Country: Saudi Arabia
Name: Aladdin
Preparation for my second interview: My interviewee is my classmate when we were taking ESL classes. His name is Aladdin and he is from Saudi Arabia. We text each other and scheduled a time and meet in the library. In the last interview, I have already known about a little about the culture of Saudi Arabia. This time, I will select several questions from each category. What’s more, I searched the background of this country to get some basic information.
My objectives:
1) Learn about the Country Saudi Arabia
2) Learn about the religious customs
3) Education system
4) The way of treatment between Men and women
5) Special holidays and Traditions
6) Clothing
7) Their usual diet
The interview report:
1. My interviewee and his home.
My second interviewee Aladdin is from my ESL class one year ago. He is 21 years old and he comes from the capital city of Saudi Arabia, Riyadh. There are over 5 million people in that city. He has a big family, five brothers and three sisters. His father is professor in the university and now is retired and his mother is a housewife, she stays at home take care of children and all his brothers set up their own companies, one sister is a doctor and the younger sisters are in school.
2. Religions
Most people in Saudi Arabia are Muslim.
3. The Education Systems
Aladdin told me that the education in Saudi Arabia was very different that in United States. He said, all the English classes in Saudi Arabia were taught in Arabic which made learning English very hard. Now he got a nice language environment.
In Saudi Arabia, the government offer free education also to study abroad.
In the country boys and girls do not attend school together. It is not allowed. For boys the levels of education include primary, intermediate, secondary and university. After the first year of secondary education, boys can choose between scientific studies or literary studies. More advance studies take place at the universities.
The first school for girls in Saudi Arabia was started in 1956. Today more than half of almost 200.000 students in Saudi universities are women. Because they are not allowed to share classrooms with men, they hear the lectures by television. There are some university campuses for women only.
4. Men and women
From Aladdin I learned that the way in which men and women interact in Saudi Arabia is much different. He said that in Saudi Arabia men and women are separated. They do not have classes together and they are not allowed to study together. He said that he doesn’t know other female expect were his mother and sisters. He said here is quite different and he likes to study here, because he can study with a lot of girls.
5. Holidays and traditions
There are three big holidays in Saudi Arabia. There are “The Feast of the End of Ramadan” ,” The Feast of the End of Hajj” and” Saudi National Day”. People will get a small holiday for these public holidays.
6. Clothing
Aladdin told me that they have their own traditional clothing, it is called Thobes. They are long dress like robes and are normally white, and they also cover their head. He also told me that women must be fully covered, maybe in some regions the women leave their face uncovered but in others it is normal for the faces to be covered. Aladdin show me his passport picture which he dressed Thobes. That is interesting.
7. Their usual diet
When we talked about what their usual eat in Saudi Arabia. He said, they eat eggs, beans with bread, and they drink Arabic coffee, and tea for breakfast. When it’s lunch time they eat chicken, camel, rice, and lamb. It surprised me that they eat camel. When I asked if you like to eat in the restaurant, he said no. Because they thought it doesn’t taste good and not good for health.
I enjoyed the interview with Aladdin. He was so glad to share the information with me. Our conversation was very comfortable and relaxed. We started with chat with each other and ended up with talking about random things, and it was very fun.
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