Sharon Scabin of Italy

Corina Sabău, 09.11.2017, 13:25

At the University
of Padua I was learning Russian, and when I realised Russian was not really my
thing, I started looking for something else. I had some Italian friends who
were working in Romania, and they suggested I should learn Romanian. I realised
right away that I liked the Romanian language and literature and I wanted to
study it. I’ve also learnt something about the Romanian education system, which
is quite different from the Italian one. For instance, although in Romania
students spend less time in class, they are so well prepared. Also, the
bibliography is much more comprehensive than the one used in Italy. In Italy,
education focuses more on what is happening during classes. As I said, I think
Romanian students are better trained than the Italian ones and when I saw the
bibliography for the first time, I was a bit surprised. I then realised that
the most important thing for the Romanian students is reading, and debates in
class focus on what they have read. In this way the student feels included in
the life of the university.

Learning Romanian,
Sharon has also started to read major Romanian authors:

One love at first
sight for me was Mircea Eliade. I first heard about him at a conference in
Italy. An extraordinary professor had a course on Mircea Eliade and cultural
diplomacy. I loved it and I wanted to learn more about him. This is how I
started reading his works. I liked his writings so much that I decided to do my
graduation paper on him. I called it Cosmogony in Mircea Eliade’s Work. So now
I can say I love Romanian literature even more. And the opportunity to walk
around Iasi, a city where great writers like Mihai Eminescu, Ion Creanga, I. L.
Caragiale also used to walk, feels me with emotion.

Sharon says that
she also loves Romania because of its people and that Iasi has become a second home
to her.