Nepalese Eagle

It's done! I am an official graduate student. I've registered for 10 hours, all of which are on Mondays and Wednesdays. If anyone has any ideas on how I can fill up my time the rest of the week, please let me know.

While I was waiting for my advising appointment today, I met another new grad student who was sitting next to me. Typically, CS professors are late to everything, and today my advisor was no exception so Proveem...Provim...Pruvam... well, I couldn't understand his name but this guy from Nepal and I chatted for about 20 minutes.

"P" was nice and interesting to talk to. He said he was happy to talk to me because not only am I an American, I am also female. I guess the elusive cross-gender communication for CS majors transcends nationality. It doesn't matter where you live: male CS majors don't often talk to females.

When "P" mentioned he had done some shopping earlier and had never seen stores so big, I asked if he went to The Parks in Arlington Mall. He said, "No, Wal-mart." I then proceeded to tell him about how big The Parks is and how many stores are there and how he should definitely go there when he has a chance. I could have gone on about the food court, traffic, and parking but I stopped myself when his eyes started glazing over.

I could almost see the stereotypical American girl mold being formed about me in his head until he showed me a picture of him and his two sisters back in Nepal and, judging by the girls' clothes, they could have been spokespersons for the American Eagle (or is it Nepalese Eagle?). I realized his eyes probably glazed over not because he had a low tolerance for shopping but because he had to listen to his sisters talk about shopping all the time and now me as well. I guess the elusive cross-gender shopping transcends nationality. It doesn't matter where you live: females like to shop.