This is the third blog-post from Esther Tot who received the ESOMAR Foundation Scholarship to study at the English based Bachelor Degree program in International Business at the National University of Management (NUM) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

A dreadful accident happened to me in 2011! It upsets me so much to talks about this but this is life and we can’t stop it. On August 30^th, 2011 my right eye got hit by a knife. It was scary and dreadfully painful! It all happened while I was cooking my own food because my mom was busy working till late that evening. I spend most of my time alone cooking and doing laundry and that time I was just about 14 years old and I was chopping a chicken leg with a small and very sharp knife. The knife broke into half and the broken and sharp piece flew up and poke my eyeball and it dropped back very fast. I thought that the chicken hit my eye but when I tried to wash it with water it didn’t go away, the sight was still blurred and I was so frightened when I looked down on the ground and saw a broken piece of the knife laying there on the floor! At that moment I knew what really hit my eyeball and when I touched the eyeball it felt soft like the balloon running out of air. I was so scared, I didn’t even have a phone.

At that time I lived with the neighbors. When they were going out they always locked the gate. I had to stand there and wait for people to pass. I gave them the key and asked them to unlock the door for me. I ran out to borrow the neighbor’s phone to call my mom. She hurried home and took me to Ogdoung hospital. We didn’t have money, my mom couldn’t even afford the 500 riels to park the bike. It was the saddest moment of our life because I had to do an eye surgery or else I would get blind forever. I could hear my mom crying and begging the doctor to please help me, that I was her only child and we were poor and the doctor said he couldn’t do a free surgery, he could only offer a discount. I cried and the nurse told me not to cry because the tears could hurt the eyeball. I tried hard not to cry but I still cried and in my heart I prayed God to help me and I memorized the memory verse of Jeremiah 29:11-12 “For I know the plans I have for you, plans to prosper you and not to harm you,  plans to give you hope and future. Then you will call on me and come and pray to me, and I will listen to you”. This verse calmed my heart. Later I heard my mom call her boss and the church pastor and a moment later they came and had  a private talk with my mom. Suddenly the doctor called me to the surgery room and did the surgery on my eye.  I could feel all the needle, knife and scissor movements on my eyeball and I kept on praying and memorizing that verse from the Bible. The surgery was successful. They covered my right eye for about one month and I could use only my left eye. Sadly the doctor said that a mistake was made by his training nurse. She forgot to cut out the dead cell and there was still water in my eyeball.

My eye has not been functioning well until now. I have to undergo a 2^nd surgery but I don’t have money. I had once asked the doctor how much it would cost to change my lens so I can see clearly again. He said it would be about $5000 dollars which I could never raise but I really want to see normally from both eyes.

Till now no one at school knows that I can see with only one eye and it always hurt when I try to look at something which is too bright or stare at the books or letters too long. My eyeball starts to hurt and I get headache. But I never want to quit my study. No one at school knows I am disabled but I never want to call myself this way. I end up bearing this pain and this pain is what persuaded me to study hard because I want a better job so I can give my mom a better life. I also want to save money to change my lens because I really want to see normally again.

My motto for pain is that, “There are 2 types of pains, the pain that changes you for good and the pain that changes you for bad and it is your choice to choose which pain you want to take.”

At last, I just want to tell everyone who struggles through any types of pain to not giving up and keep on living and changing the world, don’t let the world change your smile but let your smile change the world.

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This is the 12th blogpost from Nicolin Mamuya, the first ESOMAR Foundation scholarship in South Africa. It’s school break now. Time for an internship!

I have completed my exams and I must admit that they weren’t as bad as I had feared. I have passed all my modules, which means a celebration is in order. The school break goes on for more than a month so I had decided to keep myself busy by looking for an internship.

Fortunately, I was instantly offered a job and I now work for a property firm not too far from where I live. I will be managing the firm’s social media pages as well as handle all the admin involved in the buying and selling of property. This definitely gives me insight on the processes and possible paperwork that goes into buying property. Buying rental property proves to be a great long-term investment that I will hopefully venture into in the future.

