Meeting with Khalifa #3

Our third meeting started off rather oddly. Khalifa called me about an hour before our arranged meeting and left a cryptic message in my voicemail. To this day I’m still not sure what he was trying to say. What I took from it was that he was in Nevada and would not be “there” for another two hours. I had absolutely no idea what that meant, so I ended up just chillin’ in the BLUU until he showed up. Apparently he was trying to convey that his car was in the shop because of a faulty accelerator and that he would be late. Regardless, eventually he showed up and we began talking right where we had left off.

One of the things that struck me the most about talking with Khalifa is how often he insisted that life in America and Saudi Arabia was the same. I have never been outside the continent of North America, but for some reason I have always thought that life had to be exceedingly different in other countries.  Nonetheless, whenever I would ask what types of indigenous foods or music he liked, Khalifa would always respond that his preferences were just the same as mine. We started talking about hobbies and soon stalled on the topic of cars. Khalifa was obsessed with them and pulled out his phone to show me some pictures he had taken of his family’s almost absurd number of vehicles. Back in Saudi Arabia, one of his favorite past times is to rush home from school early and drive around the country. Apparently, gas is dirt-cheap there and you can drive anywhere for next to nothing.

           Next, we started making comparisons between our homelands. The one aspect of America that Khalifa regularly admitted made him want to cry was the price of gas. The price in the states is exponentially greater then what he is used to paying. In Saudi Arabia, paying for transportation is often never a concern. According to him, people who can afford cars just drive wherever they want without concern for the price of fuel.  The part of Saudi Arabia where Khalifa resides is extremely developed compared to other portions of his nation, which is probably one of the main reasons he maintains that America is not so different from his home.

When I first learned that having a conversation partner was a requirement in this course, I was apprehensive, but excited by the idea that I would get to know someone so different from myself. At this point, I’ve come to the realization that Khalifa and I aren’t really that different. As a species, I believe we are all products of our environments. I convinced there are certain genetic predispositions that tend to direct our actions, but the compilation of our life experiences is integral in any attempt to explain behavior. This being said, listening to someone from an entirely different culture maintain that he and I are so similar was a truly eye-opening experience. I never would have expected myself to agree with him, but following our meetings I currently under the impression that I do. Keeping in mind that this is probably to complex a concept to concur with after six meetings, I agree with the idea that there are certain motifs that run consistent through the human race. Regardless of our environment and circumstance, we all tend to desire some form of purpose, self-approval, and progress. I think these concepts are all one in the same, but I can’t really find a good word to describe them all at once. Nonetheless, I think this is probably the most monumental lesson I’ve taken away from the service learning experience.