Casey CP #6

Dakhil and I met on March 1st, 2020 around 7:15pm at Bubbly Tea Bar. Dakhil and I spent most of our time talking about our travel and future plans for graduate school. Dakhil is making plans to travel for Spring break and I was helping him decide where to go since there are so many noteworthy places to see in the US. He has his mind set on visiting Los Angeles which I thought was ambitious to tackle in a few days during break but I support his decision because I have also always wanted to visit LA. Dakhil and I both love traveling and food at the same level which I find very fun. Dakhil wants to do his Master's degree in Information Technology and focus his studies on cyber security which is what he is really interested in. He is really passionate about technology stemming from the focus towards technology that is happening in Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabia is planning to become more I talked about my plans for graduate school and he thought the field I am interested in very commendable. We talked about GRE testing and scores needed to get into grad school and how unfair it can be if schools base most of their decision on the GRE scores compared to the other scores and grades you have made in school. We discussed how much harder the GRE can be for a ESL student since it involves more than just reading the questions and answering them, the test can be challenging due to the wording and scenarios given. I asked Dakhil about what his plans are for the future and his stay in the United States. Dakhil plans to stay with the CIES until Fall 2020 or Spring 2021 taking English courses and hopes to get into his Master's program next year. He is struggling to determine whether he should go home to Saudi Arabia for a period of time before his studies because he is worried about losing all of the English knowledge he has now since he wouldn't be using it everyday like he is here. I see Dakhil getting into a great school here since he is very passionate about his studies and his love for knowledge.  It was a pleasure getting to know Dakhil and I believe we will stay connected as we part ways. What an eye opening experience it is to get to know someone from such a different walk of life.