Patris is a student in 12th grade, she came from Israel and has lived in Portugal for 3 years.
Food, people, and culture are the main differences between Portugal and Israel. Here, people eat a lot of meat, and all food is very seasoned and spicy because Israeli habits have Turkish and Arab influences. In Portugal, the food is quite balanced between meat and fish, including cod. In Israel, people are more impatient, while in Portugal they are calmer and more patient. Regarding common points between the countries, there aren't many, but they are mainly similar in the way people live their daily lives.
When Patris arrived at this school, she doesn't know exactly what impressed her most, but she says she really likes the teachers here. She states that in Israel the teaching is more demanding and there is much more discipline than in school in Portugal. For example, in Israel, when the bell rings for class, the students have to be inside the classroom waiting for the teacher. And, as soon as she enters, the students stand up as a sign of respect and greet the teacher. Whenever a student wants to speak in class, they know they have to raise their hand.
Classes run from 8:30 AM to 4:30 PM. But the classes are different. Just as here there are the Humanities and Technical-Scientific areas, there they have the areas of Sciences, Humanities, Technology, and Military. She was in the military area, where she learned maintenance, computer science, and other areas. She left Israel at 16, but if she had stayed there for two more years, she would have had to do military service. All boys and girls have to enter at 18, and until they complete two years and five months of service, they cannot think about anything else. At school, they also had outings to perform public service, that is, they had to help the community, and they did this every three months. For this reason, what impressed her most when she arrived at this school was the lack of discipline and the ease with which the students speak about and to the teachers or other older people. Here, the students yell and shout a lot and don't know how to speak properly, and she thinks there should be more respect. In Israel, discipline and punishments were provided by the school, and if you were part of the military unit, you were punished more severely; you served as an example for the rest of the school. Students there grow faster, she adds. Children with special educational needs have their own classes and are in a separate group to be more protected because they are children who need more attention, which doesn't happen here.
Regarding the teaching of the Portuguese language, every other year the student experienced varying degrees of difficulty. She mentions that whenever she had support from a Portuguese as a Second Language teacher, Portuguese became easy, but when she had to work within a class, at the same time as the other students, she didn't feel she had learned as she should have. Because she didn't feel she was truly learning, she became somewhat disconnected from what was happening around her.
She misses the strong, spicy food because she loves those robust flavors. Here the food is milder. Even the juices are different, they're more… mild. She misses hearing Hebrew spoken, her native language. And she misses living in a more urban environment because there she could get around more easily and reach more distant parts of the city. No matter what time she left home, she would always find a friend on the street. Here she feels very limited and a little out of place. There's no city life, the transport is a nightmare and the schedules are awful, she says.
When asked about her opinion on the integration of immigrants in Portugal, Patris replied as follows:
"It depends on the foreigners, the country they come from, and their native language. I think the Portuguese are a bit racist and prejudiced, at least in this part of the country. I think that when a foreigner comes to Portugal, they should ask or try to find out why we left our country, whether it was because we didn't feel safe, because it was too dangerous and there was too much violence, or because we are looking for a better life, away from the turmoil. Here, I feel that many times they look at me with suspicion and I feel that they judge me."
And finally, at this point she no longer needs any support. The support she needed she would have liked to have received in her first year of school, but she didn't. "The first year is very important because it's when we get our first impressions of the country, it introduces us to the people, what they're like and how they do things. This is the first impression that sticks and this is the impression we'll have of the country and its people," a view I personally agree with the student.
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