David-tp9

6/18/2012

I would have never thought that the event that transpired at the beginning of this session would have ever took place in my wildest dreams but it did.  When I arrived at Majdi's house he looked as though he was ready to go to the gym and he was.  He asked if we could go to the gym and I told him that since I was not technically an FSU student anymore that getting was not going to be possible for me (because I did not have 10 bucks to spend on going to a gym for an hour).  Regardless of this he asked if I could drive him down to the gym on my scooter and this is the event that I could not believe.  It was like a scene from dumb and dumber and kept me chuckling all the way home.  Please enjoy the following clip.

We rode to the gym and I could sense his uneasiness by the way he tried to balance on the back of the scooter.  Even though I was not going to get into the gym at least we could conduct our session on the outside of the gyn on a bench or something.  Getting to the gym I let him off and parked the scooter.  He insisted that I come inside and try and get it (despite my earlier explanation to him) I decided to give it a shot anyway even though I knew that it was not going to work.

After being rejected we decided to sit out on the waist high triangle of bricks that is outside the Leach center.  As we sat he practiced asking me questions that he had learned the week before while classes were still in session.  After every question he follows it with "It's good question??" which makes me happy because he really wants to get it right.  This I believe is a major improvement over a few weeks ago when he was not able to retain any sort of correction.

After this he once again expressed his perfect idea of learning in America.  The point where he expresses his desire to live with an American family for "one, two months no problem".   However this time I was prepared, knowing that this was a want of his I told him about something that I had actually used while I was abroad and thought might suit his needs.  Couchsurfing.org.  If you are not familiar with the concept basically you sign up and pay a small fee to be verified.  Once you sign up you make a profile much like Facebook that talks about you and about your family (if you have one).  Then you can make requests to stay on peoples houses abroad (usually on a couch) for free typically.  There is a whole online community of millions dedicated to helping travelers feel at home while they are away.  Take note this is very useful when traveling or making transitions.  Note make request a few weeks in advance to give host warning, time to check schedule, and respond.  In exchange for an opportunity to stay on your couch should they or other people want to visit your city.  Literally you can find several people from most cities.  A host will typically provide meals and show a bit of the sites if available to.  Afterwards you review your stay and or your stayee.  Upon suggesting this he immediately thought that I was offering my couch (which I am not because we are in the transition of moving) and I had to have an additional conversation about that.

He also was wanting something I told him was unrealistic one that it was a family on campus so that he could be immersed in English preferably with an older person that doesn't work.  I do not know everybody on campus but I was pretty confident telling him I didn't think this kind of gig existed.  Speaking with him over various subjects is almost like a tutoring session in itself because you are having to explain after many of your sentences.

After this whole ordeal we continued to go over the sentences.  Something that i found that helped him with his questions was for me to use the question in part of my answer.  For example Where do you live.  I live in......  This concept seemed to really help him and after a few more minutes of practice we called it a day and he went to workout while I returned home.