₦airaland Forum

I school in the Netherlands where I'm studying Petroleum Engineering. We recently had a presentation and all the white guys could put up about Nigeria was curruption, bad government, vandalization of oil facilities, kidnapping,lack of power even though we have oil and other vices you can think of. I tried defending Nigeria towards the end of the presentation in the midst of my white classmates being the only black in the class but at the end i discovered that the guy that gave the presentation just said the truth about my country.
In summary Nigeria is a crazy place to live relatively to the west but despite that, I cannot trade it for any other country because I just love it because I was born and brought up in the midst of all the madness there.
I still wish that our leaders can just use part of their brain and see how to improve the standard of the country because the level of suffereng is too much in Nigeria and there are no basic social facilities needed to live a reasonable life like you have in europe and other western countries.
The main problems in europe are
1. Weather: I can see why somebody will try to convince me that dressing like santaclaus is cool because the weather is really bad compared to Nigeria for most time of the year
2. A black man will always be taken as a second class citizen no matter how you try to blend. But on the long run, it gives the black man a kind of self confidence on himself and help him to rediscover himself

But in all I really appreciate living among the white race because staying with them is a form of educations on its own and result in a change in the way you reason when you were in Nigeria. So there are lots of gain being in europe but in all, I'm heading back to Nigeria after completing my studies.

Guys go to youtube. There are several videos of the Nigerian civil war and the Biafran army was defeated hands down by the federal trop partly because of their better size and they also had support from the British. Infact during the last months of the fighting the British prime minister increased the arm supply to Nigeria by five times and the Biafran army were blocked on all sides from both land and sea and had to get relief through the air.
I'm just saying this for educational purpose so that the people that believed that the igbo surrendered conditionally can know their true history.
A little educational research rather than propaganda will do you a lot of good because you can be confident of what you say in the public

I think women deceive themselve so much with this god things being the only reason that can guarantee a good home without working on themselves. If really you do all those things you listed without compromising, most men including myself will always come back to their wife at home and when he's about going astray, his conscience draws him back that he is making a big mistake which automatically tells him to self correct himself.
I am not against equal right in the home between men and women but either part you choose has its consequence. In the west, marriage and family value is dead because both parties feel they are equal so nobody should be in charge. But every man have some level of conscience and I believe will always try his best to satisfy and be good to a woman that is really submissive to him. So its not the god factor as you all preach here but your behaviour towards the man.

Before we crucify Emeagwali, Which fraud did he actually commit. I will like all the haters here to please educate us on what we dont know. Atleast a reliable link will go a long way in making us know the crime he commited

It saddens me that Nigeria with many professors and engineering/science training institutions who have not achieved anything of note outside paper publication which they cannot convert to engineering design, open their mouth to castigate another person who is trying to make a contribution to the science world.
What do we black men achieve by pulling down our fellow black? Its a pity that this race have a problem that is difficult to solve and the sooner we understand that, the better for us.
I am not a propenent of Emeagwali. I have not even read any of his work but I think the rate of at which Nigeians who have achieve nothing cast aspersion on him is alarming and embarassing. Let us look for how to move ourselves forward if we are to gain respect in the global community as a black race rather than pulling ourself backward.

@MOBO444,
You talk like an opportunities that just entered europe. 1st, the cultural orientation of the women in europe is different from those in Africa. They believe in europe that everything should be 50-50 including bills payment that is why the man doesnt go through so much financial stress as a typical african man would but there is a big difference here.
As a typical man with African background, you will still want a submissive wife like how your mother was to your father and every other family you knew when you were in Nigeria and you cannot get that from any european woman and at the end of the day, you find yourself divorcing thesame woman of the race you so much praise here. Worst still no matter how well you try to blend in with the white people, a black man is always a black man so get that in your skull and stop abusing your race cos you're abusing your mother, sisters and every other woman that is black including yourself.
I'm in europe but from day 1 when I saw the life style of the women here generally, I made up my mind that I must marry a Nigerian because I dont want to have a broken home so early cos almost every woman here believe they will divorce in no time after marriage.
In summary, you  cannot have it all. The white mans way of life has its pros and cons. Use your sense to differentiate the two of them and go for the former.

@ Jah Man
People like you fail because you refuse to accept fact and base your life on belief and faith. What is the meaning of Christian in modern day dictionary? Did the bible define the word christian? You people just look for reason to convince people that christianity is all and all where as your life doesnt correlate with what you preach. Christianity is a religion period!
China is about taking over the world and to be a member of the communist party, you must declare publicly that you dont belong to any religion yet they are progressing very well.
With the huge population of christian and muslim we have in Nigeria, what positive impact have their presence brought to the general good of the people? Nothing and they all waste their time proclaiming I worship god.
Think with your brain if you want Nigeria to move forward

I didnt see ETB here. When I left in 2008, entry level was 3,000,000 naira per annum and I am sure there was no salary cut for their staff like some other banks so why are they not on the list?

