Saneeha is a resident of Islamabad. She is from ‘a family of doctors’ – her mother works as a paediatrician at PIMs, and her two elder siblings have also studied at AKU. Infact her elder sister was already a student and living at the AKU girl’s hostel, when Saneeha started her journey at AKU.
Saneeha ‘grew up seeing her mother’. She also describes the encouraging role of her father in her life. She credits her sister’s presence at AKU for making her own transition much easier. However, she gives equal credit to AKU’s reputation and standing, for having influenced her decision to pursue medicine in Karachi.
“It is the best institution for medicine there is in Pakistan. It is so good, that I don’t mind leaving Islamabad for it…!”
Further, she says:
“AKU helps you interact with the sort of patients you are going to deal with in the country later on. It is good to be trained in the country which you will eventually be practicing in.”
Besides spending extensive hours studying, Saneeha pays daily visits to the Sports Complex, which is accessible free of cost to students. The tennis court is her ‘favourite place’ on the campus. The extracurricular activities and hostel life at AKU have enabled her to become less reserved. She has also learnt to be more independent, as her parents are no longer present ‘to look after her’.
“You need to do a lot of hard work from the beginning, but you do get time to do what you want. If you study, you do well. If you don’t – you don’t get away with it!” she explains.
Ten years from now, if she does not move to the field of surgery, Saneeha would like to have a 9 am to 5 pm job. AKU tops the list of institutions she would like to work in, as it operates ‘very systematically’.
