After breaking the ice during our
first meeting, Joe and I found ourselves a week later at Union Grounds having another
conversation. It was really nice to talk with Joe again and catch up after the
long fall break. Joe and I discussed what each of us did during the break,
which created a lot of different conversational tangents. One of the first
things we talked about was the weather difference between Texas and Chicago as
well as Texas and Japan. I just figured everyone knew it was colder in Chicago
but honestly, I understand the confusion. I couldn’t tell you for the life of
me what the weather is like in Japan right now so it was very funny for both of
us to come to the realization that we both know very little about each others
cultures.
Joe is just
becoming immersed in TCU culture so he had a lot of fun experiences to share
with me from his fall break. So far he has done a lot of fun and awesome things
with the IEP program. Joe pulled out his phone and showed me pictures of inside
an elite part of the football stadium where the IEP students got to have lunch
and listen to a speaker. How awesome is that?! I will probably never get the
chance to go in there unless I decide to donate at LEAST $50,000 a year
(shouldn’t my tuition count?!)
I think
perhaps the funniest thing that occurred during our meeting was when Joe asked
me to describe what a sorority is. Let me tell you that may seem like an easy
answer but its way more complicated than you think. First of all, sororities,
fraternities, and similar types of associations are very unique to westernized
cultures, especially in the United States. I never really contemplated what it
would be like to describe what a sorority actually is. I sat on the couch in
Union Grounds watching a million girls wearing rain jackets, hairbands, t-shirts,
sweatshirts, jewelry, and whatever else can be decked in letters, pass me by,
yet I was still fumbling for words of how to describe what it actually is.
Personally I do know what a sorority is and as a current member of one at TCU,
I can say I love being associated with one. It is a great way to be involved
and make new friends (enough of my preaching). However, regardless of my
fondness for sororities I still found myself confused on how to describe it.
This became an even more challenging task when Joe told me how he saw a bunch
of girls and guys wearing crazy costumes walking in the greek last weekend. I
don’t know about you other fellow greekers, but the first thing I say about a
sorority is not going to be “Well we have a lot of fun mixers!” While all those things are good and dandy,
it’s really not what being in one of those organizations is truly about. So I
bypassed the question and first started explaining the many things that a
sorority does. I told him about philanthropies, chapter meetings, even down to
how we go through recruitment. Joe was very interested in hearing about all
these aspects and he seemed very surprised and amused by some of them. Of
course I did get back to him about how fun it is to dress up and go to mixers
with all your best friends, but I wanted to make sure I didn’t give a
superficial interpretation of what its like to be in a great organization.
This Second
meeting with Joe was a really entertaining experience. It really opened up my
eyes to some of the differences between our cultures that I would never even
think about contemplating. Besides just being an interesting conversation it
proved to be quite humorous for both of us. I am looking forward to my next
meeting with Joe. I can’t wait to see what entertaining conversations we have
in store!
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