To prepare for my interview I did brief research on Saudi Arabia. I chose to interview Abdulhameed Aljahdali from our class, whom also goes by Abdul. He and I had spoken a couple of times before and I got to know a few things about him before our interview. He originally volunteered at the Center for International Studies on campus and because he did so well with that he now will have a paid position aiding incoming foreign students. I found this admirable. Any logical person coming across the world to study abroad would I'm sure be nervous and have many questions, and now here is someone who has been through and is going through the same thing to help them with whatever it is they may need. We talked for a while before we got into the interview questions and I got to know quite a bit about him and his take on America. We discussed St. Cloud in depth and our views on things here, I was happy to hear that we share some of the same values and ideas about balancing the fun of college and the importance of education. We had plenty to talk about and the conversation didn’t have an awkward silence or scramble for conversation. We met at Starbucks inside of Target and he even insisted on buying me a latte.
Saudi Arabia is a country in Asia and has a population of 29,000,000. It is the second largest Arab country and is surrounded by Iraq, Yemen, Oman, Jordan, United Arab Emirates, Qatar, Bahrain and the Red Sea. In English Saudi Arabia is literally translated as "The Kingdom of Saudi Arabia". The official language of the country is Arabic. 97% of the population is Muslim, but there are about a million Christians that reside there for work.
What is the clothing style for men and women in your country?
We have different kinds of clothes, the white that you see, we have something that covers our head too and this is the formal way we go out, for banks, for school. But when we are hanging out you can wear whatever you want. This is for men, women should cover everything, but in her house she can wear whatever she wants.
How are men and women treated differently?
My country has a different style of living there because we are a 100 percent Muslim country. So yeah, women, most of them don’t work, they stay home. They do like basically everything in the house, they cook, they do everything. Men do everything else. Which is job, money, he has to give his wife what she wants, he has to pick the kids up from school, he will buy groceries, he has to control the home. In my country now they are becoming more of workers there (the women). It used to be like back in the day men have to go to school, even the government paid.
How has this experience helped you respect other cultures?
I still like have now been here for a year and a half so I don’t a lot of experience. I’m getting like a different culture, totally different people. I had mistakes communicating with people when I first came, but now things have changed. This is my first experience in a university. I finished high school and came here right away. Now its getting hard for me to catch up with everything because of the language. 2012 I left my country.
Do you enjoy speaking with other cultures?
That has 2 different meaning, but international, I work on campus with them so I get more experience with other cultures. We are in school so this is our only opportunity to speak with other cultures.
Have you seen other parts of the US?
I went to Florida last year, Daytona Beach and Orlando. I celebrated the New Year there, I went to DisneyWorld too, I went to three different parts of it. I went to Epcot and Universal Studios. I also went to Washington DC, it was the same trip. We went to Florida first and then Washington. I’m going to New York this Christmas, I’m meeting friends there. There are a lot of Saudis here, some of my friends from High School are here, some are in New York. They go to school there but they are in an English program. You have to have English first before you can go to a university. I used to study in North Dakota, because ND was a small town in Grand Forks, I thought that living there might be helpful. People are more tied together, for me, I knew some English so it was good for me, but for others I would suggest if they are new to English I would suggest for them to go into bigger cities so that they can like take the bus, the trains, they know how to get from place to certain place. I used to live with a host family, so I stayed home and did my homework, where in a big city you can do things like go to the movies or do things with other international students. For my situation because I was in the middle of English, so I had to be in a place to study English, not for fun. For me I just wanted to study.
What’s the major religion?
Saudi Arabia is 100% Muslim, We do have some other religion, but you have to be on a certain Visa. We do have Americans there, but you have to have a visa to get there if you are not Muslim. All the Saudis are Muslims. Some people are there for jobs or business. Maybe there are some people that are not Muslims, but they can not be Saudi Arabia. Like the Vatican.
What made you come to the US? SCSU?
As we talked about cultures, different people, new people. A good education system. There are many internationals in here especially Midwest, Midwest has a good education system. St. Cloud wasn’t my choice from the beginning, their admission wasn’t that hard for me so I got accepted. I wanted to pick something in MN, my uncle graduated from here. Not here, a bachelor and master from Mankato and then his PhD in Virginia in Computer Science. He’s a dean of the Computer Science college in Saudi Arabia.
Do you miss your family? Do you talk to them?
Well this is kind of, not everybody say that, they do but they know that I am here for school so I don’t have to be like “I miss my family” but still in my heart, yeah for sure, this is my family, you are here for school so you should stick in school and go there for summers. My mom still wants me to come back because I haven’t been there in a year and a half. But now over Christmas I might go. My mom called me Saturday, my dad too. I have three other brothers and one sister. My oldest brother is in Mankato, he used to be here but he transferred.
What is your favorite food? What is traditional?
We have many good food. The original food is Kapsa, its basically like chicken and rice or lamb and rice. My traditional food for my family is fish so we do special kind of rice with the fish. My city where I am, the old people they used to live on fishing, I live by the Red Sea. My grandma and grandpa, they went fishing for their money, but now its not that popular anymore. The people want to move to the city. My dad grow up in a village, which is not that far from my city, here they say suburb there they say village. More houses, a tiny place.
Do you plan to stay here?
I can’t for now because I have to follow the rule that I’m here for my student visa. If there is ajob offer I will see how it goes. No one knows. My plan of course is to live in my country but still I’m not guarantee 100% that I’m going to be there. You can’t plan it, you might have better jobs here. Maybe get some money and go back, we’ll see how it goes.
What is your major?
Computer science. I’m learning now.
When did you decide to come here?
When I was in High School, a freshman, I came to the US to study English in Minneapolis. So I came here in the summer after freshman year. I was in St. Thomas just for the English program. It’s like even SCSU they have an intensive English Center. It’s in the B51 building. It was different program, but it’s all the same English. It’s still hard learning English. Sometimes English, even Americans sometimes have a hard time. For me to learn English is not that hard to catch up is. Of course, its going to be hard for anyone learning a language. In Arabic, we write from right to left. (at this point Abdul showed me his license and we finished the interview.)
Any questions for me?
(we just kept talking after this question, nothing in particular was asked)
