Saturday, June 18, 2011

International Relations

So today I'm at work, minding my own business, and heard an alert on my phone.  I looked and found that there was a message telling me that someone named Joe Fonda had sent me a friend request on Skype.  There was a very small profile picture of a brown-skinned person (maybe Asian, maybe Hispanic, it was hard to tell with so small a photo) sitting in a pick-up truck with a trucker hat, smiling at the camera.  I didn't know any such person, but decided to accept the invite nonetheless.

Almost immediately thereafter I got a message from Joe saying that I was familiar from LinkedIn.  I admitted that I didn't even know what that was, and Joe apologized, having thought I was someone else.  It seems Joe Fonda was looking for someone to practice English with due to an upcoming interview with HAUSCR.  After finding out that my new friend was in Shanghai, I could not resist an interesting story.  So I did what any reasonable adventure lover such as myself would do: I took my lunch break and spent the next hour on the phone with what ended up being an adorable Chinese girl.

We talked about things we like, our hobbies, and I even asked her some questions she might hear in an interview setting.  She asked my opinion on the Arnold Schwarzenegger controversy.  Apparently in China he's called Schwartzingu.  She's a sophomore in college and she's studying accounting on recommendation from her family, but she really wants to be a director.  Adorable.

Joe picked her name because the first part of her name started with a "Jo" sound, but didn't know it was a guy's name.  I explained that it can be a girl's name, but it can be misleading.  In fact, my mother's name is Josephine and often went by Jo when she was younger... so I just suggested to Ms. Fonda that she drop the "e."

All in all it was a fascinating and enjoyable experience.  It's not everyday you get a random phone call from the other side of the world.  I hope to hear from her again.


P.S. - Oh, and she says the sweetest things about this blog.  ^^

2 comments:

wbalelo said...

Even people on the other side of the world know how awesome you are.

Adam Jones said...

Wendy - It's nice to know that no matter where they're from, people have much in common... Like their love of me. I am a great unifier.

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