Worldwide, access to higher education is still a privilege. This unique volume recounts the experiences of students from two rural provinces -- one in Pakistan, one in the Republic of Ireland -- who have struggled to undertake graduate studies. Seeking to understand why some are able to persevere with studies against enormous odds, the authors draw on Bourdieu's theories of social and cultural capital, habitus, field and symbolic violence to analyse the students' very personal narratives. Their study reveals that, while these two provinces may appear on the surface to be entirely disparate, profound social and economic inequality in each leads mature students in Sindh and Connaught to experience similar obstacles -- although these are surmounted in different ways.