience?Mae: Yeah, actually, when my friends would read the synopsis of the book or the, I guess, the description before reading it, they would always be like, “Mae, are you Chloe?” Uh…it's not an autobiographical book, but I did borrow a lot from personal experiences from observing a lot of Chinese-Filipino girls growing up also. I actually just wanted to write like a young adult fiction story that starred a Chinese-Filipino girl in Manila. Because, like, growing up, I really loved young adult books. I loved reading, but most of the rom-coms that I would read always starred people in the U.S. or teenagers based in Western countries. So, this was kind of like my spin on, what would that look like if someone from Manila got to be the main character.Maryam: Oh, really cool, but were your parents supportive of your dreams of studying abroad?Mae: Yeah, I was very lucky. So, I'm the youngest of four siblings, and then my eldest sister actually studied abroad. She went to Singapore for college, and then I think a lot of older siblings would relate. I feel like they paved the way for it to become a bit easier for younger siblings to, like, do their own thing. So I think, if not for her, I wouldn't have really gotten the idea of, like, I could study abroad. But my parents are very supportive and they never really pushed back on me wanting to write. I think they just never expected that I would make a career out of it. So, I think a lot of people could relate when they want to do, like, a creative career. They feel like it's not usually seen as, like, a practical thing to pursue, or it's usually seen as a hobby. So that's kind of what I channeled when I was writing Chloe. Not really from my experiences with my parents, but more of like, from community, society, and like, that idea that doing something like animation or a creative thing is not something worth pursuing. I'm lucky with my own family. But yeah, I think it's more (of) what I observed from the community around me.Maryam: Interesting that you say that because in 2011 you were a Young Star columnist for the Philippine Star. So, writing has always been a huge passion of yours. But in 2012, you pursued a bachelor's degree in psychology at Pomona College. So, what inspired you to take a different path or pursue this field at the beginning?Mae: Yeah, so I really loved writing. I started writing when I was, like, nine years old or even younger. But then I always saw it as, like, something I enjoyed doing, and I was really exposed to – when I thought of, like, authors or books that are usually from international countries. So, I never really thought that I would study (at) college and then study writing. And none of my classmates were also doing that. So, I was so focused – I'm sure a lot of people in your podcast could relate, that when you're trying to apply for a college, you're just so focused on that process of the application, of doing well in high school, that for me, I actually didn't think so much about what I wanted to do in college until I was there. And then, so, when I got to college, I was lucky that I went to Pomona, and they encouraged students to take a lot of classes from different majors, departments, so that you could figure out what you wanted. So, I was ...
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    24 m
  • The international archaeology graduate turned guardian of human history

    The international archaeology graduate turned guardian of human history
    Sep 12 2025
    Maryam: Hey, how’s it going, guys! Welcome back to the Extra Credit podcast.To those tuning in for the first time, this is a series where we speak to international students, graduates, and professors from around the world about the beauty of studying abroad.I’m Maryam, your host for today.If you’re a fan of Indiana Jones, The Mummy trilogy, and anything to do with the history of humankind, you’re going to want to listen to our special guest, Nurul Hamizah Afandi.Hamizah here is a museum curator at the Perbadanan Muzium Negeri Pahang in Malaysia. She visits museum galleries and archives, researches their collections of historic artefacts, and tailors different exhibitions and displays to attract new visitors to the museum. But before she got here, she was a curious archaeology and anthropology student at University College London (or UCL) in the UK. Welcome, Hamizah. We’re excited to have you here with us. How are you?Hamizah: I'm good. Thank you so much for having me here. It's truly an honour to be invited to speak on this podcast as well.Maryam: We’re glad to have you here as well. We're excited to learn more about, you know, what archaeology and anthropology is about. So alright, let's go back to the beginning before you started digging into bygone eras when you were just a senior high school student at Mara Junior Science College. Tell us, Hamiza, you were a math whiz who participated in the National Maths Olympiad. What suddenly inspired you to study archaeology? That's quite the switch in interest, isn't it?Hamizah: Alright. Yes, so, like you said, Mathematics has always been, I guess, one of my favorite subjects and, I guess, it's partly because I got the exposure from a very young age because my mom herself is a math teacher. So we've been, like say, my mom's teaching math for students who come over to our home to get, like, extra classes and things like that. So, I guess I can say that math was part of my life because I have this, like, huge family thing going around. But I guess, during my upper form of high school, at some point – we had to choose between taking biology or accounting for our SPM (Sijil Pelajaran Malaysia) subjects. Like, you can't take both.So, it was at that point that I started thinking more deeply about life after school, like what I want to do, um, for my career and so on, because, well, it's not the end of the world of choosing like either biology or accounting, but then still, it somehow can probably limit or restrict your options afterwards. So, back then in school, we had to do this, ah, one test. It's called a RIASEC test and I did that quite a few times with – one of my aunts is a counselor so we did that together as well. So, it's one of those occupational personality type tests. So, every time I did the test, I got the same result. So, it basically stands for, I think, R-I-A-S-E-C stands for – was it realistic, investigative, artistic, social, entrepreneurship or something, and then conventional. So, I've always gotten the ‘I’ component very high, like, the – my marks for that component (were) very high. So, I guess I found out that I'm into careers with a very investigative nature of some sort.So, I guess it makes sense because Mathematics and Chemistry were two of my favorite subjects in school. And then they were like, with maths and chemistry, there's always, like, problems that we have to find solutions to and then you have questions that you have to find answers to. So, it's like, at the time, obviously you were not really like, familiar with research kind of thing, so I guess investigative is kind of like the best term to describe it. So, because of that, I tried to think harder about what (of) that has always interested me. So, I love watching crime documentaries. I love, reading crime, you know, books. In fact, one of my favorite novels is Sherlock Holmes. So it's during that time, I was like, okay, I think I'm into something related to, like, forensic science and something very, very research, very investigative of nature. So, um yeah, at that point, I was like, paying more attention to my interests: The books I read and, like, the movies I watched, to think about a career that I want to, like, go into. So, that's how it comes in the first place.Maryam: Interesting. I'm still wondering how, like, that ended up evolving into your interest in archaeology, because that's about, you know, studying what happened in the past, like civilisations from centuries or millennia ago. So, how did it get into that sort of, um, specialisation?Hamizah: Right, so, it started out as my personal interest in Forensic Science. So, basically, I was into, like, these crime documentaries and crime novels and stuff. So, I started planning to further my studies in Bachelors of Forensic Science or something related to that. But then, because I got a scholarship after SPM – so, I secured a scholarship by Yayasan Khazanah. But then, the one that they ...
