Friday, January 13, 2012

My First Foreign Interface




“When I first saw you, I never thought that you’d be my friend like what you are right now. I may not be expressive in what I feel but to tell you honestly, you’re one of the best people I share my smiles with”.
                                                        

            Our teacher Mr. Jayson, who is always unpredictable with his decisions of what shall we do next and has full of surprises every time we meet for our class schedule, drop a hot potato in front of us when he announce that we will meet 11 Korean students. Since we’re almost half of their population, so we have to choose a partner. He explains some rules to us to avoid negative feedback to some teachers and one of it was not to shout or cheer when we will meet them in person. Well, I guess sir was right when he warned us because seeing them walking from a distance was like watching Korean actors and actresses in real life; face to face.

            And so we gathered in the oval and Mr. Jayson together with their teacher tell us to take care with them and I am assigned to Mr. Byun-Jae-Hoon. Since they also have their own questions, they asked us first. Their questions are common to us but not to them. Some examples where; what is your name? Who is your mother and what she likes? Actually, I really had a hard time understanding this question because it has another meaning that’s why I don’t answer it. He’s having a hard time reading the questions but he’s doing great when almost everything were answered. And so it was my turn to ask him. Here are some of his answers and my observations about Jay.

Byun-Jae-Hoon, the man I met last January 7, 2012. He’s 24 years old, with one brother who is 18, parents who are both in their 50’s and he lives in Seoul Korea. He loves listening music and love songs in particular. His number one favorite sport is soccer, followed by swimming and singing. To become an engineer is really his dream and it was supported by his family.

Well, he thinks he’s cute when I ask him about what he thinks of himself and it’s a little bit true. His physical attributes explains everything; eyes that says, “Hey, please stop asking me that question because I don’t know what you’re talking about,” or “Excuse me, can you talk slowly?”, so in short, he has eyes that express what he wants to imply. A face that will launch a thousands boats of friends. With a skin almost as white as a snow, (well I guess it’s normal for a Korean citizen to have a complexion like that) and he’s height, just normal for his age.

At first, there’s a little bit of “shyness” or “awkwardness” when we first met but later on, we were already smiling because of his actions when he can’t recognize my questions to him. So I have to ask him slowly until he gets what I mean. He will act like; he looks down, smile and say, “I’m sorry, I don’t know”. But I like him because he’s very honest.

Even though we were given a short period of time to spend time together, asking hanging questions but still it feels like a part of me knows almost half of him. It’s not much but it feels good to have known a person like Jay. So, all in all, my day at that time is kind of unique because it doesn’t follow any routine or schedule, doesn’t track on steps that’s almost boring.


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