I moved to Thailand for graduate school. The free degree I earned isn't recognized in the US, but it inspired my side business.

07.08.2024 - 02:31 / insider.com

This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Charissa Enget, a content creator and cybersecurity architect who gained her graduate degree in Thailand. It has been edited for length and clarity.

My family moved around when I was a kid. We spent two years in China and a few more in Venezuela. Those experiences sparked my interest in living abroad again as an adult.

So, after I graduated with a mechanical engineering degree from Oklahoma State University in 2017 and was trying to decide where to go for a graduate degree, I thought it could be the perfect opportunity.

I was open to moving anywhere and also applied to schools in Spain and New Zealand, butKasetsart University in Thailand was the first school to offer me a full ride for the two-year Master of Engineering program.

My mom freaked out about howfar away I would be. She didn't come around untilthe day we went to the airport. Her anxiousness had gotten me a bit scared of going as well. But I had come up with a plan: if things went south, I would just ditch school and spend all the money I'd saved on a long vacation.

When university representatives picked me up at the airport and told me it would be a two-hour ride to the campus, I was confused.

"What do you mean it's a two-hour journey? It's only 20 minutes away," I said. They looked at each other and started laughing.

They replied, "That's the Bangkok campus. You're going through the Kamphaeng Saen campus!"

My whole stomach dropped. I had no idea what I was getting into. When I applied for the scholarship, I thought Bangkok was the only campus.

It turns out that the school has three other campuses. I had misunderstood the university website, probably because it'smostly in Thai, and had been reading the translated copy.

Since the students on campus didn't speak English, my professor was the only person I could talk to. Sometimes, I would go for days without speaking to anybody except my mom on the phone.

Depending on the class, the professors would either teach in Thai and translate it to English for me, or I just got taught one-on-one.

I thought about quitting a few times during the first couple of weeks but decided to give myself six months and try to learn the language. My plan was that if I still hated it, then I could quit.

I tried my hardest to learn Thai. I studied it for about two hours every day on an app called ThaiPod101. After four months, I understood my first spoken sentence. Six months later, I could have basic conversations.

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I made some good Thai friends, and that made life way better. I got enveloped in Thai culture because I could talk to them. My Thai friends would invite me to their houses on the weekends to have dinner with their families. They