Interviewer: Heqiu Liu
English 191
Interviewee: Yahye Samatar
Interviewee's country of origin: Somalia
Interview date: 11/03/2010
Interview #2
Me: Could you please tell me a little bit about yourself, such as your name, the country you are from, how long have you been here, and your major?
Yahye: My is Yahye Samater. I’m from Somalia. I have been here since September, 2006. I’m majoring in pre-medicine at St. Cloud State University.
Me: First, I would like to know your greeting customs. We know that people in the United States say, “Hi, how are you” and shake hands when people first meet. But, how do you guys great each other? Is there anything special there? Let’s say that if I was a stranger to you, and we meet in a meeting, how would you greet with me?
Yahye: First, when we meet someone. You say setahay in Somali and shake hands. But you can only shake hands with men. You cannot shake hands with women or girls. That is forbidden. And when you meet someone is a stranger, you still shake hands and you can ask and get to know him later. It doesn’t necessary that you have to act to know them to shake their hands. There is something special about shaking hands. It’s important in Somalia’s culture. If you don’t shake someone’s hands, that is a sign of rejection. If there are three boys sitting, you only know two of them, and you shakes their hands, and left the other one. That’s a sign of disrespect, that’s a sign of rejection. You shake all of them, sign of approval, and sign of friendship. It’s very important in Somalia’s culture.
Me: So if I was a very close friend of yours. Do we just shake hands? Can we do anything, like hug?
Yahye: If we are close friends and we haven’t seen each other for a while. You can hug. But there is nothing kissing in the cheek like some other cultures. But you can hug, shake hands. It depends on how close you are to the person.
Me: How do you hug?
Yahye: (showing me how they hug). But if a family members, a cousin, someone that is close friend to you, and you haven’t seen him like four years or five years. You may hug all the way. It depends on how close the person is. But if you are greeting someone you went high school with, it’s ok to hug under shoulders. You know shoulder to shoulder.
Me: If I was a good friend of yours and I want to pay a visit to you one day, how would you treat me as a guest in your house?
Yahye: The guest is very important in Somalis culture. When the guests come over, you may also them your bed, some of your clothing. We treat them very respectful. If you don’t treat the guests very respectful, and they may not come back. In Somalis culture, it is very important to respect the guest. When someone comes over, first thing we do, we welcome him to come over the house, give them a seat, and bring beverages, like drinks, not alcohol drinks, bring lemon juice, or mango, something sweet. And at the end, we bring some sweat, cookies, and some Somali desserts. And that shows them that they are very respected. Sometime we give doolsho, it’s Somali cake, it’s sweet. It depends on how close they are. If they are next to the neighborhood, they live next to you, you see them every day. Just bring them water or a cup of tea.
… (We are talking about something else)
Me: Next, I want to know what you guys usually do for entertainment.
Yahye: For entertainment? Uh, story-telling is a very big part of Somalis culture. When someone comes over your house, you know you can talk about the politics; you can talk about the good day back into Somalia, it depends on how close they are. If someone is from Somalia, and they live in Somalia for a while, and then come over your house, you can talk about what they do. Or you can show Somali movie, you can watch Somalis movie called …, it is very funny. You can watch with them. Also, you can play games. Like my friends, they come over my house. We are watching movies, playing game with play station. Elder, Somalis elders, they talk all day, they can talk all day. Actually, someone comes over, and they are talking to you. You don’t just talk to them. You bring tea. You don’t even know you have drink five cups of tea. You are just talking, and you are also drinking tea. That is what they have for entertainment. But we don’t have parties or something like that. But there may be some, back into Somalia, they have government working, there are some councilors that people used to go. When I was in Somalia, we would go the soccer fields, we play soccer. Or go to beach. We like soccer and basketball. Basketball is also for girls.
Me: But when women play basketball, do you usually play without the (scarves on)?
Yahye: They have their hijab on all the time but it is smaller. And they also play … like in a gym. And no male will be there. But boys always play basketball.
Me: Then, I would like to know something on your family structure. What are some of the roles that family members play in your house? First, let talk about father.
Yahye: The father is the breadwinner of the family. He is the provider. He works, uh, and he brings foods. He pays our bills, clothing, and everything. And the mother’s job is to take care of the kids, to cook.
Me: Do you work?
Yahye: Not a lot of time. Thing has changed. Back into when Somalia had a government, men worked, women stayed home. But now it is other way around. Woman works. My mother is the bread winner of the family and she has two jobs. She is working hard to provide for the family. My father didn’t have a job because all of the men’s jobs are out of windows because the government collapsed. There is no office to work. There is no factory to work. Women’ jobs are available all the time. They can sell clothing. They can have a restaurant. That is how the family plays roles. And if the father passes away, the whole family’s responsibilities become on the older son’s shoulders or older daughter. Mostly the sons because daughters don’t work too and they don’t go to school.
Me: Daughters don’t go to school?
Yahye: Mostly. Mostly they don’t go to school. Things are changed. In my generation, we went to school with a lot of girls. And in my family, all of my brothers graduated and all of sisters graduated in high school because they are living in cities but it is different in the countryside. In every culture, I think in China too.
