Cultural Conversation 2

Unfortunately, Debora, my conversation partner from Brazil did not respond to my requests to grab a second lunch. Fortunately, I have had many humorous and not so humorous experiences with people whose first language is not English. For the rest of my five blogs on my conversation partner, I will instead be writing about other conversations I have had with people of different backgrounds and cultures. For my first experience I am going to talk about my interactions with a young woman named Olga. Okay, from first glance, you are probably picturing Olga with blond braids and dressed in lederhosen. However, Olga is not from an isolated town in the mountains of Germany, she is from Mumbai, India, a city with over twelve million people. Olga, a name chosen upon her arrival to the United States, grew up in India and moved to Fort Worth for the TCU Masters of Business Administration program. I first met Olga at a speaker event on campus and she immediately introduced herself. I talked with her for a second time two months later. I was with my dad at a football game when I heard her thick Indian accent over the crowd. This time, I immediately turned around to greet her and sure enough she remembered me.

Even though I have only had minimal interaction with Olga, I would like to say that I have developed a connection with her. At first it was easy because many of my friends growing up were from India due to Intel and Nike hiring their Indian parents. I experienced a lot with the culture and even went to many of my friends Hindu celebrations. Within in Olga’s and mine first conversation, I probably asked fifty questions trying to find ways to relate to her. She loved that my favorite food is the yellow curry my friend’s mom makes and that I had worn a sari for a celebration. We talked about how Northern India is completely different from Southern India and how I see big differences between the North and South of the United States. We laughed that the major differences rarely seem to be between the East and the West. We opened up about moving to a place where we knew no one and how much we miss our families. I expressed jealousy over how large her family is back home while mine is extremely small. We both believe we are from the most beautiful places in the world, so we decided that she has to go to Oregon one day and that I have to go to India. She asked about sororities and laughed when I tried to explain them because she thought they sounded ridiculous, but a lot of fun at the same time. I am starting to question sororities myself because every foreign person I explain them to thinks they are the most bizarre concepts. Even though we grew up in different worlds, we share many similarities. We are both Christian women interested in business for similar reasons. We both somehow ended up in Texas and we both truly have no idea what we are doing with our lives even though we like to seem as if we have it all together.

I am so thankful that Olga came up and introduced herself. Sometimes bravery is key to creating relationships you can truly learn from. I have the tendency to go talk to people who I know that I will feel comfortable with, but those people almost never teach me as much as people who I would not talk to on a normal day. I probably would not have thought to sit next to her during the event if she had not come up to me. We have to take chances to meet different kinds of people and we will discover more about ourselves that way. I learned a lot about a place I have never been and a lifestyle I am not used to in just a little over a half an hour of talking. I feel like I am always reminding myself that the world is huge, so why limit myself with who I interact with? I did not only get a new LinkedIn friend (she added me) out of Olga, but also a chance to learn just a little bit more about the world. Okay, this might all sound a little Eat Love Pray, but I believe stepping out of your comfort zone will bring you more knowledge, laughter, and a desire to want more.