The refugee family with whom I have had the opportunity to mentor comes from Bosnia. Kirsten, Josh and I volunteer with a single parent family with one child. Mevlida and her daughter, Arijana, arrived in Fargo in mid January and currently live with Mevlida's parents, and their son Admir. Mevlida also has another sibling in Fargo named Zahida. She is also a single mother with two daughters, Sanela and Mirela. Considering many members of the family are together in Fargo we have had a unique opportunity to see not only parent/child relationships but grandparent/granddaughter, aunt/niece and uncle/niece relationships in interaction as well. In describing the family situations I mentioned that Mevlida and Zahida were both single parents, and while their husbands are not with them they both wear wedding bands. Due to limited language possibilities and not wanting to seem rude, we haven't asked the whereabouts of Mevlida's husband.

Generally speaking, intercultural interaction with Mevlida and Arijana has been rewarding and (hopefully) successful. In reviewing my experience I found the issues with the most relevance and explanatory significance to be the concept of heterophily/homophily, contact verses distance cultures and the issue of time and culture. In our visits and time spent with the family, these issues are the topics of discussion in class which came alive for me through the refugee mentor program.
The Gusic/Hajric family is extremely welcoming and friendly each time we visit. Their expressed hospitality happens as patterned behaviors and typically begins with the offering of beverages, coffee or Pepsi, and always ensues with the invitation to smoke with them.

This "issue" of to smoke or not to smoke has been one of the things we discuss most between Josh, Kirsten and I outside of the interaction. From attempting to observe and understand from as emic of an intercultural perspective as possible, I have come to understand the significance and prevalence of smoking in their culture. For me, as a future health professional, smoking is not something I chose to do, however, I avoid ethnocentrically judging those who do chose to smoke. I have come to realize in this situation that attitude and perhaps a bit of value heterophily are like threads woven into the 'blanket' intercultural interaction between Adem and myself.

In class we discussed how perceived heterophily can be a barrier to the probability of interaction. Adem and I clearly shared the perception of heterophily concerning the issue of smoking, and while I do not feel it prohibited our interaction (maybe because I was sitting on his living room couch and the only way to disengage our interaction would have been to kick me out of his house), I felt a twinge of rudeness (bordering on guilt) by not accepting his offering me a cigarette. I did not want to insult Adem but at the same time I didn't really want to smoke. Our heterophily on this issue did not prevent our interaction it just forced one of us to relinquish or compromise on our usual behavioral actions. Bridging this cultural gap either involved Adem accepting I wasn't going to smoke or me accepting I was, (or the option I told my mom about which was accepting but not inhaling!)

The fact of the matter is that Admir (Adem's son) explained to us that not accepting coffee, cigarettes etc. when offered in Bosnian culture seems to create an air of "conceit" as if we are saying, "No, this coffee or these cigarettes are not good enough for me." Admir and I discussed this at length and he understood my perspective that in all actuality it's not that their coffee and cigarettes aren't good enough, it's simply that I don't care for ANY kind of coffee or cigarettes at all. I asked Admir to please tell his father I didn't intend to be rude and Admir did and turned back to me laughing saying, "He is an old man ... you can't change his mind."

I think what I learned from this situation was that perceived heterophily involves formulating a judgment and then consequently performing or not performing a behavioral action. I thought about this for awhile and realized that the part of this idea that Adem was hung up on was the judgment part and the part of this idea I was hung up on was the action part. The conclusion we came to after our lengthy conversation (I need to acknowledge Admir for making this conversation possible via translation) was that regardless of whether we smoke together or not, I wouldn't become a smoker, and he wouldn't stop offering me cigarettes. The important distinction is not that we are both stuck in our heterophilic ways, but that we both have experienced exposure to another way of looking at things, and have been able to maintain mutual respect. Intercultural interaction isn't about changing someone's mind it's about opening someone's mind, (changes may or may not occur consequently).
I think that establishing this mutual respect has happened mostly through a combination of nonverbal communication and sense of humor. In our class readings on haptics, or the use of touch, we learned that contact cultures use more touch and less space than distancing cultures (Dodd, 1995, p. 173). In my observation, the family interaction leans toward the contact culture side. Typically when we arrive to visit the entire family is seated in the living room area listening to Bosnian music. For the most part family members 'overlap' on the couch, for example, the granddaughter often has her feet on her grandmother's lap and the son will sometimes sit down and the mother will lean on him. The generalization herein is that the Bosnian culture is more of a contact culture than the U.S. This conclusion could quite easily be family specific and not culturally relevant, however the use of close contact and frequent touching is something I have observed.