Me: How many family members usually live together?
Yahye: Uh, families they can have up to twenty two kids. I have a friend, a high school friend. His mother gave birth to twenty-second child. It is normal in Somalia. It is not something like, ‘wow, you have twenty two kids, oh my God.’ It is not like that. In my family, we had fifteen, fifteen kids. But two of my brother and one my sister passed away, so now have twelve, so seven girls and five boys.
(I didn’t listen quite clearly on this sentence in the interview; otherwise, I would be very sorry to hear that.)
Me: Do you live with your grandma and grandpa?
Yahye: Granma and grandpa can also live in the family, it is be respected. When you have your father’s mother living with you, the chance is that you are getting into trouble... In Somalis culture, they have great respective family. You must show respects to your grandpa and grandma. They are the family. You never kick them out or say anything that they don’t like. You have to be respective. I didn’t get a chance to live with my grandma but my brother told me that she passed away before I was born. They used to live in the house and that is common in Somalis culture.
Me: In here, you said you live alone by yourself?
Yahye: yeah, I live by myself. My vice sister live in St. Cloud but she lives in close to the north and I live in eastside. It depends. I have grown up. It is my choice. But a lot of Somalis boys live with their sisters and mother. It depends on if you can survive out there. If you are a survivor, you work hard. You move out.
Me：you can survive.
Yahye: I will call that.
Me: You have a job?
Yahye: Yeah, I do have a job.
Me: Where do you work?
Yahye: I work in Boys and Girls Scott Club in St. Cloud. I work 20 hours a week. I have a lot of bills to pay. That is why I work 20 hours a week.
Me: Next, I want to know something on you food culture. What so you usually have for diet, such as breakfast, lunch and dinner?
Yahye: Back in when I was grown up in Somalia, we have breakfast, lunch, and dinner. But here is different because you don’t have the same schedule. Back in Somalia, we always eat 9 a.m. breakfast, and 1 p.m. lunch, always, because that is everybody’s schedule. If you are in school, meals are available at 9 a.m. and also 1 p.m. That is everybody’s schedule but here we don’t have the same schedule. My sister works one day and she comes home at 5 o’clock so the breakfast and lunch go out of windows. But since I live by myself I can cook anytime if I want, anytime when I get hungry. In Somalia, we have the thing pancake called anjera. Usually you can eat with meat because Somalis have a lot of animals, such as goats, camel, cows, sheep, chicken, everything. So you always eat with meat. Mostly cameral meat because camel meat is very cheap. And you can get kilos of cameral meat in less than dollars. So the family always eats meat and pancake, also tea or mild. At lunch we eat rice with meat and vegetable. We put everything. Sometimes we eat spaghetti. Before Italy colonies came to Somalia, we only ate rice and called soor, which is corn, it looks like flower. And you eat with meat and vegetable. When Italy colonies came to Somalia, they brought pasta which is spaghetti, it is also a type in Somalis culture for lunch. You go restaurant at lunch time; they are serving rice with meat or spaghetti, that is common.
Me: how about dinner?
Yahye: Dinner depends on some family. If wealthy have a lot of money, they have a lot of things available for them. And one thing you eat is spaghetti. The other thing is …. the thing is not pancake. Or some things like that. They eat with cameral meat, vegetable, and milk. But some families like my family, we have rice with beans, it is called Anbulo. It is good type because if you eat Anbulo you can stay full for up to 12 hours because the beans have a lot of protein and you will drink a lot of water and you won’t get hungry. That is also a good type for Somalis dinner. The finger food, sambusa, is very traditional, it is serving every restaurant you go.
….
Me: which one is the important meal, lunch or dinner?
Yahye: like I said before, it depends on family’s schedule. Back into Somalia, all of them are important, except the dinner. You don’t have necessarily to have dinner. But it is very important to eat at lunch. Because you can skip dinner if you want or you can eat with the family. It depends. But nobody cares. They eat everything they want.
Me: Are there any types of food you usually don’t eat in your home country, but you eat here?
Yahye: let me think. American food, like hamburger, fried chips that are available back into Somalia. The things you don't’ eat here and you don’t eat in Somalia too is pork, like ham, bacon. It is religious. All of Somalis are Muslims, and they don’t eat pork. Some of the food that we eat here not Somalia is pizza. We don’t have pizza in Somalia. You can go to Pizza Hut and get large chicken pizza or cheese pizza.
Me: Finally, I would like to know your body languages. Do you have any special and interesting body languages?
Yahye: Yes, we do have body language. As you know, Italian colonized Somalia for 4 year, and they left their language and their body language into Somalis culture. If you see Italian, they usually shake hands, right. You used to shake hands all the time. And you can go and check it out too. In Somalia, we use our hands to explain things. You use your hands to make message. When you see someone, it is rude to stare into their eyes. You don’t stare into their chest and butts. You have to avoid all of those things. When you are talking to someone, someone is older than you, your father or your brother. You don’t look directly into their eyes. You look somewhere else to show them you are respectful. We can communicate to the eyes.
Me: Thank you very much.
Yahye: You are welcome.
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