Nickie - CP4

Leonardo (Leo) is my third conversation partner, and we met for the first time last night. He is from Venezuela and has been in the US for less than a month.  I hadn't had any luck communicating with him via email, so texting has worked out a bit better.  He brought his neighbor friend, Mohammad from Libya, who is also participating in CIES at a higher level. Mohammad was very outgoing and gregarious, so the group setting worked well. He was able to talk to everyone and give Leo a chance to practice his English too. With the election coverage on television, the topic of conversation diverged to our voting processes. Leo showed me photos of him and other Venezuelans after voting with their purple pinky fingers. I didn't understand what he was showing me, or the purpose of the inked fingers. It took a while to work through it, but we utilized the translation app on his iphone throughout the night when our communication broke down. It is quite a handy tool.  And I learned the inked fingers is to prevent people from voting twice.

Leo is in classes with my other conversation partner Mubarak. Our meetings overlapped, and it was quite fun. They told me about their teachers, and which was their favorite and why. And when communication broke down, the translation app came out. We translated Spanish to Arabic, Arabic to English, and every other combination of the three languages. Leo shared his favorite music with the group. He admitted to not being a dancer, but loves music and his family loves to dance. My personal favorite he shared was his grandmother's favorite salsa musician, Hector Laboe. I look forward to meeting with him again. Being able to utilize the translation app eases the stress of our basic communication.