.
I was happy that Alya could meet
again this week because I felt bad leaving so early on Tuesday. We got a chance
to talk about many of the things we talked about two days ago. Alya asked if
her friend could come, and of course, I said that would be great. Alya walked
in to 1873 with her friend in tow. I rose and introduced myself. Alya’s friend’s
name was Sandra; she was from Columbia and studying music and English in the
ESL program here at TCU. We got to talking, and they told me some of the
hardest parts of learning English in the United States. Apparently English teachers
in other countries do not know how to speak English themselves. Sandra told me
they taught her in Columbia that “where” was pronounced “whhho-air”. Alya
laughed and agreed. All of the words with “wh” at the start were taught wrongly.
They traded telling me stories about awkward encounters at the grocery store
and with other people on campus. Alya laughed and said if she doesn’t understand
someone she usually just nods and says yes intermittently. If they “get a
question mark look on their face”, she just says “sorry, sorry” and leaves. I
found this hilarious, and Alya and Sandra both laughed as they shared and
listened to each other’s experiences.
Alya also told me that she and her
family have made plans to visit Austin! I was excited and probably
overwhelmed her with questions. She is going to visit the outlet mall a little outside
of Austin and I told her she absolutely had to make it into Austin at some
point. We had previously talked about our favorite restaurants and types of
food, so I gave her a list of places to tour and restaurants to try. Also I
warned her about going to the outlet mall on Black Friday. She wanted to get in
on those deals but absolutely did not know the horrors and violence that occurs
during this sales extravaganza. I warned her that, depending on when she got to
the outlet mall, people might be rude and pushy, and that she might want
to wait until the afternoon to go shopping. I don’t think I adequately conveyed
the madness that is Black Friday so I told her about the Wal-Mart employee that
was trampled and killed a few years ago. I think she got my point. I tried to
make it clear I was not trying to deter her, only inform her of what she might
experience if she went shopping the day after Thanksgiving.
I
told her to feel free to text me if she had in questions while she was in
Austin. I think this was my favorite meeting we have had so far. I find myself
thinking of this less as a school assignment and more so as gathering of
friends to converse. It’s been a great time.
Oh, the terrors of Black Friday. Last year one of my friends stayed with me at my house over the Thanksgiving holiday. She is an international student from China and had never experienced Thanksgiving and Black Friday. When we got to my house, she asked if we would go shopping on Black Friday. I "accidentally" laughed in her face. As a person who has worked in retail and seen the absolute madness, you were right to warn and even to deter. I worked at Kohl's and the lines would be worthy of a 2 hour wait to reach the registers. For me, at that point, the cost of my time has surpassed the amount of discount I planned to receive on the items I wished to purchase. While Black Friday is a great mystery I'm told most people want to experience once in their life, I have no desire to. Also, that is strange that they teach them to pronounce the "wh" in such an obvious way. That just makes an already difficult language, more difficult.
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