Bobby_CP_#3

This past Saturday my conversation partner Mohammad invited me to smoke hookah at a hookah lounge near my house. I was bored and had nothing else to do so I went to the hookah lounge to hang out with Mohammad and some of his friends. When I arrived not only were my conversation partners Mohammad and Badah there, but also around five of their Kuwaiti friends from the CIES. They were playing an incredibly enthusiastic game of Uno and invited me to join in on the next round. It was clear Mohammad had the best control of English and was also the most motivated to try to learn and speak it. Whenever a member of the company would break into Arabic Mohammad would start an admonishing chorus of “English! English!” that would be repeated by a couple of the others. As the night waxed everyone became more comfortable with my presence. However, it became increasingly hard to control the rowdy bunch. Arabic was spoken most of the time, except when the speech was directed at me, or to call each other names and make fun of each other, which they did frequently and with delight. They were an energetic lot, often commenting on the beauty of the girls that passed by our way or loudly smack-talking one another. After Uno we played an Indian game called carrom, which I enjoyed but was horrible at. After the games we all tried to blow smoke bubbles with the hookah and keep the bubbles aloft. By the end of the night only Mohammad, Badah and I remained. Mohammad was desperate to practice speaking English, so much so that I feel bad not meeting with him on a daily basis. He expressed that he wish he had more English speaking friends because he only speaks Arabic except when he’s in class. I will try to meet with them all again, but especially with Mohammad because he is intrinsically motivated to improve.