Cultural Interview
April 19, 2010
A: Overview
I really enjoyed this assignment. One of my very closest friends in named Filmon. He
and I met while working at the same restaurant a few years ago, and have since then had a very
close relationship. His mother and father are both from Eritrea, in Africa, and he lived there until
he was two years old. For me, this assignment was easy. I was simply talking to one of my
closest friends with a tape recorder running in the background. He teased me a lot, saying he
knew all along how much I needed his help in class work. It made the whole interview lighthearted and I felt I retained the information all the better for this reason. This same element,
however, also created a stumbling block, because a few times we would get off topic and have to
remind ourselves that this was for a class of mine, and we couldn’t just start talking about
anything and everything. We met at his house, and it ended up taking just about an hour.
B: Analysis about Culture
I learned many things from my conversation with Filmon. As an individual who had
never grown up away from Seattle, I had taken many things for granted. I had never really
thought before about what it would be like to have to face a new language when you return to
your family home. Filmon’s mother insists on speaking Tigrinya when he goes home, which he
finds very difficult.
The discussion about food was also fascinating to me. I was aware that other cultures
have different eating habits, but I hadn’t thought about how the meaning of meals could change.
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Filmon talked about how meals for his family are more inclusive and communal than a lot of
America’s meals. The very meaning of simple tasks can change so drastically depending on
where you are. I could imagine that being incredibly difficult to adjust to.
The conflict regarding marriage was also a fascinating one. Filmon’s mother wants her
son to be happy, but also to marry a woman from the Eritrean culture. This must be such a
strong internal conflict for her son, who is trying to date and fit in with a society where Eritrean
women might be hard to find. Should he listen to his mother or try to make himself happy by
simply dating women he likes, regardless of their culture?
The idea of holding a grudge against another culture is not necessarily a new idea, but
one that spans the globe. When cultures enter into wars with one another, those animosities are
not easily let go. This is evident in Filmon’s mother’s feelings towards Ethiopians, with whom
Eritrea has been in conflict for years. Cultures everywhere must work to stop this habit of
stereotyping one group of people because of where they may come from.
Analysis of Listening
With regards to my listening skills and effectiveness, I did a good job asking natural
questions to gain more information than was originally offered when referencing the marriage
rituals and traditions. I was naturally curious, and that meant asking more questions came easily
to me. I did not do a good job when asking about religion. I could find no natural way to ease
into that subject, so I just had to ask point blank. That felt a bit awkward.
C. Reflection
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In the future, this interview will remind me never to assume an individual holds the same
connotations to a word or event that I do. Simple events like meals could hold such a different
meaning from one person to the next. I must remember that. This reminded me of the “so do
you mean?” exercise we tried the other day. I really need to ask myself that exact question.
What most surprised me was how much my friend had to share. Maybe this means there are
many people around me with this much fascinating information, and I need to take the time to
explore this possibility. I now feel I have a bit better understanding regarding some of the dayto-day struggles individuals trying to assimilate into a different culture must go through.
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Interview Transcript:
E: Ok, let’s start. We are now officially recording! So, first why don’t you explain kind
of broadly the culture you grew up in.
F: Hmm, well, Eritrea is in Africa, as I think you know. It has Sudan on one side, and
Ethiopia on the other side. Things with Ethiopia are…tense. I’m pretty sure they still are. It
was always an issue about, like, where the border was, and Ethiopia is always in a state of
violence, you could say, with Eritrea.
E: Did your family feel any of this personally?
F: What do you mean? Did any of my close family get killed or something? Luckily, no.
But you can still tell the tension’s there today. My mom lives in America now, in Arizona.
There are communities and events where you can meet people from your culture, and if she sees
someone that is from Ethiopia, she won’t really talk to them…I mean, she will, but you can tell
she’s sort of angry towards them. It’s kind of scary!
E: Wow! Alright, well, you say your mom lives here now. How old were you when you
guys came over? I guess I’m assuming you came over together…?
F: Yeah, you’re right. I was only two.
E: What was that like?
F: Ha, it was strange!! I remember it took a while to figure out the eating thing. Like, in
Eritrea, everyone eats communally. I mean really communally!! You dip your hand into the big
pot in the middle of the table. It’s a very…sensual… experience, eating. If someone offers you
a bite, you have to take it.
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E: You mean offer with their hands??
F: Yeah! We don’t use forks and knives. So yeah, you need to eat from their hands. It’s
a caring gesture, and we thought it was so weird everyone in America had their own plates and
forks and stuff. It seemed like such a separated event, eating. For my family, it’s a huge family
thing, and very involved. It took us a few years to get the hang of that.
E: So now what does your family do? Do they still eat communally, or have they
adopted our American culture?
F: If it’s a crazy, normal day, and everyone is running around, going to school or work or
whatever, yeah, you eat a bowl of cereal or have a sandwich or something and we use forks and
spoons and stuff. But on important days, holidays and when we have company or whenever my
mom just decides we should, we still do the communal meal. It still happens.
E: That’s so interesting! Cool. So what’s your mom like?
F: Oh, she’s a normal mom. Always wondering when I’ll get married and settle down
and have kids. It’s a pain, but she’s great.
E: What does she think of her son living in America?
F: It was her decision to move here all those years ago, but she worries I’ll lose my
culture. She only speaks Tigrinya when I come over. That’s the language a lot of Eritreans
speak. She speaks it to make a point that I can’t lose the culture I came from. It’s hard, because
I can still understand it, but I can’t really speak it. I do a lot of nodding when I’m home. I used
to speak it, as well as Arabic, English, and Italian, when I was very young. Those are all
languages understood in Eritrea. But I’ve lost that ability, and my mom doesn’t like that. But
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that’s what happens when you go to school in Los Angeles, where we fist lived. All you want to
do when you’re young is fit in, ya know? I wasn’t fitting in speaking four different languages!
And you lose that ability fast anyway when you don’t speak it all day. My mom fought hard, but
I still can’t speak much more than English these days.
E: You mentioned also that she is pushing you to get married and settle down. Does she
want the girl to be Eritrean?
F: Yeah. First, she wants me to be happy. If I married someone that wasn’t Eritrean,
she’d be okay with it. But she is always trying to set me up with Eritrean girls! It’s so awkward!
I had a random girl I’d never met before call and ask to meet me because she met my mom, who
gave the girl my number! It’s crazy!
E: That is so interesting. And what is an Eritrean wedding like?
F: They’re really cool. First, it’s just the regular wedding…white dress and tuxes and
whatever. But the next day, it’s the traditional wedding! Everyone, men, women, bride, groom,
all dress in white and it’s this huge party! Our culture’s food and dancing. It’s amazing.
E: If the wife was marrying an Eritrean man, but she wasn’t Eritrean, would she still
dress up?
F: Totally! Absolutely everyone dresses up and is included.
E: That sounds so fun! Well, can I switch gears a tiny bit and ask about religion? What
religion is your family?
F: We are Christian. There are, as you probably know, a lot of Muslims in Eritrea, but
we have always been Christian. Oddly, my mom only got really religious after we moved to
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America. I never have early memories of her being really religious when I was a kid. It’s more
only now. I’m not sure why that is.
E: And what about you?
F: I don’t really practice a religion right now.
E: So do you think there needs to be greater understanding between cultures?
F: Of course I do. That’s often what war and conflict is about, right? The inability to
understand each other? Understanding and respect is so important. At the same time, you need
to not just understand other cultures, but your own. When you know why you do things, and
where you come from, you become more in tune with the part of you that can make that
connection. Then you can begin to understand others.
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