This frequent use of haptics is one of the contributing factors which leads me to think that the Bosnian culture is more of a collectivist culture. The family relationships I have observed seem to be very close. The value of family in their culture is reflected by their intense desire to sit together and chat. They seem to have a great deal of time devoted to just "being together," and enjoying one another's conversation. Once again, this could be because they don't have an enormous social circle or they don't get into (or understand the language of) prime time sitcoms, however, they seem to value their groupness and harmony. Affection is apparent among family members, and is expressed through hugs and kisses and interestingly with teasing or humor.
The first time we went over to their home, the seven year old, Arijana, was a bit afraid of us. Her mother told her to come and give us a kiss, and she hid behind her mother's skirt and shook her head "No." We weren't a part of what she could identify as "group" yet, and it took her awhile to warm up to us. She took to Kirsten first, and her method of "testing" the waters to see if we were okay or not begin with her crawling

under the table and tickling Kirsten's feet and then recoiling to see the reaction. When we all responded with smiles and laughter she smirked, raised her eyebrows and continued to play.

When I was considering this interaction occurring in my living room as a child I could just hear my mother (embarrassed, more like abhorred) saying, "Stop that..what are you doing ... where are your manners?!?" Interestingly, in this interaction it didn't bother me at all. It was the first time meeting these people and touch is one way, since we couldn't speak to one another, that Arijana could experiment with interacting with us. The sense of humor and "fun" teasing seems to be one of their families most valued and practiced norms and it has many times broken the intercultural ice of interaction, because laughter is so easily shared. (For all we know they are laughing at us ... but we just join right in!)

Perhaps the most poignant cultural difference I have observed is the issue of monochromic verses polychronic time, and how it relates to cultural synchrony. As we have learned in class monochromic cultures tend to do one thing at a time, are fairly linear, scheduled and prefer avoiding ambiguity. Polychronics, on the other hand, think about a number of things simultaneously, and have a higher tolerance for ambiguity. My observation in this experience has been that I (U.S. culture) am monochromic and the Gusic family (Bosnian culture) is polychronic. I distinguish the people from the culture here because while I do believe in this instance it is a cultural thing, I do also recognize that the monochronic/polychronic differential can be an individual thing.
My explanation of the intercultural interaction surrounding time runs deeper than just monochronic/polychronic in that I feel that the U.S. is more of a "time-conscious" culture that the Bosnian culture. The explanation of time consciousness includes the implications and understandings of how time is "culturally rooted," and how "our use of time is wedded to our culture's cognitive perceptions surrounding time" (Dodd, 1995, p. 46). 1 would describe the Bosnian culture as 'less' time conscious than the U.S. in that their focus seems to be on "internal relationships rather than external schedules" (Dodd, 1995, p. 47).

One evening I went to pick up Mevlida to take her to ESL class, and I mentioned that I would be there at 6-.40 PM to pick her up because class began at 7:00 PM. When I arrived at 6:37 PM, the family was sitting around in the living room, with their socks and shoes off just chatting. I came in and they offered me a Pepsi and asked me to sit down. Admir came into the room and asked me if we could go pick up another person who also needed a ride to school. I was feeling a little anxious about the time factor, but said "Sure," we could pick someone else up. We finally got into the car at 6:53 PM and made it to the other person's house at 7:01 PM. I jokingly said to Admir pointing to the clock on my dashboard that they were going to be late and he just laughed. (We made it to Fargo North at 7:11 PM, which I might add is probably record time from where we were at and has since tarnished my driving reputation with my refugee family!) (I think the fact that I can remember all of these times quite precisely is further evidence of my monochromic "time-conscious" cultural inundation.)

Other real lessons in cultural synchrony, or the "rhythms, movement and timing" of a culture came the weekend we had planned a pool party for the family. We invited the entire extended family and they all came except Mr. and Mrs. Hajric. I phoned Admir on the Saturday morning of the party to remind him that I would be there to pick them up at 1:40 PM, (the party was to start at Josh's pool at 2:00 PM). Faith and I went to pick them up at 1:45 PM. To make a long story short by the time we finished picking them up (and waiting for them) we arrived at Josh's for the party at 3:15 PM!

