Sam - CP - 2 & 3

This week I had two meetings with Hasan. We met up for teatime and talked a while about our Halloweens. The meeting sort of got overrun by another student who was in the lounge--I'm unclear why, since he is American and doesn't have a conversation partner--and wanted to tell us about Turkey because he studied there for six weeks. I was a little annoyed that Hasan and I weren't able to have a conversation together, but what can you do? There was a game of Taboo going on with the other CIESers and TEFLers, so Hasan and I joined in. It was pretty fun, though not as fun as the Turkish version of Taboo where apparently you have to act out the word, draw it, or even make your teammates guess it using finger puppets. Awesome!

On Friday night, I met up with Hasan and his friend Nihan, another CIESer, at Railroad Square for the First Friday art walk. It was Hasan's first and last First Friday, as he put it. Hasan and Nihan are really a treat to hang out with. We had a good time walking around a huge vintage store, talking about the weird old things that people used to wear and use. I confessed that I knew the Turkish word for strawberry and orange, thanks to that exercise we did in class. They were delighted--they looked at me and smiled like they'd just seen a baby saw her first word.

We went around to a few galleries and I introduced them to some of my friends that we ran into, but H. & N. seemed kind of shy or overwhelmed. There were so many people talking, I imagine it would be hard to keep up with the conversation and I didn't really know how to bring them into it, so we just said a quick hello and went on. Before we left I brought them to Bread & Roses, a local food co-op that I'm involved in, for the grand opening party. I was hoping to show them a taste of the "other side" of Tallahassee, the side where I hang out.

The more I get to know the people in the CIES program, I just feel so humbled and grateful to be where I am. These people are working so hard to learn English, and undoubtedly facing as much frustration as they do excitement living in a new country, many of them to go to a school that I was able to just breeze right into on account of being born in the U.S. I feel so lucky to have the chance to help them improve their English and I feel so honored that they want to experience our culture. They inspire me so much! It makes me want to do everything I can to become the best English teacher possible, so that I can really impact my students' lives and help them achieve their goals.