Interview with my Girlfriend Abi Rivera
I met Abi in Brooklyn by Fort Hamilton on a Thursday afternoon. We immediately went to the Parade Grounds where I would conduct the interview. On the way there we talked some about what we would be discussing and what type of questions I would be asking her. Although I did not tell her the exact questions that I was planning on asking. She seemed fine with this, I assured her it wasn’t going to be anything too personal or uncomfortable.
Currently Abi is a freshman at New York University in the stem program. She’s from Queens but was living in Long Island prior to moving into her dorm at NYU. Abi is half Puerto Rican and half Greek, though she feels far more connected with her Puerto Rican side. We met in our freshman year of highschool and have remained good friends since. I knew I would get the best interview out of Abi because of how far back we go and how often we talk. I knew this interview would be no big deal.
Watching over our interview I noticed me and Abi spoke somewhat differently than we normally do. For the first couple minutes I sounded a little more robotic than usual. Starting off the interview was awkward and fiddly. Our voices felt a little weird and too formal, this isn’t exactly how we speak. As for Abi I also noticed that her tone of voice was a little different than how she normally speaks. I immediately recognized the tone voice she was using as the one she uses when she’s talking to some family of mine or a teacher of hers. Even though it was a very slight and subtle change in her speech, I could tell pretty easily as it’s not how she talks to me. As the interview progressed things felt a little more natural and fluent. We connected well and we each had more things to say in general. Abi definitely spoke more than me, which made sense being that she was the one being interviewed . Going into the interview I knew she would have plenty of quality and well thought out responses to my question. She speaks from the heart.
Our body language seemed a little more stiff and fidgety than normal. But not by much. Throughout the entire interview Abi was twitching around, tapping her feet and messing with her hands. But physically she didn’t seem nervous or uncomfortable. On the other hand, I think I looked very strange and out of place. I couldn’t really sit still, I was adjusting my body constantly, playing with my notebook, fidgeting with my cast and my shirt. This seemed to last the entire interview although I wasn’t really feeling weird or uncomfortable. I think I am just regularly a very fidgety person, this wasn’t an indication as to how I was feeling. One aspect that majorly affected our speech and body language was the fact that we were being recorded. Having a conversation with someone while you know your being recorded can completely switch up how you act. We both were probably much more aware of how we were speaking and acting knowing that it was all being recorded.
My favorite question that I asked her was “Coming from a Spanish speaking family, why weren’t you ever taught to speak spanish?” . I’ve alway been meaning to ask Abi about her Puerto Rican side and why she wasn’t taught to speak it. I know that most of her family members know how to speak it. In this interview I finally got to hear about why she wasn’t taught it. In asking her I discovered that her and her cousins are the first generation in the family who cannot speak Spanish. Her family just didn’t see how it was relevant to her generation. Abi expressed that not knowing her family’s native language feels robbed of her identity. Regardless of this she says she plans on learning the language one day.
Overall we connected well. Watching this interview (again and again) felt more like I was eavesdropping in on someone’s conversation rather than listening to an actual interview. It went well and had a nice flow to it.