I think the word love is deceitful in the sense that it doesnt really exist in relationship as preached.
Relationship is more about UNDERSTANDING, AGREEMENT BW PARTNERS ON DIFFERENCES AND COMPROMISE.
Once you settle this 3 things and stop being delusional about one perfect thing call love, you are definitely going to have less problem coping A your partner.

Africa is just too backward that is the reason why the white man will always take us to be an inferior being.
Why are we so gullible with news like this. Have you ever heard on any major global news station reporting that a woman gave birth to snake or something related to that in EUROPE, AMERICA OR ASIA. It must always be one bad thing or the other. I think every Nigerian need to leave the continent to the west so that their mentality can be changed. I am ashamed that my people just refuse to develop and try to use 0.005% of their brain to do something productive rather than spreading and wasting time on such a a stupid topic like this one.
Its a pity. We really need to be serious with the survival and equity treatment of our race by the way we reason.

A 45 score in toefl means you are probably so dull and wasting your time trying to go to the US to school.
Toefl is one of the easiest exams on earth for god sake. How can one score 45 and still have the courage to come to a public forum to ask stupid question?
Do lecturers and students speak yoruba language among themselves in Laspotech? Cos I cant see the reason why a graduate of a polytechnic where english is the means of instruction will get a 45 in toefl.
I know I am harsh but its the truth. Develop your english language skill if you want to compete favorably in the real world.

This is one of the most logical post I have ever seen on Nairaland.
Good work Firefire. Let the whole world see that old and archaic brains are the one's rulling us.

I sored 790-quantitative and 560-verbal and didnt give myself a pat cos i should have done better. For an engineer, anything below 700 in quantitative is just not acceptable, so 700 is an average score

I got the NFP(Netherlands Fellowship Programme) administered my Nuffic, my background is Chemical Engineering fron Unilag and I got admitted for the MSc Petroleum Engineering programme.
Check out www.nuffic.nl. The requirements are clearly stated out there

Hey guys,
Been a while since I entered this site. I'm currently at the Technical University of Delft in the Netherlands, where I am studying for MSc. Petroleum Engineering on full scholarship. I want to let you guys know that there are lots of scholarship opportunities available for international students in the school of Applied Earth Science and would advice you guys to consider applying here.
And also, the academic standard is world class. I am happy I made the decision coming here.

Congracts Bebure.
I am also going to the Technical University of Delft in the Netherland for my MSc. in Petroleum Engineering and Geoscience on full scholarship from the dutch government with everything paid for including my transport to and from the Netherland.
It also started like a childs play, writing all those exams, applying to several schools, getting several admissions, but nothing is as good as getting a good funding to attend a reputable university.
My advice to new comers, would be to put in their best and always make attemp to try what ever they think might make their life better and believe so much on their capability. If you dont push for success, it will not come.
Always attempt,

Has any Petroleum Engineering applicant to either University of Texas @ Austin, Texas A&M University college station or Lousiana State University, heard from the University about the status of their admission application. Just want to know because I am kind of anxious to knowing my admission status and I have not heard from them.

You people just say nonsense because you are either average or below average students.
I am Chemical Engineering graduate of Unilag and if you must know, Unilag admit the very best set of students for its program, such that if you take an analysis of your class mate, you will discover that over 90% of them are the best students from the respective secondary schools that they came from all over Nigeria. So is that not a reason to have a very high academic standard among its students?
In my time I was the best stdent in my secondary school with A1 in maths, A1 in Physics,A1 in Chemistry, A1 in Biology, A1 inAgric science, A2 in Economics,A2 in Geography , A3 in Further Mathematics and a C5 in English yet I made a 2.1 although a good one but not a first class. As good as I taught that I was, I met better students that I really respected in my class with most of them doing very well abroad in top schools like stanford university, imperial college, university of texas, university of nottingham etc. Infact I have a class mate that graduated with distinction from laspotec before joining us in 200 level but he could not make more than 3.9 in his undergraduate. But this guy went to University of Nottingham, UK and made a distinction in his masters that he was given a full scholarship for a PhD admission.
The situation has even improved further with the introduction of the post Jamb screening and more genuinely brilliant students are getting admitted each year with the standard further improving.
Somebody mention Delsu as a comparison to Unilag. I must tell you that Delsu is a dumping ground for people that cannot even think of getting admission into the top Universities in Nigeria so there is no need to even mention that school as over 80% of the people that go ther are either average or below average.
Get the fact that the more standard a school is, the better the number of first class you'll expected to see graduating from that school as it tends to attract very brilliant students