This "lateness" is not a overwhelming problem or dilemma for Josh, Kirsten and 1, however their have been times (evidence of our time conscious nature) that it has proven to be frustrating. In Bosnian culture they are not as governed by the clock as we are in the U.S. because they function as a more polychronic culture. This experience has helped me to understand how time functions in their culture verses our culture. Needless to say the party was a blast and we enjoyed relaxing and playing in the pool with the kids, and in reflecting on the whole time and culture issue I honestly had to laugh to think that in our time-conscious/monochronic culture we even have to begin relaxing on time!!

The most beneficial lesson I learned about time in this intercultural experience is that not one sort of time-consciousness is "better' than any other, rather the situation is suited to the culture and how it flows. I can clearly see how time in intercultural interaction can be a source of conflict and struggle, however I think a little exposure is good for both of us. I am learning from them and their culture to be a little more laid back and sometimes when I arrive now, they already have their shoes on!!
In drawing conclusions about this experience it was helpful for me to go back to the forum question #2 and consider this intercultural interaction in light of the variables we discussed surrounding how easy/hard an interaction is based on: morphological class, level of abstraction, purpose of the interaction and code type used. Right off the bat I had some theoretical basis for why communication in this situation would not be the easiest and that was that there were two morphological classes involved in the interaction. Meviida speaking Bosnian, an agglutinative language was trying to learn to speak the Isolating English language.

I can distinctly remember one night when I was visiting and had brought a coloring book and crayons for Arijana because it was her birthday that week. When I was shopping for the present I found a book that I thought would be perfect for a 7 year old learning a new language, it was called, "I Know My Town," and featured pictures of the grocery store, the bank, the bus stop etc. and words next to the pictures identifying things you would typically find at any of these places. What I hadn't considered was that this coloring book was the perfect gift not only for the 7, now 8 year old girl, but it was an appropriate learning tool for her 29 year old mother as well. The thing that struck me most as the three of us sat together and paged throughout the entire book reciting the names out loud was that there were certain 'sounds' or syllable constructs that Mevlida could not say. "Skirt," for example was one of the pictures on the page about "Shopping at the Department Store," and she struggled with the "Sk" sound. She wanted me to repeat it over and over and she kept trying imitate my mouth and produce the "Ssskk" sound. I left there that night with a new understanding of the difficulties of bridging a morphological class, as well as a new appreciation for her efforts. I though about how hard it would be for me to look at a picture of a skirt and know darn well what it was but just not be able to say it.

Analyzing how code type affected our interaction was fairly simple because we always used an elaborated code. As time has been moving along we have seen Mevlida progress and become more able to speak words, fragments and an occasional sentence in English, so obviously our code type has remained at the elaborated level.

As far as level of abstraction is concerned I feel Mevlida and I were able to match one another. I do not think either one of us views the other as "higher' on the ladder than the other. She may regard me as higher I guess just because I have home court playing advantage, however, I think she knows that I respect her and I believe that there are definitely issues/ways in which Mevlida is higher on the ladder than I am. Mevlida has experienced marriage and motherhood etc., things I am yet etic on, therefore she has a more precise experiential understanding of these things than I do. The key to making our interaction mutual and the "friends" type of situation it I owe a great deal to her. I was unsure how she would respond to me and I was a bit surprised at first when she would hug me when I left. Typically after ESL class, she smiles and laughs to find me waiting outside the room for her and she always puts her arm around me and we walk out to the car together that way. Therefore, the level of abstraction, although we can not have intense deep conversations about world issues seems to be comfortable and equal.
Finally, the purpose of our interaction, in my observation has been the most "varying" variable. Sometimes our purpose is task, for example finding Arijana's immunization records for school, while other times our purpose is relational, (i.e. when we brought over ice cream and just came to look at pictures, books etc.) At any rate the purpose of our interaction was in light of a relatively new relationship, which typically makes interaction a little more difficult. Overall, I would say that our interaction was not easy but not impossible. The biggest barrier certainly was the inability to verbally speak and comprehend one another, (for the most part) without a translator.

The refugee mentor experience was a fun and very practical, hands-on way to learn. Being in contact with real people is a perfect opportunity to understand how the concepts/theories we learn about in class play out in the real world. I would say there were many many things that happened in our interaction that just could not have been understood unless they had occurred as they did.
 
References
Dodd, C. (1995). Dynamics of intercultural communication. (4th ed.). Madison: Brown & Benchmark Publishers.
 
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