Post #5

My last two sessions with Jesse have followed a much different format than my others. The session two weeks ago, I made the decision that it was unfair for Jesse to only be talking to me during these Chat Cafes for two reasons. Firstly, I was slowly become the only American student he talked to (as he told me) and I didn't want him to get the impression that every opinion I hold is applicable to the American mindset as a whole. Secondly, I did feel that the one-on-one nature of our meetings wasn't upholding to the theoretical purpose of Chat Cafe, that a dialogue that went beyond a typical two person conversation was what made the experience unique. So I decided to bring one of my roommates with me to the session. He is Chinese American and though he doesn't speak Mandarin, I thought bringing him into the Chat Cafe would provide Jesse someone he could at least empathize with more than myself. So after meeting in the UGLI, we talked for half an hour about assumptions and misconceptions about Chinese and American culture. I could tell that Jesse was glad someone else was in the group, as Jesse was eager to answer questions my roommate asked and was really interested in listening to both of us. Half an hour into the session I could tell momentum of conversation was waning so I decided to take the Chat Cafe mobile. So we walked all the way to Main Street and my roommate and I introduced Jesse to our favorite restaurants (perhaps next week we'll go to one. Hopefully Frita Batidos). By taking him around campus, I could see that we had shown him a side of Ann Arbor he hadn't experienced before and that was a good feeling.

I was hoping to ask the class about whether what I did last week was appropriate for the Chat Cafe but seeing that its too late, I'll just post it now. In our very first session, Jesse told me that he'd love to play tennis sometime. Given that I am a huge tennis aficionado, I was more than excited to oblige. Seeing how nice the weather was last week, I decided that for the session that we'd play tennis. I knew that I would have to incorporate some element of conversation into the game, but for the most part Jesse and I simply played tennis. We joked around with each other, taunted each other, impersonated Nadal's grunting to each other. But what made the session really great was when a lone student came up to us and asked to play. He was a very talkative kid and spent over ten minutes speaking to Jesse (they were playing on the same side). We stopped playing when we only had ten minutes left and Jesse recounted at length all the weird things this lone tennis ranger spewed to him.