I think the most important thing about the GRE after your preparation is forgetting that there is a time ticking somewhere or that you have limited time left or else your last 10 minutes will be wasted if you start to palpitate. Confidence can be the difference between getting a 650 in quantitative and an 800 if you cannot compose yourself.
When I did my GRE, as at 10 minutes to go I still had about 10 more questions to do because of the crazy statistics questions they were given me earlier which I spent an unusually large chunk of my time doing. I actually wasted time there until I discovered that I had limited time left so I decided to guess one or two questions to go the next as the questions were becoming harder and more time consuming. After leaving the statistics question, I decided to compose myself and solve the remaining questions as they come and was able to do the remaining 10 questions in 9 minuites because of composure. But if you fidget, automatically you loose alot. Eventually I got 790 in the quantitative. Try to distribute you time evenly and learn how to use shore cut to solve problem because the GRE maths exam is not about being a first class mathematics graduate but being able to solve some a given number of technical mathematical questions within a stipulated time.
As for the verbal, the best I can tell you is to study a lot of words because the analogy, sentence completion and antonym all test your vocabulary strength in one way or the other but reading comprehension to me is the most difficult as I just did not understand one of the comprehension I was given on the day of my GRE and about 6 questions were given from just that comprehension and it really did affect my score.
But in summary, try to compose yourself on the day of your exam.

Thank you all forn your contribution.
I believe I am going to have a very big problem deciding on the school to attend come fall 2010 because I applied to a lot of schools and have already gotten admission in three of them.
They are:
1. University of Nottingham: Petroleum and Environmental Process Engineering
2. TUDelft: Petroleum Engineering and Geoscience.
3. Eindhoven University of Technology: Chemical Engineering.
I am also expecting to hear good news from the following schools
1. Norwegian University of Science and Technology (NTNU): Petroleum Engineering
2. Heriot Watt University: Reservoir Evaluation Management
3. Royal Institute of Technology Stolckolm: Chemical Engineering with Energy Option
4. Louisiana State university: Petroleum Engineering
5. Texas A&M: Petroleum Engineering
6. University of Texas @ Austin: Petroleum and Geosystem Engineering.

I will be needing very good advicers to convice on which of the schools to attend that will give me a better guaranteed future.
You advices will also be welcome

Hi Jojohnson,

Hi guys,
I just got admitted to TU Delft for MSc. Petroleum Engineering and Geoscience. I have a chance of being considered for scholarships like BP, huygen, nuffic etc which could cover my full cost of education.
I am hoping 2 get one of these scholarship, but at thesame time, my priority is to go to an american school because I am concerned of job after graduation and i think it is easier getting job from american schools.
Although i dont have an offer yet from any american school, I am hoping to get from atleast 2 of the schools I am applying 2 for fall semester.
What do u guys think about technical university of delft as regards standard and career prospect after graduation in europe and d world?

I also applied to some american schools for msc Petroleum Engineering.
This is my profile
GRE score aggregate 1350(quantitative-790 verbal-560 AWA-3.0)
Toefl ibt aggrerate 100 (writing-28, listening-24, speaking-20 and reading 28)
I applied to [b]University of Texas @ Austin, Texas A & M and Louisiana State University all for Petroleum Engineering.
I graduated from Unilag with a Chemical Engineering major and a GPA of 4.01/5.00
I have 1 year experience as a wellsite drilling engineer working on a jack up drilling rig.
Do u guys think my profile can give my admission with funding in any of the schools above?

@ BOSS

You are wrong with the criteria used to determine the wealth of a nation. It is per capital income & not GDP. But Per capital income is GDP divided by population. That is why lexumburg has for a very long time continue to be the riches country in the world.

@xavier
I pity your life too oooooooo. Allowing people to deceive you for nothing.
what fucking wrath are you talking about? Change the way you reason & try to be more realistic in life

@peterbam
You are too blind to see that people are deceiving you with open ended statements.
how can you call all those profecy? People make open ended statement that could mean anything & you relate it with an occurence. You need to open your eyes and stop allowing that so call MFM General Overseer to deceive you.
Grow up if you want to succeed in life

@mikkyangel

I think that if one is not sure of what he wants to say, you better shut your mouth up than talking with confidence as if you know something where as you know nothing at all.
Its good you take not of that for your future dealings with people.
There is no general standard of doing things in life. If school A state that you must bring this & that, it doesn't mean that school B will request for thesame thing, thats why you have to take your time to search for the requirement of the school you're applying to so as to prepare yourself well for the challenges ahead
Always research well

Cheers

@bigmodo lol also

I filled the online application form, printed & sent it together with my personal bank statement of account.
Did you put in for Petroleum Engineering also?

I filled the Pre Application form for Norwegian University of Science & Technology for an MSc in Petroleum Engineering in late November & got an email from them on the 19th of december telling me that I was successful with the pre application process & I was sent a customised electronic application form for admission & given February 1st 2009, to send all my credentials and the form to NTNU.