Éva Patkó

The UC Berkeley experience

Berkeley is the one of the most international and welcoming places in the United States, people genuinely smile at you on the street and curiously inquire about the strange language you speak. The friendly environment gave an extra impulse for work, for plunging into an unknown path in my research.

The department of Theater Dance and Performance Studies (TDPS) at UC Berkeley was like a second home to me, providing all the help needed, giving me a cute little cubical where I could work and especially inviting me to participate at all events and performances available on campus. My sponsor professor dr. Peter Glazer offered wise guiding, and I also collaborated with prof. Philip Kan Gotanda who teaches playwriting.

I participated at the first international HSSA (Humanities and Social Sciences Association) symposium where researchers and scholars from all over the world currently at UC Berkeley, gave lectures within their field on the thematic of the use of concepts. My presentation was about the mechanisms of power within the contemporary theater practice in my home country. Given great feedback at the conference I further developed this topic and gave two open lectures at the TDPS speaker series and the Starr King School in Berkeley. The research work itself was sometimes lonely as it involved lots of reading and other times very social, as one of my goals was to meet local theater makers and see their creative work. Interacting with students was also a great experience, I assisted courses of my UC Berkeley fellows and presented a lecture to the students on contemporary theatre directing (in Transylvania). Through the Outreach Lecture Fund program, I participated in an intense workshop with fellow academicians at De Paul University in Chicago talking about the theme of incarceration in contemporary Romanian and Hungarian drama.

The local Fulbright association organized events where Fulbrighters from all over the world could meet. We got to spend three days at the oceanside during the Fulbright Family Weekend, where we exchanged our academic and personal experiences in the Bay Area with other Fulbright families.

At the first Visiting Scholar meeting, right after arriving, one of the advices for the internationals was to go out and meet Americans, others, than just our coworkers. I am so pleased I could meet people outside the academia, interact and have a thorough intercultural life experience.

Together with my family we could enjoy the nearby beaches, the many museums and nature parks, the lovely every-days in Berkeley, and the many blooming flowers on our street. Our children learned English and made new friends, one of the funniest stories was when their Indian friend from Calcutta was teaching them Spanish words.

Dr. Éva Patkó
Assistant professor
University of Arts in Tîrgu-Mureș