Wednesday, April 23, 2014 will be a day known in history as the day I got my big commercial break as a commercial star. I met Youness in the basement of the rec again to record his project assignment. There I was able to meet his partner, Brendan, who informed me he was originally from China. The boys were incredibly efficient in getting everything set up and in order. They even had a script printed out for me, and had a real video camera with a tripod ready to go. Youness showed me some lines he had added to the script to make more of a sales pitch for his product, and I have to admit I was irrationally proud. All his grammar and wording was correct and flowed naturally, and I couldn't help but have a wave of admiration come over me. The amount of work and effort Youness has put into this semester and into learning such a foreign and complicated language amazes me. I wish I had the tenacity and drive that he possesses for half of the things I apply myself to, because it is truly unrelenting.
Despite some awkward pauses waiting for bystanders to walk through the basement and a few repeated lines, we finished filming my big career-starting piece and had nothing left to do but chat for a few moments. I apologized for my short meetings with him lately due to my insanely busy schedule, and he said he could relate. Despite only being in the IEP program and not actually enrolled in TCU, Youness has quite the heavy work load. I am not sure why I ever thought his assignments and class responsibilities would not be as intensive as mine, but this was obviously my impression considering the shock I felt at hearing of his many papers and assignments. All of this on top of the commercial project he had to do? I couldn't believe how hard the IEP program is, and as I've said before my respect for Youness increased even more.
The most exciting moment of the whole interaction was Youness extending an invitation to a party at his house on Saturday. I told him to email me the details so hopefully my schedule works and I can go! What a better way to interact with people from another country than a night of hanging out!
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