I was supported by the DAAD-Stiftung

It all started on November 2014, when I was reading for the defense of my PhD thesis "Urban everyday life of Yakutsk in the late XIX – early XX centuries". I was making an application submission for a research scholarship in Germany while preparing my defense speech and making final corrections of the defense official documents. At the same time I started to contact with Professor Otto Habeck, Head of the Institute of Social & Cultural Anthropology, University of Hamburg. A previous grant holder of the Ulla-Johansen-Scholarship, Galina Belolyubskaya, kindly introduced me to him. They were familiar to each other as they worked together on the same program at the Max Planck Institute in Leipzig. So by the help of the Ulla-Johansen-Scholarship, I continued that fruitful scientific work of the two countries – Germany and Russia in the field of historical anthropology. In August 2015 I finally travelled to Germany.

Two-month language courses in Berlin helped me much, where I have not only passed the language Express courses, but have also got closely acquainted with other fellows, and the main thing that I have had an adaptation to the new environment for me. A large number of representatives of exact ant natural sciences gathered together in Berlin. There were few of us, representatives of the Humanities but all my colleagues in that respect were very interesting people with big projects and impressive knowledge. When the first time I saw them I realized that these young girls and boys from all over the world were very passionate, loving science with the eternal optimism and excitement, having the energy for new discoveries.

In addition to the noted theme in my proposal "Transformation of the nature use system of the North peoples", my main task was, of course, to learn new working methods in the field of science and teaching activity, to gain scientific experience, to see how the anthropologists of Germany work and to feel which way of developing the European as well as world science are taking. Professor Otto Habeck and I began the serious work on the article at the University of Hamburg, Institute of Ethnology.

​Aital Yakovlev and Prof. Habeck at the Intstiut of Ethnology, University of Hamburg

During the work we have combined Professor’s large field experience, his materials, vision and technique of scientific work. In the course of work I improved my scientific views and broadened my horizons. I began to understand the similarities and differences between German and Russian societies, points of concern and values. The most important thing for me, that I have become an active participant in current scientific trends in the modern anthropology and have discovered new horizons. Internship at the Institute of Ethnology has become the reference point for me. I have outlined my future prospects, tasks, at least for the next 10 years.

Looking back on my eight months of life in Germany, I understand that I have begun to look at the world in a different way. I might even say that I have cranked it up a notch and I have become better (scientifically and even personally) than I was before. The main objective I believe is that I have made new friends and colleagues from around the world, and the world seems not so big for me now and that people from all over the world have the same interests, values and hopes for the future. And I express my sincere thanks to all DAAD team and personally to prof. Ulla Johansson, with whom I had the honor to meet in person, for the support and the chance to carry out research in the University of Hamburg!