It is June 16 and South Africa is celebrating 41 years since brave students marched against being taught in Afrikaans (the language spoken by the white people). Most of us celebrate this day by wearing school uniform and others have a gathering with friends and family to have a great time. I do believe that those students set the tone for the youth that came after them.

South Africa’s youth is very powerful and united. The students know how to fight for what they believe in. The marches for the university fees to fall and against women abuse exemplify the power they possess. Happy June 16!

The scholarship awarded to Nicolin was sponsored by SSI and in collaboration with SAMRA.

This is the second blog-post from Esther Tot who received the ESOMAR Foundation Scholarship to study at the English based Bachelor Degree program in International Business at the National University of Management (NUM) in Phnom Penh, Cambodia.

Who says education is easy? If education was easy there wouldn’t be many students who quit school. Education is hard, and Yes! Really hard but it is valuable and precious. I remember my marketing class with Ms. Sopornetra. In her class there were a lot of assignments and yes it really was hard for me and many students. We had 3 assignments per class including a presentation and, every time during her class, all the students were required to wear a business suit or, you can say, a marketer suit.

First of all, to be honest, I was not really enjoying the class much but later I found it so interesting because she gave us a real experience to practice as real marketers and business people and we learned how to do a good presentation with customers or our business partner to convince them to invest in our company. The most interesting part was the assignment of  creating our own event as if we were real business people,. The event is coming soon this August and it will be attended by 800 people. The hardest thing is that in my afternoon session together with 16 students we must find cash or coupons sponsors for $1500 US dollars to support the whole event. But one catchy word I remember from my teacher is that “Nothing is impossible to do if you really want to do it” and this word keeps running in my head and I keep on telling myself that I can do it and I am going to succeed, we are going succeed.

Nevertheless, going back to the part about the assignments and presentation: It was so stressful because we had to stay late at night to do the power-point slides and the next day we had to do a 10 pages report and I seriously thought: “why does she have to put so much pressure on us?” But the answer that comes straight in my head is that it is a self-discipline. She does this because she wants us to know and understand that when we step up in a real marketing battle this is what to expect. It could be a success or a failure so we have to learn  and be ready and also we have to think of any alternatives in case something bad or good is going to happen when we enter the marketing field. There are competitors, and if you are not smart enough to understand the insights you will surely fail your business. So in business and market research we have to really understand our competitors and learn about their strengths and weaknesses because if you know what they have or what they lack you could increase your product sales. If they lack something, your company should see an opportunity, and if they have similar products to your company we have to quickly learn about them, strengthen our product and upgrade it to make it better than their product to convince the customers to buy our product. We have to ensure that our consumers love our product and want to be a long term user of our product.

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This is the second blog from Nutsa Kvitashvili who is following the BA Program of Sociology at Caucasus School of Humanities and Social Sciences. Nutsa is the recipient of the ESOMAR Foundation Scholarship sponsored by Inizio.

This is the 2nd semester of my 3rd year. I can’t believe how fast time flies. I remember my first day in CU (Caucasus University), when I first stepped into the building. I was confused, nervous and excited, but I knew that it was a new chapter in my life, something very significant. And I was right about it. It was like yesterday and now after 3 years I have just 2 semesters left after I graduate from Caucasus University and it’s been an amazing experience for me with all the challenges and good memories.

This semester was probably the best and the most interesting one during my studying here because of the classes and lecturers. I studied German which wasn’t very hard for me because I graduated from German public school. But it was nice to study German again, when it comes to studying another language, it is very easy to forget it. So it is necessary to practice it from time to time. I also had Professional English (Social Science) class, that was also very interesting. We learned how to write properly different kind of essays, we read a lot articles about different topics and issues and practiced critical reading and thinking. What’s more I had my first speaking exam in English. Before I stepped into the exam I was very nervous, but as soon as I walked in I felt confident and got 10 out of 10.