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    41 m
  • How to break into the video game industry as an international student

    How to break into the video game industry as an international student
    Jun 9 2025
    Maryam: Hey guys, welcome back to the extra credit podcast. To those tuning in for the first time, this is a series where we talk to interesting international students, graduates and professors from around the world. I'm your host, Maryam.Gamer, guys and gals, if you dream of creating your own video games, we have a special guest today who can give us some insight on what to expect. Mody Ibrahim began his journey as a game development student at the University of Wollongong, Malaysia, back in 2013.Then, in 2017, he moved to Canada to pursue a Diploma in Internet Applications at Algonquin College, and he's been in the country ever since as an extended reality developer. It's been a long journey with many milestones, but this all began with his passion for video games. Welcome, Mody, we're so glad to have you here with us. How are you?Mody: Thank you. Pleasure to be here. Oh, I'm doing very well.Maryam: All right, okay. So, let's go back to the beginning. And by that, I mean how your personal journey started. Back home in Egypt, way before you booked your first flight to Malaysia, all right? Tell us, growing up, what was your childhood like, and how did video games play a part in your life?Mody: Oh, I certainly remember playing a lot of video games with my siblings, growing up like late night during summer vacation, when you know me and my siblings would play video games together, and I think that was something that initially launched me in that direction. Maryam: That’s great. So how did this interest or hobby turn from just playing games into creating and developing them?Mody: Well, I actually sort of stopped, or rather started playing video games less in my early teens. But I remember distinctly when I was once on the internet and found this software called Game Maker. And it was this visual scripting game engine, essentially where you didn't need to code, and you just drag and drop blocks to form your logic. And I just downloaded it out of curiosity.And I remember I really wanted to move this square with the keyboard, to have it, like, stop moving when it touches another square. And I remember struggling with that a bit. And when that actually happened, I got this, like, huge dopamine rush, and I was like, I really want to learn more about this, and want to do this more.So while, like, I had an interest in gaming, I think it was more so the curiosity over, like, how video games are made, and how that process works, and all the nuances that go into it that actually got me really interested in the field.Maryam: That's so cool. Did you join any clubs or societies that sort of cater to that passion of creating for you?Mody: I certainly knew friends back then were likely interested in that thing, but I think there was a lack of kind of community specifically around that where I grew up, so I spent a lot of time on Internet communities making video games.Maryam: Well, really cool. Did you create any video games or any sort of, like, software or projects before you actually pursued a degree in game development?Mody: Yeah, yeah, I did. But it was very, very simple, kind of like, if you've ever been on NewGrounds as a kid, it was, you know, there were a lot of flash games and, like, really small stuff. And, yeah, I certainly have some projects from back then, but they were very simple.Maryam: So cool. Okay, so now, usually, for students who want to pursue game development or game design, the popular destinations to study overseas would be the US, UK, Canada or Japan. Why did you choose to study in Malaysia?Mody: Well, that's a very interesting question. Well, there were multiple factors at play here. First, I kind of knew I wanted to eventually move to Canada, as I have family here. So the second was, I knew, from the people I talked to and from what I read about the industry, that it's not an industry where what degree you have even matters. In fact, I don't know if this statistic is still true, but a few years ago, I read that 50% of those working, like, tech jobs in North America don't even have degrees in a related field. Like over 50%.And I don't know if that's still true, but, so I was more so focused on getting into a course that has a practical application – more hands on. So I emailed a couple of universities, and honestly, kind of felt the best about the Wollongong course. And yeah, it was awesome in that aspect. And there was also the added interest in Malaysian culture, because I heard a lot about Malaysian culture as well. And I've wanted to explore that as an experience, you know, as a stop in my life. Maryam: Okay, so many people don't know what it takes to become a game developer. They don't even know what a degree in game development would look like. At a glance, if you were to create video games like Fortnite, Overwatch or The Last of Us, a lot of planning goes into bringing them to life.This includes brainstorming, ideas, storytelling, coming up with the game mechanics, character ...
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    25 m
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