For five SFS-Qatar students studying at Georgetown this semester, a newfound appreciation for life at a thriving American university has underscored their everyday crossings of Red Square, stressful nights spent in Lauinger Library and encounters with unfamiliar weather patterns.

The students hail from throughout the Eastern hemisphere – Palestine, India, Lebanon and Egypt – and have enjoyed their U.S. college experience, but Nada Soudy (SFS-Q ’11), an Egyptian student who arrived on the Hilltop in January, wishes more students on the main campus were in tune with Georgetown student life in Doha.

“I wish Georgetown would know more about us,” Soudy said. “The connection is good, but it could be so much better.”

SFS-Q was established five years ago in Doha’s University City, an area of concentrated higher education centers including branches of universities such as Texas A&M University, Virginia Commonwealth University, Carnegie Mellon, Cornell and Northwestern.

Chelsea Tucker (GRD ’12), program coordinator for the Washington Operations, helps bridge the gap between the main and Doha campuses. In this role, she also acts as liaison with the global classroom, which facilitates a videoconferencing interaction each semester between one classroom of Doha students with one of D.C.-based students, under the direction of an SFS-Q professor.

“The students over there are great – it’s a small community and the interpersonal relationships are amazing,” she said. “A lot of intellectual activity happens there naturally.”

Soudy arrived at Georgetown’s main campus in January with three other SFS-Q students: Aakash Jayaprakash (SFS-Q ’11), Jumana Alaref (SFS-Q ’11) and Tara Marakem (SFS-Q ’11). Kimberly Fernandes (SFS-Q ’11), the fifth SFS-Q exchange student, had been studying here since the fall semester.

For Alaref, the motivation for traveling thousands of miles away from home was grounded primarily in academics.

“I came to Georgetown because there are lots of classes offered here that are not offered there,” she said. “My experience at Georgetown would not be complete without coming here.”

The SFS-Q students noticed some clear differences between each campus. Soudy stressed the fact that most of the 165 students studying at SFS-Q live at home; only 10 members in her class live in the dorms at SFS-Q. Living independently at Georgetown has been a very different experience from her life in Qatar, she says.

“I’ve gotten to learn a lot about myself as this is the first time I’ve been totally on my own,” Soudy said. “It’s taught me to be independent.”

Although she is a junior, Soudy felt she could empathize with the freshman experience on the main campus. By attending an ESCAPE freshman retreat, she realized that other students were just as homesick as she was.

“I can’t imagine myself living away from home as a freshman,” she said. “That’s so brave.”

Speaking about extracurricular involvement, Marakem noticed major differences in motivation between each campus. While some students are heavily involved outside of the classroom in Qatar, Marakem feels that it is the same group of students who run and are involved in all of the organizations there.

Alaref agreed, saying she enjoyed the sense of activity on Georgetown’s campus.

“I just love it when I pass Red Square and see people handing out flyers and tabling,” she said.

Such passion helped direct Jayaprakash toward his chosen career path in social justice, which he would like to pursue in his native country of India.

“Working through a lot of the stuff I’ve gotten to do at Georgetown has given me a different outlook,” he said, referring to activities organized through the Center for Social Justice, among others.

The change from a student body of 165 to one of over 6,320 students has been a balancing act, both socially and academically. Marakem appreciated the comfortable sense of anonymity fostered by such a high number of students.

“You wake up and you don’t know necessarily who you are going to meet and what you are going to do,” she said.

An intimate environment like that at SFS-Q, however, does not translate to this pool of anonymity. Soudy said that every day the main campus feels like a new campus, with an abundance of new people to meet.

Apart from the social atmosphere, living on the campus of one of American academia’s pressure cookers could be a bit less stressful, said Marakem. She said students at SFS-Q are also concerned about grades and finding jobs, but said they tend to be more laid back than the students she has met on the main campus.

Nevertheless, Soudy said she enjoyed the camaraderie that stems from an often-stressful environment.

“I like being at [Lauinger Library] because everyone here is as screwed as you are,” she said.

When it comes to internationalism, the SFS-Q students say the Doha campus plays host to a broader spectrum of students from foreign countries. With more than 30 nationalities being represented in the SFS-Q student body, conversations can become more dynamic, and differ from the spin of class discussions at Georgetown, the SFS-Q exchange students said.

“Back home, you have so many different students from conflict-ridden societies such as Sudan, Palestine, Iran, Afghanistan, Bosnia . and if you put them all in an international relations class you hear so many perspectives” Jayaprakash said. “Here I hear the same thing, just in different forms.”

During her time in the states, Soudy has fit in her fair share of domestic travel, venturing to Disney World, New York City and Philadephia. She said her trip on a Habitat for Humanity alternative spring break trip stood out; the experience brought her Georgetown experience full circle, as she felt that the people on her trip were especially welcoming.

Small things on the main campus have also made an impression on SFS-Q students. Jayaprakash can’t get enough of his apartment’s Potomac view. Soudy and Alaref both said they would be lost without freshly toasted bagels sold at The Midnight Mug, a delicacy they hadn’t tasted before arriving at Georgetown. Given February’s successive snowstorms and D.C. spring weather, Soudy said the local climate has forced her to change her daily habits.

“Back in Qatar, I never check the weather forecast,” Soudy said.

The group said their return home on May 16 will be poignant. Marakem said she is not looking forward to the reverse culture shock.

Soudy reflected on the experience, saying her time on the Hilltop has been well worth the sometimes difficult acclimation to the culture of the main campus.

“I’ll miss the atmosphere, as it just has this freedom you don’t have at home,” Soudy said. “It’s been a difficult adjustment but I don’t regret it. . I’d make sure to encourage everyone to come. I love Georgetown.”

Correction: This article originally implied that Jumana Alaref (SFS-Q ’11) is from Israel. She is Palestinian.