I had SPSS Programming class as well and I really enjoyed it, because I like working with computers and programs. Another class I had was Political Sociology which I found really interesting with all the theories and ideologies we learned. My last and my favourite class was Sociology of Media. It was very diverting to find out how media affects on society in different ways and how the media industry works in all of its aspects.

Now I have final exams. I wrote 3 and have 2 left. I’m doing pretty well by far and I think that’s because the classes were so interesting and entertaining for me. When you are doing something with passion it suddenly gets a lot easier!

How you can support

If you are a market researcher, a national market research association, an NGO involved in research or a university interested in a scholarship in your country please contact us at info@esomarfoundation.org

Partners & Sponsors

We are always on the lookout for partners and sponsors. If you are an organisation looking to understand more on how you can support us, please find more information here or contact:  info@esomarfoundation.org

This is the second blog-post from Paola Loy Villagran, the recipient of the ESOMAR Foundation scholarship in Guatemala. Paola tells us about her recent learning experiences during her Master in Marketing at Universidad Rafael Landívar.

During these last weeks, I am attending the preparatory courses for admission to the career specialisation. In the Accounting Management course I learned how I can administer the financial statements and estimate costs, and how companies take decisions about the return of financial investment.

In addition, I took the Business Administration course. In this course I learned about the standards over taking decisions, motivations and working in teams. We  evaluated some cases of success and failure of global companies such as Kodak, Disney, Netflix.

Every week I have the opportunity to know many persons that work in different industries for example from energy and agro industries and definitely learning about their experiences has been very useful for my professional growth, now I have new friends and I am having a great time with them.

And as Nelson Mandela said “Education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world.”

Recently, I also had the opportunity to share my experience with friends of my childhood, and they are glad to hear about the ESOMAR Foundation and these programs where students can develop new knowledge about market research.

My friends and I during a visit in Iximche Park, Chimaltenango

I actually think, Guatemala needs more trained professionals to work in marketing or research areas, but unfortunately a big portion of the population in the country as I mentioned in my first BlogSpot does not have the opportunity to live and study in appropriate environments, especially in the rural areas where families have several children and education is not available for all.

My desire in the short term is to share my knowledge and experience which I am acquiring thanks to this scholarship.

How you can support Paola

If you wish to support Paola and be the donor of this scholarship, we would be happy to connect and provide you more information. Please contact: info@esomarfoundation.org

How you can support in your country

If you are a market researcher, a national market research association, an NGO involved in research or a university interested in a scholarship in your country please contact us at info@esomarfoundation.org

Partners & Sponsors

We are always on the lookout for partners and sponsors. If you are an organisation looking to understand more on how you can support us, please find more information here or contact:  info@esomarfoundation.org 

This is the 11th blogpost from Nicolin Mamuya, the first ESOMAR Foundation scholarship in South Africa. Nicolin starts making plans for the future!

The time for applying for jobs and graduate programs has finally arrived. The reality of possibly working a 9 to 5 job does not sit well with my friends and me. However, I am excited and hopeful that I will get an amazing job this year. The plan is to apply for any marketing related vacancies that I qualify for.

The immense workload in school has just become the norm. The ups and downs can make any student have a mental breakdown. The trick is time management and constant positivity. I will be starting my exams this month, with the first exam being a group presentation to Unilever on the 22^nd of May. Ridwannah, Farzaana and Patience, the girls who attended the ESOMAR conference with me in 2016, are part of my team, which makes me confident that this exam will end well. I would be lying if I said that the ESOMAR conference experience did not bring us closer.

A good friend of mine, who completed her degree, last year, gave me a rather funny piece of advice. As I was venting about how life is just so difficult, she told me to be a pineapple about it.

So apparently, being a pineapple means standing tall, holding on to your crown and remaining positive (the sweetness of the pineapple signifies positivity). That was very creative of her, especially because I love pineapples.

The scholarship awarded to Nicolin was sponsored by SSI and in collaboration with SAMRA.